4 reasons why legacy systems pose security risks for your business

It’s hard to believe that businesses are still relying on legacy systems, but it’s true. In fact, according to NTT Data, global cybersecurity threats are rising, with 62% of reported incidents in 2020 coming from data-sensitive industries, namely manufacturing, healthcare, and finance.

Relying on a legacy system also hinders companies from truly driving digital transformation. One study has shown at least more than half of the surveyed technology leaders recognize the importance of infrastructure adaptability in fostering business competitiveness.

The good news is that this isn’t a permanent condition—it can be reversed. By upgrading your legacy system with more robust features and functionality, you can revitalize your legacy system and give your business the edge it needs over the competition.

 Given the criticality of a legacy system to business operations, as further explained in our previous post, any major overhaul must be assessed by experts entirely on a case-by-case basis to determine the extent of the required upgrade with as little interference as possible. That said, here are four known security risks associated with using outdated software applications:

1. Unresolved technical debt

 Most software development teams have experienced technical debt at some point during their careers. It’s a problem that can occur when the team prioritizes faster market delivery at the expense of code quality.

The typical compromise is likely observed in more traditional software development, where every phase cascades in a linear motion. As each sprint begins with developing a workable user story, any issues arising after the release are typically deferred to the next phase.

This poses two problems. Firstly, the development team focuses solely on building bare minimum features to pass the QA testing. Secondly, the remaining issues that the team must address in the next phase often fall through the cracks when new objectives arrive. Consequently, any unaddressed bugs in the production environment will eventually entangle the software with layers upon layers of code defects rectifiable only with massive refactoring.

 The legacy system is a complicated beast. Stuck with a rapidly-devolving programming architecture, the system rapidly devolves into a spaghetti codebase that’s no longer fit for purpose. The more time goes on, the more unsecured gateways the company creates—anyone can take advantage of these vulnerabilities to wreak havoc on the business.

2. Aging IT infrastructure

The dependence of legacy software systems on legacy infrastructure can create security lapses for companies to navigate through.

Legacy systems are software programs designed with older hardware, including mainframes, operating systems, and databases. As a result, these programs may undergo recurring downtimes as their infrastructure steadily declines. This strict dependency on legacy hardware coupled with the extensive use of third-party software resources (e.g., outdated open-source codes, libraries, and frameworks), in turn, creates a welter of security lapses for companies to navigate through.

 Legacy systems are an important part of a business’s infrastructure, but they also pose significant challenges to modernizing and maintaining them.

For example, as software vendors discontinue support for their older products and certain programming languages fall out of favor, skills and development tools become obsolete. And as systems age, their structural dependencies become highly contingent on the availability of their structural support. This overreliance on scarce and obsolete dependencies plays out in real life: for example, the spike in benefit claims at the start of the pandemic had put a massive strain on New Jersey’s proprietary unemployment insurance system, forcing the state governor to seek the dwindling COBOL expertise for help. While many are quick to pin the blame on the decades-old programming language, it is not usually the absence of proper documentation or failures to anticipate evolving consumer needs with existing software capacity that causes buckling systems.

3. Evolving cyber threats

Legacy systems, which have been in operation for years and are often developed with the best of intentions, can pose a serious threat to your company’s business operations. These systems usually have long-lasting shelf lives and feature functionalities that accommodate multiple mission-critical operations. At the time of their commission, they might even fully adhere to the top-notch cybersecurity protocols available.

But even the best cutting-edge applications cannot compete with the march of time. Modern hackers have built upon years of knowledge to study and exploit system vulnerabilities that might slip under the radar of most companies. The fast-growing threat landscape has rendered many static security protocols obsolete—making legacy applications vulnerable to attacks [1].

It is vital for firms to assess their existing security measures before embarking on any new projects because this will help them determine how much effort and cost will be required for updating legacy systems [2].

 The United States National Vulnerability Database (NVD) published record-breaking 20,143 vulnerabilities in production code in 2021. This worrying trend not only highlights the brewing undercurrents of modern cyberattacks but also makes a convincing case for companies to upgrade their legacy applications whenever the opportunity arises.

The NVD data shows that medium- and high-level threats make up at least 84% of the data, while low-level threats account for just 6%. In 2021, medium- and high-level threats were responsible for more than 50% of all vulnerabilities. The remaining 46% accounted for low-level vulnerabilities.

This worrying trend not only highlights the brewing undercurrents of modern cyberattacks but also makes a convincing case for companies to upgrade their legacy applications whenever the opportunity arises.

