The first step in the C.V.I.P²-A framework. We identify every externally visible system tied to your organization, from domains and IP addresses to cloud services and forgotten infrastructure, giving you a complete map of your internet-facing exposure before an attacker finds it first.
Every organization has a digital footprint, whether you realize it or not. Your website, email servers, cloud storage, remote access tools, third-party integrations, and payment processing systems are all visible from the internet. Together, these make up your external attack surface: the collection of entry points that an attacker can see and potentially exploit from outside your network.
The Cyber Threat Surface Overview is an external reconnaissance engagement designed to discover and catalog all of these assets. We scan your domains, IP ranges, and cloud environments to build a comprehensive inventory of everything that's exposed, including the systems your own IT team may not know about.
"You cannot protect what you cannot see. The Cyber Threat Surface Overview gives your organization baseline visibility, the foundation that everything else in a security program is built on."
During the Cyber Threat Surface Overview, our team identifies and catalogs the following categories of externally visible assets. These are the same types of information that real threat actors gather during the reconnaissance phase of an attack, except we find them first and help you close the gaps.
The engagement follows a structured methodology that combines automated scanning tools with manual intelligence gathering. We use the same reconnaissance techniques that real-world attackers rely on: passive information collection, active discovery, and risk analysis. The difference is that we do it on your behalf, with your authorization, to strengthen your defenses.
We start by gathering publicly available information about your digital presence without touching your systems. This includes DNS records, WHOIS data, certificate transparency logs, public archives, and search engine indexing. This phase reveals how much an attacker can learn about you without sending a single packet to your network.
With authorization, we perform targeted scans of your domain space and IP ranges to identify live hosts, open ports, running services, and the technologies powering your external-facing systems. This is where shadow IT surfaces: the cloud instances, test servers, and third-party services that aren't in your asset inventory.
Each discovered asset is evaluated for exposure risk using CVSS (Common Vulnerability Scoring System) methodology. We separate genuine threats from known, acceptable exposures so your team isn't overwhelmed with noise. Instead, you receive a clear, prioritized picture of what actually needs attention.
You receive a comprehensive external asset inventory with risk highlights, built for two audiences: a non-technical executive summary for leadership that explains what's exposed and why it matters, and a detailed technical reference your IT team can act on immediately. We also include a recommended path forward within the C.V.I.P²-A framework based on what we found.
The Cyber Threat Surface Overview is intentionally positioned as Module C, the first module in the C.V.I.P²-A framework, because everything else depends on knowing what you have. You can't run a meaningful Vulnerability Assessment if you don't know which systems to scan. You can't build an effective threat intelligence program if you don't know what assets are exposed. And you certainly can't prepare for a penetration test if you haven't mapped the terrain first.
This is also why we price it as a flat-rate $1,500 engagement regardless of company size. Whether you're a single-location dental office or a multi-state financial institution, establishing baseline visibility into your attack surface is the foundational first step. We keep the barrier to entry low because every organization deserves to understand their exposure.
Any organization that depends on technology to operate, and that includes virtually every business today. This assessment is especially critical for organizations in regulated industries where compliance frameworks explicitly require understanding your external risk environment:
Complete the form and a Grey Team Foundation security advisor will reach out to discuss mapping your digital exposure.
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