Business Software
Business software, in the context of cybersecurity, refers to a wide range of applications and programs that organizations use to perform various functions, automate processes, and achieve business goals. The cybersecurity focus on this software is critical because it stores, processes, and transmits the company's most sensitive data (financials, customer information, intellectual property) and often provides access points that malicious actors can exploit.
Cybersecurity Risks of Business Software
The primary cybersecurity risks associated with business software across all categories include:
Vulnerability Exploitation: Flaws in the software code that hackers can use to gain unauthorized access.
Data Breach: Unauthorized access and theft of sensitive information stored within the application.
Insider Threats: Employees with legitimate access abusing their privileges or making accidental errors that compromise security.
Supply Chain Risk: Vulnerabilities introduced through third-party integrations or cloud service providers that host the software.
Configuration Errors: Misconfigured security settings (e.g., weak access controls, default passwords) that leave data exposed.
Business Software Categories in the Context of Cybersecurity
Here is a detailed breakdown of the specified business software categories and their specific cybersecurity implications:
Productivity & Collaboration
Definition: Software designed to help teams communicate, manage projects, and create/share documents (e.g., Microsoft 365, Google Workspace, Slack, Zoom).
Cybersecurity Focus: Protecting the integrity and confidentiality of communications and shared documents.
Specific Risks:
Phishing/Malware Spread: Links and files shared through these platforms can be vectors for malware.
Data Leakage: Sensitive conversations or documents stored in cloud drives can be leaked if access controls are weak.
Meeting Hijacking (Zoombombing): Unauthorized intrusion into virtual meetings, which can lead to the exposure of confidential discussions.
Identity Theft/Account Compromise: If a user's account is compromised, the attacker gains access to their entire communication and document history.
Customer Relationship Management (CRM)
Definition: Applications that manage a company's interactions with current and potential customers, storing vast amounts of Personally Identifiable Information (PII) and business interaction data (e.g., Salesforce, HubSpot).
Cybersecurity Focus: Maintaining the confidentiality, availability, and compliance of customer data (especially PII under regulations like GDPR and CCPA).
Specific Risks:
Massive Data Breaches: CRMs are primary targets because they centralize customer names, contact details, purchase history, and sometimes financial data.
Unauthorized Access to PII: Exploiting weak authentication to steal customer lists for spamming, fraud, or sale on the dark web.
Compliance Violations: Failure to properly encrypt or secure data, leading to regulatory fines.
Design & Content Creation
Definition: Tools used to create, edit, and manage digital media and proprietary design assets (e.g., Adobe Creative Cloud, Figma, AutoCAD).
Cybersecurity Focus: Protecting intellectual property (IP), source files, and pre-release content.
Specific Risks:
Theft of Intellectual Property (IP): Attackers steal proprietary designs, software source code, blueprints, or unpublished creative content, leading to competitive disadvantage.
License Fraud: Exploiting software to bypass licensing restrictions.
Embedded Malware: Content files themselves (e.g., PDFs, project files) can sometimes be engineered to contain malicious payloads that execute when opened.
E-commerce & CMS (Content Management System)
Definition: Platforms that power online sales (e-commerce) and manage the creation and modification of digital content on a website (CMS) (e.g., Shopify, Magento, WordPress).
Cybersecurity Focus: Securing payment card data (PCI DSS compliance) and maintaining website availability and integrity.
Specific Risks:
Web Skimming (Magecart Attacks): Injecting malicious code into payment pages to steal credit card information as customers enter it.
SQL Injection/Cross-Site Scripting (XSS): Attacks that compromise the CMS database or infect visitors' browsers.
Denial of Service (DoS/DDoS): Attacks that take down the e-commerce site, causing significant financial loss.
Unpatched Plugins/Themes: Third-party extensions in a CMS are often weak points that attackers target.
Document & Legal Management
Definition: Systems used by law firms, compliance departments, and general businesses to manage contracts, legal files, regulatory filings, and highly sensitive internal documents (e.g., Clio, NetDocuments, specialized document management systems).
Cybersecurity Focus: Ensuring absolute confidentiality and tamper-proof storage of privileged and legally binding information.
Specific Risks:
Attorney-Client Privilege Breach: The highest risk, where confidential legal advice or strategy is exposed, leading to lawsuits or irreparable harm to a client.
