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Notes by Peter Galonza(Пётр Галонза)
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DevSecOps

Overview

Frameworks covered in this note fall into five levels, from abstract to concrete:

  • Maturity models — “where we are now and where to move”
    • SAMM, BSIMM, DSOMM, DAF
  • Process frameworks / SDL — “how to build a secure development process”
    • MS SDL, NIST SSDF, BSA Framework, SAFECode
  • Supply chain security — “integrity and provability of artifacts”
    • SLSA, OpenSSF Scorecard
  • Approaches and practices — “how security is embedded into team work”
    • Paved Road + Guardrails, Shift Left
  • Standards and checklists — “specific requirements and control lists”
    • ISO/IEC 27034, GOST R 56939-2024, OWASP ASVS, OWASP Top 10, CIS Controls, CWE Top 25

Maturity models

Assess how mature the secure development processes are within an organization and provide a growth roadmap.

  • OWASP SAMM — prescriptive, OWASP
    • Holistic AppSec: Governance → Design → Implementation → Verification → Operations (5 functions, 15 practices)
    • 3 maturity levels per practice
  • BSIMM — descriptive, Synopsys (formerly Cigital)
    • Benchmarking: what other companies actually do (4 domains, 12 practices, 116+ activities)
    • 3 levels per activity
  • DSOMM — prescriptive, OWASP
    • DevSecOps specifics: integrating security into DevOps pipelines (5 dimensions)
    • 4 levels
  • DAF — prescriptive, Jet Security (Russia)
    • Combines BSIMM + SAMM + DSOMM + GOST 56939-2024, adapted to Russian realities
    • Includes mapping to other frameworks, FTE calculators, roadmap
    • Levels 0-4 (Basic → Advanced)

Key difference: SAMM says “what should be”, BSIMM — “what others actually do”, DSOMM focuses on DevOps practices, DAF tries to combine everything and add Russian context. Source, DAF repo

Process frameworks / SDL

Describe how to embed security into the software development lifecycle — from requirements to release and incident response.

Microsoft SDL

  • Original process framework that started the AppSec industry
  • 7 components: 5 phases (Requirements → Design → Implementation → Verification → Release) + 2 cross-cutting (Training, Response)
  • Includes:
    • Threat modeling (STRIDE)
    • Safe deployment process (staged release through “rings”)
    • Final Security Review before release
  • Source, Wikipedia

NIST SSDF (SP 800-218)

  • NIST recommendations, de facto standard for software supplied to US government customers
  • 4 practice groups, 19 practices, 42 tasks
    • PO — Prepare the Organization (people, processes, tools)
    • PS — Protect the Software (defending code and builds from tampering)
    • PW — Produce Well-Secured Software (secure design, code, dependencies, testing)
    • RV — Respond to Vulnerabilities (vulnerability response)
  • Methodology-agnostic — maps to any SDLC
  • Version 1.1 plus supplement SP 800-218A for generative AI
  • Source

BSA Framework for Secure Software

  • Risk-oriented, outcome-based framework from the Business Software Alliance
  • 3 directions:
    • Secure Development
    • Security Capabilities
    • Secure Lifecycle Management
  • Focused on providing a common language for suppliers, customers, and regulators

SAFECode

  • Set of foundational secure development practices from a non-profit association (Microsoft, Oracle, Adobe, etc.)
  • Not a framework per se, but a source of best practices that SSDF and BSA build upon

GOST R 56939-2024

  • Russian standard “Development of secure software. General requirements”
  • Used as a checklist for assessing processes, especially in the context of FSTEC
  • DAF contains a mapping to this GOST

Supply chain security

Protecting the software supply chain: build integrity, provability of origin, assessment of dependency risk.

SLSA (Supply-chain Levels for Software Artifacts)

  • Framework from OpenSSF (originally Google) that assesses the maturity of the artifact build process
  • Levels:
    • L0 — no guarantees, builds happen anywhere
    • L1 — provenance exists (build metadata), but unsigned
    • L2 — signed provenance, dedicated build infrastructure
    • L3 — isolated ephemeral environments, signing secret protection, non-repudiation
  • Source

OpenSSF Scorecard

  • Automated tool: scans a GitHub repository and gives a 0-10 score across ~19 checks
  • Critical — Branch Protection, Dangerous Workflows, Binary Artifacts, Pinned Dependencies, Token Permissions
  • Quality — Code Review, SAST, Fuzzing, CI Tests, Signed Releases
  • Maintenance — Maintained, Contributors, Security Policy, Vulnerabilities

Additional tools

  • in-toto — specification for supply chain attestations
  • Sigstore — artifact signing infrastructure (cosign, rekor)
  • CycloneDX / SPDX — SBOM (Software Bill of Materials) formats
  • GUAC (Graph for Understanding Artifact Composition) — dependency graph analysis

Relationship: SLSA defines “what the build should be”, Scorecard — “how good the repository itself is”. Scorecard can be used as a gate when choosing dependencies.

