Security starts with visibility. If you don’t know what SaaS apps are in use across your environment, you can’t protect them, assess their risk, or enforce policy. This reality makes SaaS discovery and the data that powers it critical.
Shadow IT, decentralized adoption, and third-party integrations continue to expose organizations to hidden SaaS risks. While traditional methods like SSO logs or browser monitoring can surface some apps, they often miss the long tail of unsanctioned tools and forgotten integrations. Without a complete SaaS vendor database to anchor discovery efforts, security teams are forced to operate with blind spots.
A robust, continuously updated SaaS database doesn’t just reveal what’s in use. It adds context. It helps teams understand what each app does, what data it touches, and how it behaves. This level of detail is essential for accurate SaaS risk assessment and for building a proactive SaaS security strategy that is scalable
In this post, we’ll break down why SaaS discovery depends on a comprehensive SaaS database, how it helps mitigate hidden SaaS risks, and why context is key to modern risk assessment. We’ll also show how Wing Security equips security teams with the visibility and insight they need to take control of their SaaS environment.
Why SaaS discovery is non-negotiable
SaaS discovery is the process of identifying and cataloging all SaaS applications in use across an organization. This includes both sanctioned tools that have gone through formal IT onboarding and unsanctioned tools adopted by employees or teams.
These approaches worked when SaaS adoption was limited and centralized. However, the average company uses over 130 SaaS applications, and security teams often underestimate that number by more than 50%. Unfortunately, shadow IT has become the default, not the exception for many organizations, and common discovery methods and tools simply aren’t designed to find it.
When security teams don’t have a full inventory of the SaaS tools in use, they lose control over the organization’s security posture. Here’s how that plays out:
- Data exposure: Employees might upload sensitive data—such as customer information, internal documents, or proprietary code—to unsanctioned platforms. These platforms may lack proper encryption, data residency controls, or access restrictions. The same risk exists if a sanctioned app allows public file sharing and that setting goes unnoticed. If a breach occurs or if the app shares data with third parties, your organization could be exposed without anyone realizing it.
- Non-compliance: Many industries require strict adherence to regulatory frameworks like GDPR, HIPAA, or SOC 2. When unsanctioned apps are used to handle regulated data, they often fall short of compliance requirements. Sanctioned apps can fall out of compliance due to configuration drift or missed updates. A cloud-based CRM, for instance, might have the right certifications at deployment but later introduce new features or integrations that don’t align with your compliance framework. This puts data at risk and also opens the organization to audit failures, legal consequences, or costly remediation efforts.
- Over-permissioned third-party access: Many SaaS apps, sanctioned or not, connect to other services via APIs or OAuth, often gaining access to critical systems like Google Workspace, Microsoft 365, Slack, or Salesforce. An IT-approved productivity suite may be integrated with dozens of third-party tools, some of which gain extensive access to emails, calendars, or cloud storage. If those third parties are unsanctioned or have weak security practices, they can act as a conduit for lateral movement or data siphoning. Just as concerning, if an unknown app retains access after being abandoned, it becomes a potential backdoor for attackers or a vector for accidental data leakage.
- Misconfigurations and weak controls: Security settings like MFA enforcement, role-based access, or session timeouts are rarely applied uniformly across shadow SaaS. Even approved SaaS apps often go live without consistent security settings for all users. This fragmented approach increases the likelihood of weak points in your overall security strategy, creating easier targets for adversaries and greater difficulty for your team to enforce policy.
- License sprawl and tool redundancy: While not always seen as a top-tier risk, redundant or abandoned SaaS tools can quietly drive up costs and create confusion around approved toolsets. When multiple apps serve the same function, security teams have to chase multiple risk profiles, data flows, and policy enforcement points. This not only wastes budget but also undermines the security team’s authority by encouraging workarounds and inconsistency.
Each of these risks grows as SaaS adoption scales. Without the ability to detect and evaluate every app in use across users, departments, and devices, SOC teams are left reacting to threats they never had a chance to prevent.
The expanding SaaS attack surface
Worldwide spending on SaaS is expected to reach $315 billion in 2025 and grow to more than $1,131 billion in 2032. This rapid growth is reshaping enterprise environments and introducing new challenges for cybersecurity leaders. SaaS now powers everything from marketing and HR to development and finance, with each department adding new tools to get work done faster.