Ransomware: Attackers often target these systems specifically because the data (contracts, evidence) is so critical that organizations are more likely to pay a ransom.
Regulatory Non-Compliance: Failure to maintain proper audit trails or secure records as required by financial or legal regulations.
Business software is a critical component of any organization's digital attack surface, and its security must be evaluated from an external, unauthenticated attacker's perspective to identify genuine exposure. ThreatNG, as an all-in-one external attack surface management (EASM), digital risk protection (DRP), and security ratings solution, provides a comprehensive, outside-in view to manage the specific cybersecurity risks associated with the five categories of business software you outlined: Productivity & Collaboration, CRM, Design & Content Creation, E-commerce & CMS, and Document & Legal Management.
ThreatNG's capabilities directly address the risks in these categories through its core functions.
ThreatNG’s External Discovery and Continuous Monitoring
ThreatNG performs purely external unauthenticated discovery using no connectors, which is the essential starting point for securing all categories of business software. This process identifies the organization’s exposed digital footprint, including domains, subdomains, mobile apps, and cloud services associated with these business platforms.
Continuous Monitoring: ThreatNG provides constant monitoring of the external attack surface, digital risk, and security ratings of all organizations. This is crucial because business software is constantly updated, configurations change, and new services are adopted, introducing new risks.
Mobile App Exposure: For productivity, design, and CRM solutions that use mobile apps, ThreatNG performs Mobile Application Discovery in marketplaces (like Google Play or Apple App Store) and checks their contents for exposed sensitive data, such as access credentials (e.g., AWS API Key, Stripe API Key, Facebook Access Token) and security credentials (e.g., PGP private key block, RSA Private Key). This capability is vital as mobile apps often store or provide access to data in collaboration or CRM systems.
Cloud and SaaS Exposure: Given that most modern business software is SaaS (e.g., Salesforce for CRM, Microsoft 365 for Collaboration, Shopify for E-commerce), ThreatNG specifically identifies Cloud and SaaS Exposure, discovering both sanctioned and unsanctioned services and open exposed cloud buckets of major providers (AWS, Azure, Google Cloud Platform). This helps identify shadow IT or misconfigured cloud storage that may hold sensitive documents or designs. The solution also checks explicitly for the presence of many popular SaaS platforms like Salesforce (CRM), Atlassian (Productivity), Shopify (E-commerce), and DocuSign (Document Management).
External Assessment Capabilities
ThreatNG’s External Assessment capabilities provide specific, risk-prioritized scores that map to the common threats facing business software:
Web Application Hijack Susceptibility & Subdomain Takeover Susceptibility: This directly addresses risks to web-based platforms like CMS (e.g., WordPress) and E-commerce sites. The score is substantiated by analyzing web application parts accessible from the outside world to find potential entry points. For E-commerce/CMS, the score assesses a website’s subdomains, DNS records, and SSL certificate statuses to ensure that an attacker cannot exploit a dangling DNS record to host a phishing page or malicious content.
Data Leak Susceptibility: This is highly relevant across all categories, especially CRM and Document Management, which handle massive amounts of PII and proprietary data. The score is derived from Cloud and SaaS Exposure, Dark Web Presence (Compromised Credentials), and Domain Intelligence (DNS and Email Intelligence). For instance, a high score could indicate compromised credentials that might give an attacker access to a CRM (Salesforce) or collaboration (Slack) environment.
BEC & Phishing Susceptibility: This protects employees who use Productivity and Collaboration tools (like Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace). The score uses Domain Intelligence, including Domain Name Permutations (typosquatting, homoglyphs) and Email Intelligence (DMARC, SPF, DKIM records). A low score might mean an attacker could register a similar-looking domain (e.g., micros0ft.com) for a phishing attack against employees to harvest their corporate credentials, granting access to internal documents.
Breach & Ransomware Susceptibility: This applies to all categories, as a successful breach can shut down access to all business software. The score considers exposed sensitive ports, exposed private IPs, known vulnerabilities, and ransomware events and gang activity from the Dark Web. A high score might flag an exposed database port on a web server running an E-commerce platform, increasing the likelihood of a data breach and subsequent ransom demand.
