Black Kite’s Contributions
In 2024, Black Kite continued to lead the way in enhancing third-party risk management (TPRM) through innovative tools and actionable intelligence. As organizations faced unprecedented challenges in navigating complex vendor ecosystems, Black Kite’s solutions provided much-needed clarity and resilience.
By combining advanced monitoring capabilities with a deep understanding of systemic risks, Black Kite enabled organizations to prioritize vendor risks, streamline mitigation efforts, and strengthen their overall cybersecurity posture. This section explores Black Kite’s key contributions, including game-changing tools like FocusTagsTM and proactive monitoring efforts that supported TPRM professionals in mitigating threats and securing their supply chains.
FocusTags™: A Game-Changing Tool for Vendor Risk Management
Black Kite’s FocusTags™ emerged as a cornerstone of effective third-party risk management in 2024, providing organizations with actionable insights to identify and address vendor risks. By offering targeted intelligence tailored to specific vulnerabilities, FocusTags enabled TPRM professionals to respond quickly and decisively to emerging threats.
Key Examples of FocusTags™ in Action:
Change Healthcare Client Tags:
These tags provided critical insights for healthcare organizations to identify vulnerabilities linked to their vendor ecosystem, helping mitigate risks during high-profile ransomware incidents.
Snowflake Client Tags:
Enabled organizations to assess and address risks stemming from Snowflake-related vulnerabilities, safeguarding sensitive data and minimizing operational disruptions.
CrowdStrike Client Tags:
Supported clients in maintaining resilience during the unexpected CrowdStrike Falcon outage, ensuring proactive management of potential downstream vulnerabilities.
Cleo File Transfer FocusTags™:
These tags proved instrumental during the Cleo File Transfer ransomware campaign, helping organizations identify at-risk vendors and implement rapid mitigation strategies to prevent further breaches.
Blue Yonder Client Tags:
These tags allowed one client to discover potential compromises within their own network, highlighting the value of actionable intelligence in uncovering hidden risks.
FocusTags not only streamlined risk identification but also facilitated better communication and collaboration with vendors. By prioritizing risks based on timely data, organizations could allocate resources more effectively and ensure critical vulnerabilities were addressed promptly. As a result, FocusTags™ played a vital role in strengthening supply chain security and enhancing overall resilience.
Proactive Monitoring and Intelligence for TPRM
In addition to FocusTags™, Black Kite offers a suite of tools designed to proactively monitor and manage third-party risks, ensuring rapid response to disruptive events and long-term resilience.
Supply Chain Module
Black Kite’s Supply Chain module provides comprehensive visibility into third-party ecosystems, enabling organizations to map vendor relationships, assess concentration risks, and monitor supply chain vulnerabilities. This module is particularly valuable during large-scale incidents, allowing organizations to identify critical dependencies and implement targeted mitigations.
Black Kite Bridge™
A collaborative platform that streamlines vendor outreach and remediation efforts. By integrating with FocusTags™, Black Kite Bridge™ enables organizations to share actionable intelligence with vendors efficiently, ensuring that vulnerabilities are addressed promptly. This tool fosters improved communication and collaboration, critical during fast-moving incidents like ransomware campaigns.
Proactive Cyber Risk Assessments
- Ransomware Susceptibility Index (RSI): Provides predictive insights into a vendor’s likelihood of falling victim to ransomware attacks, empowering organizations to prioritize high-risk relationships.
- Cyber Rating: Offers a clear, quantifiable view of a vendor’s overall cybersecurity posture, facilitating informed decision-making in vendor selection and monitoring.
- Compliance Module: Maps vendors’ security practices against regulatory frameworks, ensuring alignment with standards like GDPR, HIPAA, and DORA.
- Financial Cyber Risk Quantification: Translates cybersecurity risks into financial metrics, helping organizations understand the potential economic impact of third-party vulnerabilities.
Together, these tools provide TPRM professionals with a powerful ecosystem to address emerging threats. By leveraging the synergy of FocusTags™, the Supply Chain module, Black Kite Bridge™, and other advanced features, organizations can rapidly respond to disruptive events, proactively monitor their third parties, and build a resilient foundation for managing third-party risks.
A Multidimensional View of Risk
Key Contributions to TPRM
Black Kite’s comprehensive suite of tools and proactive approach to third-party risk management (TPRM) significantly enhanced cybersecurity resilience for organizations in 2024. Key contributions include:
Actionable Intelligence through FocusTags™
- Black Kite’s FocusTags provided targeted insights to identify and mitigate vendor-specific risks.
- Examples such as Cleo File Transfer, Snowflake Client, and CrowdStrike Client Tags demonstrated their ability to address critical vulnerabilities and streamline remediation efforts.
