How do you handle security risks and threats in your design phase and testing phase?

2 Security design patterns

The next step to handle security risks and threats is to use security design patterns to implement your security design principles. These patterns provide proven and tested methods and techniques that can help you achieve your security goals. For example, authentication and authorization protocols like OAuth, OpenID Connect, SAML, or JWT can be used to verify the identity and access rights of users and systems. Secure communication protocols such as TLS, SSL, HTTPS, and VPN can be used to establish encrypted connections between system components. Secure logging and auditing protocols such as syslog, ELK stack, or SIEM can be used to collect and analyze logs. Additionally, secure configuration management protocols like Ansible, Puppet, or Chef can be used to manage configuration settings.

3 Security risk assessment

The third step to handle security risks and threats is to conduct a security risk assessment to identify and evaluate potential risks and threats that could affect your system. This systematic process involves identifying the assets and data that need to be protected, their value and sensitivity, as well as the threats and vulnerabilities that could compromise them. It also requires assessing the impacts and consequences of a successful attack, their severity and frequency, and the controls and mitigations that could prevent or reduce the risks and threats, along with their effectiveness and cost. Finally, you must prioritize the risks and threats based on their risk level, which is determined by multiplying the likelihood and impact.

4 Security design review

The fourth step to handle security risks and threats is to perform a security design review to verify and validate your security design against your security goals and requirements. This quality assurance activity involves defining the scope and objectives of the review, selecting the reviewers and stakeholders, collecting and analyzing relevant documentation and artifacts, conducting the review sessions, and identifying and documenting the findings. Additionally, it is necessary to resolve and implement the findings of the review, such as corrections, improvements, or enhancements.

5 Security testing

The fifth step to handle security risks and threats is to perform security testing to verify and validate your security implementation against your security design and risk assessment. This testing activity involves defining the scope and objectives, as well as selecting the testers and tools who will perform the test cases and scenarios. These tests can be manual or automated, and use different techniques, such as black-box, white-box, or gray-box. After executing the tests, you must document the results and outcomes, such as any defects or vulnerabilities. Finally, you must resolve and implement the results and outcomes of the testing, such as fixes, patches, or updates.

6 Security monitoring and maintenance

The sixth step to handle security risks and threats is to perform security monitoring and maintenance in order to ensure the continuous security of your system throughout its lifecycle. This operational activity involves monitoring the performance and behavior of your system components, such as servers, networks, databases, and applications, to detect any anomalies or incidents. Furthermore, analyzing the data and information collected from your system components, such as logs, metrics, alerts, and reports can help identify patterns or root causes. Additionally, responding to any security events or incidents that occur in your system is necessary and should be done according to the incident response plan and procedures. Lastly, reviewing and updating your security design, risk assessment, testing, and controls based on the feedback from security monitoring can help implement changes or improvements.