Code scanning explained

Code scanning is an automated process that analyzes source code to identify potential security vulnerabilities, bugs, and adherence to coding standards. While dynamic testing methods only involve executing the code, code scanning also performs a thorough analysis of the code itself, enabling developers to identify and correct issues.

In the fast-paced world of software development, code scanning is a critical tool that helps the security and reliability of software applications. By integrating code security scans into your development process, you empower your team to catch and fix vulnerabilities early in the development lifecycle. It’s often easier to address these issues before they reach production when bugs become more difficult, critical, and expensive to fix. Code scanning can also reduce the risk of a costly security breach and improve overall code quality.

How code scanning works

Code scanning typically includes a combination of static and dynamic analysis methods to pinpoint potential vulnerabilities and issues within the code.

Static analysis involves analyzing the code without execution, while dynamic analysis involves code execution and real-time behavior monitoring. Tapping into these two techniques, code scanning tools can detect a broad spectrum of issues, such as:

• Cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerabilities

• SQL injection vulnerabilities

• Buffer overflows

• Memory corruption issues

• Coding errors and adherence to coding standards

Automated vs. manual scanning methods

Automated code scanning methods involve using tools and advanced algorithms to analyze code and identify potential vulnerabilities, bugs, and adherence to coding standards. These tools can quickly scan large codebases, identify issues, and provide developers with actionable insights. This increases the overall security and reliability of their code. Automated scanning is fast, efficient, and can be integrated into the development process to help developers catch issues early, reducing the risk of security breaches and improving overall code quality.

On the other hand, manual scanning methods rely on humans to review code. This approach benefits from the expertise of developers, who might identify complex issues that automated tools might miss. However, it’s also time-consuming and prone to human error. Manual scanning is often used in conjunction with automated methods to ensure a comprehensive review of the code.

Key features of code scanning

Code scanning includes the following key features to help developers improve code security and quality:

• Vulnerability detection: Code scanning tools use advanced algorithms to automatically detect a broad spectrum of first-party and third-party security flaws, such as SQL injection, cross-site scripting (XSS), buffer overflows, and insecure dependencies.

• Secret detection: These tools scan for hardcoded secrets like API keys, passwords, authentication tokens, and other confidential information that might be embedded in the code. This helps prevent data leaks and unauthorized access.

• Dependency management scanning: Developers use code scanning tools to analyze third-party libraries in open-source dependencies. These tools also provide alerts for outdated or vulnerable dependencies.

• Data flow analysis: Code scanning tools have the ability to trace data flow within the code, identifying potential vulnerabilities and ensuring compliance with data protection regulations.

• Developer-friendly features: Code scanning tools include helpful features like code annotations, inline error messages, and integration with development environments. This gives developers the ability to quickly identify and resolve issues.

• Integration and reporting features: These tools integrate with popular development tools and provide detailed reports, making it easier for developers to track and manage vulnerabilities.

• Broad language and platform support: Code scanning tools support a wide range of programming languages and platforms, ensuring comprehensive coverage for diverse development environments. These solutions typically support Java, Python, C++, C#, JavaScript, Go, Ruby, and other programming languages. Plus, these tools provide security coverage across diverse tech stacks.

• CI/CD integration: These tools seamlessly integrate with CI/CD pipelines, ensuring that security scans are run on every commit, pull request or deployment. Plus, these tools work with popular DevOps tools like GitHub, GitLab, Bitbucket, and Jenkins.

• Customizable rules: Most code scanning tools allow developers to define custom code security rules based on project needs and coding standards. This allows developers to follow their team’s security policies and improve consistency.

• Remediation suggestions: These solutions provide actionable recommendations with code snippets or explanations for fixing vulnerabilities, helping developers save time.

• False positive suppression: Code scanning tools help teams filter out irrelevant alerts so they can focus on real security threats. This feature not only reduces alert fatigue, it also boosts workflow efficiency.

• Reporting and compliance: These tools generate detailed security reports that include:

  • Vulnerability severity levels.

  • Impacted code areas.

  • Compliance with industry security standards, such as OWASP, NIST, and ISO 27001.

• Security intelligence updates: Most code scanning tools provide regular updates of vulnerability databases, allowing development teams to stay ahead of emerging threats.

