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Does your organization rely on legacy systems?

While it's considered costly to modernize existing legacy systems, the reality is that the maintenance costs (and cybersecurity-related financial losses) associated with keeping them as they are far outweigh those upfront costs. In fact, a recent study on the maintenance costs of legacy systems in the United States alone indicates that approximately $337 million annually is spent to operate and maintain just 10 of the US government’s legacy systems.

In a related survey conducted with C-level corporate executives across multiple industries, 70% of respondents highlighted that technical debt puts a tight leash on their IT operations, slowing their ability to stay operationally competitive.

Today, we dive further into the cost vs. the price of not modernizing legacy systems, particularly when it comes to hidden cybersecurity costs.

Firstly, What is the Definition of a Legacy System?

A legacy system is defined as "any outdated computing system, hardware, or software that is still in use." Most commonly, legacy systems include computer hardware, software applications, file formats and programming languages.

However, not all legacy systems are obsolete: the majority work even if they are outdated, and organizations of all sizes will often continue utilizing legacy systems that they deem to be integral to their daily operations.

Applications, systems, and other technologies become classified as legacy IT systems due to the following reasons:

• They no longer receive updates, support, or maintenance from their software developers

• They are no longer available for purchase (or, alternatively, rely on now-obsolete technology for maintenance)

• They are no longer able to support an organization's software

• They require IT professionals with outdated technology skill sets such as Common Business-Oriented Language, or COBOL, programming to maintain

• They require frequent or time-intensive repairs compared to more modern systems

• They require maintenance that is considered too frequent or time-intensive compared to more modern systems

• They are overexposed to security vulnerabilities and cannot be updated to meet modern cybersecurity standards

Legacy Systems vs. Legacy Applications

Before we dive into the cybersecurity risks of legacy systems, let's first clarity a common misconception: legacy systems vs. legacy applications.

A legacy application, otherwise known as a legacy app, is a software program that is now considered outdated or obsolete. Although legacy apps are still technically functional, they are prone to instability due to compatibility issues with browsers, infrastructures, and operating systems.

The majority of organizations leverage legacy applications and computer systems that continue to serve critical business needs due to concerns that, if they decide to transfer to a modernized application, they may encounter operational downtime. However, teams face the common challenge of maintaining legacy apps while converting them to more efficient code that utilizes modern tech and programming languages.

Legacy applications are generally connected to a specific version of an OS or coding language. For example, an application built to run on Windows 7 will likely not be able to run on Windows 10, even if middleware is applied.

The Four Types of Legacy Systems

The following are four common types of legacy systems:

• End of Life EOL) Legacy Systems: EOL legacy systems are ones that a vendor or developer has stopped supporting or offering updates for, or that are no longer purchasable

• Legacy Systems That Are Incapable of Scaling: These legacy systems no longer have the scalability to support a business's growing data, performance, or security needs

• Heavily-Patched Software Systems: The bulk of legacy systems are outdated software that have been patched in the past to keep it as up to date as possible. Numerous patching (or incomplete patching) can result in software being more vulnerable to security breaches than modern applications and, subsequently, lead to its discontinuation

• Legacy Systems That Are Difficult to Maintain: The majority of legacy systems require outdated knowledge in order to maintain them. This, in turn, makes it difficult and costly to find an IT expert who knows how to sufficiently keep them operational

Why Do Companies Still Use Legacy Systems?

Organizations continue to use legacy systems and applications for the following reasons:

• They Are Functional: Many legacy systems and applications work and are vital to an organization's daily functions. Replacing systems and technologies that still work simply because they are outdated is not always deemed necessary or time-sensitive

• They Are Costly to Upgrade or Replace: The cost of replacing a legacy system or application can be high. Although maintaining legacy systems frequently costs more money long-term, some organizations do not have the immediate resources to modernize their systems. Upgrading can also require long periods of time, retraining staff or hiring staff to learn and integrate the new technologies

• They Are Complex to Upgrade or Replace: Modernizing legacy systems can involve complex or lengthy undertakings. Some organizations don't have the skill set or resources available to modernize their systems and to handle the challenges that can come with doing so, especially when facing the potentials of service delays, data loss, or a worsened user experience during the changeover

How to Modernize Existing Legacy Systems

Legacy systems and applications cannot be maintained at a functioning level indefinitely. At some point, most enterprises will update or replace outdated hardware, coding language, OSes, and software.

