A Secure Development Life Cycle (Secure SDLC) is a software development methodology that embeds privacy and security controls at every phase of product creation—from requirements gathering through retirement—rather than treating them as post-deployment additions. It extends the traditional SDLC (Requirements → Design → Build → Test → Deploy → Maintain) by inserting privacy impact assessments, threat modeling, secure coding standards, automated security testing, and compliance verification at each phase gate. In the ISACA CDPSE context, Secure SDLC means that privacy requirements—data minimization, consent management, retention enforcement, breach notification—are first-class engineering requirements, not documentation afterthoughts.
Where it stops · what it isn't
- —IS: A repeatable, phase-by-phase process for building privacy and security into software products from inception to retirement.
- —IS: A governance framework that bridges business privacy obligations (GDPR, HIPAA, PCI DSS) with technical implementation decisions.
- —IS: A set of activities spanning people (training, roles), processes (phase gates, reviews, threat modeling), and tools (SAST, DAST, SCA, secrets management).
- —IS NOT: A one-time security audit or penetration test conducted only before deployment.
- —IS NOT: A substitute for an incident response plan—Secure SDLC reduces breach likelihood but does not replace response capability.
- —IS NOT: Exclusively a developer responsibility—it requires involvement from privacy officers, product managers, architects, QA, and operations.
- —IS NOT: Equivalent to DevOps or Agile methodology—Secure SDLC is a security and privacy overlay applicable to any development methodology (waterfall, Agile, DevSecOps).
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PART OFPrivacy Architecture — Infrastructure (ISACA CDPSE Domain 2)
REQUIRESPrivacy Requirements Specification (data classification, retention, consent)Threat Modeling (STRIDE, PASTA, DFD)
ENABLESPrivacy-by-Design implementation in production systemsRegulatory compliance (GDPR Art. 25, HIPAA safeguards, PCI DSS v4.0 Req. 6)DevSecOps automation (CI/CD pipeline security integration)
RELATED TOAPI Security (CDPSE Infrastructure)Encryption at Rest and in Transit (CDPSE Infrastructure)Identity and Access Management (CDPSE Infrastructure)
CONSTRAINSFeature development velocity (security gates add review time)