Bridging the Divide: Tactical Security Approaches for Vendor Integration in Hybrid Architectures

Security architecture in hybrid environments has traditionally focused on well-known concepts such as OWASP vulnerabilities, identity and access management, role-based access control, network security, and the principle of least privilege. Best practices like secure coding and incorporating SAST/DAST testing into CI/CD pipelines are also widely discussed.

However, when organizations operate in a hybrid model — running workloads both on-premises and in the cloud — while also integrating with vendor-managed cloud solutions, a different set of security design considerations comes into play. These scenarios are not uncommon, yet they are rarely highlighted in the context of secure solution implementation involving vendor software in hybrid environments.