Containers

Approaches and practices

Paved Road + Guardrails

  • Concept popularized by Netflix and AWS
  • Not a framework in the classic sense, but an approach to organizing DevSecOps
  • Paved Road — “the asphalted road”: a set of ready-made tools, templates, and CI/CD pipelines with built-in security. The developer follows it and gets security “out of the box”
  • Guardrails — rails: automatic controls that prevent insecure actions (policy-as-code, admission controllers, SAST gate, secret scanning in pre-commit)
  • Principle: security by default, not opt-in. It is easier for developers to follow the secure path than to bypass it
  • Mapping to other frameworks
    • CISA Secure by Design = paved road as an operational definition
    • SLSA L2/L3 = one of the guardrail contracts
  • Source

Shift Left

  • Basic principle: move security checks left in the lifecycle — the earlier a vulnerability is found, the cheaper it is to fix
  • Not a standalone framework, but the philosophical foundation for all the others

Standards and checklists

  • OWASP Top 10 (OWASP)
    • Top 10 web application risks. The de facto starting point
  • OWASP ASVS (OWASP)
    • Detailed application security requirements: 3 levels (basic → standard → advanced), ~130-180 controls
    • Used for verification and pentesting
  • OWASP API Security Top 10 (OWASP)
    • Top 10 API risks
  • OWASP LLM Top 10 (OWASP)
    • Generative AI and LLM risks
  • CWE Top 25 (MITRE)
    • Top 25 dangerous software weaknesses
  • CIS Controls (Center for Internet Security)
    • Prioritized set of protective measures (18 controls)
  • ISO/IEC 27034 (ISO)
    • International application security standard: processes, trust levels, ASC (Application Security Controls)
    • Adopted in Russia as GOST R ISO/IEC 27034-1-2014
  • Russian Federation GOST R 56939-2024
    • Secure software development, general requirements
  • Russian Federation GOST R 58412-2019
    • Security threats in software development
  • Russian Federation GOST R ISO/IEC 12207-2010
    • System and software engineering. Software life cycle processes (IDT)
  • GOST R 50922-2006
    • Protection of information. Basic terms and definitions
  • Russian Federation GOST R 57628-2017
    • Information technology. Security techniques. Guide for the production of Protection Profiles and Security Targets
  • CISQ (Consortium for IT Software Quality)
    • Standards for automated code quality measurement (Security, Reliability, Maintainability, Performance)
  • MISRA C/C++ (MISRA)
    • Secure coding standards for C/C++ (embedded, automotive)

Risk management

  • Calculation
    • The amount of risk = the probability of the event * the amount of damage
    • Probability of an event = the probability of a threat * the magnitude of the vulnerability
    • ALE = SLE * ARO
  • Vulnerability registries
    • CVE (Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures) — publicly disclosed security flaws
    • CWE (Common Weakness Enumeration) — catalog of common software weakness types
  • Risk analysis
    1. Asset identification — identify all assets within the system scope
    2. Asset valuation — determine the criticality and value of each asset
    3. Threat identification — identify potential threats to each asset
    4. Vulnerability identification — identify weaknesses in the security controls
    5. Risk probability and impact assessment — evaluate the likelihood of threats and their business impact
    6. Cost assessment — estimate potential damage costs and the cost of security measures
    7. Recommendation generation — produce prioritized recommendations for risk mitigation
  • Risk assessment
    • CVSS (Common Vulnerability Scoring System) — open standard for scoring vulnerability severity (0–10)
  • Approaches to risk analysis
    • Qualitative analysis
      • Risk — identified risk item
      • Description — nature and context of the risk
      • Probability — likelihood of occurrence
      • Impact — consequences if realized
      • Result — overall risk level (e.g., low, medium, high)
      • Risk mitigation measures — actions to reduce or eliminate the risk
    • Quantitative analysis
      • Methods
        • Quantitative risk indicators
          • ALE (Annual Loss Expectancy) — SLE × ARO
          • SLE (Single Loss Expectancy) — asset value × exposure factor
          • EF (Exposure Factor) — percentage of asset loss from a single incident
          • ARO (Annualized Rate of Occurrence) — expected frequency of incidents per year
        • Static analysis
          • Trend Analysis — examining data over time to predict future patterns
          • Regression analysis — modeling relationships between variables
          • Time series analysis — analyzing time-ordered data points
          • Bayesian analysis — updating probabilities as new evidence emerges
        • The Monte-Carlo — simulating risk outcomes through random sampling
    • Combined analysis
      • OCTAVE (Operationally Critical Threat, Asset, and Vulnerability Evaluation) — self-directed risk assessment methodology
      • FAIR (Factor Analysis of Information Risk) — quantitative risk analysis taxonomy
      • RMF (NIST Risk Management Framework) — structured risk management process (categorize, select, implement, assess, authorize, monitor)
      • ISO/IEC 27005 — international standard for information security risk management
      • ENISA Risk Management Framework — European framework for risk assessment and management
      • COBIT (Control Objectives for Information and Related Technologies) — IT governance and management framework
      • Risk IT Framework — IT risk management extension to COBIT
      • ISO 31000 — international standard for generic risk management
  • Information Security Architecture
    • access control mechanisms
    • threat monitoring and management systems
    • data protection measures
    • measures to comply with regulatory requirements