Application security management

Security is about protecting your valuable assets. Some of the most important assets your organization owns are in the form of information, such as intellectual property, strategic plans, and customer data. Protecting this information is critical for your organization to continue to operate, be competitive, and meet regulatory requirements.

One of main weaknesses in the IT infrastructure of organizations is where most people do not expect - in the application layer. Many applications are not built with security in mind and they become the weakest link that attackers use to carry out a data breach.

What are some of the challenges your organization might be facing when it comes to application security?

  • Compliance: External regulations and internal policy requirements
    • How do you set internal policy requirements for application security?
    • Is your private/sensitive data exposed by apps?
    • How do you check for, and demonstrate, application compliance?
  • Pace: Rapid growth in the number of applications and releases to meet business requirements
    • Which applications pose the biggest business risk?
    • How do you test apps for security in rapid DevOps/Agile shops, without slowing down the process?
    • How do you reduce costs and catch security problems earlier in the lifecycle before they get into production?
  • Resources: Resource and awareness challenges
    • Where do you start? How do you prioritize the work?
    • What do you test, and how do you test it?
    • How do you staff and improve skills and awareness?

To manage the challenge of addressing application security at the enterprise level, security teams must take a risk-based approach. This risk-based approach means that the team must prioritize assets, focus on identifying areas of highest risk, and then mitigate the risk. Addressing application security at an enterprise level goes beyond scanning applications for vulnerabilities. Large organizations might have thousands of applications that serve various purposes. The responsibility to assess and address application security typically belongs to a small security team.

Click here to learn how to create an application inventoryClick here to learn how to test applications for vulnerabilitiesClick here to learn how to determine risk and prioritize vulnerabilitiesClick here to learn how to remediate risksClick here to learn how to measure progress and demonstrate compliance

Using AppScan Enterprise, security teams can build an inventory of their application assets, classify, and prioritize their assets by business impact before they even start any security testing. This is important because organizations have limited resources and need to focus on the areas of highest risk. After applications are assessed for security vulnerabilities, they can be ranked by a security risk score. This enables Security teams to prioritize vulnerabilities in the context of the applications in which they exist, and focus on remediation activities that have the biggest impact when it comes to mitigating security risk for the organization.