Secure Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC)

Everything that interacts with an application or contributes in any way to its development throughout the complete software development life cycle is considered to be a part of the software supply chain (SDLC).

To secure the elements, processes, and procedures involved in the development and distribution of software, one must first secure the software supply chain that covers developer practices and development tools, deployment techniques and infrastructure, interfaces and protocols, and third-party and proprietary code. It is the responsibility of the organisation to carry out these security procedures and to show consumers evidence of their security efforts.

Securing the software supply chain agitates that organisations should be fully conscious of the exact components that are being used in software production. Everything that interacts with your code from development to production. Scrutinizing the code you didn't write, such as open-source or third-party dependencies, or any other artefacts, and being able to establish their provenance.

Software supply chain attacks

One compromised application or piece of software is all that is needed for a software supply chain assault to spread malware throughout the whole network. Attackers frequently aim for the source code of an application to introduce malicious code into a reliable program or computer system. Software or application updates are frequently used by attackers as entry points.

Effect of Software Supply Chain Vulnerabilities

<> Tampering of software artefacts.

<>Harmful programs signed with stolen code-sign certificates or exploiting the developer company's name.

<> Specialized code that has been compromised and delivered into hardware or firmware components.

<> Malware already installed on devices (cameras, USB, phones, etc.)

Software supply chain best practices

<>Assess the security and trustworthiness of the code that you consume. <> Generate provenance to prove software integrity and confidentiality. <> Generate private keys and sign artefacts before uploading them. <> Ensure developers are keeping writing secure proprietary code. <> Harden data transfer methods used by applications. <> Continuously test and monitor deployed applications for threats.

Ways to Ensure Software Supply Chain Security:

<>In-toto attestation, A framework to secure the integrity of software supply chains.

<> Cosign is a command-line utility for signing and verifying container images and storing this signature in an OCI registry.

<> OpenSSL, a cryptographic toolkit which can be used to perform cryptographic operations.