External Attack Surface Management (EASM) in India
External Attack Surface Management (EASM) in India is the continuous process of discovering, monitoring, and securing an organization's internet-facing digital assets to protect against cyber threats. In the context of the rapidly evolving Indian cybersecurity landscape, EASM has become a critical necessity due to the enforcement of the Digital Personal Data Protection Act (DPDPA) 2023 and strict guidelines from regulatory bodies like the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and CERT-In.
For Indian enterprises, EASM is not just a security tool but a compliance enabler. It provides the "outside-in" visibility required to identify "Shadow IT," unsecured cloud buckets, and vulnerable subdomains that could lead to data breaches and significant financial penalties under Indian law.
Why EASM is Critical for Indian Organizations
The Indian digital ecosystem is unique due to its massive scale of digital adoption and specific regulatory pressures.
DPDPA Compliance: The Act mandates that Data Fiduciaries implement "reasonable security safeguards" to prevent personal data breaches. EASM validates these safeguards by continuously testing the perimeter.
RBI & SEBI Mandates: Financial regulators in India require banks and NBFCs to maintain an up-to-date inventory of all IT assets. EASM automates this by discovering assets that internal ledgers often miss.
CERT-In Reporting: The Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) requires rapid reporting of cybersecurity incidents. EASM provides the early warning intelligence needed to detect and report threats like unauthorized access or data leaks within the mandated 6-hour window.
Core Capabilities of EASM Solutions
To be effective in the Indian context, an EASM solution must deliver four foundational capabilities:
1. Automated Asset Discovery
EASM tools automatically scan the internet to find every digital asset that belongs to an organization.
Shadow IT Detection: Identifying servers, applications, and cloud instances spun up by employees without IT approval.
Supply Chain Visibility: Mapping the digital footprint of third-party vendors (Data Processors) to ensure they do not introduce risks.
Asset Inventory: Creating a dynamic, real-time catalog of all domains, subdomains, IPs, and cloud buckets.
2. Continuous Risk Assessment
Discovery is useless without context. EASM assesses the security posture of found assets.
Vulnerability Analysis: checking for known vulnerabilities (CVEs) on external-facing servers.
Misconfiguration Checks: identifying common errors like missing security headers (HSTS, CSP) or open database ports.
SSL/TLS Monitoring: Alerting on expired or weak certificates that could disrupt service or compromise data encryption.
3. Digital Risk Protection (DRP) integration
Modern EASM solutions often converge with DRP to monitor threats beyond the perimeter.
Brand Protection: Detecting "typosquatting" domains (fake lookalike websites) used for phishing Indian customers.
Dark Web Monitoring: Scanning for leaked employee credentials or customer data dumps on the dark web.
Data Leak Detection: identifying sensitive documents or code exposed in public repositories or open cloud storage.
4. Remediation and Reporting
The final step is fixing the problems and proving compliance.
Prioritized Alerts: Ranking risks based on severity (e.g., "Critical" vs. "Low") so teams know what to fix first.
Compliance Reports: generating evidence of due diligence to satisfy auditors from RBI, SEBI, or the Data Protection Board.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is EASM mandatory in India? While no law explicitly says "buy EASM," regulations like DPDPA and RBI's Cyber Security Framework effectively mandate the outcomes of EASM: comprehensive asset inventory, continuous monitoring, and prevention of unauthorized access.
How does EASM differ from Penetration Testing? Penetration testing is a periodic "point-in-time" check (e.g., once a year). EASM is continuous. It monitors your attack surface 24/7, alerting you to new risks the moment they appear, which is essential in a dynamic threat environment.
Does EASM help with Vendor Risk Management? Yes. Under DPDPA, you are liable for your vendors' security. EASM can scan your vendors' external perimeter to give you an objective score of their security posture, helping you enforce contract compliance.
What is "Shadow IT" in an Indian context? In India, where rapid digitization is common, "Shadow IT" often refers to marketing teams creating campaign microsites or developers spinning up test servers on cloud platforms (like AWS or Azure) without informing the central IT security team. EASM finds these hidden assets.
ThreatNG and External Attack Surface Management in India
ThreatNG provides a robust External Attack Surface Management (EASM) solution that directly addresses the stringent cybersecurity requirements faced by Indian organizations under mandates like the DPDPA 2023 and RBI guidelines. By delivering an "outside-in" view of digital risks, ThreatNG helps organizations identify Shadow IT, secure vulnerable assets, and proactively monitor for threats that could lead to data breaches or regulatory non-compliance.
External Discovery: Solving the Shadow IT Challenge
For Indian enterprises, maintaining a complete asset inventory is a primary challenge and a regulatory requirement. ThreatNG’s External Discovery capability addresses this by performing purely external, unauthenticated discovery without the need for internal connectors or agents.
Uncovering Hidden Assets: ThreatNG automatically identifies subdomains, cloud environments, and digital assets that are often unknown to the central IT team ("Shadow IT"). This capability is essential for complying with RBI’s asset inventory mandates, ensuring that no digital asset operates outside the organization's security governance.
No Integration Friction: Because it operates without agents, ThreatNG can be deployed immediately to scan the vast digital footprints of large Indian conglomerates, identifying "Cloud Exposure" and "exposed open cloud buckets" that are frequent targets for data leaks.
External Assessment: Validating Technical Safeguards
The DPDPA requires the implementation of "technical measures" to protect personal data. ThreatNG’s External Assessment module validates these measures by testing discovered assets against specific, high-risk attack vectors.
