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Maintaining an organized set of IT assets is a continuous challenge. If users can’t easily find the assets they need, production bottlenecks may occur. If your IT team can’t keep track of what the organization is paying for, cost inefficiencies pile up. And if you don’t know what’s on your network, you can’t ensure that your network is secure. All of these unknowns make it hard to optimize your resources and make good decisions.
To manage your IT asset inventory effectively, you must first identify all the assets your organization has. This process is called discovery, and it’s the first step toward optimizing IT asset management (ITAM) for security and scalability.
IT Asset Discovery Definition and Importance
IT asset discovery is the process of identifying and organizing all the IT assets an organization uses. The result is a full inventory of software applications, databases, physical devices, cloud services, and more. This crucial first step is vital for pursuing a successful ITAM strategy.
Key Components of IT Asset Discovery
The process of IT asset discovery typically relies on a purpose-built software tool. The tool scans your network looking for individual assets and their specifications. Then it categorizes them according to those characteristics.
Some of the basic categories you may sort IT assets into during the discovery process include:
- What assets need management. Assets should be categorized according to their type. For example, mobile devices and endpoints may be in a separate category than software licenses.
- Where assets are located. Knowing where assets reside is a key goal of IT asset management. The question of “where” applies equally to physical geography, business function, and software environments.
- How assets function. This important component lets you define interdependencies between assets. For instance, you may group software licenses with the drivers necessary to run the software.
Examples of IT Assets
Anything that has value to your organization is an asset. IT assets are a subcategory focusing on how you process and communicate information through technology. This can include a broad range of items in a modern enterprise context.
Hardware Assets
Desktop workstations, laptops, servers, and smartphones are all examples of hardware assets. Peripheral devices like printers and smart displays are also part of this category.
These are all physical devices that occupy a unique place in your network. Practically every device with a MAC address can be treated as a hardware asset.
Software Assets
Software assets include mobile, desktop, and cloud-based applications. This category also includes things like browser extensions and digital certificates. When it comes to Software-as-a-Service applications, both the SaaS solution and your licenses to use it are software assets, as well.
Depending on the specifics of your organization, you may also treat intellectual properties as software assets. For example, the codebase of an application under development is a high-value IT asset distinct from most other types of software.
Virtual and Cloud Assets
Virtual machines, cloud instances, and serverless functions are all examples of cloud assets. These are similar to software assets, except that they exist independently of your in-house IT infrastructure. That gives them unique characteristics that merit special categorization.
Network Devices
All of the equipment your organization uses to maintain its network infrastructure — like routers, switches, and firewalls — also count as IT assets. These devices operate on your network and play an important role in ITAM, especially from a security perspective.
IT Asset Inventory List
Creating an inventory list of your organization’s IT assets is the first step toward managing those assets effectively. This list can take many forms. Startups and small businesses may start by tracking assets in a document or spreadsheet; however, as they mature their ITAM program, they should look for a more sophisticated and robust asset management solution. Large enterprises must also use a dedicated database augmented with robust synchronization features.
Importance of an Inventory List
Your IT asset inventory list plays a major role in compliance. If your organization faces a financial or IT audit, it will have to access data on its entire inventory of IT assets. This applies both to organizations pursuing voluntary compliance frameworks and to those required to keep track of IT assets by law.
Beyond compliance, having comprehensive, up-to-date information on your organization’s IT assets also helps optimize operations and security. Good management boosts productivity and prevents loss. It empowers management to make better decisions and avoid business disruption.
How to Create an Effective IT Asset Inventory List
It’s important to create your IT asset inventory list according to a detailed plan. Take time to define your scope and objectives before looking for asset discovery tools. The ideal solution for your organization may be different from other organizations in your field.
While startups and small businesses may create IT asset inventory lists manually, the needs of the modern enterprise require automatic discovery. Even a modestly growing organization will quickly find that manual processes can’t keep up.
There are two basic types of automated asset discovery tools:
- Agentless discovery tools rely on network protocols to discover IT assets. This tool sends out polls that interrogate connected assets about their identity and configuration. This is an active technique that requires pre-configured assets. For example, you may need to activate SNMP on newly connected devices so the agentless tool can recognize it.
- Agent-based discovery tools use a passive approach. You start by installing a client agent on every IT asset in your network. This agent sends data to your ITAM platform. This offers more information then the agentless approach, but it comes with higher maintenance costs and overhead.
Your preferred method of building an IT asset inventory list will influence your ability to tag and label assets effectively. Ideally, your organization will implement an automated system for issuing asset tags. Otherwise, you may manually have to complete that task. In either case, your team will need extensive training on your new asset management policies.
Features of IT Asset Discovery Tools
Both agentless and agent-based IT asset discovery tools work to achieve the same results. Both simplify the process of gaining visibility into IT infrastructure. They often go about it in similar ways, too. Here are three main features that your IT asset discovery tool should have:
Automated Scans and Updates
Automatically detecting connected devices and software is the main goal of asset discovery. To do that, your asset discovery tool must scan your entire network looking for devices and software. It can then identify these assets and report on their configuration.