Code Secret Exposure: This specifically targets risks to Design & Content Creation tools and customized E-commerce/CMS solutions. It discovers exposed code repositories and investigates their contents for sensitive data. The detection of items like GitHub Access Tokens, Stripe API Keys, or configuration files for platforms like WordPress in public repositories is a direct indicator of risk for a Design firm’s custom portal or an E-commerce payment system.
Investigation Modules and Technology Identification
ThreatNG’s Investigation Modules provide the granular detail needed to track and remediate risks within specific business software technologies.
The Domain Intelligence module uses DNS Intelligence to perform Vendor and Technology Identification. This capability is critical for understanding which third-party business software an organization is using and assessing the risks associated with it.
Examples of Technology Identification:
For Productivity & Collaboration, the platform can identify the use of Google Workspace, Microsoft Office 365, or a Zoom integration through subdomain headers or DNS records.
For E-commerce & CMS, it can identify technologies like WordPress, Shopify, or WooCommerce.
For CRM and Document Management, it can identify vendors like HubSpot or DocuSign.
The Subdomain Intelligence module lists explicitly the discovery of CRM (AgileCRM, HubSpot, Vend), E-commerce Platforms (Shopify), and Content Management Systems (WordPress, Acquia).
This identification is then layered with other intelligence:
Subdomain Intelligence will look for Known Vulnerabilities and Exposed Sensitive Ports (like MySQL or PostgreSQL for databases). A direct hit on an exposed MySQL database port associated with a WooCommerce installation is a critical finding for E-commerce security.
Archived Web Pages uncovers old login pages, Admin Pages, or document files (PDFs, Excel) that may have been forgotten but still contain sensitive information from the Document & Legal Management category.
Search Engine Exploitation investigates susceptibility to exposing privileged folders or user data via search engines, which could reveal internal documents or CRM files.
Intelligence Repositories (DarCache)
The Intelligence Repositories (DarCache) continuously feed the assessment with real-world threat data, making the risk scoring actionable:
DarCache Rupture (Compromised Credentials): This directly addresses the Data Leak Susceptibility of all business software. It identifies compromised credentials that could be used to log into an organization’s exposed Salesforce or Microsoft 365 accounts.
DarCache Vulnerability (NVD, EPSS, KEV, eXploit): This is the core engine for prioritizing vulnerabilities in E-commerce and CMS platforms. It combines NVD (technical impact) with EPSS (likelihood of exploitation) and KEV (actively exploited in the wild). For example, a known CVE in a WordPress plugin (CMS) would be prioritized if it is on the KEV list and has an associated Verified Proof-of-Concept (PoC) Exploit directly linked in DarCache eXploit.
DarCache Ransomware: Tracks over 70 Ransomware Gangs and associated activities, providing vital context for the Breach & Ransomware Susceptibility score, informing the organization on the current threat landscape targeting their sector.
Reporting and Complementary Solutions
ThreatNG's Reporting capabilities transform technical findings into strategic insight, delivering Executive, Technical, and Prioritized reports (High, Medium, Low). The External GRC Assessment provides continuous, outside-in evaluation, mapping findings to frameworks like PCI DSS (critical for E-commerce) and GDPR/HIPAA (critical for CRM and Document Management).
Complementary Solutions
ThreatNG’s external perspective can be effectively combined with internal security tools to create a stronger defense:
Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) / Security Orchestration, Automation, and Response (SOAR): ThreatNG pinpoints external exposures like a critical vulnerability in an E-commerce platform (CMS) or leaked credentials that could access a CRM. This high-fidelity, external intelligence can be fed into a SIEM/SOAR system to trigger immediate, automated actions, such as isolating the affected E-commerce server or forcing a password reset for the exposed Microsoft 365 account identified by DarCache Rupture.
Vulnerability Management (VM) Tools: Traditional VM tools scan internal networks. ThreatNG complements this by providing the attacker's view, prioritizing external vulnerabilities, such as an open sensitive port or an exposed development environment associated with a Design & Content Creation server. The DarCache Vulnerability data (EPSS, KEV) gives the VM team the context to focus remediation efforts on the few high-impact external risks, rather than thousands of low-priority internal findings.
Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) Systems: ThreatNG's BEC & Phishing Susceptibility score, derived from Domain Name Permutations, informs the security team of likely phishing threats targeting end-users of Productivity & Collaboration tools. This intelligence can be used to strengthen email filters (a function often integrated or related to EDR) or deliver targeted security awareness training to employees who are the "human attack surface".
