Security is cheapest when it is built in, not bolted on. ThreeShield reviews your architecture before it is coded and your code before it ships, so design flaws and vulnerabilities are caught while they are still easy to fix. For development teams that want a senior second set of eyes, and for the MSPs and agencies who build us into their process to show clients they take security seriously.
A design review catches the expensive mistakes before a line of code is written. A code review confirms the build actually matches that secure design. Run either on its own, or both as a pair.
| Security design review | Secure code review | |
|---|---|---|
| Looks at | Architecture, data flows, trust boundaries | The source code itself |
| Catches | Design flaws: weak auth models, missing boundaries, secrets in the wrong place | Vulnerabilities: injection, broken access control, unsafe crypto, risky dependencies |
| Needs from you | Diagrams and documentation, usually not the code | Read access to the relevant code |
| Best timing | Before or early in the build | Before a release, or on each pull request |
A senior reviewer reads the code for the issues scanners miss: broken authorization, business-logic flaws, injection, unsafe deserialization, and weak crypto, mapped to the OWASP Top 10 and ASVS.
We review how the system is put together: trust boundaries, tenancy and isolation, session and identity handling, and where sensitive data lives and moves.
We map components and data flows, walk an attacker through each trust boundary, and hand you a ranked list of the design changes worth making.
The third-party and open-source packages you pull in: known vulnerabilities, unmaintained libraries, and the supply-chain risks behind them.
The parts that fail quietly and hurt most: login and session handling, access-control checks, token and key handling, and multi-tenant separation.
Hard-coded secrets and key management, cloud and infrastructure-as-code configuration, and the CI/CD pipeline that builds and ships it all.
We work under an NDA, take the least access that does the job, prefer to review in your environment or a scoped repository, and keep nothing longer than the engagement needs. We tell you exactly what we need and why before you grant anything. Security work should not create a new exposure of its own.
A focused review of a release, a new feature, or a system you inherited and want a second opinion on.
We review at the points that matter, so security sign-off becomes a scheduled step rather than a last-minute scramble.
We sit in your pull-request and design-review flow on an ongoing basis, working from your repository and issue tracker so findings reach developers where they already work.
Most teams cannot justify a full-time application-security hire, and asking the developers who wrote the code to catch their own security flaws is asking a lot. We are the senior appsec bench you bring in when it counts: an independent reviewer who finds the issues before an attacker, an auditor, or a customer does, and writes them up so your developers can fix them and learn from them. You keep shipping; we keep the security bar high.
If you build or run software for clients, an independent security review is something you can sell and something that makes your work better. Two ways to bring us in, and we are glad to do either.
| Model | How it works | Best when |
|---|---|---|
| Arm's-length | We deliver an independent, ThreeShield-attributed review your client can trust. | The client wants an outside opinion that carries weight. |
| White-label | We act as your senior application-security bench, under your brand. | You want to widen your offering without hiring a CISSP/CISA team. |
| Built into your process | You include a review step in your delivery and tell clients the work is security-reviewed by an independent team. | You want security-conscious delivery to be a reason clients choose you. |
Bringing in an independent review raises client confidence and the quality of what you ship at the same time. Where a client needs a genuinely independent opinion of software you build or run, we keep the attribution clear about who did the work. Our rules of engagement are written down, and we never go around a partner to their client.
A review pairs well with a full cybersecurity audit, a penetration test, or continuous posture monitoring through Lavawall®.
A secure code review reads the code itself to find vulnerabilities: injection, broken access control, weak authentication, hard-coded secrets, unsafe crypto, and risky dependencies. A security design review looks one level up, at the architecture and data flows, to catch flaws before they are ever coded: a missing trust boundary, a weak authorization model, secrets in the wrong place. The design review is cheapest because it prevents problems; the code review confirms the build matches the intent. Most teams benefit from both.
For a code review, yes, we need read access to the relevant code. We work under an NDA, take the least access that does the job, prefer reviewing in your environment or a scoped repository, and hold nothing longer than the engagement needs. A design review often needs only your architecture diagrams and documentation, not the code at all. We tell you exactly what we need and why before you grant anything.
We review the common web, API, mobile, and cloud stacks, and the infrastructure-as-code and CI/CD pipelines around them. If you are on something unusual, tell us up front and we will confirm fit before we quote, rather than pretend every stack is the same.
Yes. Threat modeling is the core of the design review: we map your components, data flows, and trust boundaries, walk through how an attacker would abuse each one, and prioritize the risks worth engineering against. You come away with a short, ranked list of design changes, not a wall of theoretical threats.
Yes. We can run a one-time review, gate specific milestones or releases, or sit in your pull-request and design-review process on an ongoing basis. We work from your repository and issue tracker so findings land where your developers already work, written to be fixed rather than filed away.
Yes. Partners bring us in two ways: at arm's length, where we deliver an independent, ThreeShield-attributed review your client can trust, or white-label, where we act as your senior application-security bench under your brand. Many MSPs and agencies simply build us into their delivery process and tell clients the work is security-reviewed by an independent CISSP/CISA team, which raises both confidence and quality. Our rules of engagement are public, and we never go around a partner to their client.
No. Automated tools are part of the work, but the value is the person. Scanners miss broken authorization, business-logic flaws, and design mistakes entirely, and they drown you in false positives. We use the tools to cover ground, then a senior reviewer confirms what is real, finds what the tools cannot, and explains each issue in terms your developers can act on.
By scope: the size of the codebase or design, the depth you need, and whether it is one engagement or an ongoing arrangement. We scope and quote a fixed price before any work starts, so there are no surprises.
Tell us what you are building or shipping and we will scope a fixed-price review — a one-time look, a release gate, or an ongoing seat in your process — at arm's length or under your brand.
Get a Review QuoteIndependent · Developer-friendly · Arm's-length or white-label