How to Bridge the Divide between Developers, Security and DevSecOps

To get the best out of DevSecOps and its integrating security principles, one must look at its relationship with traditional DevOps practices. Workflow used to be linear. Before DevOps, organizations couldn't have continuous communication while dividing work between teams.

Whenever a team finishes work, they hand it over to another team. This created a barrier between the workspace. There was no integration between the teams, and there was rivalry, competition, and conflicts among the teams. Because of this, products do not get to the consumer as early as possible.

Security and DevOps

DevOps is helping to establish workflows, integrate team participation, create an avenue for feedback, and encourage experimentation.

When security is combined with DevOps, we will get DevSecOps. The other side of this dynamic, integrating DevOps ideas into security, receives less attention. This is less difficult than you may expect, though there are some difficulties.

Getting security and DevOps on the same page as one another is the first step (or in the same universe.) Simply putting security and DevOps personnel in the same meeting will not help in this situation. This is primarily because these two groups speak two different languages, respectively. As a first step toward bridging the gap, security must incorporate the philosophy, procedures, and tools used by DevOps into their processes to communicate in a similar language and follow shared practices.

The automation of processes is highly valued in the industry. When designing, testing, and delivering software through automation, a wealth of knowledge and technologies are available. When the focus switches to security, compliance, and risk, we find ourselves in a stormy collaboration between developers, operations, security, risk, and compliance teams.

Five Best Practices to Bridge the Divide between DevSecOps

1.      Automate Security

Security testing should be quicker, more secure, and less secured when it is automated. When responsibilities are shared between DevOps and security, this will enhance the fluidity of work processes for DevSecOps. Numerous automation tools can be used, including Tanium, InSpec, Contrast Security, and Splunk.

2.      Code Configurations

DevSecOps thrives on built-in security. Apps are created by converting their requirements into code and then refining them continuously until complete. This is because DevOps projects may find themselves battling with the long cycles that they were seeking to overcome in the first place if they do not have built-in security. Teams should be equipped with relevant coding skills to make this less stressful.

3.      Work in Sprints

One of the exciting things about Agile is breaking down work into sprints. When DevOps and security synchronize their sprints, they will be able to work together on the same project simultaneously. It is easier to keep track of your progress when working in sprints.

4.      Conduct a risk/benefit analysis

If a DevSecOps should be considered effective, risk/benefit analysis should be conducted, and relevant risk tolerance should be determined. DevSecOps workflows should incorporate protections for the most dangerous events in your infrastructure.

5.      Conduct Retrospectives

Conducting retrospectives is one of Agile's features explicitly made for security. This can be used by security teams to evaluate the effectiveness of controls, trade techniques, and identify valuable lessons. When the job is over, the team evaluates their assumptions and performance.

Key Takeaways:

• In the absence of an adequate security discussion in the DevOps context, (experimental) security controls are not fully integrated into the DevOps workflow.
• When teams integrate security into their DevOps processes, the security paradigm might come in the way of achieving a rapid release cycle.