Addressing Vulnerable Third-Party Modules
Question
A penetration tester has completed an analysis of the various software products produced by the company under assessment.
The tester found that over the past several years the company has been including vulnerable third-party modules in multiple products, even though the quality of the organic code being developed is very good.
Which of the following recommendations should the penetration tester include in the report?
Answers
Explanations
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A. B. C. D.D.
The penetration tester's findings reveal that the company under assessment is including vulnerable third-party modules in their software products, despite having good organic code development practices. This is a significant security concern since these third-party modules could potentially introduce vulnerabilities into the company's software products.
To mitigate this risk, the penetration tester should recommend implementing measures to detect and prevent the use of vulnerable third-party modules in the company's software development processes.
Out of the given options, the recommendation that best addresses the issue at hand is A. Add a dependency checker into the tool chain. This involves incorporating a tool into the company's software development pipeline that can automatically identify and flag any third-party modules with known vulnerabilities. This way, the development team can take appropriate actions, such as updating or replacing the vulnerable module or seeking an alternative, to ensure that the final product is free of security weaknesses.
Option B, Perform routine static and dynamic analysis of committed code, is a good practice but is not directly related to the problem of including vulnerable third-party modules. This recommendation focuses on analyzing the company's own code, rather than third-party modules.
Option C, Validate API security settings before deployment, is also a good practice but is not directly relevant to the issue at hand. This recommendation pertains to API security and ensuring that proper security controls are in place before an API is deployed. It is not directly related to the use of third-party modules.
Option D, Perform fuzz testing of compiled binaries, is a testing technique that can be used to identify vulnerabilities in software, but it is not specifically targeted at identifying the use of vulnerable third-party modules. While this recommendation could be beneficial in identifying other types of vulnerabilities, it does not directly address the issue of third-party module vulnerabilities.
In summary, the most appropriate recommendation for the penetration tester to include in the report would be A. Add a dependency checker into the tool chain, which would help identify and prevent the use of vulnerable third-party modules in the company's software products.
