Organizations are often faced with the challenges that come with robust attack surface management. This is due in large part to the massive drive for digital transformation. As companies rapidly embrace new technologies, cloud solutions and mobile access, their attack surface – i.e. all the potential entry points for a cyberattack – expands. This expanded digital footprint creates a multitude of vulnerabilities that attackers can exploit.

The problem is compounded by the fact that many organizations lack complete visibility into their entire attack surface. They might not be aware of all the devices, applications and systems connected to their network. This makes it difficult to identify and patch vulnerabilities and creates a prime opportunity for attackers who can infiltrate the network through these unnoticed weaknesses.

And attack surface management, after all, is the practice of continuously identifying, monitoring and managing these potential entry points. Thus, by taking a proactive approach, organizations gain a better view of their attack surface and prioritize which vulnerabilities to address first. This allows them to close the doors, raise the drawbridge and fill in those secret passages before attackers can exploit them.

Coming to help organizations with attack surface management is Intel 471 and the 471 Attack Surface Protection solution.

Intel (News - Alert) 471 prepares enterprises, government agencies and other organizations to win the cybersecurity war using near-real-time insights into the latest malicious actors, relationships, threat patterns and imminent attacks relevant to their businesses.

The 471 Attack Surface Protection solution is an attack surface management tool that provides its customers unparalleled visibility into their external threat landscape and drives a proactive response that neutralizes threats and mitigates risk. 471 Attack Surface Protection discovers vulnerabilities and misconfigurations that present significant risk to externally facing network assets and can negatively impact security posture.

Designed for organizations of all sizes and cybersecurity maturity levels and built to grow with customers as their businesses evolve, this tool lets security teams better prioritize the highest risk external threats first.

Using Intel 471’s malware and vulnerability intelligence, this new product helps prioritize patching and identify malware compromises in a customer's environment without requiring a separate API access. In addition to vulnerability insights found on the attack surface, users can also detect issues on unmaintained systems, exposed databases, compromised systems, expired Secure Sockets Layer certificates and more.

“Unlike other external ASM (News - Alert) solutions, Intel 471’s Attack Surface Protection leverages our premier CTI to help customers prioritize risks and allocate resources to remediate exposures quickly and efficiently,” said Jason Passwaters, CEO and co-founder of Intel 471. “At Intel 471, we created 471 Attack Surface Protection, as it allows companies to improve their overall security posture and mitigate risks to system integrity.”