A Lightweight Brutalist Security Playbook

Purpose: This lightweight playbook defines how to build, defend, and mature your security posture with a security brutalist no-nonsense, fundamentals-first approach.

Guiding Principles

1. Simplicity over complexity: Avoid fancy tools if the basics aren’t covered. Do fewer things, better.
2. Everything is verified: No assumptions. Log it, test it, prove it.
3. Access is earned: No one gets access by default; not even execs.
4. Security is infrastructure: Like plumbing or power—it's built-in, not bolted on.
5. Fail secure, not silently: Systems should stop before they break dangerously.

Brutalist Core Controls To Invest On

• Identity: Enforce MFA for everything, and least privilege access.
• Infrastructure: Define infra as code, and block shell access to prod
• Application: No secrets in code, and require signed builds
• Cloud: Maintain real-time asset inventory, anb Harden defaults (no public S3, no 0.0.0.0).
• Monitoring and Logs: Centralize + store logs immutably, and make it a point to monitor critical events (login, data access).
• Incident Response: Maintain and drill IR plan quarterly.
• Governance: Track security metrics monthly.

Weekly Operating Rhythm

1. Mon: Triage new vulnerabilities + open issues.
2. Wed: IAM access reviews.
3. Tue and Thu: Review alerts, false positives.
4. Fri: Share weekly dashboard with leadership.

Quarterly Cadence

• Red team or tabletop IR drills.
• IAM full review (privilege creep).
• Secrets audit + CI/CD deeper scan.
• Security scorecard review.
• Chaos security test.

Key Metrics to Track

• % of infrastructure defined in code, Target is 100%.
• MFA coverage (users, services). Target is 100%.
• % of accounts with least privilege. Target is 95%+.
• Secrets exposed in past 30 days. Target is 0.
• Time to detect/contain incident. Target is <1 hour.
• Security training completion. Target is 100%.

End Goal of the Playbook

A resilient baseline you can defend in audits, incidents, and public scrutiny. A security culture where failure is expected, but contained. A system where security enables speed, not hinders it.

Back or Next: A Brutalist Security Maturity Checklist.