Challenge
After hardening its security posture with automated security validation, GUD Holdings Limited tackled the next challenge of taking control of its attack surface.
Operating 17 portfolio companies in the automotive aftermarket and water products sectors, GUD relies on a small security team and automated offensive security testing from Cymulate. GUD measures the security efficacy of each business consistently across all its business units with Cymulate Breach and Attack Simulation (BAS) and Cymulate Continuous Automated Red Teaming (CART) (read more).
When Shaun Curtis, Head of Cybersecurity, wanted to take control of the organization’s attack surface, he again looked to Cymulate. With responsibility across the 17 subsidiaries, Shaun and his small team recognized the need to keep track of each business unit’s external assets. This unmonitored external attack surface could expose the organization to social engineering attacks or unauthorized network access, establishing a foothold within the organization.
The security team used open-source tools to scan for and manage its assets, but it was very labor-intensive and time-consuming. Shaun wanted an exposure assessment solution that could:
- Discover all assets associated with GUD’s infrastructure
- Provide additional information about vulnerabilities and misconfigurations related to the found assets
- Show the relationship between GUD’s internal infrastructure and its external assets
The Cymulate ASM Solution
After successful deployments of Cymulate BAS and Cymulate CART, Shaun saw the value in a consolidated exposure validation platform, but he was unwilling to sacrifice function for attack surface visibility. Cymulate Attack Surface Management (ASM) delivered both. Shaun elaborated, “I chose to implement Cymulate ASM because I wanted intelligence on my assets, not just a long list of vulnerabilities that a vulnerability management tool would give me.”
Implementation was simple. The security team provided one domain, and Cymulate ASM automatically found all its additional related domains. Each GUD business unit uses Cymulate ASM to automate two types of scans: one to discover assets (weekly) and one to detect vulnerabilities and misconfigurations against those found assets (monthly).
Shaun explained that the GUD team uses Cymulate ASM for:
A centralized view of all its external assets
“Cymulate ASM gives us a consolidated view of all our external assets, per business, in one place.”
Actionable guidance
“The Cymulate ASM list of external assets includes information on which assets are exposed, their severity, when they were first seen, mitigation recommendations, and more. We can take these insights to the business units and plan a strategy around how to execute against those findings.”
After hardening its security posture with automated security validation,GUD Holdings Limited tackled the next challenge of taking control of its attack surface.
Benefits
- Awareness
The business units now understand the risks of exposed external assets and consider this when deciding to onboard new vendors. - Automation
The small security team maintains control and visibility over its attack surface with automated scans. - Prioritization
With valuable insights into GUD’s IT infrastructure, the team prioritizes and addresses potential risks to strengthen its security posture. - Consolidation
Because Cymulate provides a consolidated platform with many capabilities, GUD was able to add Cymulate ASM without adding an entirely separate vendor to its security stack. One of the main reasons GUD chose the Cymulate platform was that GUD could grow along with the platform and utilize its more advanced solutions as it saw a need for them.
“Cymulate ASM was simple to implement, but it added so much value to our cybersecurity.”
– Shaun Curtis, Head of Cybersecurity
