Integrating DAST Into Your CI/CD Pipeline: Benefits and Implementation

In today's rapidly evolving cyber landscape, maintaining the security of web applications is a necessity. With vulnerabilities emerging faster than ever, the integration of Dynamic Application Security Testing (DAST) into your Continuous Integration/Continuous Deployment (CI/CD) pipeline can prove to be a game-changer, helping you shift security left and address security issues before they impact users.

This article explains the importance and benefits of integrating DAST into your CI/CD pipeline, exploring how this approach can significantly enhance your application's security posture, cut costs, and expedite time-to-market.

We'll also guide you through the process of choosing the right DAST tools and strategies to embed into your pipeline and provide a practical tutorial on integrating DAST into Jenkins.

What is DAST?

Dynamic Application Security Testing (DAST) is a security testing approach that analyzes applications during runtime to identify potential vulnerabilities and security risks. This is different from static application security testing (SAST), which examines the source code of an application without executing it.

The main objective of DAST is to simulate attacks on web applications and APIs from an attacker's viewpoint. This approach helps DAST uncover vulnerabilities like SQL injection, XSS, and insecure file uploads (to learn more about these vulnerabilities see the relevant OWASP Cheat Sheets). Identifying these threats early in the development process enables organizations to remediate them before they escalate into critical issues.

Advantages of Integrating DAST into CI/CD Pipeline

Integrating DAST into your CI/CD pipeline offers numerous benefits, such as improved security posture, cost savings, and faster time-to-market.

Enhanced Security Posture

DAST tools aim to identify vulnerabilities in web applications by simulating real-world attacks. By integrating these tools into your CI/CD pipeline, you can ensure that every build is automatically tested for potential security issues before it reaches production.

This proactive approach helps detect potential vulnerabilities early, allowing them to be addressed before posing a threat to your application or organization.

Quicker Time-to-Market

Incorporating DAST into the development process allows developers to find and fix security flaws more rapidly than if they were discovered during manual testing or after deployment. With automated scanning as part of the CI/CD process, developers receive immediate feedback on the impact of their code changes on application security. This enables them to address any identified issues promptly without delaying release schedules or compromising quality.

Other aspects of DAST that impact time to market include:

• Improved collaboration: Automated DAST scans provide detailed reports about detected vulnerabilities and recommendations for fixing them. These insights promote better communication between development teams and security experts, preventing misunderstandings that can lead to delays in software delivery.

  
  

• Fewer false positives: Some advanced DAST solutions use machine learning algorithms to minimize false-positive results from scans. This ensures that developers spend their time addressing real security issues rather than chasing down false alarms.

Lowered Costs

Integrating DAST into your CI/CD pipeline can lead to significant cost savings for your organization. By identifying and fixing vulnerabilities early in the development process, you reduce the likelihood of expensive data breaches. Additionally, automating security testing lowers manual labor costs associated with traditional security testing methods.

Other aspects of DAST that reduce costs include:

• Reduced remediation costs: Fixing a vulnerability during development is much cheaper than addressing it after deployment. Early detection through automated DAST scans allows organizations to avoid costly post-release patches and potential downtime.

  
  

• Fewer regulatory fines: Ensuring application security throughout the development process helps organizations comply with industry regulations like GDPR, HIPAA, and PCI-DSS. Compliance failures can result in hefty fines and reputational damage; integrating DAST into your CI/CD pipeline mitigates these risks by continuously monitoring for potential violations.

Strategies for Integrating DAST into Your CI/CD Pipeline

Choose the Right Tool

Select a DAST tool that aligns with your application stack, technology choices, and development methodologies. Ensure it supports the web application frameworks you use, as well as modern paradigms like containers, APIs, and microservices. Look for tools that offer integration options with your CI/CD tooling.

Incorporate DAST Early in the Development Process

To maximize the benefits of DAST integration, start incorporating it early in the development process, such as during code reviews or when developing new features. By starting early, developers can address security flaws immediately rather than postpone fixes until later stages of testing.

Establish Baseline Scans

A baseline scan is an initial assessment of your application's security posture using a predefined set of rules or policies. Create a baseline scan with your chosen DAST tool to set a starting point for measuring improvements over time. Regularly update this baseline scan based on changes made to the application codebase or infrastructure configuration.

