Full courseThis intensive course teaches developers how to use AI coding assistants such as GitHub Copilot, Codex and Claude Code to write, review and fix secure code. It combines OWASP secure-coding best practices with labs on vulnerable Java and .NET applications.
The course has two aims: to bring the whole development team to a shared level on web application security, including how an attacker works, and to teach developers to use AI coding assistants to find, fix and prevent vulnerabilities, in existing code as well as in new projects. Theory alternates with hands-on labs: participants exploit a vulnerability on a deliberately vulnerable application, fix it with AI and verify the result, and along the way build a new, secure application one vulnerability class at a time. The work follows OWASP guidance and uses GitHub Copilot (with OpenAI and Anthropic models), Codex, Claude Code, Burp Suite and Semgrep; the language of the new application is agreed with the client in advance. It is intended for developers who want to sharpen their application security skills and learn to use AI when writing secure code, without trusting it blindly. No previous experience with AI tools is needed.
Basic knowledge of the architecture and functioning of web applications
Basic knowledge of at least one backend language (e.g. Java or .NET); no prior experience with AI tools required
Introduction to secure coding: fundamental principles, the OWASP Top 10 and the Secure SDLC.
How AI coding assistants work: a conceptual overview of LLMs and their role in software development.
Limits and risks of AI-generated code: insecure-by-default output, outdated or insecure libraries, and hallucinated packages (slopsquatting).
Governance of AI tools in the enterprise: usage policies, protection of sensitive data, and cost and usage management.
Burp Suite introduction: intercepting and inspecting application traffic to understand its behavior.
How prompt formulation affects the security of the generated code, and why generic instructions are not enough.
Security-focused prompting: stating input validation, output encoding, error handling and cryptography requirements explicitly.
Recursive Criticism and Improvement (RCI): generating, self-reviewing and fixing code iteratively to reduce vulnerability density.
Zero-Shot Chain-of-Thought, and the pitfalls of generic and persona-based prompting.
Security instruction files for AI assistants: what they are, how to structure them and best practices.
Authentication vulnerabilities and defense: user enumeration, authentication bypass, default credentials and password reset flows.
JWT: understanding JSON Web Tokens and their secure use in authentication.
Authorization and Access Control: parameter manipulation, access matrix and business-logic bypass.
SQL injection: exploitation and prevention with parameterized queries; fixes applied and verified with AI.
Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) and output encoding.
Open Redirect: identification and prevention.
CSRF and CORS security.
Arbitrary File Upload: secure handling of uploaded files.
XXE (in-band and out-of-band) and SSRF: exploited on the vulnerable lab applications, then remediated with AI and verified.
Integrating SAST tools (Semgrep) with AI in a verification loop, and understanding how they differ from AI-only analysis.
Supply-chain risks of AI-suggested dependencies (hallucinated or outdated packages) and how to verify them.
Offensive use of AI: payload generation and attack-surface analysis.
Final security testing and retest of the application developed during the course.
Full courseLanguage-independent secure coding for the web: the main vulnerability classes and how to defend against them.
DISCOVER MORE Full courseSecure coding for Java and Spring: prevent the common vulnerabilities with Spring Security and safe defaults.
DISCOVER MORE Full courseSecure coding for ASP.NET Core: find and fix .NET vulnerabilities with the framework's built-in security features.
DISCOVER MORE Full courseBlack-box and gray-box testing of web applications with Burp Suite, based on the OWASP WSTG methodology.
DISCOVER MOREEffective date: July 21, 2026
BeDefended S.r.l. ("us", "we", or "our") operates the www.bedefended.com website (the "Service").
This page informs you of our policies regarding the collection, use, and disclosure of personal data when you use our Service and the choices you have associated with that data.
This Privacy Policy is provided in compliance with article 13 of the GDPR 2016/679 (General Data Protection Regulation).
We use your data to provide and improve the Service. By using the Service, you agree to the collection and use of information in accordance with this policy.
Personal Data means data about a living individual who can be identified from those data (or from those and other information either in our possession or likely to come into our possession).
Usage Data is data collected automatically either generated by the use of the Service or from the Service infrastructure itself (for example, the duration of a page visit).
Cookies are small pieces of data stored on a User’s device.
Data Controller means the natural or legal person, public authority, agency or other body which, alone or jointly with others, determines the purposes and means of the processing of personal data.
For the purpose of this Privacy Policy, we are a Data Controller of your data.
