What is attack surface reduction?

The attack surface for an organization is comprised of all possible attack vectors that can be used by attackers to gain unauthorized access to the assets or data owned by that organization. It usually involves exploiting vulnerabilities or abusing weaknesses and loopholes in the places and resources owned or accessed by the organization.

ASR is a process of minimizing the ways in which attackers can perform successful intrusion attacks on protected assets. In fact, preventing assets from getting compromised and minimizing the extent of the impact in the case of a successful compromise are the two primary responsibilities of ASR. The mitigations used as part of this process sometimes lead to limited acceptable impact on the capacity and usability of the assets being protected. Nevertheless, ASR remains one of the most fundamental requirements for maintaining a strong security posture and is often seen as the first line of defense against many attacks...