You just received the results from your latest penetration test, and the verdict is in: zero vulnerabilities. No critical flaws, no high-risk gaps and nothing for malicious hackers to exploit. Is it too good to be true? Did you just waste your security budget for nothing? Your previous penetration tests have always come back with vulnerabilities and areas for the security team to focus on (and developers to grouch about). In the past, coming back from a pentest with a reasonable pile of vulnerabilities was the norm, showing the process “worked.” If 100% cybersecurity is impossible, why shouldn’t pentesters earn their keep by unearthing at least a few high-impact vulnerabilities?
Expecting vulnerabilities after a penetration test is backward logic. Penetration testing as a service (PTaas) isn’t about finding vulnerabilities so much as ensuring you don’t have vulnerabilities. If you expect pentesters to uncover critical vulnerabilities with every report, is your pentesting program delivering any value to reduce your organization’s overall cybersecurity risk? Or is it just fearmongering that mostly serves to frustrate developers who clamor that the “CVSS 9.8” vuln in your environment isn’t really exploitable?
If you’re experiencing your first clean pentest report, or you’re wondering how you can get there, there are a few possibilities. Let’s break them down.
Your Security Measures Are Doing Their Job
If the pentesters you hired could not find a way in, it could indicate that your security controls are working as intended. From firewalls and effective patch management to secure configurations and robust access controls, having a strong cybersecurity program that functions as a well-oiled machine can help you successfully work towards a pentest report that’s as clean as a whistle.
When all of these measures work as they should, and your organization has made significant headway to ensure your solutions are top-tier, you’re doing something right.
You’ve Implemented a Security-first Culture
Cybersecurity is a company-wide effort. It isn’t just about offensive and defensive security tools–it’s also about the people behind them, practical employee training and collaboration between teams.
For instance, your security and development teams should be friends, not foes. The development team only has time to address the most pressing vulnerabilities. Sorting through an endless list of flaws that might never be exploited won’t work and can slow your remediation process, potentially leaving critical vulnerabilities in the queue for longer than you want and causing more vulns to pop up in the future.
By shifting security testing “to the left” and integrating practices throughout the entire software development lifecycle (SDLC), embracing an effective DevSecOps strategy that benefits both teams can enable early detection of vulnerabilities that matter the most, rather than waiting until post-production where remediation (or breach, heaven forbid) can be more expensive.
If you’ve successfully cracked that code (pun intended) and your organization has adopted a security solution that only highlights critical exploits and includes integrations that accelerates workflows, then the odds are most definitely in your favor and out of the hands of malicious hackers.
You Chose the Right Pentesters
A penetration test is only as effective as the team conducting it. Not all penetration testing solutions are created equal, nor are actual testers. When you rely on a team of researchers that are the best in the business, you should feel confident they pulled out all of the stops and tried various ways (all within scope, of course) to penetrate your network and find vulnerabilities vital to you. Your testers should have a wide range of skill sets and an ability to uncover critical flaws like cross-site scripting, SQL injections and buffer overflows.
There’s reason to celebrate if you’re confident in your provider and the quality of pentesters they offer.
You’ve Learned From Your Previous Pentest Results
A major contributing factor to a clean pentest report is your ability to learn from past results to ensure the same mistakes aren’t repeated.
Were you able to take away valuable vulnerability metrics, real-time insights and analytics and customizable reporting from your previous pentesting engagement and act on them accordingly? Did your pentest provider help you pinpoint why specific critical vulnerabilities were repeatedly proliferating? Have you been able to prioritize your team’s time and resources better to address security risks faster and more efficiently?
Delivering on value matters if you’re looking to reduce your vulnerability burden. Penetration tests are not only designed to discover any vulnerabilities your organization may have. Your provider should offer an end-to-end solution to find and remediate the vulnerabilities that matter and improve your security posture over time, revealing patterns and deficiencies in your security program and enabling organizations to take action to prevent future security risks.
It Doesn’t Mean You Can Just Relax
Before you decide to kick your feet up, it is essential to remember that a single successful penetration test does not guarantee absolute and perpetual security. The threat landscape constantly evolves, with new attack vectors and vulnerabilities emerging regularly. So, adopting a proactive and continuous approach to security is important.
If your organization is still working towards its first clean report, it won’t happen overnight. It can also be easier said than done. And sometimes, even the most mature cybersecurity programs still have vulnerabilities. Instead of putting too much pressure on yourself, you should focus on making changes where you can. This can involve adopting an offensive pentesting strategy focusing less on tactical-driven and more on strategic pentesting.
If you’re interested in learning how the Synack Penetration Testing as a Service (PTaaS) platform is helping organizations work toward a penetration test that comes back with zero vulnerabilities and builds stronger cybersecurity resilience, request a demo.
