How often should you run vulnerability scans on your infrastructure?

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Vulnerability scanning is a crucial practice for maintaining the security and integrity of your infrastructure. It helps you identify and fix potential weaknesses, gaps, and misconfigurations in your systems, networks, and applications. But how often should you run vulnerability scans on your infrastructure? In this article, we'll explore some factors that influence the frequency and scope of your vulnerability scanning activities, and provide some best practices to follow.

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Kailash Parshad

Ethical Hacker | Penetration Tester | Cybersecurity Enthusiast | YouTube Educator

1 Why scan regularly?

Vulnerability scanning is not a one-time activity. It's a continuous process that requires regular updates, reviews, and adjustments. This is because your infrastructure is constantly changing and evolving, as you add, remove, or modify components, services, and features. Moreover, new vulnerabilities and threats emerge every day, as hackers and researchers discover and exploit new flaws and exploits. Therefore, scanning your infrastructure regularly helps you keep up with the latest security developments, and ensure that you're not leaving any doors open for attackers.

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Kailash Parshad

Ethical Hacker | Penetration Tester | Cybersecurity Enthusiast | YouTube Educator
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Regular vulnerability scanning is crucial in maintaining a strong security posture. From my experience as an ethical hacker, I’ve seen organizations fall into a false sense of security after running a one-time scan, only to find themselves compromised due to newly discovered vulnerabilities. For example, while working with a financial institution, we identified critical vulnerabilities in their infrastructure during a routine scan that were missed just a few weeks earlier. These vulnerabilities had surfaced after recent updates to their software. By scanning regularly, we were able to address these issues before any significant breach occurred, proving the necessity of continuous monitoring and updates.

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2 What to scan?

The scope of your vulnerability scanning depends on the size, complexity, and nature of your infrastructure. You should scan all the assets that are exposed to the internet or connected to your network, such as servers, routers, firewalls, switches, web applications, databases, cloud services, and IoT devices. You should also scan any internal assets that store or process sensitive data, such as workstations, laptops, mobile devices, printers, and storage devices. However, you don't need to scan every asset at the same frequency or depth. You should prioritize your scanning based on the criticality, risk, and compliance requirements of each asset.

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3 How to scan?

Vulnerability scanning tools and methods can help you identify potential security issues in your infrastructure. External scanning simulates an attacker's perspective to detect open ports, misconfigured services, outdated software, or weak encryption exposed to the internet or external networks. Internal scanning looks for vulnerabilities hidden or protected by perimeter defenses, such as privilege escalation, unauthorized access, or data leakage. Credential scanning utilizes valid credentials or permissions to access assets and check for weak passwords, default accounts, or excessive privileges. Agent scanning installs a small software agent on your assets to detect software patches, registry entries, or system logs.

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4 When to scan?

The frequency of your vulnerability scanning should depend on several factors, such as the level of risk and exposure of your assets, the rate of change and update of your assets, and the compliance and regulatory requirements of your industry. For instance, you may want to scan your web applications daily or weekly, servers after every configuration change or software update, and assets according to the PCI DSS, HIPAA, NIST, or ISO standards. On the other hand, you may want to scan your printers monthly or quarterly and routers after every network change or firmware update.

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Kailash Parshad

Ethical Hacker | Penetration Tester | Cybersecurity Enthusiast | YouTube Educator
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Determining the frequency of vulnerability scans depends on multiple factors, including the risk level of the assets and the regulatory requirements. In practice, I’ve found that organizations often overlook assets that require more frequent scanning. During an engagement with a retail company, we set up a schedule where their public-facing web applications were scanned weekly, and critical servers were scanned after every configuration change. This approach allowed the company to catch potential vulnerabilities early and comply with industry standards like PCI DSS. It also provided a balance between maintaining security and minimizing disruptions to their operations.

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5 How to improve your scanning?

Vulnerability scanning is not infallible and can produce false positives, false negatives, or incomplete results, depending on the quality and accuracy of your tools and methods. To improve your scanning, you should use multiple tools and methods to cover different aspects and layers of your infrastructure, and update and customize your tools to match the latest security trends. Additionally, you should review and prioritize your results based on the severity, impact, and likelihood of each vulnerability. Lastly, document and report your scanning processes, results, and actions for stakeholders and auditors.

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6 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?

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Kailash Parshad

Ethical Hacker | Penetration Tester | Cybersecurity Enthusiast | YouTube Educator
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Beyond regular scanning, fostering a proactive security culture within your organization is key. One of the most effective strategies I implemented involved combining vulnerability scanning with security awareness training. In a case with a healthcare provider, we not only performed regular scans but also educated their staff on the importance of timely patching and vulnerability management. This dual approach significantly reduced the number of vulnerabilities over time, as employees became more engaged and responsive to security issues. Additionally, incorporating threat intelligence into your scanning process can help anticipate and defend against emerging threats, making your security measures even more robust.

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How often should you run vulnerability scans on your infrastructure?

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1 Why scan regularly?

2 What to scan?

3 How to scan?

4 When to scan?

5 How to improve your scanning?

6 Here’s what else to consider

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