January 5, 2026
Electric utilities have spent years investing in cybersecurity programs, tooling, and compliance frameworks – yet patch management remains the most consistent point of failure. CIP-007 continues to be the most violated NERC standard year after year, which tells us something uncomfortable but important: we're still either leaving doors open or we're failing in our documentation.
What Is The Vulnerability Disclosure to Exploit Timeframe
CIP-007 lays out a clear structure. Each software or firmware title must be reviewed for applicable security patches at least every 35 days, followed by another 35-day window to apply the patch or formally document mitigation. On paper, that sounds reasonable. In practice, it assumes attackers are willing to wait.
They're not.
Threat velocity has changed dramatically. As recently as last year, industry guidance pointed to an average of 15 days between public vulnerability disclosure and active exploitation. Today, that window is much tighter. At a recent ReliabilityFirst compliance workshop, a figure attributed to CISA threat analysis put the average time from vulnerability disclosure to exploit in under five days. By the time many utilities complete their evaluation cycle, adversaries already have working exploits. That gap matters.
How to Avoid Security Incidents
It explains why patching remains such a persistent compliance issue, and why compliance gaps often turn into security incidents. When CIP-007 violations show up in audit findings, they're not just paperwork problems, they're indicators of real operational risk.
The broader energy sector is seeing the same pattern. In 2024, Halliburton disclosed a ransomware attack that disrupted operations and resulted in roughly $35 million in recovery costs. While oil & gas and electric utilities operate under different regulatory regimes, attackers don't care. TSA-SD-Pipeline regulations are in place to look at risk, vulnerabilities, and patches then intelligently prioritize the approach. Yet the bad guys exploit the same thing every time: known vulnerabilities that stayed open too long and they moved faster.
And in today's threat environment, "too long" might be measured in days, not months. What will it look like by the end of 2026… hours?
For electric utilities, the stakes are even higher. We're not just protecting data. We're protecting reliability, safety, and public trust. And the gap between how fast we're required to move and how fast attackers actually move is widening.
This is where patch automation stops being a "nice to have."
What are the Benefits of Patch Compliance
Automated patch compliance doesn't eliminate operational constraints. It doesn't magically create maintenance windows or make legacy assets disappear. What it does is remove friction where friction no longer serves us: asset discovery, patch evaluation, risk-based prioritization, exception management, and evidence collection. It replaces spreadsheets, email chains, and tribal knowledge with repeatable, defensible processes that hold up under audit and in real-world operations.
This is the philosophy behind how AssurX approaches patch automation, both for compliance and security. Not as a standalone security tool, but as part of a broader compliance and risk workflow that recognizes how utilities actually operate. AssurX helps teams track patch obligations, document decisions when patches can't be applied, manage compensating controls, and produce audit-ready evidence without heroics or last-minute scrambles.
Watch AssurX On-Demand webinar "Eliminating the Insecurity of Security Patch Management".
Why Automating Patch Compliance is Critical
CIP-007 isn't failing us, but it is giving a growing window for the bad guys to do bad things. TSA Pipeline Security Directives mean well but aren't prescriptive and aren't enough. Our tools and processes haven't kept up with the reality that we've seen in the 'year of exploit velocity' and 2026 is the time to automate the patch compliance process.
About the Author
Scott Crow is the Senior Business Systems Strategist – Energy & Utilities at AssurX, where he drives strategic innovation and technological transformation across the critical infrastructure landscape. With extensive experience in delivering IT/OT solutions, Scott specializes in tackling the most pressing cybersecurity and compliance challenges for the energy and utilities sector. His expertise lies in aligning technology with business objectives, seamlessly integrating people, process, and technology to develop solutions that optimize operational performance while safeguarding critical systems.
