The Salesforce Drift Breach: Navigating Third- and Fourth-Party Risk Exposure in the SAAS Ecosystem

September 30, 2025

Salesforce is one of the world’s most widely adopted CRM platforms, powering everything from B2B sales pipelines to public health initiatives—like vaccine distribution during the COVID-19 pandemic. With its vast customer base and partner ecosystem, Salesforce enables thousands of third-party applications to integrate and extend its capabilities.

But with great connectivity comes great risk.

Recently, threat actors compromised authentication tokens for Drift, a workflow automation app integrated with Salesforce via Salesloft. This allowed unauthorized access to Salesforce CRM instances across multiple organizations—including cybersecurity leaders like Proofpoint, Tenable, and CyberArk.

Importantly, Salesforce itself wasn’t breached. The attack exploited a third-party integration, demonstrating how even trusted platforms can become vulnerable through their ecosystem.

Key takeaway: Organizations are responsible and accountable for securing their own data—including when data resides on third-party SAAS applications and fourth-party integrations are enabled.

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How to Reduce Risk: Principles and Tools That Matter

While integrations are complex, applying foundational cybersecurity principles can significantly reduce exposure. Here’s how:

Deep Third-Party Risk Management

Proactive TPRM involves more than vendor questionnaires. It requires continuous visibility and control. Key components include:

Architecture and Data Flow Mapping
Authentication and Access Controls
Security Testing and Vulnerability Management
Certifications (e.g., SOC 2, CSA STAR)
Incident Response and Breach History
AI-Powered Risk Scoring
Review of Critical Sub-Processors

Least Privilege, Token Hygiene, and Access Controls

In one client engagement, our team worked with an organization using Drift. Because Drift had only read access to non-sensitive fields, attackers were unable to exfiltrate full customer records.

To contain exposure, we recommend:

Restrict write/delete permissions to prevent privilege escalation.
Refresh tokens frequently to limit attacker dwell time.
Scope access narrowly—apps should only access what they need.

Monitoring SaaS Applications: Beyond Logs

Even with strong controls, continuous monitoring is essential. While logs are foundational, they’re only useful when paired with:

Playbooks and use cases
Anomaly detection models
Real-time alerting and dashboards

There are some emerging technologies that can automate and accelerate this process. These tools can:

Discover hidden integrations (e.g., Drift nested inside Salesloft)
Flag risky permissions and token behavior
Detect spikes in API calls or data exports
Provide real-time visibility into user access and exposure

At RiskSentinels, we specialize in:

Third-Party Risk Management (TPRM)

Vendor posture reviews and fourth-party mapping
Continuous monitoring and risk scoring
Integration governance and onboarding controls

Fractional CISO Services

SaaS security strategy and policy development
Incident response planning and tabletop exercises
Cyber insurance readiness and control narratives

Control Consulting

Implementation of least privilege and token hygiene
Monitoring tools integration strategy
Salesforce hardening and breach simulation

Had we been engaged prior to the Drift breach, we could have helped contain exposure, enforce scoped permissions, and monitor integration behavior in real time.

If your organization relies on Salesforce, Microsoft 365, or other cloud platforms, now is the time to rethink your integration strategy. Let us help you build a resilient, risk-aware SaaS environment—before the next breach makes headlines.