A Secure Software Development Life Cycle (SSDLC) is a collection of best practices that provides added security checks to the standard software development life cycle. It’s a crucial part of CYDEF’s development process and a core element of our solutions.
Security is Essential at All Stages of Development
At CYDEF, security is foundational to the entire organization and especially to its software development life cycle. As a result, security is baked into every phase of development, starting with requirements and ending with complete verification.
From day one, CYDEF’s Chief Technology Officer, Tiago de Jesus, has insisted that adopting a secure software development life cycle isn’t an objective, rather it is the most essential and fundamental building block of our team culture. Having a “security first” mindset is an absolute requirement for building code at CYDEF.
Reducing Vulnerabilities is an Outcome
This laser focus on security throughout the software development life cycle dramatically reduces the probability of a costly mistake requiring a retroactive response. The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) claims that “The cost of removing an application security vulnerability during the design phase ranges from 30-60 times less than if removed during production.”
Our development team focuses on security throughout the product life cycle so that we practice what we preach and so that we can reduce the total cost of application development.
What is Secure Software Development Life Cycle?
A Secure Software Development Life Cycle (SSDLC) provides the development team with a clear protocol: security + functionality.
This security-first approach empowers CYDEF’s development team to include multiple security checks in their workflows. These checks verify that issues are anticipated and tested and that all detected weaknesses are addressed at the earliest point in the development cycle. This strategy greatly reduces the chance of any security vulnerability passing into a final product build and making its way into a user’s hands.
CYDEF’s SSDLC contains testing at all phases of development. This includes verification that no design requirements compromise CYDEF’s zero trust model, unit testing of core functions, code reviews for all changes, integration testing in the build pipelines and standalone quality assurance regression testing in isolated environments. Beyond CYDEF’s internal automated and manual testing, 3rd party pentesting is regularly scheduled to certify that our Production Builds are impervious to external threats.
A Secure Approach is a Cultural Mindset
A secure software development life cycle requires a shift in mindset for many developers. In an era where attacks have grown more frequent and complex, the standard approach of completing development tasks and pushing them for testing will not suffice.
Attackers are looking for vulnerabilities that they can exploit, so developers must be thinking about the security of their code.
At CYDEF, we’ve adopted the security mindset. We think about securing every step of the development process. This attunes the team’s mindset to account for security-oriented processes, establishing an understanding of security behaviors during requirements gathering, i
mplementing automated verification into our deployment processes, and a handful of other tactics that ensure our code is as secure as possible.
CYDEF and the Future of Secure Software Development Life Cycle
Over the next few months, CYDEF will be undertaking a SOC 2 compliance audit. Our development and operations teams have been hard at work over the past few months to finalize the procedures and policies that support our SOC 2 certification. The process of adopting a Secure Software Development Life Cycle was a critical component. CYDEF is expecting to announce the results of the audit later this year.
Our secure approach to development and dedication to a SOC 2 certification isn’t just a marketing differentiator. It’s our approach to our business. Our endpoint detection and response solutions monitor an environment, looking for expected inputs and outputs. When our solutions detect the unexpected, we know to pause and assess what’s happening. Our development team lives by this same approach to check for anomalies in the code along the development cycle. As a result, we ensure that we won’t be surprised by an issue later in the product life cycle.
If your ideal cybersecurity partner is one who lives and breathes security, CYDEF would love to hear from you. We’re devoted to enabling all businesses to securely operate online.
