A false positive is an alert that a detective and protection software generates when legitimate activity is classified as an attack.

This may not seem as harmful as a false negative, but it can be detrimental in the long term. In the short term, it can result in a website, file, or item being quarantined, blocked, or deleted and in the long term lead to alert fatigue and ignoring alarms. Like “The Boy Who Cried Wolf”, the problem is liars are not believed even when they speak the truth.

False positives can also occur easily in attack surface management when assets are incorrectly attributed to an attack surface. In these cases it’s important to have a facility for vetting these and excluding them from future assessments.

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Improve Attack Surface Visibility While Reducing False Positives

Join Meir Asiskovich, VP of Product at CyCognito, as he demonstrates how your Security team can build a more streamlined and focused attack surface visibility program that eliminates this noise, prioritizing risks based on their business impact, discoverability, and exploitability intelligence.

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CyCognito Report

State of External Exposure Management, 2024 Edition

State of External Exposure Management Report

Critical vulnerabilities often hide in plain sight—especially in your web servers.

The report is a must-read for understanding today’s external risks and how to prioritize them effectively. Download the report to stay ahead of emerging threats and strengthen your security posture for 2025.