Testing is a crucial part of developing software. You need to ensure that your software development is secure down to the very unit of source code. With that in mind, this blog post is going to go over how to integrate security testing into your software development life cycle.
Have a Plan and Identify Requirements
The first step is to have a plan. There will be many different steps in your software development life cycle, and you need to familiarize yourself with the potential risks within each of them. You should have an overall goal for the software, and need to identify requirements that the software needs to have.
In turn, be sure to identify security considerations related to these requirements and what sorts of things might need to be addressed. Create a roadmap your team will follow, and make security a priority at each step. This can help you stay on track, and know what lies ahead. If you can identify potential security hazards ahead of time and prepare for them, it can be incredibly helpful.
Be sure to take your time on this plan, and ensure your entire team is knowledgeable on the best security practices and protocols in place. If things can be done with security in mind from the start, it can make testing a much easier process for everyone involved.
Run Frequent Penetration Tests
While there are several different types of tests that are important to ensure the quality of your software, few are more crucial than penetration testing. Penetration testing is essentially a simulated cyber attack against your software. Running these tests can ensure you are prepared to deal with real attacks that are unfortunately becoming more common.
They will help you find weak points in your security, and show you the things you need to improve. If you don’t run these sorts of tests, you could be vulnerable and it could lead to a hack, leak or data breach, all of which are terrible to deal with.
Many developers will only run these during a specific testing phase, but it is a good idea to run them more frequently throughout the entire life cycle. This will ensure nothing gets missed, and all vulnerabilities can be covered for before an eventual release.
Also, the methods used by hackers changes so frequently that these consistent pen tests ensure you are always prepared. If you only do one test, your software may be vulnerable to newer and more modern tactics used by cyber criminals.
Don’t Forget About Maintenance
However, once the software has been deployed and released, your work in terms of security testing still isn’t done. There is always a chance that something slipped through the cracks. If you simply stop testing the software after release, you could have real customers and users experiencing bugs or security-related problems.
Not only could this hurt your reputation, but patching these issues could involve customers not being able to use your software for an extended period. It’s better to find these issues yourself and fix them quickly, rather than having them found by others. If you don’t test after deployment, your chances of discovering these issues yourself and dealing with them quietly will be very low.
In conclusion, we hope these tips and included information have been able to help you successfully integrate security testing into your software development life cycle. Simply put, the more you test throughout the process, the more secure your software will be.
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