Why we build every project security-first (and why you should care)

Security isn't exciting. Most business owners never think about it until something goes wrong — a defaced website, a data breach notification, customer records exposed, a phishing campaign launched from their own domain. By then it's already too late and the damage is real: financial, reputational, and legal. Here's why most agencies treat security as optional, why that's a serious problem, and what you should expect from any agency you trust with your project.

Why most agencies skip security

The honest answer is economics. Security costs time, and most agencies are optimising for delivery speed and margin. Implementing proper authentication, sanitising all user inputs, setting correct security headers, managing environment variables properly, using parameterised database queries — these add hours to every project. Hours that agencies on tight margins are reluctant to spend on something clients can't immediately see.

There's also a genuine skills gap. Most web developers are trained to build features, not to think adversarially. They know how to create a login form. They may not know the attack vectors that form creates — and they may not know that they don't know.

The vulnerabilities that affect almost every web project

You don't need a security background to understand the common risks. Here are the four most critical, explained plainly.

Cross-Site Scripting (XSS)

XSS attacks happen when an attacker injects malicious JavaScript into a page that other users then see. Imagine a comment section where user input is displayed back on the page without sanitisation — an attacker submits a script instead of a comment, and that script runs in every visitor's browser. It can steal session cookies, silently redirect users to phishing pages, capture keystrokes, or replace page content entirely. Modern frameworks like React and Next.js provide significant protection against XSS by default, but it's not automatic — developers still need to handle edge cases correctly.

SQL Injection

When a database query is constructed using unsanitised user input, an attacker can manipulate the query to do almost anything: extract your entire database, modify records, delete tables, or bypass authentication entirely. The classic example is a login form where instead of a password, an attacker submits a carefully crafted string that makes the query return true for any user. The fix is simple but requires discipline:

// Vulnerable — user input directly interpolated into queryconst result = await db.query(  `SELECT * FROM users WHERE email = '${req.body.email}'`); // Secure — parameterised query (user input never touches SQL)const result = await db.query(  'SELECT * FROM users WHERE email = $1',  [req.body.email]);

Broken authentication

Weak password policies, missing rate limiting on login endpoints, poorly managed session tokens, JWTs stored in localStorage, password reset flows that can be bypassed — authentication failures are among the most exploited vulnerabilities in real-world attacks. Taking over a user's account is often more valuable to an attacker than any other exploit because it grants legitimate access to everything that user can do.

Security misconfigurations

Exposed .env files, debug mode left on in production, missing HTTP security headers (Content-Security-Policy, X-Frame-Options, HSTS, Referrer-Policy), public S3 buckets with sensitive files, overly permissive CORS settings — these require no clever hacking. They're carelessness. And they're extremely common, even on professionally built applications.

What OWASP is

The Open Web Application Security Project (OWASP) is a non-profit that maintains free, open resources on web security. Their most cited resource is the OWASP Top 10 — a regularly updated list of the ten most critical security risks to web applications, based on aggregated data from real-world vulnerabilities.

Building 'OWASP-aware' doesn't mean passing a certification. It means your development process actively considers and mitigates the risks on that list throughout the build — not as an afterthought at the end. It's a development mindset, not a checkbox.

What to ask your agency before you sign

These questions take two minutes to ask and will tell you a great deal about how seriously an agency takes security:

• ✦How do you handle user authentication — do you build it from scratch or use a proven provider?
• ✦Are all database queries parameterised?
• ✦What security headers will you implement on this project?
• ✦How are API keys and environment variables managed?
• ✦Are you familiar with the OWASP Top 10?
• ✦Do you have a security checklist or process before launch?

A good agency will answer these questions clearly and confidently. An evasive answer, or a response that treats the question as overly technical, is a significant warning sign.

How we approach security at Nuvox

Our founder has a background in cybersecurity — it's not a value we adopted for marketing purposes, it's something we've cared about for years. In practice, that means: authentication is handled with proven providers (NextAuth.js, Clerk, or similar) rather than built from scratch; database queries are always parameterised; security headers are correctly configured on every deployment; .env files are never committed to version control; user inputs are sanitised before use; OWASP Top 10 serves as a reference throughout every build.

For clients who want additional assurance, we offer security audits as a standalone service: a systematic review of an existing codebase against known vulnerability patterns, with a written report and remediation recommendations. It's something every serious business should consider before launching anything that handles user data.

Security isn't a feature you add at the end. It's a constraint you design around from the start.