With the business landscape becoming more interconnected, and software development increasingly relying on third-party and open-source components, importance of application security testing is also gaining prominence. Further, cloud adoption has multiplied potential vulnerabilities, making applications prime targets for hackers, increasing overall risks. Thus, to achieve a robust security posture, a multi-faceted approach to application security is much needed. Testing methods, Static Application Security Testing (SAST) and Dynamic Application Security Testing (DAST), offer unique benefits, collectively ensuring comprehensive protection against a wide range of vulnerabilities. At Avancer, we harness the power of SAST and DAST as a part of our comprehensive strategy to identify, mitigate and manage vulnerabilities throughout the software development and implementation lifecycle, ensuring a strong and resilient application.
Understanding SAST and DAST
SAST focuses on analysing the source code to find out potential vulnerabilities and security issues, such as input validation vulnerabilities, insecure coding practices and configuration weaknesses. This technique helps companies to get an early security assessment of the application and address any vulnerability during the development stage itself and eliminate any security risk even before the app could go live. As SAST involves analyzing the source code to find out any potential security issues and vulnerabilities, we use SAST tools scan for any known coding patterns and practices that could lead to security gaps in the app. We typically perform this analysis during the development phase or as part of the CI/CD (Continuous Integration/Continuous Deployment) pipeline. We use SAST tools to scan the application’s codebase without executing it, which enables us to identify issues such as SQL injection, cross-site scripting (XSS), buffer overflows, and insecure authentication methods. It helps our developers in gaining insights into the security posture at the code level of the application.
With regards to DAST, the technique focuses on testing the application in a running state, wherein real-world attack scenarios are simulated. This is conducted by sending request to the app and analyzing how it responds. DAST tools assess the runtime behavior of the app, examine the app’s input handling capabilities, uncover potential security vulnerabilities and test the authentication mechanisms. Unlike SAST that focuses on analyzing the source code, DAST examines applications in a running environment to identify security vulnerabilities, such as injection attacks, broken authentication, session management issues, and other vulnerabilities that occur during runtime. DAST tools help us in interacting with the app like a user, making actual requests and analyzing the results thereof.
Our best practices in leveraging the strengths of SAST and DAST
1. We leverage SAST and DAST in the software development lifecycle stage itself.
We integrate SAST and DAST into the development process from the beginning. This helps us identify and address security issues at the code level early on, thereby, reducing the chances of critical vulnerabilities occurring in the later stages.
To ensure the security of any software applications, especially built on Java platforms, leveraging both SAST and DAST in the development cycle or DevSecOps is an effective approach. They are complementary to each other and help in identifying vulnerabilities in applications. We integrate SAST and DAST tests into Continuous Integration/Continuous Deployment (CI/CD) pipeline to ensure that security checks become a standard part of the development workflow. Such automation allows us to test the code regularly, detect issues early, and respond to them promptly.
At Avancer, we ensure that SAST is integrated in the early stages of the software development cycle itself. Our developers use it to analyze source code to detect security flaws during the coding phase. Further, by integrating SAST, our developers are able to get real-time feedback on any possible security issues while writing the code. This enables us to identify and remediate any vulnerabilities even before merging the code into the main branch, thereby, helping in minimizing the cost and effort of addressing any challenges later in the development process.
We also leverage DAST, typically on running applications, through continuous integration and deployment pipelines. Our experts trigger automated DAST tools during certain phases such as QA or before deploying to the production environment. This helps us in identifying security issues that could occur while the application is running or during configuration.
2. We automate security testing and supplement with manual security testing.
We automate both SAST and DAST processes to ensure providing consistent and regular security assessments. In order to make security checks a standard protocol of the development workflow, our experts integrate these tests into the Continuous Integration/Continuous Deployment (CI/CD) pipeline itself. This allows us to test the codebase on a regular basis, detect issues and mitigate them at the earliest.
Although automation is crucial, we also focus on conducting manual security testing by experienced security professionals. Such testing can identify complex vulnerabilities, logic flaws, and other issues that automated tools may not detect.
3. We run DAST in production-like environments and focus on false positive reduction.
In order to ensure that the application runs without issues, it is imperative to perform DAST in environments that closely resemble your production setup. This helps us in finding issues that are specific to your environment and configuration. We focus on integrating the results received from SAST and DAST testing into a centralized security management platform. This helps us in collating the findings, remove duplicate results and prioritize vulnerabilities as per their severity and potential impact on the application.
We are aware that SAST and DAST tools may also generate false positives. Thus, we focus on investing time in enhancing the configurations of the tools, tuning rule sets, and providing appropriate context to improve their accuracy. It is essential to reduce false positives, as it helps us to focus on real threats and avoid wasting time on non-existent vulnerabilities.
4. We perform regular security assessments.
As application security is an ongoing process, we recommend conducting regular SAST and DAST assessments, especially in the event of significant code changes, updates, or deployments. Such assessments help in identifying new vulnerabilities promptly. At Avancer, our experts also leverage SAST and DAST best practices whiles customizing off-the-shelf products as well, as we believe that even fragments of a code should follow such protocols that will ensure a secure product, and proactively negate any possible future challenges.
5. We combine SAST and DAST in penetration testing.
We also integrate SAST and DAST in penetration testing to undertake a comprehensive approach to application security. While SAST focuses on identifying security weaknesses at the code level, DAST complements SAST by giving real-time assessment and confirming the existence of vulnerabilities in the live application. Combining both the techniques helps us in increasing the effectiveness of application penetration testing, along with ensuring a comprehensive evaluation of the app’s security posture.
Leveraging SAST and DAST in development cycle: Our case analysis
While developing our indigenous API engine Identity Bridge, we used SAST and DAST as crucial components during the development cycle. It enabled us to collaborate between development, operations and security teams. We were able to use automated SAST tools to scan code as soon as it is provided to version control, and automated DAST tools for testing applications at different stages of the pipeline. Further, as our security professionals work in close collaboration with our developers they were able to provide continuous feedback, enabling developers to create secure coding standards.
Designing scalable and flexible solutions:
Cloud environments are dynamic and can scale rapidly. Our IAM solutions are designed to accommodate this scalability while maintaining security. As organizations expand their cloud presence, our IAM solutions can handle the increasing complexity of managing user identities and access.
In conclusion
Using SAST and DAST together helps enterprises to prioritize and address gap areas based on their potential impact, as well as allocating resources more effectively, focusing on critical vulnerabilities that may get exploited by hackers. This enhances the efforts of risk mitigation and helps mitigate vulnerabilities. Further, the combination of SAST and DAST aligns with compliances and regulatory requirements. By leveraging both the techniques, we are able to demonstrate a comprehensive approach to app security, ensuring compliances.
Application testing is crucial to identify vulnerabilities and strengthen app security. With the combination of SAST and DAST, we can not only comprehensively assess applications for potential risks, but also detect early vulnerability and improve overall application security.
How Avancer can help?
Avancer offers customized solutions and advanced tools for implementing the integrated approach of SAST and DAST in application testing. With our experienced team and using latest technologies, we ensure providing accurate and comprehensive application security testing. We optimize workflows, deliver actionable reports, and provide continuous support for effective remediation. By partnering with Avancer, enterprises are able to achieve a strong security posture, reduce vulnerabilities, and get constant monitoring to mitigate potential risks.
