DevSecOps Red Teaming: How Attackers Actually Exploit Your Pipelines
DevSecOps aims to integrate security throughout the software delivery lifecycle, but even the most mature pipelines can be vulnerable to real-world attacks. Red teaming in DevSecOps involves simulating attacker tactics specifically targeting CI/CD pipelines, build environments, and automation workflows. This blog dives into how adversaries exploit misconfigurations, stolen credentials, and insecure dependencies within DevSecOps pipelines. By understanding these attack methods, security teams can better anticipate threats, harden their processes, and defend their software supply chains against increasingly sophisticated pipeline attacks.
Introduction: The Hidden Battlefield Inside Your CI/CD Pipeline
DevSecOps promises security baked into every step of software delivery, but attackers know exactly where to look when trying to breach your organization. The CI/CD pipeline — the backbone of rapid development and deployment — often contains subtle vulnerabilities that go unnoticed until exploited.
Red teaming your DevSecOps pipeline involves simulating real-world attack scenarios that specifically target these weak points. These exercises expose hidden risks, misconfigurations, and overlooked attack vectors so your security team can proactively defend your software supply chain.
In this blog, we dive into unseen red team simulation scenarios that reveal how attackers exploit DevSecOps pipelines — based on real-world lessons and case studies.
Case Study 1: Credential Theft via Misconfigured Secrets Management
Scenario:
A red team simulated an attack on a popular organization’s Jenkins pipeline. The attackers discovered that the Jenkins credentials used to push code to repositories were stored in plaintext within a build job configuration.
How Attackers Exploit:
By accessing the Jenkins UI (due to weak RBAC policies), attackers extracted these credentials and gained write access to the source code repository. They then injected malicious code into the build process, which was automatically deployed without triggering alerts.
Key Lesson:
· Never store secrets in pipeline configs without encryption or vault integration.
· Implement strict access controls and audit logging on pipeline tools.
Case Study 2: Exploiting Insecure Dependency Management
Scenario:
In another simulation, the red team targeted an open-source dependency scanning step integrated into a CI pipeline. The tool was outdated and failed to catch a known vulnerable library version.
How Attackers Exploit:
Attackers crafted a malicious payload disguised as a benign dependency update. Because the scanning tool was ineffective, the payload slipped through and was incorporated into the production build, giving attackers a foothold.
Key Lesson:
· Keep vulnerability scanning tools up to date.
Use multiple scanning layers to catch evasive or novel threats.
Case Study 3: Pipeline Configuration Drift Leading to Backdoor Deployment
Scenario:
A Kubernetes-based pipeline was audited during a red team exercise. The team found that a manual configuration change in the deployment manifests wasn’t reflected in the version-controlled infrastructure code.
How Attackers Exploit:
An insider introduced a backdoor container image in the live environment. Since this change was never committed to the IaC repo, automated compliance checks missed it, allowing persistent unauthorized access.
Key Lesson:
· Enforce GitOps principles strictly — all changes must go through code review.
· Automate drift detection to catch manual or out-of-band changes.
Case Study 4: Abuse of Third-Party Integrations in CI/CD
Scenario:
The red team explored an organization’s use of third-party CI plugins that integrate with external cloud services. One plugin was poorly secured and leaked authentication tokens via verbose logging.
How Attackers Exploit:
By accessing pipeline logs (which had insufficient access restrictions), attackers retrieved these tokens and used them to escalate privileges in cloud infrastructure, gaining wide-ranging control.
Key Lesson:
· Limit logging verbosity in sensitive environments.
· Regularly audit third-party integrations for security hygiene.
How to Harden Your DevSecOps Pipeline Against These Attacks
· Implement Strong RBAC: Limit pipeline tool access based on least privilege.
· Integrate Secrets Management: Use vault solutions instead of static secrets in configs.
· Automate Vulnerability Scanning: Regularly update and run scanning tools at multiple stages.
· Enforce GitOps: Keep infrastructure and deployment configurations fully version-controlled.
· Monitor Logs and Access: Detect unusual activity in pipeline tools and cloud integrations.
· Conduct Regular Red Teaming: Simulate attacks on your pipelines to find blind spots before adversaries do.
