5 Best Practices And 1 Open Tool
“I repeat, my cases are all about source code theft. Because I want to be the best hacker in the world. I like to break the security mechanism&”-” Kevin Mitnick, network security consultant, author, keynote speaker
Open source software began more than 30 years ago, roughly equivalent to the time when Worldwide Web became mainstream. Since then, clear security standards have been adopted for technologies ranging from mobile phones to emerging technologies such as cloud computing, artificial intelligence and the Internet of Things. However, due to the openness and accessibility of open source software(OSS), it is still an outsider.
The good news is that open source code is open to people and enterprises and can be used, distributed and modified. The bad news is that hackers are also human beings. Their motivation is not to improve code, but to introduce open source chaos.
The source code makes all IT applications have security vulnerabilities. Therefore, you need to identify applications and open source components that have open source components.
Open source code is prone to risks
You may have heard of open source front-end programs or languages, such as Ozilla Firefox, GIMP, Python, PHP, Apache Spark and various CRM applications such as Odoo, Hubspot or Concourse Suite. However, Wireshark, TCPflow, Ngrep and other network protocols and packet analyzers are back-end tools and open source applications used to resolve security exceptions. Self made tools in these stores often fall off the safety radar.
Many organizations do not consider the popularity of open source code and components. More than 95% of the world’s applications contain open source code, and 90% of IT leaders rely on enterprise open source code to support networks, “infrastructure modernization, application development, and digital conversion.”. Most leaders believe that enterprise open source is as safe as proprietary software, but threats still exist.
More than 85% of applications have one or more vulnerabilities. More worrying is that WordPress, Wikipedia and other ordinary PHP based applications are prone to “serious defects”.
Some developers borrow non-commercial open source code, often getting more than they expected. Security vulnerabilities, etc. More than 80% of network attacks occur in the application layer world, which is harmful and costly.
If you are 5% of developers who do not use open source, you are ahead.
Why?
The vulnerability of open source software may expose the organization and relevant parties to the risk of downtime and loss of important information, affecting revenue, reputation and progress. When using open source software, it may disclose business secrets and personal identity information of customers and employees. In 2017, like Equifax vulnerability, the personal data of nearly 150 million consumers was disclosed.
Equifax failed to provide “reasonable” network security, and incurred $425 million in federal fines and litigation costs.
CIA – Three words that summarize the open source security goals
Often referred to as CIA data confidentiality. Integrity and availability are the cornerstones of all information system security plans. As the basis of security policies, the CIA aims to protect intellectual property rights, ensure business continuity, provide employees with access to company resources, and provide accurate, reliable and accessible data.
For patches, unchecked or Equifax, outdated open source software may compromise the confidentiality, integrity and availability of data.
5 Best Practices for Organizational, Data, and Stakeholder Security
In essence, open source software will have programming vulnerabilities and backdoors to facilitate hackers to steal source code. In particular, security vulnerabilities are included in the National Vulnerability Database(NVD) and other public forums.
Exposing code and security vulnerabilities helps developers fix vulnerabilities and create patches, but does not expose all potential security threats. However, organizations can follow simple protocols, policies, and best practices and keep informed to avoid all known threats.
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Maintain a complete list of all open source software
Implement security software analysis tools to identify, track, and monitor open source threats and vulnerabilities throughout the environment, and generate important alerts.
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Keep all open source software and components up to date
Make it difficult for intruders to penetrate, system damage and malicious activities. Q& to create a policy, you do not check the vulnerability of the code segment first, nor are you allowed to copy and paste the code segment into the internal components in the open source repository.
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Create, test, and implement open source security policies
Prepare forensic medicine for emergency planning, continuous updating and testing of security policy deficiencies, and investigating the consequences of security vulnerabilities.
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Hire a dedicated DevOps security strategy team
Discover all open source software and map it to known vulnerabilities in Q&A. Provide continuous training for developers on internal policies and external security risks.
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Identify license risks and infringements
Open source software and components training developers, legal advisers and Q&A; compliance with open source licenses can avoid litigation and intellectual property infringement
Best tools for automating open source testing and best practices
Snik is a powerful open source security management platform. Gartner, Reddit, Segment, Accuity, and other companies can benefit from comprehensive security coverage. Snik Open Source has just been deployed, and the productivity of these companies has been improved. Their team accelerated application development and easily protected the development pipeline.
Snik does not need a separate DevOps security team. It is robust and suitable for agile environments. Snyk can achieve these confidentiality, integrity and availability goals faster, and solve one of the five practices in real time, helping to save time, cost and resources.
Snyk eliminates guesswork and legwork in inventory audits related to open source protection, and eliminates constant NVD searches to identify the latest vulnerabilities and licensing risks. Snik is trusted by the company, developers, and security teams. It can be seamlessly integrated into the existing development workflow to achieve maintenance automation, quickly detect, determine priorities, and solve problems through a comprehensive intelligent database.
If you need to use open source code in the following applications or back-end tasks, please use the above five best practices and Snik’s open source security management platform to use them confidently.