Secure System Design Principles

Secure System Design Principles establish the foundation for robust information security architectures. Here are the key principles: 1. Defense in Depth: Implementing multiple layers of security controls to protect critical assets. If one layer fails, others remain operational as backups. 2. Least Privilege: Users and systems should only have access permissions necessary to perform their job functions and nothing more. 3. Separation of Duties: Critical tasks are divided among multiple individuals to prevent fraud, errors, and conflicts of interest. 4. Fail Secure: Systems should default to a secure state when failures occur rather than becoming vulnerable. 5. Keep It Simple: Simplicity in design reduces potential security flaws. Complex systems have more attack vectors. 6. Zero Trust: Verify everything and trust nothing - all users and devices must be authenticated and authorized regardless of location. 7. Minimize Attack Surface: Reduce the number of entry points attackers can exploit by removing unnecessary services, protocols, and functionality. 8. Secure Defaults: Systems should ship with secure configurations out-of-the-box, not requiring users to enable security features. 9. Complete Mediation: Every access to a resource must be checked for proper authorization, with no bypassing of security controls. 10. Privacy by Design: Building privacy protections into systems from the beginning rather than adding them later. 11. Psychological Acceptability: Security mechanisms should not make resources more difficult to access than if security was absent. 12. Open Design: Security should not rely on keeping design details secret (contrasts with security through obscurity). By implementing these principles, organizations build resilient systems that can withstand attacks and protect sensitive data even when parts of the security infrastructure are compromised.

Secure System Design Principles establish the foundation for robust information security architectures. Here are the key principles: 1. Defense in Depth: Implementing multiple layers of security con…

Concepts covered: Layered Security, Principle of Least Astonishment, Secure Baselines, Secure Development Lifecycle (SDLC), Information Hiding, Defense in Depth, Domain Separation, Separation of Duties, Least Privilege, Fail-Safe Defaults, Configuration Management