Cloud Security’s Unspoken Truth

Jun 26, 2025

Jonathan Kaftzan
VP Marketing

Why most security findings are noise and and how to focus on what actually matters?

Every DevSecOps, cloud security and even AppSec team knows the feeling: scanners flag hundreds – sometimes thousands – of critical issues across your pipelines, environments and apps. But how many of those findings actually matter? How many represent real, immediate risk to applications running in production?

The uncomfortable answer? Very few.

At ARMO, we’ve seen firsthand how over 60% of security findings are irrelevant hypothetical risks that will never be exploited. And when it comes to runtime threats, things get even worse: teams have to sort through nearly 7,000 alerts to find just one real incident.

It’s not just about wasting time. It’s a sign that something is fundamentally broken in how cloud security is typically done today.

The problem: security built on hypotheticals

Most cloud security tools rely on static analysis — scanning code, images, and configurations to surface every theoretical risk. To be clear: these risks aren’t pulled out of thin air. They’re based on widely accepted industry benchmarks and best practices, developed by some of the smartest minds in cybersecurity. The problem is, those benchmarks are intentionally broad, since they are designed to apply to as many environments as possible. That makes them useful for general guidance, but not always relevant to your specific application or cloud setup.

On top of that, some of the flagged issues were explicitly accepted by engineering or security teams. They are necessary for the application to function and deliver business value. So what shows up as a “high risk” on paper may actually be a conscious, well-understood tradeoff.

The result? Alert fatigue. Wasted developer time. And real threats slipping through the cracks. Security teams end up chasing ghosts, while the truly dangerous issues, the ones actually reachable in runtime, remain buried in noise.

The better way: focus on real risk first

At ARMO, we believe the future of cloud security is real-risk-first.

That means flipping the current model on its head:

Start with what’s actually exploitable in production.
Using eBPF-powered runtime data, we identify which vulnerabilities are reachable in your live environment.
Mitigate risk immediately.
While waiting for patches, ARMO applies precise prevention policies. They block risky behaviors like dangerous system calls or API access, and are tailored to the affected workload.
Detect the unknown with behavior, not brittle rules.
For zero-days and novel threats, ARMO uses adaptive, behavior-based detection across the app, container, Kubernetes, and cloud layers — without drowning teams in false positives.

The results

This approach isn’t just more effective — it’s more scalable and sustainable:

60–80% reduction in noise by filtering out irrelevant findings
Immediate protection from real threats, while waiting for a patch
Simplified detection using behavioral models instead of thousands of rules

Security that works with your team

Security shouldn’t just be a set of checkboxes or a constant source of distraction for teams. In the complex world of cloud-native environments, teams need to focus on real, actionable risks, not hypothetical threats or irrelevant findings. By aligning security efforts with actual runtime behavior, ARMO ensures that security is effective and efficient and doesn’t slow teams down. This approach makes it easier for teams to focus on what’s important by aligning security priorities with real, immediate risks.

Maybe it’s time to rethink you approach. Try ARMO today.