4. System vulnerabilities can increase over time

 Businesses today have a multitude of significant challenges to tackle. These include the boom and bust of a business lifecycle, fluctuating market conditions, new legislations, corporate restructuring, mergers and acquisitions. These factors have all influenced how a business calibrates its IT system. Since any adaptations or updates come from different teams throughout the years, the system quickly falls prey to security loopholes. This becomes even clearer when incremental enhancements are merely tacked on current configurations without proper documentation and audits.

These conflict points will become deeply embedded into the architecture—making it difficult for companies to gain a complete overview of the system and implement additional layers of safeguards.

 Legacy systems are not designed with security in mind. They are typically built using one or more legacy technologies, which means they have outdated security measures.

Notwithstanding its flimsy foundation, a legacy system can continue running and expanding outwards for years without showing any anomalies. That is until a vigorous shake-up exposes the structural vulnerabilities within its cobbled patchwork of disparate frameworks, APIs, and features.

Such a complex yet jumbled architecture built on an outdated security technology—a prominent characteristic of most legacy systems—also lacks the mechanisms to garner enough contextual information to monitor and foil any potential infiltrations in real time.

The breach incidents against the US Office of Personnel Management (OPM) from late 2013 to mid-2015 exemplify this innate design flaw. While it remains unclear how the hacker groups gained access to the system on two separate occasions, the OPM had long been criticized for its portal’s woefully convoluted structure and inadequate security practices, which explained the office’s delayed countermeasures against the unauthorized access.

How to address these security risks?

 In the wake of the tragic event in New York City, people are asking: “How can we make sure that our organizations are safe?” And as an industry, we have an answer: We can’t. The only way to make sure your organization is safe is to take responsibility for its security.

That means doing a thorough risk assessment every couple of years or so, identifying gaps in your system’s security, and taking steps to ensure that they’re closed before they become a problem. It means making an inventory of all of your assets and tools so that you know what’s due for maintenance or refurbishment—and doing it before it’s too late. It means implementing best practices for securing applications that have been recommended by third-party security companies. And it means taking action now—before another tragedy occurs—so that you don’t face the same kind of challenge next time around.

There are so many ways to improve your security, and we’ve got a few tips for you!

First, align your resources and workforce properly to help you act swiftly against any emerging threats in the event of a crisis. Draw up a plan on how your development team can best approach a security incident across multiple scenarios and assign each member to specific tasks ahead of time.

Next, bolster your system with the latest security access protocols. These safety measures encompass not just end-to-end encryption methods and clear audit trails but also multidimensional accessibility features, such as geo-based logins and two-factor authentication.

While intrusions are more likely to occur due to system vulnerabilities, you can further minimize risks by introducing good cyber hygiene as part of your operational protocols. Make sure that every employee adheres to these administrative safeguards.

We know that your business depends on the right IT solutions to make it happen. Whether you’re looking for a way to modernize or migrate your legacy application, or decommissioning any features or programs that are no longer relevant to your company’s strategic goals, we can help.

When you put a decommissioning plan in motion, we can tell you when it’s the right time to modernize or migrate your legacy application. With modernization, you can deliver a better customer experience as it brings enhanced security features and better interface designs. Meanwhile, legacy migration allows you to shift your entire system to a new operating environment, typically from a bulky mainframe database to a scalable cloud platform.

Why modernize and migrate your legacy application?

 The modern business is constantly on the lookout for ways to improve its operational efficiency and enhance customer experience.

Today, legacy modernization and migration emerge as the surefire solutions to help businesses elevate their applications to modern standards.

However, this process isn’t a one-off engagement but rather a continuous investment in technology against the ever-evolving threat landscape. With cutting-edge innovations proliferating at an unprecedented scale, spanning from the highly intuitive AI and IoT to diverse cloud-based platforms, software renovation empowers companies to reimagine their future value creation across breadth, complexity, and depth.

Asahi Technologies offers deep expertise in agile methodology, comprehensive development tools, and thorough strategic planning within a highly collaborative environment to help companies unlock myriad business opportunities with the best version of their proprietary applications.

IT Solutions is a technology partner that has helped numerous clients scale their operations and drive digital growth with critical software enhancements.

We specialize in helping our clients make the most of their existing investments, whether it’s an upgrade to your legacy system or a new one, or making sure you’re ready for a new era of digital business.

Our dedicated team can help you turn your business around by delivering the solutions you need—whether it’s security patches, new software programs, or anything else that will help you grow. We’ll work closely with you to determine exactly what your needs are and how we can best help you meet them.

Looking for a technology partner? Reach out now to get started!

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