Software Supply Chain Security at RSA Conference 2023

Pay attention to this emerging category at RSA Conference ’23

By Huz Dalal, Senior Director Product Marketing April 24, 2023

4 min read

The risk of supply chain attacks increases as more companies rely on third-party vendors and suppliers for critical services and products. Supply chain attacks have become increasingly prominent in recent years. In 2022, for instance, supply chain attacks surpassed the number of malware-based attacks by 40%. These types of attacks involve targeting a company’s suppliers, vendors, or partners to gain unauthorized access to their systems, with the ultimate goal of compromising the primary target’s network.

This year’s 2023 RSA Conference is a great opportunity to learn about securing your software supply chain.

What are SSC attacks?
A software supply chain attack occurs when a cyber threat actor infiltrates a software vendor’s network and employs malicious code to compromise the software before the vendor sends it to their customers. The affected software then compromises the customer’s data or system. As more companies rely on third-party vendors and suppliers for critical services and products, the risk of a supply chain attack increases.

Why software supply chain security matters to everyone

The reason is in the name. Any weak spot along the entire software supply chain can instantly become the way in for bad actors. That’s why this fast-emerging market focuses on providing solutions to secure the entire software supply chain – end-to-end.

Here are three reasons everyone should pay attention to this market category:

1. Improve software development and delivery

Not only does a secure software supply chain protect your organization from cyber attacks, it also improves software development and delivery. When all supply chain components – even down to the binary level – are secure and up-to-date, organizations will have improved software quality and reduced production failures. This will result in faster updates, fewer rollbacks, and ultimately, a better user experience. For example, vulnerability contextual analysis enables teams to spend less time on remediation work and focus on exploitable vulnerabilities only, making the process more thorough and efficient.

2. Prevent reputational and financial losses

As supply chain attacks evolve in frequency and sophistication, it’s important to have a comprehensive solution in place to protect your organization – from the attacks themselves and their repercussions. The growing SSCS market provides tools to detect, prevent, and remediate supply chain attacks. Ideally, these tools should also help us understand the blast radius of vulnerabilities. By investing in these solutions, you can mitigate the risk of an attack and minimize or even prevent the potential impact on your organization’s reputation and finances.

3. Ensure compliance with regulations and standards

Regulations and standards such as GDPR, HIPAA, and PCI-DSS require organizations to secure their software supply chain. Failure to comply with these regulations can result in fines and legal consequences. The Software Supply Chain Security market category provides solutions that help organizations meet these compliance requirements. To guarantee that everyone is on the same page, it helps to seamlessly integrate security policies across development and release processes from a unified platform.

Additional software supply chain security resources

Software supply chain security, or lack thereof, affects everyone. That’s why the opportunity to stop attacks in the supply chain is everyone’s business. Check out the vendors at the RSA Conference serving software supply chain security so you can harden your organization’s software development lifecycle (SDLC).

Additional recommended resources:

It’ll be a whirlwind few days at the RSA Conference in San Francisco. I’m excited to catch up with some familiar faces and meet new folks. See you soon!

Visit the JFrog booth #4102 to learn more. Come meet us in person at more upcoming events!