What Is DevSecOps and Why Cybersecurity Is a Priority in Uncertain Times

Did you know that one in four breaches in remote work is linked to trusted insiders?

Insider threats are not new, but as a major part of the workforce is working from home due to the COVID-19 pandemic, internal breaches in remote work and other types of new cyber attacks are affecting more and more organizations across the globe.

According to the latest Amatas’ Cyber Threat Intelligence Report, cybersecurity threats are constantly growing in number, variety, and intensity. Besides insider breaches, attacks against SMBs, phishing, ransomware, cloud, and VPN attacks are all on the rise. In this troubling digital landscape, it’s important to know how to keep your organization protected — not only because of fear and insecurity, but as a strategic business solution.

Puppet’s 2019 State of DevOps Report shows companies that have accelerated their DevOps practices are reaping significant benefits in terms of security. Тhese organizations achieve this by embedding security principles in their software development process from the very beginning.

This is how the rise of the term DevSecOps comes around. It builds upon the concept of DevOps — the cultural shift that fosters effective collaboration between development and operations teams — but integrates security in the picture too, by including collaboration with security teams in the software development lifecycle.

What exactly is DevSecOps, then?

DevSecOps practices help organizations minimize vulnerabilities and match security with their general IT and business objectives. This makes DevSecOps highly beneficial for improving the software development processes of organizations from all business venues, boosting their productivity, security, and agility.

A decade ago, taking care of security aspects was reserved for the final stage of software development, but then the process was much lengthier. Today, with iterations as short as days and with the rise of cloud, containers and microservices, the DevOps framework doesn’t allow for security to remain a last-on-the-list issue.

DevSecOps inserts the dimension of security in the DevOps practices to boost the development process from the very early stages of the lifecycle. As such, DevSecOps is an extra layer in the cultural changes spurred by DevOps. This shift-left approach embeds application and infrastructure security practices in the rapid development and deployment cycles.

With DevSecOps, IT security is fully integrated across the whole cycle. In this way, these practices are building a security foundation into the whole organization and each of its DevOps initiatives.

In practical terms, DevSecOps entails the security team is synced with the development and operations teams from the very beginning. That’s how information security is embedded in the process with ease, avoiding bottlenecks. This also allows for security automation plans that prevent delays and optimize delivery times.

The benefits of DevSecOps for organizations

Maybe you are wondering what’s in for your organization to apply DevSecOps practices? Is it worth it? Here are four reasons to consider why it makes sense to implement DevSecOps in your business.

1. Boost of the operational efficiency in security and IT

DevSecOps improves the effectiveness of your IT and security teams and their contribution in the context of the development process. A growing number of organizations, for example, are embedding security scans based on automation in their Continuous Integration and Delivery (CI/CD) pipelines.

DevSecOps allows for greater speed and agility in the work of your teams. Instead of getting bogged down in testing at the end, security teams provide their insights early on, freeing up more time for other high-value work

2. Optimal use and ROI of your cloud services and security infrastructure

With DevSecOps, you can maximize the effect of your security investments in your infrastructure. If your operations rely mostly on the cloud, using DevSecOps practices, you can maximize the uptime of your cloud services.

DevSecOps offers improved security controls for prevention and detection in applications. This allows you to keep to a minimum the expensive downtimes that problems with your cloud services’ security can cause.

3. Greater speed and agility across the development process

Implementing DevSecOps practices has direct positive effects on the development process as a whole. They improve the collaboration and communication between teams that are crucial for the software building — development, operations, and security. This results in better productivity and faster delivery.

DevSecOps also empowers development, operations and security teams to respond to change and new security demands rapidly — on the go. These practices embed a new level of organizational agility in the process of building a product.

4. More automation and better quality assurance

DevSecOps allows for automation to become an even bigger part of the development process. With automated security testing and quality assurance integrated across the lifecycle, teams can introduce safety improvements in an incremental way. This paves the way for more automated builds, which means higher speed of delivery too.

The higher level of automation means that teams can spot vulnerabilities in the code early on. This saves a ton of time and efforts that otherwise would be needed in late-stage testing. Early detection also allows for better scalability of products.

Improving the Cybersecurity Practices in Your Organization

The Amatas’ Cyber Threat Intelligence Report projects insider threats in remote work to grow to one in three in 2021. Attacks against SMBs are more and more frequent too, with 28% of all breaches being against smaller companies. Automated phishing attacks have increased steadily, with 15% per year in 2019 and 2020. Similar trends can be seen with ransomware and with cloud and VPN attacks. In this landscape, cyber security naturally comes at the forefront of business priorities.

Are you looking for ways to set or improve the cybersecurity practices in your company? Starting out with this process may not be that easy, as the options are numerous.

Resolute Software is soon launching a cybersecurity assessment package to help out organizations in their security efforts. It will allow you to identify and measure the risks your company is facing in the ever-changing digital landscape of new technologies and the challenges posed by remote work.

Stay tuned for our security assessment package and get in touch to learn more about our digital solutions!