According to iOCO Application Management, OpenText Premier Partner, organisations are embracing AppSec practices and focusing on their software security posture, but highlight that insufficient funding and security resources, plus a disconnect between developers and security teams — remain major roadblocks.
Paul Meyer, Security Solutions Executive, iOCO Application Management, highlights the concerns raised regarding the safety and integrity of the software supply chain as reported in the 2024 State of Code Security survey, sponsored by OpenText and produced by Dark Reading as fuelling a heightened focus on application security.
The companies in the OpenText, Dark Reading survey were noted to be aware of the need to implement end-to-end controls for protecting commercial and third-party applications, internally developed applications, and open source code.
Yet, adoption of containers, microservices, cloud-native, and hybrid application environments were reported to be complicating the challenge for many organisations while heightening the need for better application security. iOCO endorses a secure it all, from data to development approach.
This is a holistic approach that encourages businesses to tap into integrated security and governance to strengthen their application security, data trust, and threat intelligence. It is possible to elevate precision, speed, and scale for developer-first code security and quickly find and fix defects with unparalleled accuracy and auto remediation. All this can be achieved through AI application security. OpenText is the market in the development of these solutions.
Meyer says the protection of identities, data, and applications with automated security posture management is essential. “Integrated AI and analytics help businesses to detect anomalous behaviour, identify gaps, and adapt security controls. Risk mitigation can be provided for modern enterprises thus keeping them ahead of threats with comprehensive, proactive security – from ransomware protection to AI-powered code security,” he adds.
Enterprises can discover, classify, govern, protect, and store sensitive data with secure information management. It also means they can trust their data to be AI-ready while adhering to privacy laws and regulatory requirements.
The Dark Reading survey highlights the fact that a substantial percentage of organisations appear to be bolstering their AppSec practices due to a shortage of security staff.
South Africa is no stranger to the lack of cyber specialist skills. But from a global perspective the widespread presence of open source code in applications and worries about attackers with deep knowledge of application flaws are also highlighted in the survey.
The report notes that when asked to check off their greatest pain points regarding application security, 23% of respondents cited attackers with deep knowledge of application vulnerabilities, 20% referred to inadequate security staff, and 19% said frequent use of open source code libraries.
The survey reported less-cited risks to application security including inadequate security tools, security-illiterate developers, poor quality application code, plus misconfigured tools and systems.
“It is a complex and varied picture. One thing is clear, ransomware and threat protection are not enough on their own. Fast disaster recovery is a must for strong cyber resilience and business continuity. OpenText advises companies to get rid of the disconnected, one-off tools overwhelming their security teams in favour of managing enterprise cybersecurity and data governance from a single vendor.”
iOCO Application Management – is an end to end software technology solutions company with more than two decades experience delivering OpenText solutions in southern Africa.
