Vulnerability Assessment (VA)

A vulnerability assessment is a largely automated check of your systems for known weaknesses, such as missing security updates, unsafe settings and outdated software. Attackers look for exactly these gaps, often with the same kind of tools. A regular assessment lets you find and close them first, across every server, cloud account and application you run.

What a VA does, and what it leaves out

A VA tells you which weaknesses exist and how serious each one is. It does not try to break in. That is the job of a penetration test, where experts actively exploit weaknesses to show what an attacker could really do.

A common pattern is to run a VA every quarter for breadth, and a penetration test once or twice a year for depth. If you want both in a single engagement, choose VAPT.

Who usually asks for it

IT and security teams use VA to keep a steady baseline of their exposure. Auditors often ask for recent results as evidence that patching and configuration controls work. It is also a sensible first step for an organization that has never tested its systems and wants to know where it stands.

How we carry it out

First we build an inventory with you: servers, network devices, cloud accounts and applications, and how important each one is to the business.

Then we scan. Where possible we use login credentials, so the tools can see inside each system instead of only knocking on the door. We use tools such as Nessus, Qualys and OpenVAS, and compare configurations against CIS Benchmarks (published hardening guides for common systems). Our analysts check the results by hand to remove false alarms, and link each finding to its public CVE or CWE reference.

Finally we rank the findings. We weigh the CVSS severity score, the OWASP Risk Rating, whether a working exploit is publicly available and how critical the affected system is. A medium-rated flaw on your payment server can matter more than a high-rated one on a test machine.

What lands on your desk

  • An executive summary of your exposure and, on repeat assessments, how it has changed over time.
  • A checked list of findings with severity, affected systems and fix guidance.
  • Tickets exported to your issue tracker, so the work can be assigned.
  • A retest of the items your team has fixed.

Reporting is mapped to ISO/IEC 27001:2022, SOC 2 and PCI DSS. You can run a VA once, every quarter or continuously. Request a vulnerability assessment proposal to agree which systems to cover and how often.