Why do companies only take security seriously after they get hacked?

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Breaches are only getting worse, regulations are stricter than ever, and yet security is still not given enough effort in most development cycles. And the worst part? Most security incidents could have been prevented with a proper security design review.

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A security design review could be the difference between catching vulnerabilities early and scrambling to contain a breach later. Yet, many teams still push security to the end of development when fixing issues is harder, more expensive, and sometimes impossible.

Table of Contents

1. Security design review is how you build secure systems from day one
2. Security design reviews are no longer optional if you want to stay secure
3. How organizations can implement effective security design reviews
4. Security design reviews are a must for any serious organization

Security design review is how you build secure systems from day one

Security design review is how you prevent security disasters before they happen. It’s a proactive approach that makes sure your systems and applications are secure from the ground up, not patched together after launch.

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Instead of waiting for security issues to pop up in production (where they’re 10x more expensive to fix) a security design review identifies risks early in the design phase.

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Here’s what it covers:

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• Threat modeling - Mapping out potential attack scenarios before they become real threats.
• Secure architecture validation - Making sure your system’s foundation is strong and resilient.
• Compliance alignment - Ensuring you meet industry security standards before auditors come knocking.
• Risk mitigation planning - Putting clear security controls in place to reduce vulnerabilities.

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Skipping this process means you’re inviting risk into your system. If security matters to your business (and it should), a security design review is necessary.

Security design reviews are no longer optional if you want to stay secure

Every year, cyber threats get more sophisticated, expensive, and harder to contain. And the cost of a single security misstep keeps climbing. If your organization isn’t prioritizing security design reviews, you’re taking unnecessary risks.

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Here’s what’s happening right now:

Attackers are targeting design flaws

Cybercriminals are using new attack techniques that bypass traditional defenses. If your system isn’t designed with security in mind from the start, you’re making it easier for attackers to exploit those vulnerabilities.

Zero-day vulnerabilities

• A zero-day vulnerability is a software flaw that developers don’t know about yet, but attackers do.
• There’s no patch, no fix, and no easy way to stop it until the vendor discovers and addresses the flaw.
• Attackers sell zero-days on dark web marketplaces, which makes them highly valuable for cybercriminals.

Supply chain attacks

• Instead of hacking your company directly, attackers target your third-party vendors, suppliers, and software dependencies.
• A single compromised library or cloud provider can expose hundreds or thousands of businesses at once.
• Example: The SolarWinds breach where the attackers injected malware into a software update, affecting 18,000+ organizations, including government agencies.

Design flaws

• Most security incidents don’t happen because of missing patches. They happen because security was ignored during design.
• Hardcoded credentials, weak authentication flows, and poor access controls are some of the most exploited vulnerabilities in modern breaches.
• Without a security design review, these weaknesses don’t get caught until an attacker finds them first.

Compliance failures can shut you out of business

Regulations are more demanding than ever, and failing to meet them isn’t just about getting fined. What if it also cost you customers, contracts, and credibility?

Financial Sector

• PCI DSS (Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard): Requires organizations that handle payment card data to implement strong security controls, including encryption, access controls, and vulnerability management.
• DORA (Digital Operational Resilience Act): Mandates that financial institutions assess and manage IT risks to guarantee that systems are designed to withstand cyber threats.
• Basel II: Requires banks to maintain sufficient capital reserves based on their operational risks, including cybersecurity risks.

Healthcare & Medical Devices

• HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act): Requires healthcare providers to protect patient data by implementing access controls, encryption, and regular security assessments.
• FDA Cybersecurity Mandates: Medical device manufacturers must design security into their products, ensure they can be updated against new threats, and provide a cybersecurity risk management plan.

Government & Defense

• NIST 800-53: Requires federal agencies and contractors to implement security controls, including system design reviews, continuous monitoring, and threat detection.
• FedRAMP (Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program): Cloud service providers working with federal agencies must meet strict security requirements, including encryption and access controls.
• CMMC (Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification): Requires defense contractors to implement cybersecurity best practices, with a focus on protecting controlled unclassified information (CUI).

