Security Testing: Protect your Business and Customers

Different industries use computer software to process and store sensitive business information and customer data. This sensitive data often becomes the target of cybersecurity attacks. Unfortunately, data breach often results in severely damaging a business reputation, and a loss of consumer trust and confidence. Therefore, performing continuous security testing has become more crucial than ever, for businesses looking to boost their brand value, and protect their customers.

 

What is Security Testing?

Security experts use security testing to detect any kind of potential vulnerabilities, weaknesses, risks, or threats in the system, and to protect data and information from possible cybersecurity attackers.

Experts usually use this type of testing to automate specific tasks, and improve testing efficiency. Also, to find issues and bugs that might be exploited by hackers, and are often missed by manual analysis techniques.

In addition to that, it is used to protect information, databases, data history, and servers. Moreover, it is utilized to ensure customers’ trust and integrity, and secure software applications against future attacks.

Types of Security Testing

Conducting security testing multiple times, throughout the software development lifecycle, is an essential requirement before publishing software applications today.

In the next section, we will examine the different types of security tests and their properties:

1. Vulnerability Scanning

This type of security testing is considered the first step in vulnerability management, and app/software security, and is usually automated (manual tools are also available).
It is performed to identify potential loopholes, and vulnerability signatures, across the entire software system. Moreover, it serves the purpose of understanding the baseline of security risks.

2. Security Scanning

Security experts perform security planning to detect vulnerabilities and misconfigurations in the app/software, network, and systems. Afterward, they compile and process results from these tests through in-depth analysis, to produce solutions that fix the issue at hand.

3. Penetration Testing

Penetration testing (or Pen-Testing) is the process of simulating a real-life cyberattack against an app/software, system, or network under secure conditions.
It must be performed manually, by a trusted and certified security expert, to gain an understanding of the strength of security measures against attacks happening in real-time.
In addition to that, unidentified vulnerabilities including zero-day threats, and business logic flaws, are often exposed through penetration testing.

4. Security Audit/Review

Security auditing or security review is a structured security testing method used to review/audit the app/software against pre-defined specifications. By performing gap analysis and code/design reviews.
The security of the physical configurations, operating system, information handling processes, and user practices are examined. In addition to, compliance with regulatory standards and frameworks.

5. Ethical Hacking

Ethical hacking is a broad term, that encompasses a number of hacking methodologies. This type of security testing attempts to expose all vulnerabilities and misconfiguration, by simulating cyberattacks from within the app/software.

6. Risk Assessment

By performing risk assessments, experts can identify and analyze security risks facing the app, software, or network. Afterward, they classify these risks as critical, high, medium, or low. Subsequently, they recommend modification measures based on the assigned level of priority.

7. Posture Assessment

This type of security testing uses a combination of security scanning, ethical hacking, and risk assessment to test the overall security status of the organization.

Benefits of Security Testing

Implementing security tests during the software development life cycle, before any release, comes with an array of benefits. These benefits significantly impact the performance of your digital product and your business.

The following are some of the benefits of security testing:

1. Security tests, ensure that the final product is both safe, and secure for your customers to use. Therefore, reducing the risk of losing consumer data, and harming your brand’s reputation.
2. Early detection of vulnerabilities, results in significant cost savings. Because addressing issues after release with patches, is more expensive than addressing issues during the software development life cycle.
3. Security tests, enable you to stop the development process when you discover critical errors. You can restart the software development process if you found a fatal mistake or a critical vulnerability during penetration testing.
4. Early security tests, help prevent any delays or unknown risks down the road.
5. Security tests, minimize the risk of external cybersecurity attacks, by exposing errors early during the testing process.

How to Perform Security Testing for Web Application?

Depending on the phase in the software development life cycle, there are different methods to guarantee application and network security, some of these methods include:

• Design Review: during this stage, security teams review the design and architecture of the application, to check for security errors before starting the coding process.
• Code Review: this includes the manual testing of source code, to search for security issues. This enables security teams to find software vulnerabilities unique to the application.
• Black-box Testing: this involves testing the application’s source code for security issues during runtime. This testing method aims to give security teams insights, into how a hacker can compromise the production environment, without access privileges.
• Coordinated Vulnerability Management: involves hiring security experts and researchers, to act as consultants. The purpose of hiring them is to perform penetration tests, and ethical hacking, in order to identify and report on vulnerabilities.
• Automated Testing: Here, experts use automated tools for security testing. They categorize it into various approaches, such as Static Application Security Testing (SAST), Dynamic Application Security Testing (DAST), Software Composition Analysis (SCA), and Runtime Application Self-Protection (RASP).

Mash World’s Security Testing Services

Protect your software against potential threats with customizable security testing solutions. At Mash World, we have the proper technical understanding, tools, and skills to secure your app information, using advanced vulnerability scans, system configuration, network security, and more.

We help you operate your software application with ZERO risks, by utilizing a combination of the below security testing solutions:

1. Black box Penetration Testing

Mash World team will help you resolve any software vulnerabilities to avoid falling victim to hackers.

2. Source Code Review

We provide extensive code review solutions, using high-end automation tools to verify security control implementations.

3. OWASP Top 10

We are constantly updated with the Open Web Application Security Project (OWASP) report to implement more secure coding for your digital products.

4. Suggested Remediation Plan

Prioritizing and fixing security flaws according to an extensive plan that provides developers with a timeframe and suggestions to avoid security attacks.

We make sure your digital product is 100% secure by:

• Using customized security solutions from our professional security team.
• Protecting your company’s image.
• Securing your customers’ data against theft.
• Reducing expenses spent on security breaches.

In the end, the correlation between security testing and business success is pretty straightforward. This type of testing creates quality digital products. Subsequently, quality drives traffic, and traffic drives revenue, which leads to overall business growth.

With the help of Mash World’s security experts, we can ensure that your software/application is secure against every major security threat in the market. Schedule a call with our team today to discuss your security testing needs.