In today’s modern world, the number of threats to businesses and their customers increases almost every day. The main problem in today’s businesses is the continuous security risk that quickly evolves over short periods of time, leaving businesses with a widening gap in manpower and the resources needed to protect their data.
Everyone can be a potential target
Every day, more information about cyber-attacks makes its way into the headlines – like in 2014, when JP Morgan Chase Bank disclosed a massive breach that compromised the data of 76 million households and 7 million small businesses. Other U.S. financial institutions, brokerage firms and financial news publishers have been targeted, including Citigroup, HSBC, Dow Jones and the payroll service company ADP.
For this unceasing problem, cybersecurity is very important to eradicate all security risks and threats.
But what is cybersecurity and how can it solve the problem?
Cybersecurity is the practice of defending applications, computers, servers, mobile devices, electronic systems, networks and data from malicious attacks. It is also known as information technology security. Adding this practice will prevent unwanted risks and cyber-attacks that might take place.
Here are the following aspects of your business that might be directly damaged in case of a cyber-attack:
- Your financial capital
- IT equipment
- IT-based services
- Information base
- Customer data
Information can take on many forms: client lists, customer databases, financial details, customers’ financial details, deals that are either finalised or under consideration, pricing information, product designs and manufacturing processes.
Prevention solutions
VAPT stands for Vulnerability Assessment and Penetration Testing. With the help of this service, we can easily eliminate the risks and threats by applying all the security guidelines along with the software development phase.
Figure 1: Security Development Cycle
SDC reference site
Security in Requirements Defining Phase
- How will security be integrated with the process of development?
- What are the main objectives of security?
- How can security be maximised while minimising disruption?
- What software is likely to be used with the system under development, and how will security-related features be integrated with that other software?
- What security feature requirements are needed for the system under development?
Security in Designing Phase
- Defining the designing guidelines & architecture of security
- Documenting the elements of the surface of software attacks
- Conducting threat modelling
Security in Implementation Phase
- Use standards for coding & testing
- Use fuzzing tools & relevant tools for security testing
- Use tools for code scanning/static analysis
- Carry out code reviews
Security in Verification Phase
- Conduct beta testing
- Conduct specific security test
Security in Release Phase
- Conduct a “Final Security Review” (FSR). This review is designed to answer the question of whether the system is now ready to be released to the customers from a security standpoint.
- The “Final Security Review” is intended to be conducted by an independent team, and sometimes even by outside security review consultants. This is to try to isolate the FSR from preconceptions and biases that exist in the product design team as much as possible.
Security in Support and Servicing
- Conduct evaluation reports of new vulnerabilities and issue fixes as needed.
- Conduct a post-mortem assessment and analysis of the security bugs found. How, where, and when they were found may indicate a need for process change, a need for tool updates or changes, etc.
Conclusion
Applying this technology in any business will prevent direct damages such as financial loss, sensitive information leakage, property damage or even damage to the integrity of your company or application.
