Application Threat Modeling

Threat Modeling extends beyond traditional security risk assessments by factoring in multiple variables that reduces the guess work out of identifying risk for an application environment. Application threat modeling encompasses key variables that represent a more comprehensive risk analysis for a given threat landscape. With an integrated analysis of threats, business objectives for an application, actors (application and human level users), and factors such as attacks, vulnerabilities, and countermeasures. All of these are systematically reviewed in order to identify risk issues that have greater degree of accuracy in probability analysis.

What is Threat Modeling?

Simply said, threat modeling is the modeling of threats for an application. Its a process that focuses on application decomposition in order to identifying security flaws that would be most probable attack vectors for exploitation. Application Threat Modeling s best used during the SDLC process for identifying probable attack vectors, software vulnerabilities, and misuse cases.

Who can and should use Threat Modeling?

Threat modeling is a collaborative effort that encompasses the roles of developers, business analysts, system administrators, project managers, security operations, and more. Unlike traditional risk assessments, it fosters candid group think around a target application environment in order to identify realistic threats and underlying attacks that extend beyond theoretical possibilities but validated assertions. An application evaluated by these exercises provide numerous advantageous over risk assessment techniques as they are conducted based upon true attack to vulnerability pairings and not simply control gaps.

Value Behind Threat Modeling

Threat Modeling is the great security integration component that fuses numerous security processes into one. Threat modeling integrates efforts from security architecture, static analysis, dynamic analysis, vulnerability management, software development, security governance, security operations and beyond at various stages. The blueprint of an application is quickly broken down via data flow diagramming and application walk-throughs, thereby allowing for a workflow of security efforts to follow a chain-like reaction. As a result, the barriers dividing proper communication of security and IT issues becomes smaller through collaborative threat modeling efforts as relationships between standards, application countermeasures, business objectives, attack branches, probability coefficients for conducting attacks or exploiting vulnerabilities are properly measured. In the end, an organization gets a risk picture that actually makes sense.

Looking for Mines - A High Level Data Flow Diagram Example:

Advancing Application Security

Application Threat Modeling is not security - it's security strategy. The state of application security is a chase to maintain a secure state of it's environment and the data it maintains. Beyond vulnerability identification is the responsibility to protect what's most important and what's more vulnerable. Tired of HIGH, MEDIUM, LOW risk designations that are tied to frameworks that don't actually understand your application environment? Evolve your application security process into a new dimension of security strategy that fuses technology and business risk into sensible and actionable terms.