Vulnerability scanning is the process of scanning a network or system to identify any existing security vulnerabilities.

It is a proactive measure used to detect any weaknesses that an attacker may exploit to gain unauthorised access to a system or network.

Vulnerability scanning can be either manual or automated, and can involve scanning for known vulnerabilities, analysing the configuration of a system or network, or using an automated tool to detect any possible vulnerabilities.

At Safetech, a vulnerability scan is typically performed with specialised software so that our highly experienced cyber security professionals can start searching for weaknesses and security issues in your system.

The scan typically looks for missing patches, known malware, open ports, weak passwords, and other security risks.

Once the scan is complete, the results are analysed to determine which areas of the system need to be addressed to improve its overall security.

There are two main types of vulnerability scan: unauthenticated and authenticated.

Unauthenticated scans are conducted without any credentials and, as such, can only provide limited information about potential vulnerabilities. This type of scan helps identify low-hanging fruit, such as unpatched systems or open ports.

Authenticated scans, on the other hand, are conducted with administrative credentials. This allows the scanning tool to provide much more comprehensive information about potential vulnerabilities, including those that may not be easily exploitable.

Vulnerabilities are widespread across organisations of all sizes. New ones are discovered constantly or can be introduced due to system changes.

Criminal hackers use automated tools to identify and exploit known vulnerabilities and access unsecured systems, networks or data.

Exploiting vulnerabilities with automated tools is simple: attacks are cheap, easy to run and indiscriminate, so every Internet-facing organisation is at risk.

All it takes is one vulnerability for an attacker to access your network.

This is why applying patches to fix these security vulnerabilities is essential. Updating your software, firmware and operating systems to the newest versions will help protect your organisation from potential vulnerabilities.

Worse, most intrusions are not discovered until it is too late. According to the global median, the dwell time between the start of a cyber intrusion and its identification is 24 days.

Automated vulnerability scanning tools scan for open ports and detect common services running on those ports.

They identify any configuration issues or other vulnerabilities on those services and look at whether best practice is being followed, such as using TLSv1.2 or higher and strong cipher suites.

A vulnerability scanning report is then generated to highlight the items that have been identified.

By acting on these findings, an organisation can improve its security posture.