The result is a sprawling, decentralized stack of cloud-based applications, many of which operate beyond the security team’s line of sight. The implications are especially acute for SOC teams and CISOs who are charged with defending complex, fast-moving environments.
SaaS growth Is outpacing security
As more business functions shift to SaaS, the number of entry points, user interactions, and data flows multiplies rapidly. Security teams are no longer just managing devices and endpoints. They are managing a fluid network of cloud-based tools that may or may not be under centralized control.
Every new SaaS app introduces another potential pathway for attackers, another integration to evaluate, and another source of sensitive data that must be monitored and secured. Without visibility into this expanding footprint, it’s nearly impossible to enforce policy, assess risk, or respond to incidents with the speed and accuracy modern security operations demand.
Real-world example: Nissan’s 2023 GitHub exposure
In January 2023, Nissan North America disclosed a data breach involving a third-party service provider. The breach occurred when the vendor inadvertently stored Nissan’s customer data in a misconfigured GitHub repository, leaving it exposed to unauthorized access.
The compromised information included full names, dates of birth, and Nissan finance account numbers of 17,998 customers, although Social Security numbers and credit card details were not exposed. The breach stemmed from an unknown and unmonitored SaaS connection—one that would have been caught with proper SaaS discovery.
This isn’t a one-off incident. SaaS breaches are now a recurring theme in annual reports like the Verizon Data Breach Investigations Report (DBIR). The 2024 DBIR also revealed that stolen credentials were involved in 77% of breaches targeting SaaS applications. For example, attackers used phishing and credential stuffing to infiltrate collaboration and CRM tools, often pivoting into more sensitive environments through SaaS integrations and cached tokens.
These types of incidents highlight why discovery alone is not enough. Security teams must also have visibility into how SaaS apps are accessed, what permissions they’re granted, and how identities are managed within and across platforms.
Why a complete SaaS database is the foundation of SaaS security
From credential theft in collaboration tools to supply chain compromises that ripple across integrated platforms, the attack surface is expanding in ways that legacy security models aren’t equipped to handle.
Knowing that an app exists in your environment is only the beginning. To respond effectively, security teams need to know what that app does, who has access, what data it touches, and how it connects to other services.
That level of insight begins with a comprehensive SaaS database. This is your catalog of known SaaS applications enriched with metadata that includes:
- App purpose and category: Identifying the business function of each application helps security teams assess its potential data sensitivity. For example, file-sharing tools and CRMs often store large volumes of sensitive customer or operational data, making them attractive targets for attackers.
- Risk profile: Each app can be scored based on known vulnerabilities, breach history, and default security settings. An app with a history of data leaks or with permissive default sharing settings would carry a higher risk score.
- Compliance certifications (SOC 2, ISO 27001, GDPR, etc): Apps that store or process sensitive data should meet regulatory and industry standards. If a marketing platform lacks GDPR compliance, for example, it may not be suitable for handling EU customer data.
- Behavioral indicators (e.g., data sharing, integrations, storage practices): These data points capture how the app behaves in the environment. Does it frequently integrate with cloud storage? Does it access sensitive calendar data? Behavioral insights help prioritize high-risk apps.
- Popularity metrics: How frequently an app is used across industries or geographies can make an app an attractive target. For example, an emerging tool rapidly gaining adoption in tech startups may indicate a trend that security teams need to get ahead of.
- Threat intelligence: This includes data on known vulnerabilities (such as CVEs), reports of recent exploitation, and discussions in threat actor forums. If an app has been mentioned in underground marketplaces or was exploited in a recent campaign, security teams can prioritize investigation or mitigation before exploitation occurs.
Just as a vulnerability scanner relies on a threat signature database to identify known exploits, SaaS discovery tools depend on a vendor database to recognize and contextualize the apps in use. Without this foundation, even the most advanced monitoring systems are limited to surface-level insights. They may detect network traffic or OAuth activity, but they won’t be able to determine whether an app is business-critical, non-compliant, or connected to sensitive data workflows.
Static vs. dynamic SaaS databases
Most discovery solutions rely on static, precompiled app libraries. These become outdated fast and miss new or niche applications. In contrast, a dynamic SaaS vendor database, such as Wing Security’s, is continuously updated and includes metadata on hundreds of thousands of apps. This allows for:
- Accurate identification of obscure or newly released tools
- Real-time risk assessment based on evolving threat intelligence
- Automated classification without constant manual input
This dynamic model ensures that discovery is not a one-time scan, but an ongoing process that adapts to your evolving environment. With Wing Security’s continuously refreshed database, security teams can detect and evaluate SaaS apps the moment they appear, whether introduced by a developer, a third-party vendor, or an unsuspecting end user.
