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AWS Best Practices for DevSecOps

In simple terms, DevSecOps refers to the practice of integrating security into an application right from the early stages of its development lifecycle. It facilitates the collaboration of people, processes, and tools to ensure that security is a shared responsibility of all stakeholders in an application development initiative.

 Why Is DevSecOps Important in AWS?

For over a decade, companies have successfully transformed their digital landscape on AWS with DevOps. Following a productized approach to technology development with iterative improvements has become a norm in almost every major enterprise software initiative. However, with the growth of technology-driven experiences, the need to ensure that these digital assets offer a secure experience is ever more important today.    The answer to ensuring a continued secure experience on the cloud lies with DevSecOps. By transitioning security into a key contributing pillar in the early stages of development, a business’s cloud application can have increased resilience, higher quality, and better end-user experience owing to low or negligible defects.   Implementing DevSecOps in AWS is not a simple task, but here are a few tips to help enterprises leverage the best ROI from their AWS DevSecOps initiatives:

·      Nurture a Secure Development Culture

It is imminent that technology-driven security practices will be key in building a safe digital infrastructure on AWS. But before venturing into the technical side, enterprises must ensure that they foster a culture of secure technology development for all their digital assets. Just like how DevOps culture brings all teams on a common thread to achieve unified and consistent delivery goals, security needs to be a central continuous growth pillar.    One way to achieve this goal of continuous security improvement is to pick members from different teams as security champions who will be given special training and learnings needed to take on a leadership role within the team for integrating security. They can then motivate their teams to follow secure development practices in day-to-day functions.

·      Keep Track of Changes Through Version Control

Modern productized technology development initiatives on AWS involve small yet frequent incremental releases or deployment of feature updates. In the past, deployment was a challenge in such a scenario, but with the advent of DevOps, the entire release cycle was streamlined efficiently. However, with smaller development sprints occurring frequently, there is a scenario where code changes happen continuously, and chances are that engineers might lose track of the changes.    This can be a huge security threat as in any vulnerable scenario for which solutions may take time, the older code block must be reverted immediately to ensure that the application runs smoothly on AWS without any end-user service disruption.   To eliminate the challenge, deploying a version control system in your development lifecycle is important even before implementing DevSecOps principles. A good version control system that has features like digital signatures, identity verification, application lifecycle management tools, etc., will ensure that it becomes easy to revert changes should anything go wrong from a security perspective.

 

·      Automate Security Validations

Continuous security checks are a primary objective of DevSecOps, but this should not hamper the speed of development and deployment as the digital space is highly competitive today. The best way to tackle this challenge is to automate as many security checks as possible.   Automating dynamic as well as static code testing will ensure that vulnerabilities are detected early on and corresponding development teams are notified automatically. Additionally, automated checks will also ensure that there are no biased decisions made to handle any threat. When performing security checks manually, engineers may feel tempted to prioritize perfection over iterations for fear of disruptive experiences, and this is a dangerously biased decision. With automation, such bias can be eliminated, and digital channels can be assured of secure experiences.

 

·      Leverage the Right Tools

From version control to automated security checks, there are several tools and platforms available to guide and help development teams follow DevSecOps practices. However, it is important to conduct a thorough examination of any tool before deciding on an investment. Businesses must evaluate their unique workflows, priorities, cost, and manpower constraints and select a solution that aligns closely with their goals and requirements.    Above all, it is extremely important to check their compatibility with AWS and how well they scale in the cloud to meet the increasing demands of your digital channels over time.

 

·      Start Small, Prioritize, and Scale

We have seen how important it is to cultivate a culture of secure development to ease the adoption of DevSecOps in AWS. Once representatives from different teams are picked to spearhead the secure development motto, they should be directed to start with small daily functions in the team. Eventually, they can scale with a prioritized list of activities, and over time, there will be end-to-end coverage. This approach allows for a smoother adoption of DevSecOps as engineers get a breathing space to try new approaches, integrate change management effectively and reap ROI from the initiative the right way.

Conclusion

Achieving effortless implementation of DevSecOps in your AWS landscape will be critical in ensuring continuous growth for new digital channels rolled out to your customers. The tips we covered here will ensure that you have a roadmap to smoothly welcome DevSecOps into your daily development practices.    However, the complexities of DevSecOps may prove to be a bit overwhelming for your technical team, especially if technology isn’t your core business line. This is where a knowledgeable partner like Enreap can be your biggest asset. Get in touch with us to know more.