Chapter 78 — Capstone: a board-to-packet security review

Brief

Take SecureShop or one of your real systems and perform a full senior-level security review across the domains this guide now covers: cloud, Kubernetes, distributed authorization, web/API, data protection, detection, enterprise identity, AI/LLM if present, mobile if present, secrets, abuse, and operations.

Tasks

1. Draw the system and data flows.
2. Identify crown jewels and regulated data.
3. Build an attack-path graph.
4. Review cloud IAM and guardrails.
5. Review workload identity, Kubernetes, and runtime posture.
6. Review API authorization and abuse cases.
7. Review secrets and key lifecycle.
8. Review data protection, retention, and deletion.
9. Review detection coverage and incident runbooks.
10. If AI is used, review model inputs, retrieval, tool access, output handling, cost controls, and prompt/data logging.
11. Produce a prioritized risk register.
12. Present the top three risks in executive language and engineering language.

Deliverable

security-review/
  diagrams/
  attack-paths.md
  control-map.md
  findings.md
  risk-register.md
  detection-gaps.md
  executive-summary.md

Definition of done

• Every critical data flow has an owner.
• Every high-risk attack path has a proposed path-breaking control.
• Every accepted risk has an owner and review date.
• The executive summary can be read in five minutes.
• The engineering findings are specific enough to become tickets.

Rubric (/100)