The main pillars of data security in test environments

The main pillars of data security in test environments

Companies increasingly protect their most sensitive information, but most of them do not take the same care in test and development environments. In the last decade, there has been a major shift in the way companies deal with their data. Many companies now copy their production databases with real-world data into certification environments, which makes it possible to work with test environments that are all similar to the production environment. The problem is that the development environment does not have the same level of security as the production environment. There is also the problem of using outside companies to work in these environments, leaving data even more vulnerable. Thus, it is critical to protect the test environments and it is on the main security pillars of this area that this article focuses!

Always use data masking

Software that allows data masking, such as Datapeers, is essential in today’s development world. What this solution does is create a “masked” copy of the production base and make it available for development and testing. These solutions blend the contents of the tables maintaining their integrity and relationships. The phone number, for example, is copied into the development environment with valid but not true numbers.

Optimization of time and reduction of human error

Previously, the work of data masking had to be developed manually, which consumed many resources and many hours of work. In addition, the likelihood of human error was very high. With software that does this work, an entire system can be masked in just a few hours, as the execution time is greatly reduced. Thus, in addition to gaining advantages in terms of resource savings, there is also the advantage of ensuring that no errors occur and private data are not exposed.

Review the code carefully

Software that needs to withstand malicious attacks should have a number of preventative activities to withstand attempts to steal information. Reviews in the code should be strict. In addition, the team of programmers should implement the use of threat models, which will guide developers during the period of testing and code reviews.

Control access

If employees are not trained to take safety seriously, they will not worry about it on a day-to-day basis. Companies should raise awareness of their human resources to the growing need to protect data as it is a matter that concerns everyone. It is advisable to create a code of ethics and to sign a confidentiality agreement. In addition, not all employees should have access to all information. Each employee must have access only to the information strictly necessary to carry out his work. This way, in case of attack or loss of data, it is much easier to discover its origin.