Legacy system and software modernization and migration often involves refactoring, which is the restructuring of a system's code to make it compatible with a new platform. The steps to modernize existing legacy systems are as follows:

• Identify which components of the system or application are no longer meeting standards or requirements for business processes and must be modernized or upgraded. Organizations should consider both functionality and cost

• Evaluate modernization or migration options

• Choose the option that will most benefit the organization's architecture, scalability, and functionality

Once a method is chosen, data migration becomes critical. It also often involves data conversion (alongside the following steps):

• Extraction: Data extraction due to the majority of data potentially being stored in legacy systems or related outdated formats. Before data migration begins, organizations must ensure that business-critical data can be extracted

• Data mapping: The data then must be converted to the new system's formats and requirements via data mapping. Often, pre-existing data does not map exactly to the new information system, which can lengthen this phase

• Updating the data: All incomplete and nontransferable data should be deleted and all duplicate data deduplicated

• Test the migration: Teams should then test on a sample data set. Through this step, potential errors, bugs, or other unexpected challenges can be identified before the bulk of the data migration begins

• Migrate the data: Once organizations have extracted, mapped, updated, and tested their data, they can then migrate it in full to their new platform

Proactive Penetration Testing to Combat Legacy System Challenges

Here at Packetlabs Ltd., we take cybersecurity further than automated VA scans.

Packetlabs is a CREST-certified and SOC 2 Type II accredited cybersecurity firm specializing in penetration testing services. To strengthen your security posture and tackle common concerns like legacy system challenges, we offer solutions such as penetration testing, adversary simulation, application security, and other related security assessments.

Our full list of offerings include:

• Red Teaming: Red Teaming is a full-scope simulated attack designed to get a holistic review of the level of risk and vulnerabilities across people, processes, and tech in an organization

• Purple Teaming: Purple Teaming is our collaborative testing exercise where the Packetlabs red team works with your internal security operations team (or blue team) to bridge the gap between offensive techniques and response efforts

• Cyber Maturity Assessments: A Cyber Maturity Assessment supports the tactical direction of your cybersecurity strategy. As the first step in strengthening your security posture, this assessment generates the roadmap to strengthen your overall security program

• OT Assessments: OT Cybersecurity Assessments simulate the likelihood of an attacker reaching the control centre from an external and internal perspective with production-safe testing

• Ransomware Penetration Testing: A ransomware penetration test evaluates the preparedness and risk of a ransomware attack and identifies gaps in people, processes, and technology, to determine the likelihood and readiness for a ransomware attack

• Cloud Penetration Testing: Multiple perspectives help with strengthening your security posture. These include Cloud Penetration Testing, which simulates an attacker in the environment, and a Cloud Penetration Review, which provides insights into cloud-specific vulnerabilities originating from an insecure configuration. Each of these services can be conducted separately or, for maximum effectiveness, combined as an enhanced cloud security bundle

• Objective-based Penetration Testing: Following a preliminary penetration test, objective-based testing conducts a more advanced simulated cybersecurity attack. The test is conducted by persistent ethical hackers who deploy multiphase attacks to gain access to your organization's data so that you can discover gaps and vulnerabilities unique to your organization and test your ability to detect and respond to threat actor

• Application Security Testing: More targeted in scope than a regular pentest, application security testing uncovers vulnerabilities residing in your web and mobile apps. Application Security Testing actively explores your application from an attacker’s perspective

• Infrastructure Penetration Testing: An infrastructure penetration testing assessment uncovers vulnerabilities in your IT and network systems and provides a tailored approach to each environment

These are in addition to the Packetlabs Portal, which enables you to quickly view findings, prioritize efforts, request retests after remediation, and monitor progress.

Conclusion

Legacy systems and apps oftentimes pose mounting cybersecurity challenges for organizations of all sizes.

Reach out to our team today to learn how penetration testing can help identify legacy system-related threats (and help your team eliminate operational continuity concerns as you replace them.)