One of the major reasons applications lack adequate security and remain vulnerable to attacks is the separation between DevOps and Security teams. This organizational divide inhibits collaboration, resulting in insecure applications. Especially with the vast amount of code being created in the era of GenAI.
Traditional AppSec fails to meet DevOps requirements in several critical areas, while Runtime AppSec provides breakthrough solutions:
Traditional Security Tools Are Too Complex for DevOps Teams
DevOps professionals consistently report that security tools exceed their skill sets and available time resources. These tools cannot simply be handed to DevOps teams without extensive training and ongoing support. The complexity issue affects traditional and runtime solutions differently:
- Traditional AppSec
The Application Security industry has successfully made SAST (static application security testing) and SCA (software composition analysis) accessible to developers and security specialists. However, DAST has proven more challenging, requiring skills and resources that exceed most developers' capabilities. Configuring DAST, ensuring proper authentication, and maintaining adequate crawling coverage creates unsustainable workloads for development teams. WAAP complexity is so significant that integrating it into CI/CD processes is rarely considered feasible.
- Runtime AppSec
Runtime AppSec tools only require installation with minimal configuration and operational overhead. DevOps teams do not need extensive training, ongoing operation responsibilities, or monitoring of active processes. Instead, they receive continuous
security reporting on their application ecosystem while Runtime AppSec operates autonomously in the background.
Limited Lifecycle Coverage Creates DevOps Friction
Both DevOps and Security teams agree that traditional technologies fail to cover the complete DevOps lifecycle from development through operation.
- Traditional AppSec
SAST, DAST, and SCA primarily operate during the Build/Test phases with limited Programming phase coverage but provide no Operation phase protection. WAAP functions only in the Operation phase without Programming or Build/Test capabilities. This fragmentation forces DevSecOps specialists to master multiple technologies across distinct phases, often without adequate tool coverage in critical areas.
- Runtime AppSec
Runtime AppSec bridges this gap by functioning across both Dev and Ops phases using the same technology platform. This unified approach reduces adoption complexity for DevSecOps teams while enabling vulnerability detection and remediation in the Dev phase and attack protection in the Ops phase.
Intermittent Coverage Leaves Security Gaps
DevOps teams maintain continuous application lifecycle coverage from initial development through production decommissioning, while traditional security tools create coverage gaps.
- Traditional AppSec
Traditional AppSec tools, such as SAST, DAST, and SCA are intermittent scanners rather than continuous monitors. Scans operate for minutes or hours before stopping, with subsequent scans potentially delayed by hours, days, weeks, or months. During these intervals, applications remain unmonitored and unprotected.
- Runtime AppSec
Runtime is persistently active, not intermittent. It functions as a monitor rather than a scanner, ensuring that an application is never left unattended, unobserved, or unprotected — even for a moment. Typically, it dynamically connects to the application or API process when execution begins and detaches only when the process ends, providing continuous security throughout the entire lifecycle of the application or API.
Runtime AppSec breaks down silos between DevSec and Ops, fostering true collaboration. It integrates seamlessly into CI/CD pipelines and delivers security coverage across the entire DevOps lifecycle. By addressing the shortcomings of traditional AppSec approaches, it elevates application security to the next evolutionary stage.
