What it Takes to Secure Your Web Apps

By Data-Core Systems | 09/14/2021

Web software applications are complex, but without the right security, they can be easy to hack. Due to web applications’ complexity, it is important to test every single aspect of the program, both on the front and back end. This is no easy feat.

Challenges of security testing

Hackers tend to look for the easiest way into your organization, so if you have a small IT team, you may be limited on resources to identify vulnerabilities. Additionally, most organizations follow a continuous integration and continuous delivery (CI/CD) schedule instead of a fixed release when updating their applications.  This continuous process opens the door for more technical risks. With each release, your team needs to be on top of managing these vulnerabilities. Hiring security experts outside of your IT team can be costly, and it may be difficult to retain them.

How to secure your apps

Now there are technologies that help identify security risks in your applications.  The best tools combine:  

• application crawling and attack capabilities
• flexibility in scan scope and scheduling,
• accuracy in results with a modern UI
• intuitive workflows
• sensible data organization

Data-Core Systems uses various security testing tools, plus our skilled workforce, to quickly scan an app and detect any vulnerabilities.  We comprise them into a list that includes historical and detailed technical information for each vulnerability, making it easier to prioritize which vulnerability to tackle first. We supply this report and then either your team, our security specialists, can fix the vulnerabilities.

Business logic vulnerability assessment

An area that gets forgotten as far as security vulnerability, is securing the business logic of applications. It is important to make sure internal information can only be accessed by those authorized within your organization. Data-Core Systems’ Business Logic Vulnerability Assessments include finding broken authentication such as:

• week password policy
• absence of lockout mechanism
• secure password recovery
• role bases

The assessments also cover authorization vulnerabilities such as:

• role-based access control
• vertical privilege escalation
• horizontal privilege escalation
• access control vulnerabilities within multi-step processes
• context-dependent access controls

Benefits of working with a security testing vendor

IT teams must keep up with evolving security threats and anticipate business needs which may not be realistic for smaller IT teams. Some benefits to hiring an outside vendor:

• a team that stays up to date on the latest security threats  
• detailed reports of vulnerabilities and recommendations on how to fix them
• a team ready to fix any vulnerabilities, not simply report that they exist
• manage risk more effectively

Uncovering security vulnerabilities is key in reducing and managing security risk in your applications. Let Data-Core Systems help you identify vulnerabilities and secure your applications today.