Software Development - a hub for stealing Intellectual Property

23 March 2011; With a continued increase in software development investment among most organisations, security holes during implementation and operational management are becoming more evident, says local software development company Dariel Solutions.

Wayne Yan, Senior Software Developer at Dariel Solutions says; “As software continues to change and heterogeneous systems are implemented, managing authorisation across disparate IT systems within a single enterprise is one of the biggest security issues corporates are faced with today. The reality is that auditing, tracking and constructing a consolidated view of user access can be an expensive task and therefore often not undertaken. The result leads to huge security holes within an organisation – and this is a concern that should definitely not be overlooked.”

So while software upgrades and new systems are needed to remain competitive, security policies are not effectively being implemented and managed. For example, employees, developers and consultants in many instances have unlimited access to crucial data and therefore Intellectual Property (IP).

Continues Yan; “Over the past few years, external security issues have become a key focus for many organisations, where they are investing in the top of the range security technologies, to ensure protection from external malicious threats. Yet, they are failing to acknowledge that the biggest security issue within software development is often an internal one! The implications of such internal threats are colossal and can be detrimental to any business, no matter how much is spent on state of the art security systems. Anyone having access to imperative systems, where there are no control policies, can result in code theft, data leakage and unauthorised software changes.”

As a reputable software development company, Dariel Solutions recommend that businesses take the following into consideration in ensuring the effective security of software:

· Internal audits – such inspections assist to determine weak points within an organisation's internal security structure. Establishing what these are will allow for the necessary action to be carried out, to alleviate unnecessary information leakage and or code damage or sabotage.

· House keeping – this involves assessing the business at every level and can be referred to as a 'clean up' process. It is fundamental for a company to determine who currently has access to which systems and what policies (if any) are in place to ensure these systems are secured. Furthermore, house keeping means that businesses must at all times be aware of ex-employees and ensure that they are removed from any authentication and authorisation store.

· New control processes and enterprise strategy implementation – taking the outcomes from an internal audit, effective processes and strategies can be developed to ensure that internally, any software development process has the right security measures in place.

“Software development will remain an impactful technological aspect for businesses across a variety of sectors in the years to come. It is therefore essential that the right security strategy around information management in any corporate is implemented. A suggestion in getting this right is the triangle model of enrolling people, processes and technology, all of which should work together to provide an enterprise view of managing internal security. It is also beneficial to partner with a highly regarded software development company focused on internal best practices, who understands the security repercussions of software,” concludes Yan.