Web Application Hijack Susceptibility
This assessment is critical for preventing client-side attacks that can compromise user data. ThreatNG evaluates subdomains for the presence of key security headers, assigning a security rating (A through F) based on their configuration.
Header Analysis: It specifically analyzes subdomains for missing Content-Security-Policy (CSP), HTTP Strict-Transport-Security (HSTS), X-Content-Type, and X-Frame-Options.
Preventing Breaches: By identifying missing CSP headers, ThreatNG helps prevent Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) attacks. Identifying missing HSTS headers helps prevent Man-in-the-Middle attacks. Rectifying these configurations is a direct way to demonstrate "reasonable security safeguards" to Indian regulators.
Subdomain Takeover Susceptibility
Abandoned subdomains are a significant risk for brand reputation and phishing. ThreatNG identifies "dangling DNS" records where a subdomain points to an inactive third-party service.
DNS Enumeration and Vendor Matching: The solution uses DNS enumeration to find CNAME records pointing to external services. It then cross-references these hostnames against a comprehensive Vendor List.
Granular Identification: The assessment checks against specific categories, including Cloud & Infrastructure (e.g., AWS/S3, Microsoft Azure), PaaS & Serverless (e.g., Heroku, Vercel), and CDN/Proxy (e.g., Fastly, Ngrok).
Verification: It performs specific checks to confirm if the resource is truly inactive. Securing these subdomains prevents attackers from hosting malicious content on a legitimate corporate domain, a scenario that triggers reporting obligations under CERT-In.
Reporting: Evidence of Due Diligence
To satisfy audits from the Data Protection Board of India, organizations need clear documentation of their security posture. ThreatNG’s Reporting module generates the necessary artifacts.
Compliance Mapping: The solution creates "External GRC Assessment" reports that map technical findings to governance frameworks. This allows Indian CISOs to view their external risks through the lens of compliance obligations.
Prioritized Documentation: Reports include prioritized risk levels (High, Medium, Low) and security ratings. These documents serve as tangible proof that the organization is actively managing its external attack surface and addressing risks based on severity.
Continuous Monitoring
The Indian threat landscape is dynamic. ThreatNG provides Continuous Monitoring of the external attack surface, ensuring that the organization’s security posture is evaluated in real-time. This allows security teams to detect new vulnerabilities or unauthorized assets the moment they appear, rather than waiting for a periodic audit.
Investigation Modules: Proactive Threat Hunting
ThreatNG goes beyond simple scanning with Investigation Modules that allow teams to hunt for specific threats targeting their brand and data.
Domain Intelligence and DNS Analysis
Web3 Domain Discovery: ThreatNG checks for the registration of decentralized domains (e.g., .eth, .crypto) matching the organization's brand. This prevents impersonators from using these domains for fraud.
Typosquatting Detection: The solution identifies Domain Name Permutations—lookalike domains that have valid mail records. Detecting these is crucial for stopping phishing campaigns targeting Indian consumers.
Sensitive Code Exposure
Public Repository Scanning: ThreatNG searches public code repositories to find Access Credentials and secrets that have been accidentally committed.
Specific Credential Detection: It looks for specific high-value keys such as AWS Access Key IDs, Google OAuth Tokens, and Stripe API Keys. Revoking these keys prevents unauthorized access to the critical infrastructure hosting personal data.
Social Media and Dark Web Monitoring
Information Leakage: The solution monitors platforms like Reddit for employees discussing sensitive internal information ("Narrative Risk").
Credential Dumps: It scans the Dark Web for compromised credentials that could be used to breach the organization's perimeter.
Intelligence Repositories (DarCache)
ThreatNG’s Intelligence Repositories provide context to the discovered risks. By correlating findings with data on Ransomware Groups (e.g., those targeting the Indian financial sector) and Verified Proof-of-Concept Exploits, ThreatNG ensures that teams prioritize the vulnerabilities that are most likely to be weaponized by active threat actors.
Cooperation with Complementary Solutions
ThreatNG functions as a critical intelligence source that enhances the efficacy of the broader cybersecurity stack used by Indian enterprises.
Cooperation with GRC Platforms
ThreatNG cooperates with Governance, Risk, and Compliance (GRC) platforms by automating the collection of external risk data. Instead of relying on manual questionnaires, GRC platforms ingest ThreatNG’s "External GRC Assessment" data to provide a real-time view of compliance with DPDPA and RBI frameworks. This ensures that risk scores reflect reality, not just policy.
Cooperation with SIEM Systems
ThreatNG cooperates with Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) systems by feeding them external threat intelligence. When a SIEM analyzes internal logs, it can cross-reference ThreatNG’s data on Compromised Credentials or Typosquatting Domains. This correlation helps SOC teams distinguish between a routine login failure and a targeted attack using stolen credentials.
Cooperation with Third-Party Risk Management (TPRM)
ThreatNG cooperates with TPRM solutions by validating vendor security. Since DPDPA holds organizations liable for their vendors, TPRM teams use ThreatNG to perform non-intrusive assessments of their supply chain. By analyzing a vendor’s Domain Record and Cloud Exposure, ThreatNG helps TPRM solutions verify if a partner meets the required security standards before a contract is signed.
Cooperation with Vulnerability Management
ThreatNG cooperates with Vulnerability Management systems by prioritizing external risks. It identifies which vulnerabilities are visible to the public internet and correlates them with Known Exploited Vulnerabilities (KEV). This data allows vulnerability management teams to prioritize patching the external-facing assets that pose the greatest risk of a breach, optimizing their response to CERT-In alerts.
