Claims-Based Attestation
Claims-Based Attestation in cybersecurity is the traditional method of assessing a vendor's or an organization's security posture by relying primarily on documentation and direct statements from the assessed party. It is fundamentally an assessment of what an entity claims to be doing, rather than what is objectively observed.
Detailed Definition
This method is most commonly used in third-party risk management (TPRM) and governance, risk, and compliance (GRC) audits. It centers on questionnaires, security certifications, and policy documents as the primary sources of evidence.
Mechanism: The process typically begins with a consuming organization issuing a standardized questionnaire (like a CAIQ or a custom vendor risk form) to a third-party vendor. The questions require the vendor to attest (formally declare) to the existence and effectiveness of specific security controls. For example, a question might be, "Do you enforce Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) for all administrative access?" The vendor's response of "Yes" constitutes the claim.
Evidence of Assertion: The vendor supports their "Yes" with documentation, including internal security policies, penetration test summaries, or compliance certificates (e.g., a SOC 2 report). These documents are assertions of control, but they often represent a point-in-time snapshot or are internal records that lack independent external verification.
The Limitation of Claims: The critical weakness of claims-based attestation lies in the inherent trust gap it creates. The assessed organization has an incentive to present its posture favorably, and the claims are complex for the assessing organization to verify independently.
The claim might be out of date (e.g., the policy was updated since the document was provided).
The claim might be internally accurate but fail to account for external exposure (e.g., they claim to use MFA, but an unmonitored external server is running an exposed service without it).
The attestation is a non-continuous, static process, meaning that compliance can lapse immediately after the documentation is submitted.
Risk: Relying on claims-based attestation can lead to a false sense of security, as documented policies may not reflect the actual, externally visible security landscape, leaving the consuming organization vulnerable to risks the vendor failed to report or accurately observe. This necessitates a shift toward a model in which external, objective observation validates or drives the claims.
ThreatNG helps overcome the limitations of Claims-Based Attestation by providing a system of objective, externally verified evidence that either validates or contradicts a vendor's claims, moving the assessment from reliance on assertion to reliance on certainty. This is achieved through its External Attack Surface Management (EASM) capabilities, with a focus on its Context Engine™ and Correlation Evidence Questionnaire (CEQ).
ThreatNG’s Role in Validating Claims-Based Attestation
ThreatNG’s approach transforms the assessment from a static documentation check into a continuous, evidence-driven validation process.
1. External Discovery
ThreatNG performs purely external unauthenticated discovery, which is crucial because it ensures the assessed organization or vendor is observed from an attacker's perspective, thus removing bias or omission from internal claims.
Example: A vendor might claim in a questionnaire that they track all their domains. ThreatNG's Domain Intelligence modules, including Domain Name Permutations, may uncover several high-risk typo-squatted domains or domains with offensive language keywords that the vendor failed to list. This external discovery immediately challenges the completeness of the vendor's initial claim.
2. External Assessment
ThreatNG's comprehensive assessments provide objective, quantifiable security ratings (A-F) that serve as non-claims-based evidence, directly validating or invalidating an attestation.
Data Leak Susceptibility: A vendor might claim in a questionnaire that all cloud storage is securely configured. ThreatNG's Data Leak Susceptibility assessment checks for external digital risks across Cloud Exposure (specifically exposed open cloud buckets). If ThreatNG finds an open, exposed cloud bucket of AWS, Microsoft Azure, or Google Cloud Platform, this factual, external finding contradicts the vendor's claim. It provides irrefutable evidence of a compliance gap.
Web Application Hijack Susceptibility: A vendor might claim that it enforces secure web application configurations. ThreatNG's assessment checks for the absence of key security headers, such as Content-Security-Policy and HTTP Strict-Transport-Security (HSTS), on subdomains. A poor rating (e.g., F) due to missing headers is objective proof that the claimed security control is ineffective or nonexistent on specific external assets, validating the proper security posture.
Cyber Risk Exposure: A vendor might claim all their certificates are valid and secure. ThreatNG's assessment identifies explicitly issues such as invalid certificates. This is a concrete technical finding that directly negates the vendor's general attestation of a secure certificate management program.
3. Investigation Modules
The Investigation Modules, specifically the Context Engine™ and CEQ, are designed to eliminate the Contextual Certainty Deficit and reject the shortcomings of claims-based assessment.
Correlation Evidence Questionnaire (CEQ): This is the core solution that rejects static, claims-based assessment by leveraging the proprietary Context Engine™ to find irrefutable, observed evidence of external risk. Instead of asking the general question, "Do you monitor for exposed credentials?", ThreatNG's CEQ would use the evidence from Sensitive Code Exposure (uncovering an exposed code secret like an AWS Access Key ID in a public repository) to ask: "Provide the immediate remediation steps taken for the AWS Access Key ID [Key ID number] found exposed in the repository at [URL], as identified by ThreatNG's external assessment." This converts a vague claim into a concrete operational mandate.
Contextual Risk Intelligence (Context Engine™): This patented solution uses Multi-Source Data Fusion to correlate external technical findings with decisive legal, financial, and operational context. This process achieves Legal-Grade Attribution, which is the opposite of a claims-based approach, providing security leaders with absolute certainty.
4. Intelligence Repositories
The Intelligence Repositories (DarCache) provide the necessary external threat and risk data to verify a vendor's claims against real-world context independently.
Vulnerabilities (DarCache Vulnerability): A vendor might claim they prioritize patching based on standard severity. However, ThreatNG's repository includes KEV (actively exploited vulnerabilities) and EPSS (exploitation likelihood). If a vendor's asset is vulnerable to a flaw on the KEV list, ThreatNG provides evidence that the vulnerability is an immediate and proven threat, overriding any claims the vendor makes about their planned patching schedule.
ESG Violations (DarCache ESG): A vendor might claim strong governance. The repository provides external evidence of publicly disclosed ESG violations concerning Competition, Consumer, or Financial offenses. This provides an independent source of truth about governance issues that directly impact the risk calculation, regardless of the vendor's claims on policy documents.
5. Continuous Monitoring
ThreatNG provides continuous monitoring of the external attack surface, digital risk, and security ratings for all organizations. This counteracts the static nature of claims-based attestation, which often relies on annual or semi-annual reviews. ThreatNG ensures that if a vendor's security posture degrades—violating an earlier claim—the change is immediately detected and flagged.
Collaboration with Complementary Solutions
ThreatNG's verifiable evidence is ideal for cooperation with systems designed to manage vendor claims.
Complementary Solutions for Third-Party Risk Management (TPRM) Systems: ThreatNG can cooperate with TPRM solutions by injecting Legal-Grade Attribution and evidence directly into the vendor profile. This means that when a vendor submits a claims-based questionnaire, the TPRM system can use ThreatNG’s objective findings (e.g., an F rating on Cyber Risk Exposure) to automatically mark specific claimed controls as "Failed-Unverified" or "Confirmed-Violation," forcing the vendor to address the external proof rather than simply asserting compliance.
Complementary Solutions for Policy Management: ThreatNG's Policy Management system, branded as DarcRadar, enables Customizable, Granular Risk Configuration and Scoring. This capability can cooperate with an internal policy management system to ensure that a claimed internal policy (e.g., "All high-risk third parties must use specific security controls") is dynamically validated against ThreatNG's external findings. The system can alert when an external finding (e.g., a BEC & Phishing Susceptibility score of F for a high-risk vendor) falls outside the acceptable risk appetite defined in the policy.
