Developer Checklist: How to Catch Security Risks During Pull Request Reviews

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Most security vulnerabilities enter codebases through routine development tasks like adding packages, updating routes, or modifying permissions — not through obviously flagged security changes. Conducting a security review at the pull request stage is the most cost-effective way to catch risks before vulnerable code reaches production. Reviewers should use a repeatable checklist covering authentication, authorization, input handling, secrets, external calls, and dependencies. Dependency changes deserve particular scrutiny, as a single package addition can introduce known CVEs, malicious scripts, or vulnerable transitive dependencies that reviewers often overlook. PR-level security review is not a replacement for automated scanning or penetration testing, but serves as an early, context-aware checkpoint in the development workflow.

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