This positions your team to move from reactive response to proactive risk management and sets the stage for deeper monitoring and automated enforcement workflows.
How Wing Security enhances SaaS discovery and risk assessment
Wing Security goes beyond traditional SaaS discovery tools by integrating one of the industry’s most comprehensive SaaS databases into every stage of our discovery and assessment pipeline.
Our solution provides more than just discovery. We deliver advanced detection capabilities with real-time risk classification and enforcement workflows, supported by a comprehensive SaaS database.
Discovery across every entry point
Our platform continuously scans for SaaS activity across browsers, SSO logs, OAuth grants, and API traffic. This multi-layered approach ensures that no application goes unnoticed. Unlike methods that depend solely on endpoint agents or user reporting, we achieve broad and accurate SaaS visibility without relying on intrusive device-level agents or complex endpoint instrumentation.
SaaS discovery tools powered by Wing Security’s extensive vendor database
Every discovered application is enriched with contextual data from our dynamic vendor database. This allows security teams to immediately assess whether an app complies with organizational policies, whether it has known vulnerabilities, and how it behaves in real-world environments. Instead of managing a flat list of app names, teams get deep, actionable insights.
Real-time monitoring and behavior tracking
Our platform continuously monitors changes in app behavior, user access, and permissions over time. If an app suddenly requests elevated privileges or a dormant integration becomes active again, the system flags the change so teams can respond before the incident escalates.
Alignment with compliance and governance
By providing detailed metadata and audit trails, Wing Security makes it easier to ensure SaaS usage aligns with regulatory frameworks such as SOC 2, ISO 27001, HIPAA, and GDPR. Our platform also simplifies reporting and supports internal governance by surfacing relevant data for IT, legal, and compliance stakeholders.
Best practices for SaaS risk assessment
SaaS risk assessment demands more than a checklist. To protect dynamic and decentralized environments, security teams need a strategy that balances visibility, automation, and collaboration. Here are six foundational steps to guide a scalable, sustainable SaaS security program:
- Establish continuous SaaS discovery as a default control: SaaS adoption is fluid. Set up ongoing discovery to detect new apps in real time. including shadow IT, user-authorized OAuth integrations, and apps adopted without IT involvement.
- Evaluate apps in context, not isolation: Assess risk based on how each app is used, who uses it, what data it accesses, and how it integrates with other systems. A CRM granted wide API access presents different risks than a standalone design tool.
- Monitor user access and permission changes over time: Track evolving OAuth scopes, admin privilege escalations, and dormant apps with residual access. What was low-risk at onboarding may become a problem over time.
- Automate policy enforcement wherever possible: Define rules that trigger alerts, restrict access, or initiate reviews based on risk thresholds or behavioral changes. Automation reduces manual workload and ensures consistent enforcement.
- Align app usage with compliance frameworks: Ensure SaaS adoption supports internal policies and external regulations such as SOC 2, HIPAA, ISO 27001, and GDPR. Use SaaS metadata to validate certifications, monitor geographic data transfers, and flag apps lacking the necessary compliance controls before they are widely used.
- Use tools that incorporate dynamic SaaS vendor databases: Relying on static lists or manual discovery leaves gaps. Choose platforms that combine always-on discovery with a continuously updated SaaS database to provide real-time visibility, risk context, and actionable intelligence.
When applied consistently, these best practices help turn SaaS risk management from a reactive exercise into a proactive, strategic discipline. By choosing tools that integrate dynamic SaaS vendor databases, teams can quickly improve visibility while also laying the groundwork for automation, contextual analysis, and long-term governance.
SaaS sprawl is inevitable. Blind spots are not.
A dynamic SaaS database is the foundation that makes visibility possible. It empowers accurate discovery, contextual risk assessment, and informed decision-making at scale.
Whether you’re dealing with a handful of rogue apps or an organization-wide proliferation of shadow SaaS, your risk management strategy starts with discovery, and discovery starts with a robust SaaS vendor database.
Want to see what’s hiding in your SaaS stack? Explore Wing Security’s SaaS discovery capabilities today.