Tenable Vulnerability Management Scan Performance Study

This study is a technical report that examines the performance of Tenable Vulnerability Management scans at scale. The objective is to analyze how various factors affect scan performance when scanning an organization's external network for vulnerabilities. The study identifies four key contributing factors: scanner hardware, scanner and scan job configuration, operating system settings, and internal Tenable platform tuning. It details a series of five iterations, each building on the previous one, to test the impact of these factors on scan duration. The report outlines the hardware and configurations used, including managed Tenable Nessus scanners and specific settings adjusted during each iteration. Results indicate that tuning hardware and configurations can significantly reduce scan times, with the final iteration achieving a scan time of 8 hours using 340 scanners. The report emphasizes the importance of understanding these variables to optimize vulnerability scanning processes.