Building new applications both quickly and securely does not have to involve a trade-off, thanks to Micro Focus Fortify Application Security Testing, says distributor Axiz.

Jaco Isaaks, Pre-sales Engineer at Axiz, notes that with the rise in web and mobile application development, breaches are happening more frequently. “Organisations know that developing their own software sets them apart from their competition in that it helps them solve a specific business issue directly and improves their customer experience. But when developing software in-house, you need to ensure the application is secure.

“Hackers are after your data and will try to exploit weaknesses in an application to gain access and steal personal and confidential customer information, which could cost organisations millions in revenue. And with POPIA now in full effect, breaches can also prove costly and damage brand reputation. This is why it is vital for organisations to invest in an application security testing solution to prevent unauthorised access to your systems,” he says.

Isaaks says Micro Focus Fortify helps organisations build software fast with all the necessary security, and remains a leader in the Gartner Magic Quadrant for Application Security Testing (AST) for its Fortify offering, based on its completeness of vision and ability to execute.

Micro Focus has been named a leader eight times in a row for its Application Security Testing solution. Says Isaaks: “Micro Focus provides a full SDLC coverage with SAST, DAST, IAST and SCA. They have strong CI/CD pipeline integration that includes innovative features, machine learning assisted auditing (Audit Assistant) and real-time analysis in the IDE using Security Assistant. This helps a great deal when bringing security to the engineering team.”

He says: “Fortify allows customers to discover, identify and resolve vulnerability issues by finding bugs and building more secure code by using Static Application Security Testing (SAST) technologies. Dynamic Application Security Testing (DAST) simulates attacks on running applications before they get into production. Both SAST and DAST complement each other and allow for a seamless AppSec integration into the SDLC. Software Composition Analysis (SCA) can be used for open source and third party software. IAST and RASP (Runtime Application Security Testing) are also useful in certain situations.

“Fortify provides customers, both locally and globally, with a solution to secure their applications and continuity of the application security throughout the entire SDLC. Micro Focus provides their customers with a comprehensive solution that covers most areas including newer areas identified or included in the review for AST. We believe Fortify provides solutions for different use cases as well as flexible deployment options such as on-premises and perpetual or term licence models or as a service with their on-demand offering (FOD) that runs a managed application security as a service.”

Axiz is a leading IT Infrastructure and software distributor in Africa, providing a number of services and products to partners, including the Micro Focus brand.