AI-Era AppSec: Transparency, Trust, and Risk Beyond the Firewall - Felipe Zipitria, Steve Springett, Aruneesh Salhotra, Ken Huang - ASW #363

In an era dominated by AI-powered security tools and cloud-native architectures, are traditional Web Application Firewalls still relevant? Join us as we speak with Felipe Zipitria, co-leader of the OWASP Core Rule Set (CRS) project. Felipe has been at the forefront of open-source security, leading the development of one of the world's most widely deployed WAF rule sets, trusted by organizations globally to protect their web applications.

Felipe explains why WAFs remain a critical layer in modern defense-in-depth strategies. We'll explore what makes OWASP CRS the go-to choice for security teams, dive into the project's current innovations, and discuss how traditional rule-based security is evolving to work alongside — not against — AI.

Segment Resources:

• github.com/coreruleset/coreruleset

• coreruleset.org

The future of CycloneDX is defined by modularity, API-first design, and deeper contextual insight, enabling transparency that is not just comprehensive, but actionable. At its heart is the Transparency Exchange API, which delivers a normalized, format-agnostic model for sharing SBOMs, attestations, risks, and more across the software supply chain.

As genAI transforms every sector of modern business, the security community faces a question: how do we protect systems we can't fully see or understand? In this fireside chat, Aruneesh Salhotra, Project Lead for OWASP AIBOM and Co-Lead of OWASP AI Exchange, discusses two groundbreaking initiatives that are reshaping how organizations approach AI security and supply chain transparency.

OWASP AI Exchange has emerged as the go-to single resource for AI security and privacy, providing over 200 pages of practical advice on protecting AI and data-centric systems from threats. Through its official liaison partnership with CEN/CENELEC, the project has contributed 70 pages to ISO/IEC 27090 and 40 pages to the EU AI Act security standard OWASP, achieving OWASP Flagship project status in March 2025.

Meanwhile, the OWASP AIBOM Project is establishing a comprehensive framework to provide transparency into how AI models are built, trained, and deployed, extending OWASP's mission of making security visible to the rapidly evolving AI ecosystem.

This conversation explores how these complementary initiatives are addressing real-world challenges—from prompt injection and data poisoning to model provenance and supply chain risks—while actively shaping international standards and regulatory frameworks. We'll discuss concrete achievements, lessons learned from global collaboration, and the ambitious roadmap ahead as these projects continue to mature and expand their impact across the AI security landscape.

Segment Resources:

• https://owasp.org/www-project-aibom/

• https://www.linkedin.com/posts/aruneeshsalhotra_owasp-ai-aisecurity-activity-7364649799800766465-DJGM/

• https://www.youtube.com/@OWASPAIBOM

• https://www.youtube.com/@RobvanderVeer-ex3gj

• https://owaspai.org/

Agentic AI introduces unique and complex security challenges that render traditional risk management frameworks insufficient. In this keynote, Ken Huang, CEO of Distributedapps.ai and a key contributor to AI security standards, outlines a new approach to manage these emerging threats. The session will present a practical strategy that integrates the NIST AI Risk Management Framework with specialized tools to address the full lifecycle of Agentic AI.

Segment Resources:

• aivss.owasp.org

• https://kenhuangus.substack.com/p/owasp-aivss-the-new-framework-for

• https://cloudsecurityalliance.org/blog/2025/02/06/agentic-ai-threat-modeling-framework-maestro

This interview is sponsored by the OWASP GenAI Security Project. Visit https://securityweekly.com/owaspappsec to watch all of CyberRisk TV's interviews from the OWASP 2025 Global AppSec Conference!

Show Notes: https://securityweekly.com/asw-363