Security patching explained

One in five security breaches in 2025 happened because of the exploitation of vulnerabilities as an entry point, according to the 2025 Verizon DBIR. These breaches usually weren’t caused by zero-day exploits or sophisticated nation-state attacks. Often, these breaches were caused by vulnerabilities that already had patches available but hadn’t been applied.

This is exactly why security patching is vital to ensure the security of an organization. But what exactly qualifies as security patching, and how is it different from a regular software update?

What is security patching?

Why organizations fail at security patching

• A recent research from Google indicate that the average time between the disclosure of a vulnerability and exploitation is five days.
• Whereas a 2025 report shows that the average time taken by organizations to remediate critical vulnerabilities is 84 days.

When viewed together these data points show how patching delays are causing the organizations to fail at security patching. Is the delay due to pure negligence, or are there any underlying reasons?

Visibility

The basic reason for the delay is the presence of invisible assets in the organization's network that have not been tracked for a long time. These assets will have critical vulnerabilities that remain unpatched, providing easy access to attackers to exploit those vulnerabilities. The time spent in rediscovering these assets and adding them to the patching workflow is a major factor in patching delays.

Complexity

The modern IT infrastructure is a compilation of physical servers, virtual machines, network devices, computers, laptops, mobile devices, and more. Each of these components has different patching methodologies and timelines, making it difficult for the IT team to accelerate security patching.

Fear of downtime

According to a 2025 industry report, 98 % of IT professionals say patching interrupts their work. Even if the IT team is on board, encouraging the whole organization to prioritize security over operational efficiency can be a huge ask. This directly leads to a delay in security patching, allowing the attackers more time to exploit the vulnerabilities.

Resource crunch

Even if the above-mentioned factors are resolved, having limited resources can still negatively impact the security patching process. According to a 2025 global IT trends report, almost 36% of IT teams have fewer than five employees juggling multiple responsibilities. But this is easily mitigated by the use of patch automation tools, allowing the team to focus on other critical tasks.

Inside the security patching workflow

With the what and the why established, the next focus is the how:

• Build inventory: Without tracking the IT assets in the network, it can be almost impossible to patch every vulnerability present, thereby making this a fundamental step in the patching workflow. However, organizations can use an automated IT asset management system to have real-time, continuous visibility into their IT infrastructure.
• Detect security patches: This includes monitoring and identifying security patches released by the vendors for the software in the organization's network. Since time is of the essence here, it is advisable to completely automate the process using crawlers, as manual tracking is not viable.
• Evaluate impact: After collecting the patches, they need to be classified based on their severity to help IT teams prioritize deployment. Instead of wasting time on low-risk security patches, the IT team can zero in on critical vulnerabilities without delay. Another factor to consider here is the operational impact, as some security patches might require a system or application restart.
• Validate security patches: The security patches then need to undergo rigorous testing in a small sample size of your network. By doing this, the IT team can ascertain if the security patch causes any untoward side effects. According to a 2025 state of patch management report, only 61% of IT teams test patches before deployment, but this step is crucial, as missing this can cause operational disruption.
• Apply security patches: Following collection, impact analysis, and testing, the next step is security patch deployment. Depending on the scale and complexity of the IT infrastructure, this can be done manually, but it is highly advisable to automate this process to avoid costly errors.
• Track status: The final step in the workflow is to ensure the stability of the systems after the security patches are deployed successfully. If the organization has a patch automation tool, it can leverage it to check if the targeted vulnerabilities are secured across the organization and to identify any missed updates.

Handling all of this manually can take a lion's share of an IT team's time, whereas automated patch management software frees up the team to focus on other IT activities.

Why security patching is a compliance requirement

In addition to the potential financial and reputational costs from a security breach, not applying security patches to vulnerabilities can also cause non-compliance. Most countries worldwide have compliance regulations for cybersecurity and security patching for vulnerabilities is crucial for such regulations.

These frameworks require documented evidence of defined patch timelines, severity prioritization, deployment logs, and exception handling. Some of the major compliance regulations that require security patching include:

• ISO 27001
• SOC 2
• PCI DSS
• HIPAA Security Rule
• GDPR

Manual patching makes it difficult for organizations to demonstrate documented evidence, resulting in high compliance risk and audit pressure. Using an automated patching tool helps organizations navigate the stringent compliance frameworks and ensure audit readiness.

