Andrew said the near future for Patchlink will concentrate on integrating a network scanner with the patch management system so IT managers and network security employees can conduct an internal penetration test to automatically find any network holes or vulnerabilities caused by an unpatched system.

"We (Patchlink) are looking at introducing the idea of a penetration test tool from inside the network ... not an awful lot of products out there have a scanner integration model and we are pushing the idea of using a "check and balance" integrated system so a network scanner can correlate results; if there are any discrepancies for vulnerabilities a red flag will go off."