A compliance audit shows your customers exactly what measures you have in place to keep their data and assets safe. Given that trust is such a crucial aspect of customer relationships, the quality and efficiency of your compliance audit is more important than ever. ‍ A-LIGN, one of Vanta’s technology-enabled security and compliance partners, recently released its 2024 Compliance Benchmark Report, based on an annual survey of nearly 700 business leaders and compliance professionals.

In today's digital landscape, trust is paramount. Customers want to know that their data is secure and that they can rely on the companies they do business with. ‍ One of the best ways to provide this assurance is through a well-crafted, up-to-date Trust Center. But what exactly should go into a Trust Center? How easy are they to maintain, and how much manual work do they save security teams?

Vanta was founded on a mission to secure the internet and protect consumer data. We got our start in 2018 by automating compliance with information security frameworks like SOC 2, making it faster and easier for companies to demonstrate their security and unblock revenue.

It's never been more important for organizations to demonstrate their security practices in order to win the trust of customers. ‍ Historically, companies have used static web pages to demonstrate their security posture. And while these can act as helpful marketing tools, these pages don't provide enough evidence for customers to evaluate a vendor’s security program. This leads to lengthy email threads and manual processes in order to manage incoming customer requests. ‍

There are several steps your organization must take to protect itself from potentially exploitable packages. First, you’ll need to carefully review and triage the package vulnerabilities that present risk to your organization, then you’ll need to patch each one. Patching a package may sound easy, but doing so without breaking your product can be tricky. ‍ Before patching, you may review the changelog between versions. Opening the changelog, however, could further the patch dread.

Continuous controls monitoring (CCM) is a crucial aspect of making GRC processes more automated, accurate, and actionable through technology. It helps organizations transition from inefficient point-in-time checks to automation-driven compliance controls that provide a real-time view into their security posture. That’s why many proactive risk management teams are already prioritizing control automation for their GRC program.

According to Vanta’s 2023 State of Trust Report, respondents spend an average of nine working weeks per year on security compliance. ‍ Some security teams have accepted that governance, risk, and compliance (GRC) will inevitably take tons of time and effort. And many continue to work towards small-scale efficiencies because they don’t believe anything better is possible. ‍ But there’s a better option for today’s businesses: GRC automation.

For many teams, managing governance, risk, and compliance (GRC) is still a very manual process. As a security leader, you might be wondering how to future-proof and scale your GRC program when so much of your team’s time is spent on collecting screenshots or copying and pasting information from one spreadsheet to another. ‍ The future of GRC management doesn’t have to be more of the same though.

This month’s Vanta updates: ‍ ‍