Schedule Periodic Scans

You can schedule scans at regular intervals and also at critical stages of your CI/CD pipeline. Any of these scans should generate issues that feed back into the development and testing stages, allowing developers and testers to address them:

• Daily scans: Schedule daily scans during off-peak hours to avoid potential disruptions caused by scanning that may impact end-user experience.

  
  

• Weekly scans: Perform more comprehensive scans weekly to identify vulnerabilities that may have been missed during daily scans.

  
  

• On-demand scans: Trigger on-demand scans when significant changes are made to the application, such as deploying a new feature or updating a critical component.

  
  

Analyze and Prioritize Results

DAST tools often generate large volumes of data. It's essential to analyze and prioritize these results based on their severity, exploitability, and potential impact. Use risk scoring systems like CVSS (Common Vulnerability Scoring System) to rank identified vulnerabilities by their threat level. This will help your team focus on addressing high-priority issues first.

Create Feedback Loops

Establish feedback loops between developers and security teams for continuous improvement in both code quality and security posture. Encourage collaboration through shared dashboards displaying DAST findings or by integrating alerts into communication platforms like Slack or Microsoft Teams.

To facilitate quick remediation of identified vulnerabilities, ensure your DAST tool offers actionable guidance for developers with clear steps they can take to fix each issue. This enables them to address problems efficiently without requiring extensive security expertise themselves.

Tutorial: Integrating DAST into Jenkins

This tutorial will walk you through the steps of integrating Dynamic Application Security Testing (DAST) into your Jenkins CI/CD pipeline. By doing this, you can automatically scan your applications for security vulnerabilities during the build and deployment stages.

Step 1: Install and Configure a DAST Tool

First, select a suitable DAST tool that meets your requirements. For this tutorial, we will use OWASP Zed Attack Proxy (ZAP), an open-source web application scanner. Download and install ZAP from its official website.

Step 2: Set Up Your Jenkins Environment

If you haven't already established a Jenkins environment, follow the official Jenkins installation guide. After successfully setting up Jenkins, log in to your account and go to "Manage Plugins" under "Manage Jenkins." Search for "OWASP ZAP" in the list of available plugins and install it.

Step 3: Create a New Pipeline Job in Jenkins

1. Go to the main dashboard of your Jenkins instance.
2. From the left-hand menu, choose "New Item" to create a new Pipeline Job.
3. Give your new job a suitable name (e.g., 'DAST_Pipeline') and select 'Pipeline' as its type before clicking on 'OK.'
4. In the Pipeline configuration section of your newly created job page, scroll down to find 'Definition.' Choose 'Pipeline script' from SCM or 'Pipeline script' and provide your pipeline code. This code will include the necessary steps to run ZAP.

Step 4: Configure Your Pipeline Script for DAST Integration

In this step, you'll need to modify your Jenkinsfile or pipeline script to integrate ZAP into the build process. Here's an example of a simple Jenkinsfile that includes running ZAP:

Replace "http://your-web-application-url" with the link to your web application and replace "YOUR_ZAP_API_KEY" with the API key obtained from OWASP Zed Attack Proxy (ZAP).

Step 5: Run Your Pipeline Job in Jenkins

After configuring everything, save your changes and start a new build by clicking on "Build Now." You should see two stages in progress—one for building your application and another for running DAST using OWASP Zed Attack Proxy (ZAP).

Once completed, go to Console Output under Build History on the left-hand menu. Check if there are any security vulnerabilities detected during scanning.

Conclusion

Integrating a DAST tool into your DevOps process is essential for maintaining security and ensuring that vulnerabilities are discovered early in the development cycle. By implementing DAST, you can identify potential threats before they escalate into major issues, ultimately conserving time and resources.

By integrating a DAST tool into your CI/CD pipeline, you can detect vulnerabilities early in the development process, saving time and resources and preventing significant problems later on. It ensures your applications are secure before they are deployed to production. Finally, it assists you in complying with security regulations and standards.

When implementing a DAST tool, consider several factors. First, choose a tool compatible with your development environment and programming languages. Second, make sure the tool can be integrated into your pipeline without causing delays or disruptions. Lastly, establish clear processes for analyzing and addressing vulnerabilities identified by the tool, to ensure the issues discovered by DAST can be rapidly remediated by developers and testers in your organization.