Best Practices for Black Kite Customers:
Analyze New CVEs:
Determine if the vulnerability affects enough vendors to justify a campaign. Assess whether the vulnerability presents an actual risk based on factors such as CVSS score, EPSS likelihood, Known Exploited Vulnerabilities (KEV) status, availability of a Proof of Concept (POC), or active use in the wild.
Streamline Notification and Response:
If the vulnerability is actionable, notify affected vendors through Black Kite Bridge™, enabling direct vendor responses and tracking remediation progress. If not immediately actionable, add vendors to a watch list and monitor for changes in the vulnerability status.
Plan for Potential Disruptions:
For critical vulnerabilities, assess the potential impact on key vendors and incorporate this intelligence into business continuity planning, ensuring readiness for possible future disruptions.
Proactive Monitoring and Collaboration:
- Tools like the Supply Chain module and Black Kite Bridge™ enabled organizations to map dependencies, monitor threats, and engage vendors effectively.
- These capabilities were essential in mitigating cascading risks during disruptive events, ensuring rapid response and minimizing operational downtime.
Best Practices for Black Kite Customers:
Use Critical FocusTags™ for Impactful Events:
- Leverage critical FocusTags™ to understand downstream implications during large-scale breaches. For example, assess connections to breach victims and evaluate whether your organization’s data is impacted.
Proactively Communicate with Vendors:
- Set clear expectations upfront to keep them informed about current and emerging risks.
- Enable vendors to interact directly with Black Kite data, helping them stay informed and actively update their profiles in the platform.
Incorporate Black Kite into Vendor Onboarding:
- Make Black Kite a central part of your vendor onboarding process. Establishing this practice early builds a habit of engagement and aligns vendors with your risk management strategy, improving response and remediation efforts.
Comprehensive Risk Assessment Frameworks:
- Black Kite’s Ransomware Susceptibility Index® (RSI™), Cyber Rating, Compliance, and Financial Cyber Risk Quantification (CRQ) allowed organizations to anticipate risks, measure their impact, and align with regulatory standards.
- These frameworks provided a proactive and holistic approach to third-party risk management.
Best Practices for Black Kite Customers:
Use a Tiered Approach:
- Implement a tiered system to guide thresholds and assessment criteria, bringing efficiency to the risk management process.
- Define tiers to determine the scope of engagement:
- Critical/Tier 1 Vendors: Require in-depth reviews.
- Lower Tier Vendors: Streamline assessments and automate decisions using RSI and DBI for a Pass/Fail approach.
Leverage Automation with Our AI Parser:
- Use the parser to assess the "inside-out" view and compare findings with Black Kite Intelligence.
- Ensure adherence to frameworks and standards.
- Pre-fill questionnaire responses and only follow up on identified gaps, reducing the back-and-forth of questionnaire management.
Prioritize FocusTags™ and RSI™ for Threat Management:
- Address current and emerging threats through:
- Remediation: Mitigate vulnerabilities.
- Risk Transfer: Use cyber insurance to manage exposure.
- Risk Acceptance/Assignment: Leverage FAIR to assign or accept risks appropriately.
Monitor and Adapt:
- Use RSITM alerts based on tier thresholds to track changes and address issues promptly.
- Continuously monitor RSI and resolve arising FocusTags to stay ahead of risks.
By integrating these tools and strategies, Black Kite empowered organizations to navigate the complex threat landscape of 2024, enhancing their ability to secure supply chains, reduce vulnerabilities, and build long-term resilience.
Case Studies: Successful Mitigations and Responses
The challenges of 2024 provided valuable opportunities to examine how organizations effectively navigated complex cyber incidents. By leveraging innovative tools and fostering strong partnerships, several organizations managed to mitigate risks and respond effectively to breaches. Below are three case studies highlighting such successes:
- Cleo File Transfer Ransomware Attack: A Fortune 40 retailer partnered with Black Kite to promptly identify vendors associated with Cleo vulnerabilities. Using actionable intelligence, the company initiated a critical vulnerability campaign, mitigating potential risks even before the issue gained wider attention. This proactive approach minimized operational disruptions and aligned cybersecurity actions with leadership objectives.
- CrowdStrike Outage: During an unexpected outage of CrowdStrike’s Falcon platform, a customer utilized Black Kite’s FocusTags™ to respond to the potential loss of services and plan accordingly. The real-time insights enabled the organization to act quickly, maintain operational resilience, and mitigate the impact of the disruption on their operations.
- Blue Yonder Client Tags: One of Black Kite’s clients leveraged Blue Yonder Client Tags to identify potential compromises within their own network. This timely discovery allowed the organization to address security
These case studies demonstrate the importance of proactive threat intelligence, strong vendor collaboration, and the strategic use of cybersecurity tools. Organizations that embraced these practices in 2024 were better positioned to mitigate the cascading effects of cyber incidents.