Without losing productivity, effective patch management may protect your company from well-known vulnerabilities and unauthorized access.
Patch management aids IT teams in eliminating bugs, productivity enhancement, and quick response to known attacks.
So, What is Patch Management?
Applying updates to software, drivers, and firmware to protect against vulnerabilities is known as patch management. The optimal working performance of systems is also ensured by effective patch management, increasing productivity.
All systems need to be protected, whether they are on a company laptop or a userless PC-based device, such a kiosk. Ignoring patch management can put your company at risk for breaches and leaks as well as productivity loss and reputation damage.
Operating systems, applications, and embedded devices are frequently in need of fixes (like network equipment). A patch can be used to correct a vulnerability that is discovered after a piece of software has been released. By doing this, you may assure that none of the resources in your environment are open to exploitation.
Why is patch management important?
The main objectives of patch management are to protect your endpoints from hackers and maintain optimal system performance. However, patch management also offers a number of other advantages:
1. Security: Patch management repairs vulnerabilities in your software and apps that can be exploited by hackers, lowering the security risk for your company.
2. System uptime: Patch management makes ensuring your programmes are current and function properly, supporting system uptime.
3. Compliance: Due to the ongoing increase in cyberattacks, regulatory authorities frequently demand that firms maintain a specific degree of compliance. Patch management is a crucial component of following compliance rules.
4. Feature improvements: Patch management can include feature/functionality updates in addition to just fixing software bugs. Patches can be essential for ensuring that you have access to a product's most recent and greatest features.
“Software that has been properly maintained and patched can increase staff productivity.”
The Patch Management Process
Installing new updates for all of the assets in your organization's inventory as soon as they are made available without thinking about the consequences would be a bad plan. Instead, a more calculated strategy ought to be used.
Patch management should be performed using a thorough organisational method that focuses on security as well as cost-effectiveness.
Key steps to the patch management process include:
• Create a current inventory of all of your production systems: This is the only way to accurately track which assets are present in your ecosystem, whether it be on a quarterly or monthly basis. You will have an informed perspective of the operating systems, version kinds, and IP addresses that are in use, as well as their geographical locations and organisational "owners," through careful asset management. Generally speaking, the more frequently you update your asset inventory, the more knowledgeable you'll be.
• Create a strategy for bringing all systems and operating systems under a single version: Standardizing your asset collection makes patching quicker and more effective, despite being challenging to do. To speed up your remediation process as new patches are published, you should standardise your assets down to a manageable number. You and the technical teams will both benefit from the reduction in remediation time.
• Make a list of all the security measures in place at your company: Monitor your firewalls, antivirus software, and vulnerability management software. You should be aware of where these are located, what they are guarding against, and what assets are connected to them.
• Compare your inventory against reported vulnerabilities: Understanding your organization's security risk requires using your vulnerability management solution to determine which vulnerabilities exist for which assets in your ecosystem.
• Sort the risks: You may easily manage the assets you believe to be crucial to your firm using vulnerability management solutions, and you can then prioritise what needs to be remedied in accordance with that priority.
• TEST! In your lab environment: Apply the patches to a representative sample of the assets. To be sure the patches won't cause problems in your production environment, firstly test the computers.
• Put the patches on: Start applying patches after determining what has to be remedied first in order to truly lower the danger in your area. Additionally, more sophisticated vulnerability management technologies give users the option to automate the laborious steps in the patching procedure. Even though you tested in your lab environment, there can still be unexpected outcomes in production if you don't send out the updates to batches of assets. Make sure there won't be any significant problems by dipping your toes in a little before diving right in.
• Track the progress: Verify the success of the patching by reevaluating your assets.
How a successful patch management programme benefits your organization
Patch management can help your business in a number of ways:
• A more secure environment: Patching vulnerabilities on a regular basis aids in managing and lowering the risk in your environment. This shields your company from unexpected security lapses.
• Happy clients: You understand how crucial it is that the technology truly works if your company provides a good or service that customers must utilise. The technique of patch management helps keep your systems operational by correcting software issues.
• No arbitrary fines: Regulating organisations may fine your company money if it is not patching and, as a result, is not adhering to compliance rules. Compliance is ensured through effective patch management.
• Product innovation: You can add patches to your technology to update it with better features and functionality. This can give your business a way to widely implement your most recent software advancements.
Patch Management Best Practices
When implementing patch management, the following recommendations should be kept in mind:
• Establish precise expectations and hold teams responsible: Utilizing organisational agreements, such as service-level agreements, helps control teams and guarantee that the task of decreasing risk is being completed.
• Assemble technical teams in cooperation to ensure a common language: Software bugs are frequently referred to as "risks" by security teams, although "patch" may be used by IT/DevOps teams. A good patch management method depends on everyone being aware of the significance of patching and being on the same page.
• Create a catastrophe recovery plan: It's usually a good idea to have a backup strategy in place in case your patch management procedure should falter and cause problems.
Patch management should be integrated into vulnerability management strategies.
Every vulnerability management programme needs patch management. But maintaining a consistent patch management strategy doesn't always include applying a fix to everything in sight.
In general, you have three choices when a vulnerability is found:
1. To resolve the problem, apply a patch for the vulnerability, if one is available.
2. Implement compensating controls to minimise the vulnerability without requiring a complete patch. This approach is frequently taken when a suitable fix or patch is still pending and can be utilised to buy some time before eventual correction.
3. Accept the danger posed by that weakness and take no action.
Although patching is the optimum course of action, it is up to companies to decide which choice is appropriate for them in certain circumstances.
In IT, Patch Management Is Essential
Patch management has more advantages than disadvantages. In the end, having more access to and control over your devices and the ability to remotely patch and fix them gives your IT staff and business more flexibility. Although there are many risks, such as hackers and data thieves, patch management can help keep your firm operating efficiently. Patch management is a critical component of vulnerability management, but it’s just one piece of the puzzle.
Our Patch Management Specialists will implement best practises, automation, allowing you to save money, time and free up your engineers to focus on other profitable projects.
Get in touch today with Stardawn IT today for Patch Management Setup, Audit & Best-practices implementation services.
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