Technological advancements are democratizing access to increasingly vital business activities like app building. This has created a new wave of citizen developers who are becoming essential in their organizations as business and tech experts. In fact, their value comes from understanding both sides of the coin very well — business needs and tech requirements.
Citizen developers are automating workflows and streamlining business activities through web and mobile applications that use low-code and no-code, which reduce the programming burden of building apps. This ease of creating allows businesses to deliver more solutions for their clients and staff.
However, as cyberattacks loom larger in 2024 with no signs of stopping, citizen developers must improve their cybersecurity knowledge to build more secure apps. Malicious actors target small yet vulnerable systems as a gateway to access data from larger corporations, so no-code apps aren’t spared from being a hot target.
Let’s explore three fundamental steps for citizen developers to decrease the vulnerability of their apps so they reap all the benefits and none of the headaches.
Cybersecurity Awareness Training
The magic of becoming a no-coder lies in how easy it has become to code with highly visual tools that remove the need for complex processes without much formal training. However, this also means many no-coders haven’t received the same education as developers, including cybersecurity awareness training and how to infuse it into apps.
Thankfully, many online courses are available—from Amazon’s Learn Security page to Coursera’s official ISC2 awareness training—to help you learn the basics of cybersecurity.
While it might seem like an optional extra step, cybersecurity awareness training should be the first thing you do as a citizen developer before you pick up a no-code tool. The truth is that cybersecurity is no longer a nice-to-have for organizations, including any app you build for business growth, as cyberattacks are on the rise. Therefore, it’s crucial to secure all potential points of vulnerability, including your desktop or mobile app!
Data Sharing and Access Control
Depending on the app you build, storing or extracting data could be essential for it to function properly. These data points can vary from innocuous information to sensitive personal data, whether from employees, clients, proprietary data, etc.
No-code and low-code tools usually connect with other systems to perform these database functions, which means information is already traveling from one place to another for your app to work. Learning how to encrypt it while at rest or moving can help this data stay secure from prying actors. Likewise, explore your no-code platform’s cybersecurity practices to ascertain how they store and visualize your data.
For example, Appli automatically encrypts/decrypts all data from the local and cloud databases so users can rest assured the data they’re implementing in their application is secured.
On the other hand, if you implement a database in your app that only you or critical actors should have access to, ensure it stays that way. This is the principle of the “Least Privilege,” which ensures other users are adequately authorized inside the app and have the least amount of access to sensitive data, keeping them at a basic access level.
Keeping traveling and stored data safe and granting proper access controls will already add an extra layer of security hackers will have to work hard to penetrate, saving you potential headaches in the future.
Low-Code/No-Code Application Limbo
Lastly, let’s discuss the flurry of apps you might work on but not fully use in the long term. This is no fault of your own but rather a normal reaction to any initiative: some might not stick, some prove less useful than expected, and others might be all the rage inside your company or with clients. This might lead an organization to grow its app limbo, where apps stay stagnant forever.
Not addressing these unused apps might turn into an asset management failure, as they’re still vulnerable entry points for malicious actors to gain access to company data. As a result, businesses might have a graveyard of apps that are time bombs in the making.
To fix this, it is best to keep a comprehensive and updated inventory of every new app created in a company or even for personal use to ensure their status is worth keeping or removing. As such, companies can more easily keep track of their flying assets and control their lifecycle.
OWASP’s helpful list provides more information about the top 10 risks for low-code and no-code apps and how to mitigate them.
After you’ve checked off cybersecurity awareness training from your to-do list, it’s time to get going! Start improving business operations with Appli’s low-code/no-code app builder — download it today.
