422 Secure development strategies

Explore the coding techniques and design decisions used to build software that actively prevents vulnerabilities.

Overview

This section focuses on the specific practices and strategies developers use to write secure code. It builds on the previous section (421 Secure software development lifecycle) by zooming in on how secure behaviour is implemented at the source code level.

Secure development strategies go beyond correctness—they are about anticipating misuse, reducing risk, and enforcing consistent behaviour in unpredictable conditions. Developers must consider not only how to make software work, but how to prevent it from being misused or exploited.

The topics in this section guide students through core ideas such as input validation, error handling, resource management, attack prevention, and security testing. These are the daily tools of secure programmers.

Targets

In this section, students learn to:

• Implement defensive coding practices to reduce vulnerabilities

• Design systems that handle input, errors, and access safely

• Evaluate code for resilience against common attack types

• Apply testing and review techniques to confirm secure behaviour