Navigating the Cyber Defense Landscape: The Buyer’s Guide for Vulnerability Intelligence

An increasing focus on vulnerability management

In today’s interconnected digital landscape, where data breaches and ransomware loom large, vulnerability management is critical for organizations looking to stay ahead of threat actors. Through their eyes, vulnerabilities are open windows that can give them unsolicited access into your network, which gives them free reign to perform a wide variety of cyberattacks.

It’s not surprising then that vulnerability management is the top initiative that CISOs are prioritizing in 2024, according to a recent Booz Allen Hamilton survey. However, building a truly effective vulnerability management program (VMP) is challenging—and in order to achieve a well-performing VMP, organizations need a comprehensive, timely, and actionable source of vulnerability intelligence.

The Buyer’s Guide to VI

Vulnerability management demands a concerted effort, replete with substantial resources and nuanced expertise. However, at the heart of all VM processes and challenges is one critical element—vulnerability intelligence.

The quality of your vulnerability intelligence directly impacts all of the stages of vulnerability management and if your VI is lacking, or is not timely, it will cripple your VM program. Uncovering the flaws plaguing your data can be extremely difficult, especially if you don’t know where to look. We put together this guide to help security and IT professionals—as well as C-level management—to help them identify if their VI is up to task.

In this guide we tackle the most common VI challenges:

1. You (and your VI vendor) are likely missing a third of known vulnerability risks:
   The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposure (CVE) database fails to report over 100,000 vulnerabilities.
2. You don’t have enough time:
   Last year, the average organization left 45 percent of critical CVEs unpatched.
3. You don’t have enough context to effectively prioritize or fix:
   Flashpoint found that nearly 42 percent of all 10.0 vulnerabilities in 2023 are scored incorrectly—being actually 9.0 or less.

Cybersecurity teams and threat actors are racing against the clock, with both seeking to outpace the other. An effective source of vulnerability intelligence is comprehensive, timely, and actionable. It should notify you of all relevant, newly disclosed vulnerabilities—as soon as there is enough information to make a risk-based decision. Equipped with important contextual information, it will empower you to better prioritize.

Using The Buyer’s Guide to Vulnerability Intelligence, organizations will be able to:

• Bridge intelligence gaps: Learn how your current strategy may be leaving you exposed to over 30% of known vulnerability risks and how to identify and rectify these gaps.
• Master the art of data: Delve into what best-in-class data means for your organization, and vendor differentiators that will elevate your VMP.
• Embrace Fortune 500 Best Practices: Elevate your teams by adopting the proven practices of Fortune 500 organizations and the included self-assessment checklist.
• Centralize your defense: Empower your teams with a unified source of truth, bringing cohesion to your organization’s approach to VM.

“Flashpoint, a transformative leader and catalyst, shapes its corporate culture by harnessing purpose and mission to protect what matters most to fuel innovation. The company’s extensive knowledge is reflected in its offerings; its solutions are definitively superior to those of its competitors.”

Security Advisory Practice at Frost & Sullivan

Know your vulnerability intelligence needs

Equip yourself with the data and insights needed to make informed decisions when selecting a vulnerability intelligence solution that is tailored to your organization’s unique needs. Whether you are a security or IT professional struggling with any aspect of initial detection to remediation, or are a member of C-level management seeking to unite your security teams, this straight-to-the-point guide is for you. Download the guide or get a demo today.