ITAM for your cybersecurity strategy? It’s more important than you might think

Cybersecurity breaches pose sophisticated, ever-evolving threats to organizations of all shapes and sizes. In fact, in Q1 2025, more than 91 million individuals were affected by cybersecurity attacks, according to the Identity Theft Resource Center (ITRC).

To successfully protect and manage your IT infrastructure, you need insights and data from across your entire organization. That’s where effective IT asset management (ITAM) can help.

ITAM helps you track, monitor, and control your IT assets throughout their lifecycle. With the data generated from a modern ITAM methodology, you can answer questions such as:

• What IT assets do you own, and where are they located?
• Who uses them, and why?
• How are they configured and updated?
• How much do they cost, and what value do they deliver?
• How do they comply with policies and regulations?

By providing this data, ITAM also helps you improve your cybersecurity with improved visibility, control, and insights into your IT assets.

To understand, let’s explore what to consider when building an ITAM strategy, what kinds of data ITAM provides, and how you can leverage that data to strengthen your cybersecurity.

What to consider when modernizing your ITAM strategy

When building out ITAM solutions, every organization undergoes a different journey. Needs, goals, use cases, user bases, and workflow habits are all unique to your organization. Tailoring your ITAM strategy to best suit your organization means having deep knowledge of your IT environment, security gaps, and current management state.

To build the best ITAM process for your organization, consider the following:

The size and complexity of your IT environment: How many assets do you need to manage? How many are onsite or in the hands of remote workers? How are new assets introduced into your organization, and what controls are in place at that point of entry? The more IT assets you have and the more diverse and dynamic they are, the more laborious a manual ITAM process would be. Advanced and automated ITAM tools will help boost efficiency in complex environments.

The nature and scope of your cybersecurity needs: The criticality of data, dispersion of devices, and breadth of software all impact your potential attack surface. The more sensitive and critical your IT assets are — and the more exposed they are to cyber threats — the more robust and secure your ITAM process must be. As risk and vulnerability increase, so does the need for comprehensive asset management to protect your organization.

The maturity and capabilities of your current ITAM process: Where are your IT assets currently tracked? Are they managed in a dynamic, up-to-date system, or are you relying on manual spreadsheets? Do you maintain hardware on a reactive basis, or do you have the data and processes in place to patch, upgrade, or replace before an incident occurs? Your current ITAM maturity and capabilities will determine how quickly you can deploy modern processes and what changes and trainings you’ll need to ensure a successful adoption.

The kinds of data ITAM can provide

With a modern ITAM strategy, you can unlock insightful data that highlights the gaps in your organization’s cybersecurity. This includes (but is not limited to):

A complete inventory of IT assets: ITAM provides a holistic view of your hardware, software, networks, and connected devices — including location, status, and configuration. With this information, you can quickly spot irregularities, such as an unrecognized device accessing your network from an unauthorized location, or the presence of unauthorized software within your environment.

Hardware and software lifecycle information: An effective ITAM strategy will help you identify the age of all your assets, as well as whether they’re in use and compatible with the latest OS, firmware, and patches. You can effortlessly find outdated devices and applications and either patch or prepare for replacement.

Total cost of ownership: From the initial sticker price to replacement parts, recurring maintenance, and levels of support, it’s important to know how much you’re actually spending on your IT assets. By providing this information, ITAM helps you build a data-driven refresh cycle — optimizing your long-term investments and lowering your risk of having cybersecurity vulnerabilities fly under the radar.

How does ITAM impact your cybersecurity?

You’ve identified the unique needs your ITAM practice must satisfy, as well as the kinds of data ITAM can provide. As you solidify your modern ITAM strategy, one question remains: how will all this strengthen your cybersecurity?

When implemented correctly, ITAM provides visibility, control, and insights into your IT assets and their security status. Here’s how:

Identifying vulnerabilities: ITAM can help identify outdated software, missing patches, misconfigured settings, unauthorized software, and more. It also helps assess the severity and impact of vulnerabilities so you can remediate accordingly.

Enabling asset prioritization: ITAM helps prioritize your IT assets based on their value, criticality, and risk. With the collected data, you can determine which assets are most critical and sensitive for your organization and which ones are most vulnerable to cyber threats, letting you allocate your resources and efforts more efficiently.

Accelerating security alert responses: With ITAM, you can respond to security alerts faster and more effectively, thanks to having relevant and timely information. ITAM gives you the visibility you need to locate and isolate affected IT assets, identify the root cause and scope of the incident, and contain and resolve the issue.

Mitigating security risks: ITAM tools can help mitigate risks by identifying and eliminating redundant, obsolete, or underused IT assets, optimizing your IT asset utilization and allocation. And by giving you deep insight into which roles need access to certain data and applications, ITAM tools help enforce privilege access, giving users permission for only what they absolutely need for their day-to-day.

To dive deeper into ITAM’s cybersecurity benefits, view SHI’s interactive infographic: The importance of IT asset management (ITAM) in cybersecurity.

What’s next: Evaluate your overall strategy

ITAM helps you track, monitor, and control your IT assets throughout their lifecycles and provide visibility, control, and insights into your assets and their security statuses. It helps improve your cybersecurity posture by:

• Identifying vulnerabilities.
• Enabling asset prioritization.
• Accelerating security alert responses.
• Mitigating security risks.

To reap the full benefits of ITAM, you need to understand how an ITAM methodology will affect your users and support your long-term needs and goals. If you’re unsure where to begin, consult the experts!

ITAM experts, including SHI’s own lifecycle management specialists, have years of experience tailoring asset management tools and capabilities to the unique use cases of organizations, big and small. And in the case of partners like SHI, our expertise extends not just to asset management, but to cybersecurity as well — ensuring the solutions you select help reduce security gaps and protect your data, users, and equipment.

Whether you’re just starting to consider ITAM for your organization or you’ve already begun the research process, you can gain the best understanding of your current state by reviewing your overall ITAM and cybersecurity strategies.

SHI’s ITAM process consulting services analyze your ITAM processes, identify gaps and shortcomings, and uncover solutions to your most pressing (and sometimes hidden) issues and vulnerabilities. For many organizations, ITAM process consulting is an important first step for bringing IT asset management practices into the modern era.

Are you ready to boost your cybersecurity with IT asset management? Contact our experts to engage our ITAM process consulting services today.