Secure Software Design: Principles and Best Practices

This comprehensive, hands-on course empowers developers, security engineers, and technical leads to embed security into every phase of the software development lifecycle—transforming from reactive patching to proactive, secure-by-design engineering. Through intensive practical training using OWASP frameworks, industry-standard security tools, and cutting-edge GenAI assistance, learners build production-ready secure applications and automated security workflows that prevent vulnerabilities before deployment.The curriculum progresses through four strategic modules: Module 1 establishes a security-first engineering mindset, exploring real-world breaches, foundational security principles (CIA Triad, Least Privilege, Zero Trust), and hands-on threat modeling using STRIDE and DREAD frameworks augmented by GenAI-powered attack scenario generation. Module 2 dives deep into the OWASP Top 10 vulnerabilities, teaching students to identify and mitigate injection attacks, broken access control, XSS, CSRF, and authentication flaws through practical code examples in Python and JavaScript, while implementing secure password storage, OAuth 2.0 flows, secrets management, and encryption for data protection. Module 3 focuses on secure coding practices and DevSecOps automation, where students apply OWASP Secure Coding guidelines across multiple languages, identify anti-patterns like insecure deserialization, integrate SAST/DAST/SCA tools (Bandit, Semgrep, OWASP ZAP, Snyk) into CI/CD pipelines, and leverage GenAI for intelligent code review and security test generation. Finally, Module 4 prepares students for enterprise deployment, covering OWASP API Security Top 10, secure microservices design, container hardening, cloud security patterns, cybersecurity governance frameworks (NIST SSDF, ISO 27001), and policy development, culminating in complete secure architecture blueprints for web apps, mobile backends, and SaaS platforms.Each module includes hands-on coding laboratories with vulnerable code samples to fix, real-world security scenarios to analyze, and practical tool integration exercises. The course culminates in a comprehensive capstone project where students design a complete secure application including threat models, architecture diagrams, security implementation plans, governance policies, and DevSecOps pipeline specifications. By the end, students leave with a portfolio of secure coding patterns, automated security tools, policy templates, and architectural blueprints they can immediately apply to build resilient, compliant software systems.