Benefits of code scanning

Development teams that use code scanning tools reap an array of benefits, including:

• Improved security: Code scanning is instrumental in the early identification and resolution of vulnerabilities during the development phase, allowing teams to mitigate the risk of security breaches and data exposure.

• Faster bug detection: Code scanning tools automate the process of identifying bugs and vulnerabilities, enabling developers to detect and fix issues quickly. This reduces the time and effort spent on manual code reviews and increases developer satisfaction.

• Enhanced code quality: These tools help identify and resolve coding errors, ensure adherence to coding standards, and mitigate code complexity. This all comes together to elevate the quality of the codebase.

• Improved compliance: Code scanning helps organizations comply with industry standards and regulations, such as OWASP, NIST, ISO 27001, GDPR, by identifying and resolving vulnerabilities. Regular security scans can help businesses avoid regulatory penalties and maintain industry standards.

4 challenges of implementing code scanning

Despite the many advantages of code scanning, development teams sometimes face challenges when implementing these tools. Here are the four most common hurdles:

Challenge #1: False positives

Some code scanning tools have the potential to generate false positives, which can result in unnecessary extra work for developers. However, the most advanced tools tap into machine learning and analytics to help minimize noise and focus on real threats.

Challenge #2: Integration issues

Integrating code scanning tools into existing development workflows may require some effort and customization. However, most modern code scanning solutions offer seamless integration with popular development tools and platforms.

Challenge #3: Developer resistance

Some developers may be hesitant to adopt code scanning tools because they see it as another layer of complexity or a barrier to productivity. This is why it’s important to educate developers about the advantages of code scanning and engage them in the process.

Challenge #4: Scalability concerns

It can be difficult for large teams and enterprises to adapt code scanning for their massive codebases. Advanced code scanning tools use distributed processing and incremental scanning to address these concerns.

Code scanning vs. traditional security methods

Code scanning offers several advantages over traditional security methods, such as manual code reviews, static analysis, and periodic security audits. Here's a comparison:

• Manual code reviews vs. automated scanning: Manual code reviews are labor-intensive and susceptible to human error, while automated code scanning tools offer a thorough and uniform analysis of the code base with more frequent scans.

• Periodic security audits vs. continuous security monitoring: Periodic security audits provide a snapshot of the code's security at a specific point in time, while code scanning enables continuous security monitoring, identifying vulnerabilities as they arise.

Best practices for implementing code scanning

To effectively implement code scanning and reap the full benefits of these tools, it’s important to follow these key best practices:

• Integrate tools into CI/CD pipelines: Code scanning should be integrated into continuous integration/continuous deployment (CI/CD) pipelines to help ensure code is scanned and vulnerabilities are identified and remediated before deployment.

• Conduct regular scans and audits: It’s important to conduct regular code scans and security audits to identify vulnerabilities and help ensure ongoing security.

• Train developers on secure coding: Educate developers about secure coding practices to minimize the introduction of vulnerabilities in the first place.

• Use multiple scanning tools: Employ multiple code scanning tools with varying strengths to enhance vulnerability detection and minimize false positives.

The future of code scanning

As organizations look for new ways to streamline development processes, boost efficiency, and enhance security, the future of code scanning holds great promise. And as demand for code scanning tools continues to rise, there will likely be major advancements in this technology.

The evolution of AI is already having an impact on code security and code scanning tools. The use of AI and machine learning (ML) in these solutions enhances vulnerability detection, diminishes false positives, and delivers more precise and actionable insights.

Plus, code scanning tools are increasingly automated, using threat intelligence to identify and prioritize vulnerabilities based on their severity, context, and exploitability. In response to the shifting cybersecurity landscape, code scanning tools are evolving to address new threats and vulnerabilities, providing ongoing protection against emerging security risks.

Code scanning solutions from GitHub

As organizations face ever-changing cyberthreats and other security challenges, code scanning has become essential in modern software development. It’s more important than ever for organizations to find the right code scanning tools for their development teams.

GitHub Code Security is a code scanning solution that helps developers write more secure code from the start with security analysis built into their development workflow. This solution helps developers find and address security issues in their code earlier, improving the security of their projects. With GitHub's code scanning solution, developers can bolster the security and quality of their code, optimize development workflows, and guarantee adherence to industry standards and regulations.