Checkov Brings Static Security Analysis to Terraform Infrastructure Code

Infrastructure as Code (IaC) files like Terraform define real cloud resources and can introduce serious security risks if misconfigured, yet they are often excluded from standard static application security testing workflows. Checkov, an open-source SAST tool originally built by Bridgecrew and now part of Prisma Cloud, scans Terraform and other IaC formats using graph-based analysis to detect misconfigurations before they reach production. The tool can identify issues such as publicly accessible S3 buckets, unencrypted RDS instances, and overly permissive security groups by scanning code at the pull request stage. Developers can test Checkov against TerraGoat, an intentionally vulnerable Terraform project maintained by the same team, to practice identifying and remediating a range of real-world misconfigurations. The approach applies the established 'shift left' security principle to cloud infrastructure, catching dangerous declarations in code review rather than after deployment.