What is Attack Path Analysis?

Attack Path Analysis (APA) is a cybersecurity methodology that identifies and visualizes the sequence of vulnerabilities, misconfigurations, permissions, and trust relationships an attacker could exploit to move from an initial entry point to a critical asset. Rather than evaluating risks individually, APA shows how multiple exposures can be chained together to create a viable attack route.

Why is Attack Path Analysis important?

Traditional security tools often identify vulnerabilities in isolation. Attack Path Analysis provides the context needed to understand which exposures can actually lead to a breach. By revealing how attackers could move through an environment, APA helps security teams prioritize remediation efforts based on real-world risk rather than severity scores alone.

How is Attack Path Analysis different from Vulnerability Management?

Vulnerability Management focuses on identifying and remediating known vulnerabilities such as CVEs. Attack Path Analysis goes a step further by analyzing how vulnerabilities, identities, misconfigurations, and connectivity combine into exploitable attack chains.

Vulnerability Management answers:

What vulnerabilities exist?
Attack Path Analysis answers:
How could an attacker use them to reach critical assets?

What is the difference between an attack path, attack surface, and attack vector?

An attack surface is the set of assets, services, identities, and interfaces that could be targeted.

An attack vector is the specific method used to gain access, such as phishing, credential theft, or exploiting a vulnerability.

An attack path is the complete sequence of steps an attacker follows from initial access to a target asset by combining multiple attack vectors and exposures.

How does Attack Path Analysis work?

Attack Path Analysis builds an attack graph using data from assets, vulnerabilities, identities, network relationships, cloud configurations, and threat intelligence. It then analyzes potential paths that attackers could use to move through the environment and reach critical assets. Modern APA platforms continuously update these paths as the environment changes.

What types of risks can Attack Path Analysis identify?

Attack Path Analysis can identify:

Vulnerability-based attack paths
Identity and privilege escalation paths
Cloud misconfiguration paths
Hybrid cloud-to-on-premises attack paths
Lateral movement opportunities
Excessive permissions and trust relationships
Routes to critical business assets

Can Attack Path Analysis identify cloud security risks?

Yes. Modern APA solutions analyze cloud-specific exposures such as misconfigured storage, excessive IAM permissions, exposed services, and cross-account trust relationships. They also map how cloud exposures can connect to identities, workloads, and sensitive data to create exploitable attack paths.

Why are identity-based attack paths important?

Many modern attacks rely on compromised credentials, excessive permissions, and trust relationships rather than solely on software vulnerabilities. Identity-based attack paths reveal how attackers can escalate privileges, move laterally, and gain access to sensitive resources through identity systems such as Active Directory, Entra ID, Okta, and cloud IAM platforms.

How does Attack Path Analysis support Zero Trust?

Zero Trust is based on the principle of "never trust, always verify." Attack Path Analysis helps organizations identify excessive trust relationships, unintended access paths, and over-permissioned accounts that violate Zero Trust principles. This enables teams to implement more effective segmentation and least-privilege controls.

How does Attack Path Analysis align with MITRE ATT&CK?

Attack Path Analysis and MITRE ATT&CK complement each other. MITRE ATT&CK documents real-world adversary tactics and techniques, while APA shows where those techniques could be used within an organization's environment. Mapping attack paths to ATT&CK techniques helps security teams prioritize detection, prevention, and remediation efforts.

How does Attack Path Analysis support CTEM?

Attack Path Analysis is a foundational capability within Continuous Threat Exposure Management (CTEM). It helps organizations discover exposures, prioritize risk based on exploitability and business impact, validate findings in context, and focus remediation efforts on the attack paths most likely to be exploited.

What are chokepoints in Attack Path Analysis?

A chokepoint is a system, identity, permission, or relationship that appears in multiple attack paths. Remediating a chokepoint can disrupt numerous attack paths simultaneously, making it one of the most efficient ways to reduce risk.

What are the biggest challenges of implementing Attack Path Analysis?

Common challenges include:

Incomplete asset visibility
Poor data quality
Cloud and identity complexity
Modeling large-scale environments
Maintaining up-to-date attack graphs
Operationalizing remediation across multiple teams

Organizations with strong asset inventory and exposure management programs typically achieve better APA outcomes.

Can Attack Path Analysis reduce remediation workload?

Yes. By identifying the exposures that contribute to actual attack paths, APA helps teams focus on the vulnerabilities and misconfigurations that matter most. This reduces remediation noise and enables security teams to prioritize actions with the greatest impact on risk reduction.

How does Qualys Attack Path Analysis work?

Qualys Attack Path Analysis is integrated into the Qualys Enterprise TruRisk™ Management platform. It combines vulnerability data, asset context, identity relationships, cloud security posture, and threat intelligence to identify, prioritize, and visualize attack paths across hybrid environments.

Using TruRisk™, Qualys helps organizations focus remediation efforts on the attack paths most likely to impact the business.

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