Strengthen your server security: Site24x7’s approach to patching and monitoring
Security is at the forefront of every decision made in the tech space. A key tool in the fight against server attacks is patching. In this article, let us learn how Windows-reliant enterprises secure their servers and VM instances: with patches and Site24x7.
What is a patch?
A patch is an update to a program or application that contains the fixes for vulnerabilities and bugs. Software service providers like Microsoft regularly review their products for critical vulnerabilities, fix them, and roll out patches to their users to protect them from cyberattacks.
When are patches released?
Before we learn about the patch release cycle, let us understand vulnerabilities. Vulnerabilities, in terms of tech talk, refer to gaps and weaknesses in a system that can be exploited by an attacker to perform malicious actions. Cybersecurity professionals and volunteers regularly review software packages and report on them to the respective organization. The organization then reviews the report, and if a vulnerability is found to be valid, the organization fixes it and rolls out a version of the product containing the fix—this is called a patch.
What is Patch Tuesday?
Microsoft, being the leading workstation and server provider for organizations globally, rolls out security updates on the second Tuesday of every month. This allows Windows users to plan their patch routines. So, the second Tuesday of every month got the name Patch Tuesday.
What is the difference between KB and CVE?
When a vulnerability is detected and acknowledged by Microsoft, a unique identifier number is assigned to the vulnerability. This number is called the Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures number, commonly referred to as the CVE number. When the vulnerability is fixed, the patch information is provided in the form of an article that contains information about one or more CVEs. This article is referred to as a knowledge base article, in other words, a KB. The KB is useful in finding the patch package for each CVE.
KB numbers are not sequential. For example, KB1002 could be released before KB1001.
Some recent critical CVEs
Q4 2024 has been a busy quarter for Microsoft's security team—they have patched more than 80 IT-security related bugs and rolled out the fixes. Let us look at three important patches that were rolled out recently.
- CVE-2024-43498: This vulnerability has a severity rating of 9.8 (on a scale of one to 10). Due to this vulnerability, any remote attacker can send a customized request to a vulnerable .NET web application or desktop application without any authentication.
- CVE-2024-43639: This vulnerability, which gives unauthorized remote code execution access to attackers, was detected in Windows Kerberos, the authentication protocol widely used in Windows domain networks.
- CVE-2024-43451: NTLM hashes are used for authentication in Windows servers, workstations, and devices. If an NTLM hash is stolen, it can be used to perform pass-the-hash attacks, where an attacker mimics a valid user without authentication credentials or even logging in.
How does Site24x7 secure millions of servers worldwide?
Our server monitoring tool has been fortifying cybersecurity efforts for thousands of enterprises by alerting system administrators promptly whenever there is an update available for Windows devices. With our Windows update monitor, you can get critical updates on:
- The number of and details about critical updates.
- The number of and details about security updates.
- The details about each update from different sources (e.g., Microsoft, Dell, Intel, and more).
- The relevant KB link for each update.
And much more vital information.
Armed with these significant particulars, you can apply patches promptly to your servers and other Windows devices. Site24x7 saves you time spent checking the compatibility of the available patches from Microsoft with your devices. Site24x7 displays only the updates that are required for and compatible with the monitored device.
Watch over your servers with Site24x7
With our lightweight yet robust enterprise-grade server monitoring agent, you have easy access to every single patch available for your server's configuration. Information is not just limited to the updates available—you also get key metrics like availability and performance of the CPU, memory, disk, services, processes, and much more. Try Site24x7's server monitoring suite now.
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