The Difference Between Attack Surface Management and External Attack Surface Management
Attack surface management (ASM) and external attack surface management (EASM) are both solutions used to understand and reduce your organization's attack surface, but they differ in scope and focus. Which one you choose will depend on your team’s goals and objectives.
Attack Surface Management
ASM identifies and manages all potential points of entry (attack vectors) that attackers could exploit to breach an organization's security defenses. It encompasses both external-facing assets as well as the internal assets that make up your organization's IT infrastructure. This can include network devices, applications, databases, cloud services, endpoints, and more.
ASM assesses your infrastructure for vulnerabilities and identifies points where your infrastructure is exposed across the entire attack surface, whether the attacks come from inside or outside of the organization. The goal is to reduce your overall attack surface by identifying and mitigating vulnerabilities, strengthening security controls, and minimizing potential avenues of attack.
External Attack Surface Management
EASM specifically targets the external-facing components of your organization's attack surface, focusing on assets and vulnerabilities that are accessible from outside the organization's network perimeter. It identifies and monitors external-facing assets such as web applications, websites, domain names, IP addresses, cloud instances, and third-party services.
EASM assesses and manages risks associated with external attack vectors, such as phishing attacks, web application vulnerabilities, exposed sensitive data, misconfigured cloud services, and other external-facing security issues. The goal is to reduce your external attack surface by identifying and mitigating vulnerabilities and points of exposure that external threat actors could exploit.
Differences Between ASM and ESM
Scope of Infrastructure Visibility
ASM identifies and monitors your external attack surface as well as internal attack vectors. It assesses your infrastructure for vulnerabilities in both externally-facing assets as well as internal assets. This way it covers your entire infrastructure.
In contrast, EASM focuses specifically on your external attack surface. It identifies and prioritizes vulnerabilities in external-facing assets for mitigation.
Threat Actor Focus
Given ASM’s broad focus on your entire IT environment, it helps protect you from internal as well as external threats.
Given EASM’s narrower focus on only externally-facing assets, it helps protect you primarily from external threats.
Which Solution is Better
In the end, whether you choose to go with an attack surface management solution or an external attack surface management solution will depend on your organizational goals. If you are narrowly focused on identifying and managing vulnerabilities associated with external-facing assets and components, choose EASM. If, however, you are concerned about managing all potential attack vectors across your entire IT infrastructure, an ASM solution will be the better choice.
Redjack Improves Your ASM or EASM Deployment
By leveraging an ASM or EASM solution, your organization can proactively reduce your exposure to potential threats and strengthen your security posture. However, these solutions are more effective if you can guarantee that they are scanning all of the assets that they should.
The Redjack platform compiles a comprehensive asset inventory and uses an AI-driven analysis engine to identify your critical business functions. This gives you complete visibility into your IT infrastructure and allows you to prioritize assets based on their demonstrated impact on the organization.
Contact us to learn how Redjack has been helping the world's largest corporations and government agencies improve their cybersecurity visibility and focus.
