5 Best practices for ensuring secure container images

The blog post by Loris Degioanni outlines best practices for ensuring secure container images throughout the application life cycle, emphasizing the importance of integrating security measures early on to minimize risks in production. These practices include consistently embedding image scanning during the build process, within the CI/CD pipeline, and continuously when images are running, to protect against newly discovered vulnerabilities. It warns against running images as root due to the increased risk of exploitation and highlights the necessity of scanning both OS and non-OS packages to identify vulnerabilities across all components. The article advises caution when using images from public repositories, advocating for thorough scanning and analysis regardless of the image's origin, and underscores the importance of maintaining small image sizes to reduce potential attack surfaces. Ultimately, the post stresses that while secure container images are crucial, they are only part of a holistic security strategy needed to protect containerized applications from malicious actors.