Differences between security patches and routine updates

Employees often fail to differentiate between security patches and routine software updates. They see a notification to apply a patch and are frustrated by the interruption to their day-to-day workflow, and dread a patch that forces their machine to restart.

To ensure prompt deployment of security patches, it is crucial to educate users about the difference between security patches and routine updates.

In short, security patches fix critical security vulnerabilities that need immediate attention. Whereas routine updates focus on enhancing software through UI/UX enhancements, bug fixes, and new features.

Manual methods create patching backlogs as IT teams struggle to keep up with update volumes. Systems stay vulnerable longer because manual processes react to threats after discovery.

Real-world security patching challenges

In theory, security patching is a clean, repeatable workflow, but in the real world, IT teams often face operational, technical, and human challenges. As discussed before, these challenges often result in delays and sometimes even in a security breach.

One of the most common problems faced by IT teams is the continued reliance on manual patching.

Manual patching

The modern IT infrastructure for any organization is a complex beast with a number of OSs, third-party applications, browsers, and firmware in the mix. Each of these components releases frequent updates, a combination of both security patches and routine updates.

With the sheer number of patches released, it can be very hard for IT teams to manage the volume manually and identify critical patches on time. This can cause a delay in patching critical vulnerabilities, significantly increasing the network's exposure to threats.

Solution: Leverage an automated patch automation tool to detect, classify, and deploy patches. This will free up the time and effort of the IT team to focus on critical vulnerabilities and other high-value tasks.

Even with a dedicated patch automation tool, organizations can face problems in their security patching workflows.

User patch fatigue

As noted earlier, every regular user is overwhelmed with a huge number of patches regularly, often needing to apply patches every other day. Faced with a steady stream of patches, the users often confuse routine updates and security patches and stop reacting with urgency.

Solution: Minimizing patch notifications by bundling non-critical patches and deploying them during predefined windows can help avoid sensory overload and maintain urgency.

Legacy Systems

According to a 2025 survey of over 500 professionals, 62% of organizations still have legacy systems in their network. They are not easily replaceable as they are tightly coupled with the company's core workflows, and replacing them comes with a huge risk of cost or downtime.

However, most vendors don't support their older systems, stopping patch support altogether making these systems vulnerable if any new security flaw is discovered. Even if the vendor releases patches, they often come with complex manual processes making them time-consuming and error-prone.

Solution: To maintain business continuity, segment the legacy systems and gradually phase them out of network. Meanwhile, the IT team can implement vendor-supported work-arounds to maintain the security of the network.

Process bottlenecks

Practically, IT teams are not the only stakeholders in a security patching workflow, as they have to go through relevant technical, operational, and business teams for approval. When each team has its own priorities, process delays are inevitable, often giving attackers enough time to weaponize known vulnerabilities. A rigid process of testing, approval, compliance check, and downtime validation can result in a high risk of the patch being stalled.

Solution: Clearly define ownership across teams and leverage automation wherever possible to streamline the approval process.

Evaluating organizational patch management maturity

Now that we've explored the workings of security patching and the real-world challenges associated with it, it is time for some soul-searching. Every organization is different, and must start by determining where it stands by looking inward.

These questions are designed to evaluate the organization’s current position in security patching.

• Visibility: Does the organization have complete visibility of all IT assets?
• Categorization: Does the IT team classify the patches based on their severity?
• Prioritization: Are the critical vulnerabilities addressed first?
• Speed: How quickly are the patches deployed?
• Consistency: Are all the endpoints across the network covered?
• Validation: Does the IT team verify if all the patches are successfully deployed?

Based on these responses, the strength of the organization’s security patching workflow can be ascertained.

Final thoughts on security patching

The global average cost of a data breach in 2025 was approximately $4.44 million, according to the IBM Cost of a Data Breach 2025 report, not counting the reputational cost associated with such breaches. As discussed earlier, most of these breaches happened due to visible gaps left open by vulnerabilities, and not due to some advanced tech wizardry.

Having a strong, well-oiled security patching machinery will help ward off these threats and maintain business continuity. Organizations that invest in fast and consistent using patch automation tools can significantly reduce financial and reputation risk.