What threats do your applications face? Do you think "threat modeling" is a new idea, or is it simply common-sense programming dressed in new clothes? Do you think that adding threat modeling to your application design process will truly result in more secure applications or do you think that it mostly increases development costs and time without providing much additional security? Let us know in the design.architecture discussion group.
You cannot build secure systems until you understand your threats. Threat modeling is essential to a secure enterprise. Microsoft has adopted threat modeling, and now no product design is complete without a threat model. In this article, Microsoft's Michael Howard uses his experience to explain the process of threat modeling and how to use it in any organization.
by Michael Howard
December 17, 2002
he process of securing applications begins with understanding the threats against your applications. Portions of this article are excerpted from Writing Secure Code, 2nd Edition, available from Microsoft Press.
A member of the press asked me this question a few days after the Windows Security Push in February and March of 2002: "What was the most important skill your team taught developers, testers, and designers?" Without hesitating, I replied that we taught developers to trace every byte of data as it flows through their code and to question all assumptions about the data. For testers, it was data mutation. For designers it was analyzing threats. In fact, during the Windows Security Push (and all pushes that followed at Microsoft), we found that the most important aspect of the software design process, from a security viewpoint, is threat modeling.
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he process of securing applications begins with understanding the threats against your applications. Portions of this article are excerpted from Writing Secure Code, 2nd Edition, available from Microsoft Press.
