Whitelisting, blacklisting, and greylisting control IT access through their respective principles of explicit trust, distrust, and quarantining.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Also known as allowlisting, denylisting, and tracklisting, respectively, these cybersecurity principles apply broadly throughout information technology (IT) and can help manage a wide range of threats across assets and sources.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We will explore the pros, cons, and use cases for each technique, in brief in the chart below and then in greater depth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Table of Contents<\/p>\nTechnique<\/th> Security type<\/th> Default Setting<\/th> When to Use<\/th> Main Drawback<\/th><\/tr><\/thead> Whitelist<\/strong>
(aka: Allowlist)<\/strong><\/td>Trust-centric<\/td> Always Deny<\/td> Strictly limit access to known good sources<\/td> Difficult to maintain<\/td><\/tr> Blacklist<\/strong>
(aka: Denylist)<\/strong><\/td>Threat-centric<\/td> Always Allow<\/td> Block known malicious sources<\/td> Never-ending process<\/td><\/tr> Greylist<\/strong>
(aka: Tracklist)<\/strong><\/td>Threat-centric<\/td> Quarantine, then investigate<\/td> Quarantine potentially malicious sources<\/td> Can block legitimate sources<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n