Importance of remote software testing in a post-covid world

 

What is Continuous Penetration Testing?

Introduction

In today's digital world, one thing remains constant: change.

The digitization of the economy boosts efficiency while also increasing the risks posed by rogue actors. In reaction to regular attacks, many firms have enhanced their cybersecurity procedures.

Unsurprisingly, IBM's Cost of a Data Breach Report shows that the average cost of data breaches has risen by 10% over the last 11 years, with the healthcare industry experiencing the greatest losses. It is understandable that HIPAA compliance has become a prerequisite in the healthcare industry.

There are several cybersecurity compliance standards in existence today for a variety of businesses. The majority of laws require firms to take a number of security safeguards to ensure that system security controls are in place. Penetration testing  is frequently necessary for maintaining security compliance or is a crucial part of it.

Due to this, the majority of businesses are switching to a more modern strategy that incorporates continuous penetration testing using a platform called Pentest as a Service. Agile Penetration testing is a continuous testing alternative that may be utilised to do asset- or vulnerability-focused testing in addition to Comprehensive Penetration testing for Compliance.

Continue reading to find out more about continuous penetration testing and how it can support your goals if you're a security manager attempting to enhance the cybersecurity readiness of your organisation.

What is Continuous Pentesting?

Every day that goes by, the security environment gets more dynamic, making it harder to stop hostile attacks on your IT systems. This is made worse by the fact that 82% of survey participants in the State of Penetration testing 2023 expect their vulnerability backlog to grow this year.

Ongoing penetration testing becomes important in this situation. To find and fix vulnerabilities before a malicious actor takes advantage of them, penetration testing simulates real-time attacks on your IT infrastructure.

The modern software development lifecycle (SDLC) has security vulnerabilities because pentests used to take weeks or months to set up. Continuous penetration testing helps with this.

Instead of merely doing a couple of these larger pentests for compliance throughout the year, businesses can now include security straight into their SDLC by utilising services such as Agile Pentesting.

Continuous penetration testing allows your organisation to be proactive in identifying and addressing problems that could otherwise go undetected.

Agile Pentesting for Development

Agile pentesting is a strategy for performing security testing throughout the development process, mirroring the iterative nature of agile development. Security risks are decreased and the development process is made secure since it takes a proactive approach.

Instead of waiting until the end of the development cycle, agile penetration testing allows security tests to be unlocked in smaller iterations with more targeted testing. This enables security and development teams to conduct more frequent, continuous feedback cycles to address vulnerabilities as they arise.

According to NIST studies, the first coding phase of development introduces the most majority of faults (85%). It can cost up to 30 times as much to correct these manufacturing faults.

Agile pentesting enables businesses to test continuously throughout the development process, starting at the very beginning and prioritising the most important areas in upcoming sprints. Organisations can efficiently identify vulnerabilities in apps, web services, and underlying infrastructure by integrating agile penetration testing into the SDLC.

Targeted testing solutions are offered by agile pentesting services, enabling quicker testing and, as a result, quicker development. Services include vulnerability testing and delta testing, which test specific changes made to a code base between launch cycles.

How Agile Pentesting Works

The separation of large work units into smaller, more manageable jobs is the first stage of the agile development lifecycle. Agile development uses a more repeated technique than traditional waterfall development, in which requirements are pre-defined and strictly followed. 

When paired with Agile Pentesting, agile development begins with a broad concept and iteratively improves it while finding and resolving security problems. Iterative development aids in completing projects more rapidly and securely.

This method must be used while performing security testing, especially when development must be accomplished swiftly and securely.

Vulnerability Scanners

Another element that is typically combined with ongoing penetration testing to achieve a strong security posture is scanning. Security experts utilise scanning technology to monitor assets and find faults.

When used in conjunction with Comprehensive and Agile Penetration Testing, scanning tools can offer an additional method for quickly detecting vulnerabilities that need to be fixed.

It's also critical to be aware of scanning solutions' drawbacks. These automated scanning tools will miss human logic assaults and other more intricate system flaws. Additionally, they produce a lot of false positives, which are merely a distraction but nevertheless consume significant time from security professionals.

Security scanners are useful, but when compared to penetration testing using DAST, there are other problems with scanning systems.

Also Read: Importance of Penetration Testing Services

Using Penetration testing Beyond Compliance Requirements

Compliance is becoming increasingly important as rules such as GDPR, PCI-DSS, and ISO 27001 become more prevalent.

Compliance, on the other hand, should not be considered as a checklist.

It's also critical to strengthen your security posture to avoid an expensive breach that could hurt your bottom line or harm your consumer reputation.

You may improve your security posture by finding vulnerabilities and making remediations before a hostile attacker finds them to exploit by leveraging Cobalt's PtaaS approach for your penetration testing service needs.