Last year, nearly 60% of cyber compromises were directly attributable to unpatched vulnerabilities – flaws that organizations knew about but hadn’t remediated in time. The problem with traditional vulnerability management (VM) approaches is they treat every finding equally, leaving security teams drowning in noise and fighting to sort serious risks from low-level tasks.

This is where Risk-Based Vulnerability Management (RVBM) comes in. These tools are sometimes overlooked, but they shouldn’t be. When done effectively, RBVM can transform your security program into a measurable, risk-aligned business enabler.

Pitfalls of traditional vulnerability management

According to Verizon’s Data Breach Investigations Report (DBIR), there’s been a 34% jump in vulnerability exploitation since 2024, with the average patch time taking 209 days. Organizations find themselves forced into a reactive posture: scrambling to “fix everything” rather than systematically reducing the greatest risk.

• Alert overload: Security teams face thousands of scan results every month, many of which never see the light of a patch. This continuous stream of new threats can cause alert fatigue, where an ‘alert’ is anything but alarming.
• Manual triage bottlenecks: With finite resources, manual prioritization delays remediation. There can be days or weeks between vulnerability discovery and patch deployment.
• Blind spots in cloud & shadow IT: Rapidly evolving cloud infrastructures and unsanctioned apps slip through traditional scan-and-patch cycles, creating hidden entry points for attackers. An incomplete asset inventory means hidden vulnerabilities.
• Lack of resources for remediation: Few security teams have the resources to deal with every vulnerability, as soon as it comes in. So how to know where to focus the most bang for your buck?

Where does Risk-Based Vulnerability Management (RBVM) come in?

Risk-Based Vulnerability Management shifts the focus from sheer volume to addressing risks with the most business impact. It predicts the likelihood of a vulnerability being exploited and helps focus attention on the true risks to the organization. This reduces the overall workload of security teams and increases their efficacy, keeping organizations ahead of threat actors.

RBVM combines:

1. Asset criticality: Which systems house your crown-jewel data?
2. Exploitability: Which vulnerabilities are most likely to see real-world attacks?
3. Threat context: What’s happening in the wild today?

By scoring vulnerabilities on these dimensions, RBVM surfaces the handful of issues that pose the highest risk. It helps SecOps teams to remediate in days, not weeks, by reducing noise and giving tactical clarity:

• Prioritization based on real-world risk from threat intelligence
• Centralizes all network, cloud, and app scans for comprehensive visibility
• Provides clear, actionable insights and trends across the entire organization
• Assign resources to the most critical areas

CVSS scores aren’t the same as actual risk

The problem with CVSS is it’s a static, theoretical score based on vulnerability characteristics (e.g. attack vector, complexity). The RBVM perspective is that severity is one dimension of risk, but not the whole picture. RBVM empowers your security teams to act faster and smarter by focusing remediation on what truly matters: threats that are exploitable, relevant, and impactful to your business.

• A low CVSS score risk could still be actively exploited and used in campaigns. For example, traditional VM classed the Fortinet vulnerability as moderate severity (7.2), whereas Outpost24’s OutscanNX correctly prioritized the Fortinet vulnerability based on real-world threat activity and exposure with a critical risk score of 84/100 and flagged it for immediate patching.
• A vulnerability with a high CVSS score might never actually be exploited in the wild. For example, traditional VM categorized OpenSSL DoS as high risk based on a CVSS score of 7.5. The OutscanNX risk score (46/100) identified it as low risk to internal services and there were no active exploits in the wild.

How Outpost24’s OutscanNX empowers RBVM

Outpost24’s Risk-Based Vulnerability Management solution, OutscanNX, turns vulnerability management from a compliance checkbox into a strategic driver of cyber resilience:

• Continuous vulnerability discovery: Gain full visibility across networks, cloud environments (AWS, Azure), and Shadow IT portfolios. No blind spots permitted.
• Threat intelligence-led scoring: Use real-world exploit data to dynamically re-prioritize your backlog, reducing false positives and sharpening focus on imminent threats.
• Scanning-less “Delta” snapshots: Between full scans, receive instant alerts if new vulnerabilities emerge or configurations drift, ensuring minimal exposure windows.
• Intuitive risk dashboard: Communicate progress to executives with solution-based reporting, customized alerts, and easy export to PDF, Excel, or XML for both technical and business audiences.
• Seamless integrations: Streamline workflows with connectors for IAM, PAM, SIEM, ticketing systems, and CMDBs for automating ticket creation and handoffs.

Best practices for getting the most from RBVM

These practices ensure that RBVM becomes a living process—continually adapting to new threats and evolving business demands.

1. Maintain an accurate asset inventory: RBVM relies on knowing what you own. Automate discovery across on-prem, cloud, and SaaS.
2. Customize your risk policies: Tune scoring thresholds and business-context rules so that the dashboard reflects your organization’s unique risk appetite.
3. Bridge security & DevOps: Embed prioritized fix tickets into your CI/CD pipelines to accelerate remediation and foster collaboration.

Try OutscanNX today

Stop drowning in vulnerability noise and start fixing what matters. Discover how OutscanNX can help you reduce business risk, streamline compliance, and take a proactive stance against the next breach. Get a live demo of Outpost24’s OutscanNX and see how your team can focus on the critical few. It’s simple to deploy as a SaaS, hybrid, or on-prem solution. Request your demo today.