Prioritize and Remediate Vulnerabilities with Visibility, Automation, and Compliance

Vulnerability management is a continuous process within cybersecurity that helps organizations identify vulnerabilities, evaluate their criticality, and take action to remediate them. A vulnerability management program typically combines vulnerability scanning, risk-based prioritization, and remediation efforts that improve overall security posture. By addressing known vulnerabilities and monitoring for new vulnerabilities across endpoints, workloads, and cloud environments, security teams can reduce the attack surface and defend against cyber threats.

Tufin supports effective vulnerability management by helping security teams align firewall and network policies with remediation workflows, ensuring that security risks are addressed consistently across hybrid and multi-cloud environments.

• Reduce security risks by identifying vulnerabilities and security weaknesses before they can be exploited by hackers
• Prevent data breaches and mitigate cyberattacks caused by malware or misconfigurations
• Maintain compliance with frameworks like CIS, NIST, and other regulatory requirements
• Support IT teams and stakeholders with dashboards and metrics to measure progress and track remediation efforts
• Strengthen security posture through risk-based vulnerability management and patch management strategies

Vulnerability management solutions give security teams the ability to streamline the vulnerability management process, prioritize vulnerabilities, and coordinate remediation across complex networks and cloud environments.

Vulnerability scanning, as defined by NIST, is the automated process of identifying vulnerabilities in IT assets, operating systems, applications, and cloud environments. Vulnerability scanners detect security weaknesses, misconfigurations, and known vulnerabilities from sources such as the National Vulnerability Database and assign CVSS scores to measure exploitability and criticality.

Scanning is a key step in the vulnerability management lifecycle, helping security teams address vulnerabilities with risk-based prioritization and integrate results into the broader vulnerability management program.

• Configuration vulnerabilities such as weak permissions, open APIs, and firewall misconfigurations
• Software vulnerabilities in operating systems, cloud-native applications, and SaaS workloads
• Endpoint vulnerabilities caused by unpatched devices or outdated antivirus protection
• Network vulnerabilities in flat networks, routers, or segmentation policies that allow lateral movement
• Human-related vulnerabilities like phishing, poor password practices, or lack of validation steps
• Cloud vulnerabilities such as misconfigured cloud environments and exposed sensitive data

Identifying vulnerabilities across all IT assets allows organizations to remediate vulnerabilities faster and mitigate the risk of data breaches.

Vulnerability assessments should be conducted on a recurring basis as part of an effective vulnerability management process. Best practices recommend:

• Regular scanning cycles for all operating systems, endpoints, and workloads to identify vulnerabilities and known exposures
• Real-time validation of critical vulnerabilities to mitigate immediate risks
• Continuous monitoring of cloud environments and IT assets to address new vulnerabilities as they appear
• Periodic penetration testing to validate the effectiveness of vulnerability management tools and remediation efforts
• Lifecycle tracking with metrics and dashboards to measure improvements in security posture over time

Organizations that prioritize vulnerabilities based on exploitability, criticality, and risk scores can remediate vulnerabilities more effectively, reduce their attack surface, and prevent cyber threats.