“Rugged DevOps,” “DevSecOps”—am I missing any? About the only thing more abundant than the volume of terms emerging to describe different facets of how security supports DevOps are the number of vendors now claiming to provide products and services that “solve” related security problems.
There have been some interesting offerings we’ve seen emerge at this point and most of them probably have merit, in that they likely can accomplish the job they claim to do. Regardless of whether that “job” is actually something that needs to be done to solve a DevOps-related security issue, that is something for the professionals in the developer, operations and security worlds to determine—and hopefully something they will be interested in discussing here.
This new column’s point is to go looking for problems and solutions. Specifically, it’s focused on how and if DevOps is causing things to go wrong in security (and from time to time in other spots) and what DevOps-focused organizations are doing to correct course.
Security Questions to Ponder
Is it true that security can’t keep pace with “continuous?” Will “agile” and security always be oil and water? Will DevOps and security never achieve a harmonious “peanut butter and chocolate”-like relationship? Or, is the talk about how DevOps is the best thing that has ever happened to security and a great opportunity, actually the new reality?
Another great question this column seeks to answer is whether any of the “so-called” security problems DevOps is creating are anything new, or if they are the same old challenges that have existed since the first bit of sensitive data was exposed to the Internet decades ago.
There are times when I may mention specific vendor solutions in this column, but only if an actual end user or practitioner is attached to the reference. If that happens, I will always point out if any are clients of mine at my day job.
It’s no coincidence that this column is being launched just ahead of RSA 2016, as DevOps Connect: Rugged DevOps @ RSA Conference is a major part of the big show, and, that is where the world will be talking DevOps and security after all. Here’s hoping the event will expose problems and provide solutions.
