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Is your security keeping up with today’s cyber threats? Traditional “reactive” methods can leave you vulnerable to an attack (and its full impact on your business). However, continuous threat exposure management (CTEM) offers a proactive cybersecurity approach that keeps you ahead of adversaries.
Understanding the Difference: Reactive vs. Proactive Security
Reactive security means waiting until after an incident to adjust your strategy and patch up any vulnerabilities. Proactive security, however, is aimed at prevention. It fosters a culture of cyber resilience by continuously monitoring for vulnerabilities and remediating them before an adversary does.
Limitations of Reactive Security
Imagine your organization fell victim to a breach. Many records were stolen, and millions in revenue were lost due to downtime. Following that incident, you invest a ton of money in revamping your cybersecurity program. You might feel a huge sense of security afterward, but wasn’t the damage already done?
Relying solely on reactive security measures after the fact leaves them exposed. Threats can deliver repeated attacks and exploit unaddressed vulnerabilities — constantly leaving you caught off guard, scrambling to react and recover. Ultimately, this approach is costly and damaging to your IT systems, data integrity, and brand reputation.
The Benefits of a Proactive Approach
Proactive cybersecurity lets you avoid the regretful questions: “Could we have prevented this breach if we had acted sooner?” As the name suggests, it focuses on continuous monitoring and threat prevention over post-incident responses. It helps you stay ahead of threats and treat security as an ongoing process rather than a reactionary break-fix approach.
The advantages of this approach are clear:
- Enhanced overall security
- Reduced incident response and recovery costs
- Efficient vulnerability management
- Higher resilience to potential threats
The Role of Continuous Threat Exposure Management (CTEM) in Proactive Security
By now, you probably are leaning toward wanting a proactive security approach. So, how do you facilitate such a strategy? Continuous Threat Exposure Management (CTEM) offers the framework to stay ahead of threats and improve overall resilience. Here’s how:
Continuous Monitoring and Threat Identification
Robust CTEM means you’re always alert. It uses automation and advanced analytics to monitor threats in real-time, assess their potential impact on your business, and continuously adjust defenses. That lets you stay vigilant. You’re always prepared to respond to emerging risks by preventing incidents from unfolding into full-blown attacks.
Dynamic Vulnerability Management
The other side of CTEM is vulnerability management. Rather than a static approach where you run a network scan and evaluate risks every quarter, CTEM is “dynamic.” You constantly assess the security infrastructure to find weaknesses or gaps an adversary could exploit. Then, after prioritizing each one based on risk, you can quickly remediate each system’s vulnerabilities by adding controls, patching software, updating apps, etc.
This maintains CTEM’s proactive scope by addressing new vulnerabilities as they’re discovered rather than waiting for periodic reviews.
Key Steps to Transition from Reactive to Proactive with CTEM
Ready to go from reactive to proactive with CTEM? Here’s how to start your journey:
Assessing Current Security Posture
Where are your security gaps, and which reactive methods leave you vulnerable? Take stock of your program by evaluating things like:
- Current security measures in place
- Historical data on breaches or threats discovered
- The average number of vulnerabilities (per assessment)
- How long it takes to patch up those vulnerabilities
Once you know where you stand, you have a baseline to compare to on your journey to proactive security.
Implementing Continuous Monitoring Tools
CTEM itself is not a security tool but a method or strategy. At its core, however, are continuous monitoring tools that give you nonstop visibility.
Invest in threat intelligence platforms, endpoint detection and response (EDR) tools, and automated vulnerability scanners. You can also partner with an expert-managed detection and response (MDR) service that applies CTEM.
Continuous monitoring helps bolster your threat detection capabilities and ensure constant vigilance against emerging risks.
Building a Cross-Functional Security Team
It’s your people who ultimately drive change. So, when going from reactive to proactive, assemble a coalition that’s skilled (and passionate) in preventing incidents and mitigating risk.
Create a collaborative environment for various security specialists to thrive. Threat assessment and investigation personnel should be able to easily coordinate incident response and remediation teams in real time.
You’re all on the same team and should manage security threats and vulnerabilities as one.
Benefits of a Proactive Security Posture with CTEM
CTEM is a stepping stone to a modern, proactive security program. Here’s how it can help your business:
Enhanced Resilience Against Cyber Threats
Because you constantly monitor for threats and vulnerabilities and then take action accordingly, it’s far more difficult for attackers to penetrate your network. This solution gives you the confidence to operate business as usual, knowing you can withstand anything an adversary throws your way.
Cost Savings Through Preventive Measures
The average cost of a security breach is roughly $4.88 million. Investing in a CTEM program is a fraction of that. When you can prevent attacks from happening altogether, you reduce the burden of incident response and recovery costs. This approach proves more economical than dealing with the aftermath of a cyber incident.
Improved Trust and Compliance
Want to build customer trust? Showcase your commitment to protecting their sensitive data. And there’s no better way to foster this commitment than through proactive security practices. CTEM can also help your organization better align with regulatory and industry compliance demands.
Case for Evolving Security Strategies
Cyber threats aren’t sitting still. And neither should your security strategy. CTEM represents the future of cybersecurity by giving you the power to meet today’s (and tomorrow’s) threats head-on.
Adapting to New Threats
The only way to protect your business is to stay agile and adaptable to new threats. CTEM embodies these principles. It ensures that security measures remain relevant and effective over time.
For instance, if new ransomware emerged, a CTEM program would keep you safe. It continuously monitors and assesses your external attack surface. It also goes far beyond by looking at data breaches, botnets, domain squatting, and other federated data sets — giving you a holistic, complete picture of your risk exposure.
Positioning for Long-Term Security Success
Embracing proactive security sets you up for the long run. And CTEM is a great way to foster a culture of cyber resilience at every level of your organization. By constantly reducing vulnerabilities and threat risk, you give yourself security assurance now and for the future.
Reactive vs. Proactive: One Clear Winner to Improve Your Security Posture
Reactive security, where you spot and patch vulnerabilities once a quarter or improve controls after a breach, is no longer effective. A proactive approach that applies CTEM is your best defense against emerging threats.