Software development security metrics

Following the publication of the safecode fundamental practices for secure software development, v2 2011, safecode also published a series of complementary guides, such as practices for secure development of cloud applications with cloud security alliance and guidance for agile practitioners. Secure software development life cycle processes cisa. A powerful software testing methodology is the key to managing and scoring well on software quality metrics. Top 5 software metrics to manage development projects effectively. The current state of practice within dod is that software complexity is often estimated based on number of source lines of code sloc, and. Describes the characteristics of the product such as size, complexity, design features, performance, and quality level. Software development metrics are quantitative measurements of a software product or project, which can help management understand software performance, quality, or the productivity and efficiency of software teams. Within the software development process, there are many metrics that are all related to each.

Thus, the typical notion of devsecops focuses on the software development lifecycle, attempting to put testing in as early as possible into the. Pdf security level, security performance, and security indicators have become standard terms to define security metrics. Top 10 productivity metrics for software development. Application security is the process of making apps more secure by finding, fixing, and enhancing the security of apps. Without metrics, you cant communicate the value of your ssi to your companys leadership team.

This information might come in the form of a dashboard with metrics for executives and software development management. With over 20 years in tech development and security, he brings bigpicture vision and knowhow to the data security and compliance realm. The trustworthy computing security development lifecycle or sdl is a process that microsoft has adopted for the development of software that needs to withstand security attacks. A rigorous and practical approach, third edition provides an uptodate, accessible, and comprehensive introduction to software metrics. Simply put, its the time from start to finish that is. Software security metrics owasp appsec california, january 2016.

The rapid rate of application development, paired with the unreasonable amount of. Formal code metrics such as lines of code loc, code complexity, instruction path length, etc. They help software teams monitor productivity across workflow stages, access software quality, as well as introduce more clarity to the development process. Metrics can ensure visibility, accountability, and management of your software security initiative ssi.

If the team checks how many bugs there have been and formulates this. If there are well established metrics and measurements in project then the test analyst can easily track and report quality results to the management. New development practices, including agile methodologies like scrum, have redefined which measurements are most meaningful and under what conditions you can benefit. Using veracode to test the security of applications helps customers implement a secure development program in a simple and costeffective way. The first metric to suss out is the percentage of applications that are part of the securedevelopment lifecycle, said pete chestna, director of developer engagement. Another important software testing metrics, defect density helps the team in determining the total number of defects found in a software during a specific period of time operation or development. Lead time determines the time taken by a team to generate ideas, develop and deliver a software product. Agile metrics are used to find out ways to enhance the process of software development. Measuring the health of software development activ ities within dod programs using these obsolete metrics is irrelevant at best and, at worst,can be misleading. Mapping the field of software development security metrics. If youre not working with securitymetrics yet, you should be.

This metrics describe the project characteristics and execution. The security assessment is helpful for software developers, risk management team, executives of the company, etc. During all the software development life cycle it is very important to apply metrics and measurement because metrics and measurement set expectations. This is the time it takes for the code to go from committing to deploy. May 08, 2012 the software industry lacks standard metric and measurement practices. If there are well established metrics and measurements in project then the test analyst can easily track and.

Almost every software metric has multiple definitions and ambiguous counting rules the result of metrics problems is a lack of solid empirical data on software costs, effort, schedules, quality, and other tangible matters. Applications that have weaker security metrics may have underlying quality issues. Top 5 software metrics to manage development projects. In this blog series, i am discussing five secure software development lifecycle sdlc lessons learned from optivs application security teams. Software security metrics owasp appsec california, january 2016 caroline wong, cissp, director 2. The dod enterprise devsecops reference design leverages a set of hardened devsecops tools. Without metrics, you cant communicate the value of your. Security response metrics security metrics are also a measure of software quality. Usually, lead time, cycle time, team velocity, open and close rates are taken into account. For the last 20 years i have managed teams building and operating highperformance financial platforms. They obtain the following classes of security metrics for which we here. Savola vtt technical research centre of finland, oulu, finland reijo. Developers can use visual studio to generate code metrics data that measure the complexity and maintainability of their managed code. The hallmarks of measurement in agile development include.

A framework for managing, measuring, and predicting attributes of software development products and processes reflecting the immense progress in the development and use of software metrics in the past decades, software metrics. Integrating security practices into the software development lifecycle and verifying the security of internally developed applications before they are deployed can help mitigate risk from internal and external sources. Guiding every software project whether inhouse development. By embedding security testing into every phase of the software development lifecycle sdlc, development teams can costeffectively improve software quality while not slowing development timelines or hindering innovation. Its up to the ciso to prove your security activities are valuable to the company and thats where application security metrics come in. Management has very limited visibility into the level of quality of software projects under their responsibility. He is known as a creative thinker, driven in his work and resourceful in his solutions. How application security metrics can strengthen your team code. The authors of 6 suggest a security metric classification based on the software development phase measured by the metric.

