What Are Best Practices for Patch Management – A Step-by-Step Guide

At its core, patch management is the process of ensuring that your software is as up to date and free from vulnerabilities. Cybercriminals are always looking for new ways to exploit weaknesses within your IT environment, so the best thing you can to prevent breaches is to ‘patch’ up those weak points before attackers get the chance to exploit them.

If every software provider you use shares patches as needed, it can quickly become overwhelming. Effective patch management helps to ensure that computers and networks are kept secure, reliable, and are up to date with all features and functionality required of them.

Patch management is an essential aspect of documenting compliance with security and privacy regulations. It can lead to noticeable improvements in performance and can be used to update software to work with the latest hardware. 

In this article we’ll explore why patch management is so valuable, what the process of implementation involves, and what the best patch management practices are.

What Is Patch Management, And Why Does It Matter? 

Patch management is the continual process of mitigating vulnerabilities in your environment by ensuring that applications, servers, and other systems stay up to date. This requires the identification, acquisition, testing, and deployment of software updates, otherwise known as patches, to fix these security vulnerabilities.

Leaving systems unpatched can leave them vulnerable to both known and unknown exploits, increasing the odds of a security breach incident. Common areas addressed by patches include operating systems, applications, and firmware, with the threats that they aim to mitigate include malware, ransomware, and general data breaches.

Out-dated software is a common target for attackers, making unpatched systems a significant security risk. However, manually checking every application across every endpoint in an organization’s environment isn’t an effective use of time, especially considering how quickly the threat landscape can shift. Organizations are advised to implement a patch management solution to take on this task. 

Timings

The timing of deploying patches is also very important as deploying them too late can leave systems vulnerable to exploits, while deploying them too soon – without carrying out the necessary tests – can introduce bugs or compatibility issues. 

Effective patch management needs to find the balance between security, system stability, and business continuity; this is where patch management solutions come in handy. A good path management solution should support patch timing optimization via automated patch scheduling, the prioritization of critical updates, and by allowing phased rollouts to keep disruptions to a minimal. 

They should also provide testing environments where patches can be tested to ensure they do not negatively impact operations before they are rolled out. By strategically timing patches, organizations can reduce security risks while maintaining system stability and operational efficiency.

Steps For Implementing Patch Management 

By following these steps, organizations can ensure a secure, efficient, and well-managed patching process:

1. Assess requirements 
   • Ensure that your patch management solution is allowed sufficient access to your applications and systems.
   • The pain points that a well-executed patch management program can address will depend on your organization’s specific environment and needs. 
   • If your organization already has a patch management program in place, identify any areas of improvement.
2. Take inventory of assets 
   • This involves understanding what types of applications, operating systems, and devices are running in your organization’s environment, including which versions these items are running.
   • It’s also important to be aware of how many users, software licenses, and endpoints are in your organization.
   • Be sure to prioritize coverage for most critical systems.
3. Create policies 
   • Next you should determine how often patches need to be deployed.
   • This means delegating responsibility to team members in charge of running patch management programs, ensuring that they are trained on your organization’s policies and procedures.
   • Have a plan of action prepared for different scenarios such as routine maintenance, emergency patching, and assets becoming obsolete over time.
4. Select a patch management solution
   • Select a solution that adheres to all of the requirements that you have identified in the previous sections.
5. Roll out patch management solution 
   • When trialing a new solution, it’s suggested to deploy it to a test environment first.
   • Once the solution has been tested and tweaked to suit your organization’s needs, it can be rolled out across your organization.
   • Patch management tools should  allow automation to deploy patches efficiently.
6. Monitor and adjust 
   • Patch management isn’t one-and-done; it’s an ongoing process.
   • If any issues arise, teams should be able to adjust their policies or pivot their patch management strategy.

Best Practices For Patch Management 

These are the key principles that NIST’s recommendations for enterprise patch management planning support: 

• Risk responses, including patching, will never be 100% perfect. Some patches may inadvertently cause operational problems, but most will not. It is wise to keep an eye on systems after a new patch has been introduced to identify any unintended consequences.
• Conducting a risk assessment of each new vulnerability to plan the optimal risk response for it is simply not feasible. Planning needs to be done in advance so that when a new vulnerability is identified, a decision can quickly be made about how to respond to it. Time is often a critical factor, so the more prepared you are the better.
• Automation is also needed for emergency situations, like patching a severe vulnerability that attackers are actively exploiting. Having automation in place gives an organization agility and scalability when it comes to its risk responses.
• Some of the changes that an organization may need to make could take months or even years to put in place, but that does not mean that other practices cannot be improved in the meantime.

To read more related articles on patch management from Expert Insights, why not take a look at the following articles: 

• The Top Patch Management Software for Business 
• The Top RMM Solutions for MSPs 
• The Top Remote Management Tools For Windows