DevSecOps is simply DevOps that focuses on security along a continuous integration/continuous deployment (CI/CD) pipeline.
DevSecOps works to understand the state of security, from the early stages of converting a user story into source code to the build, deployment, and infrastructure management of the deployment environment. For security compliance, the DevSecOps process must be followed from an early stage of the software development life cycle. Compliance with security requirements is essential in industries like banking, finance, capital markets, healthcare, government projects, social media, and e-commerce.
Customers of software organizations expect delivery to be rapid. After products go live, customers can demand changes, looking for additional functionality to meet their business requirements. While the engineering team must meet deadlines, they should always ensure that changes in the source code, the artifact packaged as part of the delivery pipeline, and the deployment region all remain secure. Failing to meet security requirements could leave an exploit open to hackers.
Now that you understand what DevSecOps is and why you need to practice it in your organization or projects let’s look at the differences between DevSecOps and DevOps.
DevOps is a process in which the delivery pipeline is streamlined and automated to handle checkstyle validation, build process, test execution, packaging, and deployment. These all happen continuously and without any manual intervention.
The value of DevOps practice is in the software development lifecycle — it improves productivity and makes the delivery pipeline efficient and fast. But what about the security implications of deployed packages and artifacts in a production environment?
You might be OK if developers have performed their due diligence in dealing with security checks while developing the source code. But if not, the shipped package will remain vulnerable to attackers. It’s not enough to consider security at the functional source code level. There are several other issues, such as:
These factors must be considered and scanned for security issues, but they are not addressed in the DevOps flow as described. To address these concerns, you need DevSecOps. Below is the DevSecOps pipeline, including security-related scanning across various stages. Please note that you may need to use different security tools to carry out these security scans.
Let’s look at the DevSecOps process. When the developer is ready with code changes, they can perform a source composition analysis (SCA) and static application security testing (SAST). SCA scans the dependent open-source libraries for vulnerabilities, while SAST deals with scanning the source code for security flaws. This is entirely optional because:
The flow then moves to the build and test phases. After successfully executing test suites, dynamic application security testing (DAST) is performed to test the application’s vulnerability to external attacks.
After DAST, the packaging is completed, and the security vulnerability check is performed on infrastructure as code (IaC). Recently, many applications have been deployed in Kubernetes/Docker Swarm clusters, so testing the infrastructure code for vulnerabilities is also mandatory. Once all tests are successful, the software is deployed.
You’ve now seen the steps involved in DevOps and DevSecOps practices and how they differ. The above flow diagrams are just simple illustrations of these processes — the details and numbers of steps involved will vary based on your organization or project needs.
The benefits of DevSecOps lie in the observability of your application development and delivery processes. In other words, you get to know what happens when you move from the early stage of converting your stories in the sprint cycle to source code, followed by the build process, test execution, packaging, and deployment.
Here are some of the other benefits you can experience from the DevSecOps workflow:
While several benefits are associated with DevSecOps, specific challenges must be addressed. Implementing this process smoothly and effectively takes time, effort, and money. Here are some best practices if you’re considering DevSecOps in your projects.
First, identify the tools that meet your security scanning requirements. Once the choice is made, integrate those tools with the pipeline.
Additionally, it would help if you reinforced that security is the responsibility of every individual within your organization or project. For instance, you can encourage your teams to participate in security awareness training and organize security hackathons.
Furthermore, ensure that you develop code securely to prevent:
Finally, consider organizing and promoting sessions on cross-skills. For example, bring in a security specialist to talk to each team, ensuring that they know security best practices and how to mitigate issues right from the start. These sessions will promote collaboration across teams and within the organization.
This article provides a solid understanding of DevSecOps, which should encourage you to implement it within your organization or project. By implementing DevSecOps and integrating the best practices described, you can promote observability in the delivery pipeline, inspire confidence in your customers by delivering high-quality, secure products, and improve collaborative efforts across your organization’s teams.
All organizations must be security compliant, particularly those exposed to the internet. Thankfully, with DevSecOps and the appropriate security tools in place, it’s easy to be security compliant from day one.