Updates are also an important factor of IT asset discovery. These tools need to accommodate new devices and software as it hits the market. That means receiving updates showing how to identify new assets. High-quality scanners from reputable vendors generally take care of the update process autonomously.
Real-Time Monitoring
IT asset discovery is not a one-time task. Your organization will continue growing and changing over time. It will provision new assets, onboard new users, and deploy new technologies. You should not have to manually run IT asset discovery on a regular basis to accommodate these changes.
Instead, your scanning tool will run automatically in real time. When new devices are connected to your network, it will detect and gather data on them. This gives your IT team real-time visibility into your IT infrastructure and helps you maintain a robust security posture. If unauthorized devices or rogue assets are connected to your network, you should know about it quickly.
Comprehensive Reporting
Many organizations pursue IT asset management for compliance purposes. Your asset discovery tool should issue compliance reports that serve this goal. These reports demonstrate that your organization adheres to specific compliance requirements and consistent internal policies.
To generate these reports, your IT asset discovery scanner will need to create an audit trail as it scans your network. This allows you to compile documentation that shows how you detect and manage assets. Organizations pursuing GDPR, HIPAA, or SOX compliance must adhere to strict IT asset discovery regulations.
Benefits of IT Asset Discovery
The ability to track and categorize assets automatically provides a significant boost to efficiency and productivity. The larger and more complex your organization’s IT environment is, the greater these benefits will be. And if your organization plans to grow, establishing an asset discovery program as early as possible will help ensure your IT scales smoothly.
Enhanced Security
IT asset discovery can have a transformative impact on endpoint security. Without automated discovery, your security team can only detect newly connected assets through manual processes and proactive threat hunting. Gaining real-time visibility into your IT asset inventory enables faster, more accurate detection and response.
You can leverage the data generated by your asset discovery tool to improve operational security. For example, your insider risk team may wish to know how long a device under investigation has been in use in the organization. That data may not be available anywhere else. Your asset discovery scanner will tell you exactly when that device first appeared on your network — and where.
Improved Resource Management
The ability to easily map asset dependencies helps reduce the time and cost of asset maintenance. This improves your organization’s ability to manage resources that may otherwise be used wastefully.
When configured correctly, your asset discovery tool can help you identify high-value assets nearing the end of their lifecycle. If your IT team prioritizes preventative maintenance for these assets, you can mitigate the risk of costly disruption when they fail. If the asset can’t be repaired, you may choose to proactively replace it.
Compliance and Risk Management
Many regulatory frameworks include IT asset discovery in their requirements. Others avoid specifically calling for automated discovery. Nevertheless, achieving compliance with these frameworks is often much easier with a full-featured asset discovery tool.
That’s because manual IT asset discovery processes are time-consuming and error-prone. Compliance frameworks generally want to reduce the risk associated with these kinds of activities. Implementing a robust, automated solution makes it far less likely that your team overlooks an important IT asset.
Cost Savings
Tracking your IT assets and understanding the relationships between them improves efficiency across the board. When leaders and managers have accurate information about their assets, they are better equipped to keep up with the organization’s changing needs.
This translates directly to increased cost savings. Investing in IT asset management reduces the risk of asset underutilization and feature duplication. It helps decision-makers accurately predict costs and identify ways to reduce them over time.
This is especially true when supported by a strong IT asset management strategy and combined with IT service management (ITSM) processes. These two concepts provide ample opportunity to reduce costs without compromising on quality or productivity.
How to Choose an IT Asset Discovery Solution
Before you can choose the right IT asset discovery solution, you must carefully assess your broader ITAM strategy. Understanding your short-term and long-term goals is key to finding the solution that delivers value.
Evaluating Your Needs
No two organizations have the same security risk profile, asset inventory, or growth strategy. Your choice of IT asset discovery solution is a reflection of your organization’s needs.
For example, your growth goals will determine how scalable you need your solution to be. If your organization has a large number of unregulated, outdated, or duplicate assets, you’ll need a robust, automation-ready solution built for visibility and policy enforcement. Organizations pursuing regulatory compliance may need specific features stipulated by regulators.
Key Criteria to Consider
When looking for an IT asset discovery tool, prioritize integrated solutions that provide a single source of truth for your entire tech stack. Conducting ad hoc integrations for unsupported devices and applications can quickly slow down the IT asset discovery process. It can introduce user experience friction and may even impact your security posture.
Discovering unmanaged applications and IT resources is vital to asset management and security. Simplify the process with a full-featured IT asset discovery and management platform with streamlined user provisioning, utilization monitoring, and access request management. JumpCloud can help you consolidate IT management and security through its simple and powerful open directory platform. Sign up for a 30-day free trial to find out more.
