Building Security Into the Development Workflow
Shipping out new features and products quickly feels great. Most developers thrive on momentum, finding ways to solve problems and seeing their ideas come to life, put into the hands of real users. However, far too often, in the rush to keep things moving, security is treated as something that can be added later, usually left as an afterthought.
A line of code here, and an update there, but then suddenly it becomes apparent that the project is riddled with flaws and security vulnerabilities that could have been easily avoided.
The simple truth is that the strongest products on the market are almost always those that have had security built into the workflow from the beginning. That means we need to rethink how we approach coding, testing, and deployment so that we don’t view them as separate steps, but rather as part of a secure foundation that runs throughout the entire lifecycle of product development.
Why Security Belongs in the Build
Businesses today have access to a wide range of cybersecurity services that they can utilize to safeguard their data, applications, and systems. Whether it’s penetration testing and incident response or vulnerability scanning, these services play a crucial role in protecting against threats and ensuring operations run smoothly once a product has been shipped and is in the wild.
And while these tools are all excellent for strengthening defenses, they usually only come into play once the code has been written and the product is live. Relying on them alone is like locking your front door but leaving the windows wide open. To truly build secure products, security has to be considered from the very beginning, right inside the development workflow.
The goal isn’t to slow teams down or to get in the way of innovation. It’s more about giving developers confidence that every shipped product or feature has safety baked in. It’s not left as an afterthought, but a key feature of the build that users expect, even if they never directly see it.
Common Security Gaps in the Dev Process
Even some of the most skilled teams can miss things and overlook basic security measures, especially when they’re rushing to meet their deadlines. Some of the most common gaps include:
- Dependencies that go unchecked. If a library is outdated, it can introduce a wide range of vulnerabilities into a project that would otherwise be clean.
- APIs that aren’t hardened. Weak endpoints are among the easiest and most frequently exploited targets for attackers.
- No automated security testing. When security checks aren’t backed into the workflow, such as into CI/CD, risky code can more easily slip unnoticed into production.
It’s essential to note that these gaps are not necessarily a result of carelessness. They happen because security isn’t integrated into the development flow.
Practical Ways to Build Security Into Development
How do you actually build security into your development process without it getting in the way and grinding projects to a halt? Here are five practical tips you can follow.
1. Adopt secure coding standards
Every project should have secure coding standards built into its workflows. Not only that, but these practices need to become consistent for them to be effective. This includes measures such as sanitizing inputs, avoiding hard-coded secrets, and enforcing strong authentication. It sounds basic, but standardization is the first layer of protection.
2. Automate security testing in CI/CD
Manual checks can’t keep up with the pace of modern development. By integrating automated scanning into CI/CD, security becomes part of every push and pull request. Static code analysis, dynamic testing, and dependency checks all happen in the background. This means developers get instant feedback, issues are caught earlier, and fixing them feels like part of the natural workflow rather than a roadblock added at the end.
3. Review third-party dependencies
Modern apps are built leaning on the shoulders of countless libraries and packages. While this is beneficial for speeding up development, it also introduces several hidden risks. For example, a single outdated package can put an entire project at risk. However, if you regularly review these dependencies and run automated vulnerability scans, you can often identify these issues before they become a problem. In general, it’s best to treat every dependency as a single piece of code. In other words, you should inspect them, monitor for updates, and replace the ones that are no longer maintained.
4. Encrypt by default
Encryption is not something that should be added on later. It should be a baseline expectation for every project that devs work on. When you protect data (whether in transit or at rest), you prevent information from being exposed if any of your systems are breached. Building encryption into early development workflows means that you don’t have to retrofit security later on (when it’s much more complex and more costly to do). Using proven libraries makes this process even easier, ensuring that sensitive data is always protected without introducing unnecessary complexity.
5. Treat infrastructure as code (with security in mind)
Infrastructure as code (IaC) allows team members to automate provisioning, scaling, and deployment. However, IaC also offers a perfect opportunity to integrate security. Developers can enforce least-privilege policies, set up logging and monitoring, and apply compliance checks as part of the build.
Suppose you treat your infrastructure the same way you treat application code ( such as reviewing it, testing it, and securing it). In that case, you can more easily create environments that are safe by default and scalable without compromise.
Final Word
For a while now, the status quo has been that security teams and dev teams live in separate siloes. Developers are the ones doing the building, security is the one auditing, and the cycle just repeats from there. Unfortunately, that approach no longer works as it once did, mainly because it is too slow and fragmented to keep up with modern demands/threats.
Instead, security should not be viewed as something that is bolted on at the last minute. It should be woven into the DNA of your development workflow. For developers, this means treating security like any other feature: part of the build, tested in CI/CD, and constantly improved. It’s not about slowing down. It’s about building with confidence.
Start small. Add automated scans to your pipeline. Review your dependencies. Encrypt by default. Each step moves you closer to a workflow where security isn’t an afterthought but a natural part of how you code.
