Cyberattacks are undoubtedly the fastest growing crime, the cyber world continues to face today and would probably be the biggest challenge humanity would face in the decades to come.
According to a Cybercrime report, it is predicted that cybercrime will cost the world $6 trillion annually by 2021, up from $3 trillion in 2015.
This whopping figure is scary but it is a blind truth to believe. Some of the unknown cyberattacks in recent years to name a few were NotPetya and Wannacry Ransomware attacks, Ethereum, Operation Shady RAT and many more.
The businesses across regions of the world were affected and surfaced huge economic losses that ran into billions of dollars. The digital world with digital transactions all around and especially the connected Internet of Things (IoT) world is more prone to these cyber-attacks.
Some of the most common types of Cyber Security Attacks include:
- Malware,
- Phishing
- SQL Injection Attack
- Cross-Site Scripting
- Denial of Service (DDoS)
- Session Hijacking
- Zero-Day Exploit
- Insider Threats
- Identity Theft, to name a few
Businesses across all industry sectors such as Media & Entertainment, Technology, Retail, Finance & Insurance, Hospitality, Gaming, Healthcare & Medical, Telcom, etc. are today largely affected by these cyber-attacks.
Basically, businesses should be aware of the major five core segments that need security:
- Infrastructure security
- Inbuilt Networks security
- Applications hosted on loud security
- Web & Mobile Application security
- IoT System’s security if using connected systems
Thus, there is an imminent need for businesses across domains to protect themselves from the increasing threat of cyberattacks only through leveraging security testing.
Do you want to be the next target of cyber-attacks? If ‘No’ then how do you Safeguard your Applications (Web & Mobile) and other critical data from these Cyber Attacks?
Vital Importance of Security Testing:
Security testing ensures applications are free from vulnerabilities, threats or any other form of risks. Prompt security tests evaluate whether the system’s data and resources are protected from any potential intruders.
Also Read: Why Your Employees are Your Weakest Link When it Comes to Cybersecurity
Hence, it is vital to involve security testing right from the initial phases of the software development lifecycle (SDLC).
Interestingly, a security tester should wear different hats as a hacker, cracker, ethical hacker or as packet monkey. Security testing can be performed on newly developed software, hardware, network infrastructure or on the information systems to ensure they are threat and vulnerability free.
What are the types of Security Testing?
To effectively perform the various types of security testing, the tester should have good knowledge of HTTP protocols and understand server communication through HTTP.
Basic knowledge of SQL injection and XSS is equally important. Some of the methods of security testing are:
- Ethical Hacking,
- Password Cracking,
- Cross-Site Scripting (XSS),
- Vulnerability Scanning,
- SQL injection, etc.
Exclusively, software Application security testing helps enterprises to find out security vulnerabilities through an extensive range of tests. Which in turn help them to discover vulnerabilities and evaluate the overall security overview of the applications.
As the impact of the security threat is evident everywhere, therefore it is essential to involve security testing right from the early stages of the SDLC.
Security Testing Tools to Test Web & Mobile Applications:
Some of the Security Testing Tools for Web Applications include:
- BeEF (Browser Exploitation Framework),
- Brakeman,
- CROSS,
- Ettercap,
- FlawFinder,
- Gendarme,
- Knock Subdomain Crack,
- Web security, etc.
Some of the Security Testing Tools for Mobile Applications include:
- Zed Attack Proxy,
- Micro Focus,
- Kiuwan,
- QARK,
- Android Debug Bridge,
- CodifiedSecurity,
- Drozer,
- White Hat Security,
- Veracode, etc.
What is Automated Security Testing?
With technological innovations, it has been seen that new Application security testing solutions have been evolved to support the latest development methodologies of Agile and DevOps. Today’s applications are more prone to build security threats due to a large number of digital transactions, thus increasing more security risks.
Hence, automated security software testing has taken up high priority wherein continuous testing and delivery is being authorized.
This innovative emergency has been significantly named DevSecOps, which involves the process of maintaining security testing needs by integrating the built-in strengths of DevOps within the Security Testing process.
Typically, automated tests are packed in the testing cycle to balance the DevOps continuous integration and continuous testing while deeply scrutinizing applications for security. Such a type of security testing gets robust, iterative and ensures more flexibility. This type of security testing ensures applications are flawless, more secure and delivers better quality.
Some of the latest Automated Security Testing Tools are:
Cloud Infrastructure tools:
Tools built in a cloud environment like Microsoft Azure Advisor and third-party tools like evident.io can be used for scanning configurations to achieve best practices.
Automate Security tests:
Gauntlet is a very popular tool framework to create and run automated security tests.
Code Analysis:
Veracode is commonly used to scan code to find out potential vulnerabilities in the code.
Runtime application security:
Tools like Contrast Security run within the application in production and can ably help to identify security issues in real-time.
Business Benefits with Automated Security Testing
- Ensures faster software releases with automated tests and at the same time delivers quality releases
- Significantly brings down the time required to perform automated tests when compared to manual tests or functional security tests
- Reduces go to market time
- Saves overall testing time
- Helps to shorten test cycles which further shortens the delivery cycles
- Ensures a lesser number of defects at the product go-live time and protects brand reputation
- Assures lower maintenance costs
Last but not least, in recent years it has become utmost important for businesses to leverage automated security testing and frequent security checks. This will enable businesses to achieve faster time to market, quality releases and gain threat-free, stable and secure applications
