Across the Asia Pacific region, cyber threats have continued to plague organisations big and small, disrupting operations and exposing sensitive info to malicious actions.
For developers, too, security is crucial as cyber threats can cause applications to malfunction, making it harder for customers to have their needs met and for employees to conduct their work. As a result, businesses will have to direct more focus on resolving issues and dealing with legal repercussions, leaving them no time and resources to improve their service offerings.
Aligning security with the software development lifecycle (SDLC), then, is the key to delivering fortified apps that fulfil end-user expectations. However, our recent Progress survey, DevSecOps: Simplifying Complexity in a Changing World, shows that 51% of organisations are only somewhat familiar with how security fits into DevSecOps.
DevSecOps success depends on culture and collaboration
Simply put, successful DevSecOps adoption requires developers and security teams to deliver high-quality services in a short amount of time without compromising security and compliance.
During this process, communication plays a key role in striking a balance between those two aspects. Often, however, there are barriers that can hinder the collaboration between the two teams. For example, if they operate with different functions, processes, and tools, this can hamper their ability to communicate inputs and determine the best courses of action. When asked about the state of collaboration between their developers and security staff, only 30% of organisations said they are confident.
Aligning both teams' operations requires the use of infrastructure as code (IaC), which supports a uniform application deployment process. By executing a single script, users will be able to automate the development of services and functions as part of the continuous integration/continuous delivery (CI/CD) pipeline. This allows organisations to reduce operational costs, enable faster time-to-market and minimise errors brought on by manual processes.
Organisational culture might also pose another challenge as both teams need to depend on one another to enable cybersecurity in product development.
For example, developers need to allow security teams to actively participate in incorporating security tools and practices in the SDLC process while security teams need to communicate the business risks of having a weak posture to developers so that they are aware of the responsibilities they have in ensuring a positive user experience. Our survey echoes this with 71% of organisations agreeing that culture is the biggest barrier to successful DevSecOps progress.
During the proof-of-concept stage of the SDLC process, both teams must review their security configurations to determine what changes need to be made before the software is deployed for use. This will enable security gaps to be plugged in and end-users to receive consistent coverage, which will boost the business' competitiveness and regulatory compliance.
Cybersecurity comes from the top
A security-first mindset provides a critical foundation for building secured apps. The best way of building this mindset is through training and upskilling programs that can transform developers into cybersecurity experts.
Most organisations are aware of this as 61% of them are looking to increase investment in continuous learning for developers and engineers. With training modules and courses centred around cloud and Kubernetes frameworks, developers will be able to effectively reinforce their operations from threat actors.
These programs should be combined with application experience (AX) platforms that allow businesses to optimise their services while enabling security features. Integrating this platform can give DevSecOps teams full visibility of their network traffic as well as early insights into malicious behaviour. Through analysis algorithms, AX platforms can also apply effective responses, such as secondary authentication measures and prevention of access.
Apart from focusing on technology and training, leaders also need to work with security teams in drawing up and enforcing security policies. This means clearly defining roles and procedures so that developers know what they must do to align their operations with cybersecurity.
Successful DevSecOps comes from developers working together with security teams to
integrate a security-first approach to application development. This is crucial — especially as organisations accelerate the creation of new services — in safeguarding users while ensuring that their services remain operational or can be recovered. Moreover, it can also build digital trust, which will encourage more customers to do business and push organisations ahead of the rest.
