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Patch Management Checklist

This month’s Patch Tuesday reminded us all of the criticality of patching. Microsoft, Adobe and Oracle delivered a slew of patches providing “critical updates” to numerous vulnerabilities. Our dynamic and complex IT environments mandate the need for effective patching, and multiple operating systems, new attack vectors and threats from malware-exposed vendor applications make the challenge even harder. But given the need to effectively patch across your entire infrastructure, from the operating system to the application layer, it’s no surprise that a patchwork approach to patch management simply won’t cut it.

Many organizations struggle to keep up with disjointed manual patching methods that they think are their last resort. To simplify the process, your patch management solution should be:

Automated, eliminating time consuming and error prone manual patching chores
Centralized, providing a single patch management point for both applications and operating systems
Reliable, including third party assessment that patches are indeed effective
Compliant, delivering comprehensive reporting that meets patch auditing requirements

Want to know more about making the patch management process easier? Read the recent white paper, "Patch Management 2.0: Evolving Your Patch Management Technology to Combat Growing Security Challenges" — /resources/Patch-Management-2.0. It will help you understand how patch management has evolved, and how new tools can help identify and remediate new vulnerabilities.

Sincerely,

Wynn White [Signature]