Attack Surface Management: State of the Art and Operational Challenges

In this paper, we approach the topic of ASM, place the task in the context of cybersecurity operations, review the current methods, and discuss their issues and challenges. We outline an ASM pipeline consisting of common tasks and review the usability of the existing tools. We pinpoint a trade-off between the scope and precision of the existing tools that should be considered, namely in medium to large networks. Finally, we formulate and discuss the issues and challenges for emerging network environments, including those involving IoT or OT, volatile environments, or extensive use of cloud computing. Each of these emerging technologies brings novel issues that need to be approached by ASM, be it improved fingerprinting in IoT and OT, precisely timed scans in volatile environments, or coverage of external services in the cloud.