The best metrics for measuring software development productivity and efficiency are committodeploy time cdt. As companies increasingly adopt agile development methods, many are looking for ways to improve their application security. Defense innovation board metrics for software development. The full range of security practices and related metrics is beyond the scope of this article, but as with agile process metrics and production metrics, there are a few specific metrics. Defense innovation board metrics for software development software is increasingly critical to the mission of the department of defense dod, but dod software is plagued by poor quality and slow delivery. Remember, metrics are an opportunity to tell a story about the value security professionals provide to the business and how a mature security program is a riskreduction, businessenablement platform. Using such metrics will allow you to analyze the performance of your product from the inside and realize how significantly the invisible part influences the visible. Devops has replaced siloed development and operations to create multidisciplinary teams that work together with shared and efficient practices, tools, and kpis. Tuning our secure sdlc to reduce friction with engineering moving. Security metrics that actually matter in a devops world the new. The best software development metrics that will level up. The results are then divided by the size of that particular module, which allows the team to decide whether the software is ready for. Security requirements are often simple and commonsensical, but the software development team needs to be mindful of them, and of the metrics derived from them.

Software development metrics is a handbook for anyone who needs to track and guide software development and delivery at the team level, such as project managers and team leads. This is the traffic light approach that oversimplifies the data. The main characteristic of devsecops is to automate, monitor, and apply security at all phases of the software lifecycle. We can help you choose welldefined, achievable metrics tailored to your companys risk profile and business processes. New development practices, including agile methodologies like scrum, have redefined which measurements are most meaningful and under what conditions you can benefit from them.

Required investment in testing and production readiness are two new metrics which can make a big difference in team leadership and build a more effective development organization. Software metrics are important for many reasons, including measuring software performance, planning work items, measuring productivity, and many other uses. Software security metrics you can use now having explained the measurement problem and how not to solve it, we now turn to two practical methods for measuring software security. The reader is provided with examples of new metrics that meet the existing reporting requirements. To deliver highly secure software and services in this fastmoving environment, it is critical for security to move at the same speed.

Secure development is a practice to ensure that the code and processes that go into developing applications are as secure as possible. Visibility, accountability, and support metrics can ensure visibility, accountability, and management of your software security initiative ssi. The process adds a series of security focused activities and deliverables to each phase of microsofts software development process. These characteristics can be used to improve the development and maintenance activities of the software. Development teams can identify potential risks, understand the current state of a project, and track progress during software development. The best software development metrics that will level up your. Metrics in agile software development can also help a scrumkanban master keep track of their teams wellbeing. Sep 16, 2017 a software metric is a measure of software characteristics which are quantifiable or countable. Much of this happens during the development phase, but it includes tools and. As an alternative, we believe the following measures are useful for dod to track performance for software programs and drive improvement in cost, schedule, and performance. Applications that have weaker security metrics may. It is also important for your development and security teams to have access to metrics that help them perform their jobs better. However, they can be dangerous, and using the appropriate metrics is critical.

This article discusses how measurement can be applied to software development processes and work products to monitor and improve the security characteristics of the software being developed. Code metrics data can be generated for an entire solution or a single. Hipaa and security compliance is definitely the most confusing part of my job, but securitymetrics took the time to break it down and make it easier for me to put a plan in place. What most people do when faced with creating a metrics program is calculate a few measurements that seem interesting on the surface. Strengths and weaknesses of software metrics, 2006. Troy tribe is senior vice president of sales at securitymetrics. Agile metrics are a crucial part of an agile software development process.

Pci compliance hipaa security assessment securitymetrics. A software metric is a standard of measure of a degree to which a software system or process possesses some property. Jul 14, 2009 software project success has always been the goal of the industry. Riskdriven security metrics in agile software development an industrial pilot study reijo m. Summary software development metrics is a handbook for anyone who needs to track and guide software development and delivery at the team level, such as project managers and team leads. The value of the effort spent on kpi measurement shouldnt exceed the business value if tracking software development metrics takes you half of the sprintthe product ownerscrum masterteam are actually losing time that they could have spent developing the product. The importance of secure development with the vast amount of threats that constantly pressure companies and governments, it is important to ensure that the software applications these organizations utilize are completely secure. Calculate code metrics visual studio microsoft docs. In addition, these metrics might not be informational.

Providing useful metrics for the security of a software system is a. Top 10 productivity metrics for software development infopulse. Top 10 software development metrics to measure productivity. About securitymetrics data security and compliance company. Software security metrics software measures are troublesome loc, fps, complexity etc laws of physics are missing metrics are context sensitive and environmentdependent architecture dependent aggregation may not lead to strength.

It is aimed at practitionersdesigners, architects, requirements specialists, coders, testers, and managerswho desire guidance as to the best way to. Even if a metric is not a measurement metrics are functions, while measurements are the numbers obtained by the application of. To facilitate improvement, the ssg publishes data internally about the state of software security within the organization. Find out everything about team productivity metrics on infopulse blog. Riskdriven security metrics in agile software development. Apr 18, 2017 the best metrics for measuring software development productivity and efficiency are committodeploy time cdt. Measures and measurement for secure software development cisa. Monitor these metrics over time to see how security, operations and development teams are responding to security issues, per application supported. Jason drake, director of infrastructure and security. Fundamental practices for secure software development. Codebased software development metrics show the quality of the technical part of your project. Even if a metric is not a measurement metrics are functions, while measurements are the numbers obtained by the application of metrics, often the two terms are used as synonyms.