DevSecOps: What is its Place in the Development Process?

by Emma Dallas | December 18, 2019 11:28 am

So many Devs and Ops you should keep an eye on while developing or working with the software. How to filter them and implement only necessary techniques and methodologies? We follow the trends and touch upon the most relevant topics, one of which is DevSecOps. Read the article to get a clear image of what it is and why numerous companies rush to integrate it into their projects.

What is DevSecOps and why is it so important?

DevSecOps is a big process in which you need to take care of security. There is no universal DevSecOps definition, but everyone agrees that it is the implementation of security during the earliest stages of the app’s development. The main aim of DevSecOps is to mitigate the risks and weak sides of a product and bring security closer to the goals of IT.

Initially, DevOps presupposed control of the app’s security. On a practical level, the number of specialists on security was so small that they acted not as participants in the SDLC[1], but as a control body that set requirements and checked the product’s quality at the last stage of the launch.

Such a division usually leads to constant release delays as developers get information on security issues at the final stage of the cycle.

Today companies see that security in all areas and industries should spin in one wheel with the development – in Agile[2]. The DevSecOps paradigm fits the agile development methodology, its implementation, support, and can participate in each release and iteration. The most important part of the “DevSecOps” word is that it is a process. You must understand this before thinking about buying tools to handle security matters. Just incorporating tools into the DevOps security process is not enough – the interaction and understanding between the participants in the process are important.

There is usually one security specialist in a company for 100-200 developers. He performs several functions and physically does not have time to check everything. Even if he tries his best, he cannot check all the code that the developers generate. The concept of Security Champions is made for such cases.

Security Champion is a person within the development team who is responsible for the security of your product and works with DevSecOps tools. So it is a good idea to think about the integration of Security Champions with the existing team of developers and thus expanding your security team’s influence.

DevSecOps or DevOps: differences

What are the differences between these two notions? They are very similar, the main distinguisher is that DevOps cycle aims to deliver reliable software as often as necessary, while DevSecOps simply adds the security sauce to this process, but the overall workflow does not change.

Integrating security into DevOps requires new approaches, processes, and tools. Below are basic steps that are required to succeed in the integration of these two notions:

1. Audit of the existing IT infrastructure, debugging.
2. Automation of Security Testing.
3. Constant checking of code dependencies.
4. Breaking checks into manageable parts.
5. Integration with other DevOps tools.
6. Continuous training of the dev team in safe coding.

Integration of security into the set DevOps process is not an easy task, but the benefits it gives will definitely make you think it over.

Benefits from implementing DevSecOps at a project

It is easy to define the benefits of DevSecOps at a project, as they are pretty obvious. Automation of security control from the very beginning reduces the possibility of false administration and errors that lead to release delays or give access to attacks.

Thus, main security processes such as data management[3] and access control, defects and vulnerability scanning are activated by a program in the security DevOps process. Thanks to this approach, security teams focus on setting policies. Experts foretell that 80% of development teams will use DevSecOps by 2021.

Last word on DevSecOps in software development

Specialists say that there is no unique approach or tool that will bring security to your current processes. Individual approach and analysis of the current state of a project is the first thing to do. Once you manage and add security to the development and operations, DevSecOps will work on the product’s efficiency and minimize the risks of vulnerabilities. It is a good background for your assurance in the app’s quality and reliability[4].

Read more useful information about trends in development and software testing on QATestLab blog.

Related Posts:

• Digital Transformation: What you need to know to succeed in 2020[5]
• What is Scriptless Automated Testing?[6]
• How to Distinguish Between QC, QA and Testing?[7]

Source URL: https://blog.qatestlab.com/2019/12/18/devsecops-development-process/

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