Despite being beneficial in automated provisioning of computing infrastructure at scale, infrastructure as code (IaC) scripts are susceptible to containing secrets, such as hard-coded passwords. A derivation of practices related to secret management for IaC can help practitioners to secure their secrets, potentially aiding them to securely develop IaC scripts. The goal of the paper is to help practitioners in secure development of infrastructure as code (IaC) scripts by identifying practices for secret management in IaC. We conduct a grey literature review with 38 Internet artifacts to identify 12 practices. We identify practices that are applicable for all IaC languages, e.g., prioritized encryption, as well as language-specific practices, such as state separation for Terraform. Our findings can be beneficial for (i) practitioners who can apply the identified practices to secure secrets in IaC development, and (ii) researchers who can investigate how the secret management process can be improved to facilitate secure development of IaC scripts.
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Can We use Authentic Learning to Educate Students about Secure Infrastructure as Code Development?
Despite yielding benefits for organizations, infrastructure as code (IaC) scripts are susceptible to security weaknesses, such as hard-coded passwords. Existence of such security weaknesses necessitate integration of education materials related to secure development of IaC scripts. In this preliminary work, we describe our experiences of how application of authentic learning helped students learn about secure development of IaC scripts. Our paper shows education materials based on authentic learning to help students learn about secure IaC development.
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- Award ID(s):
- 2026869
- PAR ID:
- 10343041
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- 27th ACM Conference on on Innovation and Technology in Computer Science Education (ITiCSE '22)
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- 631 to 631
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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