CISA Adds 32 Known Exploited Vulnerabilities to Catalog

Dangers Within – Insider Threat

As cyber-attacks become more widespread, it is critical to secure your IT architecture so that you do not fall victim to one and become the next cautionary tale. When it comes to cyber-attacks, the finance industry is one of the most attacked.

A financial institution, such as an investment bank, manages huge amounts of sensitive data and funds, making them great targets for cybercriminals because successful attacks may be extremely profitable. From an attacker’s perspective, the more external assets you have, the broader your attack surface. A growing attack surface obviously provides more options for a threat actor to acquire unauthorized access to your environment, implying the larger the organization, the more likely a breach or cyberattack will occur. Smaller firms, on the other hand, are vulnerable since they usually have less robust security measures. Investing in attack surface training for your security teams is the finest investment a financial institution can make.

Managing a constantly changing external asset inventory manually is becoming nearly impossible. Understanding potential attack vectors as well as your organization’s specific weak points is critical to developing and maintaining a strong security posture and protecting your company’s reputation. Main cyber threats that financial services face includes – Cloud migration misconfigurations, Compliance with data protection regulations, Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS), Ransomware, Third-party risk, Insecure payment systems, Unmanageable asset inventory

Because the financial services industry is the most vulnerable, a strong cyber security strategy is essential for survival and should be prioritized on the boardroom agenda.

A comprehensive understanding of one’s attack surface is a vital step in informing any risk management function. To say the obvious, what you can’t see can’t be protected. Financial institutions require a continuous, real-time, and regularly updated view of their attack surface to solve this blind spot. This enables them to identify, assess, and ultimately manage the risks associated with their known and unknown internet-accessible assets.

Attack surface management delivers continuous discovery, monitoring, and assessment of a financial institution’s internet-facing resources.

To solve this issue, financial institutions can use ASM to create a single source of truth for all of their internet-connected assets and their potential vulnerability to attacks, regardless of whether they are on-premises or distributed across numerous cloud providers. Given the increasing reliance on the internet, a solid ASM strategy should be regarded as a critical component of cyber hygiene as financial institutions seek to improve security maturity and decrease risk.