Secunia Vulnerability Intelligence Manager 4.0 released

The Secunia VIM 4.0 covers more than 40,000 software systems and applications. Its provides intelligence about software vulnerabilities available to organizations, ensuring that security threats can be dealt with before the IT infrastructure is compromised.

Effectively, any program downloaded to an employee laptop is a threat to the organization’s security. Consequently, it is not enough to manage the software systems that make up the organisation’s official software infrastructure.

As cybercrime against corporations, organizations and government institutions is slowly becoming a recognized security threat, the importance of managing software vulnerabilities is an aspect of security that is gradually receiving attention in organizations around the world.

If there are flaws in the software, cybercriminals have access to the entire infrastructure of any organization. And modern organizations use a lot of different software programs: it is a common misconception to think that only the organization-wide systems purchased, implemented and maintained by company IT departments pose a risk. Any software flaw in any program or app used in any endpoint related to the organization represents a security risk – including company laptops used both professionally and privately by employees.

Effectively, any program downloaded to an employee laptop is a threat to the organization’s security. Consequently, it is not enough to manage the software systems that make up the organisation’s official software infrastructure.

“And it is not enough to wait for official software patches from Microsoft,” warns Morten R. Stengaard, Director of Product Management and Quality Assurance at Secunia. “As only 22% of vulnerabilities affect Microsoft programs and operating systems, it is critical to have the correct vulnerability intelligence to spot the vulnerabilities in the remaining 78% – the third-party programs. And the threat to third-party programs is on the increase: the share of vulnerabilities in these has risen from 45% to 78% from 2006 to 2011.”

Recent research from information technology research company Gartner, emphasizes the risk software vulnerabilities pose: “Through 2015, 80% of successful attacks will exploit well-known vulnerabilities and be detectable via security monitoring. [-¦] Applications are the gateways to the data that is the focus of a targeted attack. Dynamic application security testing (DAST) tools can be used to scan productions applications to find vulnerabilities. When a vulnerability is present on a running application, production data is at risk, and remediation cycle times are long – typically taking multiple months.

Key benefits of the Secunia VIM include:

• Reliable and accurate Vulnerability Intelligence at your fingertips
• Personalised alerts via email and SMS
• Comprehensive XML feeds
• Comprehensive Vulnerability Management tool
• Threat intelligence covering more than 40,000 systems and applications.

What’s new in VIM 4.0:

• New and improved user interface
• Integration with the Secunia CSI
• Improved assets matching
• Improved data export
• Activity log.