Introduction
In today’s world of digital transformation, it’s crucial to prioritise security in program development. One of the best ways to ensure the security of your application is through security code review. Security code review is an important practice that helps you identify and address security vulnerabilities in your application’s source code.
A security code review is an audit of your application’s source code. Which involves analysing the code line by line to identify potential security risks. This process is conduct by experience developers or security professionals who understand common vulnerabilities and can spot them in code.
Steps to conduct security code review
Here are the steps to conduct a security code review for your application:
Step 1: Define the Scope
Before beginning the code review process, it’s important to define the scope of the review. The scope should specify which components of the application will be review. Including which programming languages, libraries, and frameworks are in use. The scope should also define what type of review is being conduct. Such as a full review of the entire application or a targeted review of specific areas of concern.
Step 2: Identify Common Vulnerabilities
The next step is to identify common vulnerabilities that may exist in the application’s code. Common vulnerabilities include SQL injection, cross site scripting, buffer over flow, and many more. A security professional or developer with experience in secure coding practices should be able to identify these vulnerabilities by analysing the code.
Step 3: Analyze the Code
Once the vulnerabilities have been identify. Firstly, the next step is to analyze the code line by line to determine whether the code contains any vulnerabilities. This process involves reviewing the code’s logic, syntax, and structure to ensure that it is secure and meets industry standards. Manual code review is typically conduct by skilled developers. But there are also automate tools available to assist in the process.
Step 4: Evaluate Findings and Prioritize Fixes
After the code review is complete, it’s important to evaluate the findings and prioritize the necessary fixes. The findings should be rank by severity. And fixes should be prioritise based on the level of risk connected with each vulnerability. Fixing critical vulnerabilities should be the top priority, followed by high, medium, and low level vulnerabilities.
Step 5: Implement Fixes
The final step is to implement the necessary fixes to address the identified vulnerabilities. The fixes should be implemented as soon as possible to reduce the risk of an attack. Additionally, it’s important to retest the application to ensure that the vulnerabilities have been addressed and that the application is now secure.
Conclusion
In conclusion, conducting a security code review for your application is an important practice that helps ensure the security of your application. By following these steps, you can identify and address security vulnerabilities in your code, reducing the risk of a cyber attack. Lastly, it’s important to prioritise security in program development to protect your application and its users’ data.
Lead QA Engineer at CeeGees Software Solutions Pvt. Ltd.