Tech & Cloud Providers

• ISO 27001: Requires organizations to implement an information security management system (ISMS) that includes risk assessment and security design controls.
• SOC 2: Mandates that cloud providers and SaaS companies secure customer data with strong controls over access, logging, and encryption.
• GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation): Requires companies that process EU citizens’ data to incorporate privacy and security by design to make sure that user data is protected from breaches.
• CCPA (California Consumer Privacy Act): Demands that companies handling California residents’ data provide security measures to protect personal information from breaches.

Fixing security flaws late costs more than doing it right from the start

If you think security design reviews are too expensive, look at what it costs to fix security issues later.

• Fixing security flaws post-deployment is 6x–10x more expensive than catching them early. Once your product is live, fixing an issue means pulling engineers away from other projects, rewriting code, and potentially delaying releases.
• Breach costs are getting more costly: The average data breach now costs $4.45 million. This includes forensics, legal fees, regulatory fines, lost business, and damage control.
• Downtime and lawsuits can destroy your business: A security breach can take your systems offline, disrupt operations, and even lead to class-action lawsuits if customer data is exposed.

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A security design review makes sure that risks are identified early, compliance requirements are met, and expensive breaches won't happen. You're not only preventing attacks here. Instead, you're prioritizing the security of your business, your customers, and your bottom line. If security isn’t a priority in your design phase, attackers will always find the gaps for you on their terms.

How organizations can implement effective security design reviews

Instead of a one-time event, your security design review should be a built-in step in your software development lifecycle (SDLC). If you want to catch security flaws early and avoid expensive fixes later, here’s how to do it right.

Make security design reviews a standard practice in your SDLC

Security should be part of every stage of development, instead of the usual check at the last minute. A proper security design review starts before coding even begins, continues throughout development, and is finalized before deployment. Treating security as a step before deployment increases risks and makes fixing issues far more expensive. Instead, integrate security reviews as a mandatory step in your SDLC, just like code reviews and testing.

Use security-by-design frameworks to guide the process

Established frameworks like NIST Secure Software Development Framework (SSDF) and OWASP Software Assurance Maturity Model (SAMM) help ensure security best practices are consistently applied. These frameworks provide structured guidelines for secure design, implementation, and testing, which reduces the chance of missing critical security flaws. Standardizing your approach means your teams won’t be improvising security, it will be built into your process from the start.

Automate threat modeling to identify risks faster

Threat modeling helps teams visualize potential attack scenarios, but manual approaches can be slow and inconsistent. Using automated threat modeling tools speeds up the process, guarantees consistency, and makes it easier to scale security reviews across multiple projects. Automating threat modeling helps teams to quickly identify and mitigate risks without slowing down development.

Get Security, DevOps, and Compliance teams working together

Security isn’t just the responsibility of the security team. It affects engineering, DevOps, and compliance as well. When security is treated as a shared responsibility, teams can work together to prevent vulnerabilities instead of reacting to them later. Developers need to understand security requirements, DevOps must ensure secure deployment, and compliance teams need to verify regulatory alignment. Cross-team collaboration ensures security is prioritized at every stage.

Bring in external security assessments when needed

Even organizations with strong internal security teams can benefit from an outside perspective. External security assessments, such as penetration testing, code reviews, and compliance audits, can help identify blind spots and validate existing security controls. Regular third-party reviews provide an extra layer of protection and ensure your security measures stand up to real-world threats.

Security design reviews are a must for any serious organization

Security can’t be something you just do because you remember that you have to do it. Too many organizations still rely on testing and patching vulnerabilities after all the steps are done, but that is outdated, expensive, and risky. Shifting security left, as in integrating it into design and architecture, is the only way to stay ahead of threats.

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Fixing security flaws post-deployment is up to $50,156. But what’s worse is the way a security breach won’t just cost money. It damages your reputation, leads to lawsuits, and can even put you out of business. Companies that prioritize security early avoid these disasters and build a foundation of trust with customers, partners, and regulators.

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If you want to future-proof your security strategy (or your business itself), then let our team at SecurityReview.ai help you transform security reviews from a slow and manual process into an AI-powered automated workflow, delivering comprehensive threat modeling in seconds instead of weeks. With faster and more efficient security design reviews, we can help identify risks earlier, stay compliant, and eliminate security bottlenecks in a little bit longer than blinking your eyes.

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