Data Processor (or Service Provider) means a natural or legal person, public authority, agency or other body which processes personal data on behalf of the Data Controller.
We may use the services of various Service Providers in order to process your data more effectively.
Data Subject is any living individual who is the subject of Personal Data.
The User is the individual using our Service. The User corresponds to the Data Subject, who is the subject of Personal Data.
We collect several different types of information for various purposes to provide and improve our Service to you.
While using our Service, we may ask you to provide us with certain personally identifiable information that can be used to contact or identify you ("Personal Data"). Personally identifiable information may include, but is not limited to email address, first name and last name.
We use only technical cookies that are strictly necessary for the operation of the Service (for example, a session cookie used by the contact form to prevent abuse). We do not use profiling or advertising cookies, and our analytics tool works without cookies.
Cookies are files with small amount of data which may include an anonymous unique identifier. Cookies are sent to your browser from a website and stored on your device.
These cookies do not collect Personal Data that can identify you and are used exclusively for the technical operation of the site.
Anyway you can instruct your browser to refuse all cookies or to indicate when a cookie is being sent.
Your language preference is stored locally in your browser (localStorage) and is never transmitted to us.
We may also collect information how the Service is accessed and used ("Usage Data"). This Usage Data may include information such as browser type, browser version, the pages of our Service visited, the time and date of each visit, the time spent on those pages and other diagnostic data.
BeDefended S.r.l. uses the collected data for various purposes:
- To provide and maintain our Service
- To notify you about changes to our Service
- To allow you to participate in interactive features of our Service when you choose to do so
- To provide customer support
- To gather analysis or valuable information so that we can improve our Service
- To monitor the usage of our Service
- To detect, prevent and address technical issues
BeDefended S.r.l. will retain your Personal Data only for as long as is necessary for the purposes set out in this Privacy Policy. We will retain and use your Personal Data to the extent necessary to comply with our legal obligations (for example, if we are required to retain your data to comply with applicable laws), resolve disputes, and enforce our legal agreements and policies.
BeDefended S.r.l. will also retain Usage Data for internal analysis purposes. Usage Data is generally retained for a shorter period of time, except when this data is used to strengthen the security or to improve the functionality of our Service, or we are legally obligated to retain this data for longer time periods.
Your information, including Personal Data, may be processed and maintained on computers located outside of your state, province, country or other governmental jurisdiction where the data protection laws may differ than those from your jurisdiction.
If you are located outside Italy and choose to provide information to us, please note that we can transfer the data, including Personal Data, to Italy or other EU countries and process it there.
Your consent to this Privacy Policy followed by your submission of such information represents your agreement to that transfer.
BeDefended S.r.l. will take all steps reasonably necessary to ensure that your data is treated securely and in accordance with this Privacy Policy and no transfer of your Personal Data will take place to an organization or a country unless there are adequate controls in place including the security of your data and other personal information.
BeDefended S.r.l. may disclose your Personal Data in the good faith belief that such action is necessary to:
- To comply with a legal obligation
- To protect and defend the rights or property of BeDefended S.r.l.
- To prevent or investigate possible wrongdoing in connection with the Service
- To protect the personal safety of users of the Service or the public
- To protect against legal liability
The security of your data is important to us, but remember that no method of transmission over the Internet, or method of electronic storage is 100% secure. While we strive to use commercially acceptable means to protect your Personal Data, we cannot guarantee its absolute security.
BeDefended S.r.l. aims to take reasonable steps to allow you to correct, amend, delete, or limit the use of your Personal Data.
You can contact us to make changes on your Personal Data.
If you wish to be informed about which Personal Data we hold about you and if you want it to be removed from our systems, please contact us.
In certain circumstances, you have the right:
- To access and receive a copy of the Personal Data we hold about you
- To rectify any Personal Data held about you that is inaccurate
- To request the deletion of Personal Data held about you
Please note that we may ask you to verify your identity before responding to such requests.
We may employ third party companies and individuals to facilitate our Service ("Service Providers"), to provide the Service on our behalf, to perform Service-related services or to assist us in analyzing how our Service is used.
These third parties have access to your Personal Data only to perform these tasks on our behalf and are obligated not to disclose or use it for any other purpose.
We use a self-hosted instance of Plausible Analytics, an open-source, privacy-friendly web analytics tool, to measure aggregate traffic on our Service.
All analytics data is collected and stored on our self-hosted instance and is not shared with any third-party analytics provider. Plausible does not use cookies and does not collect or store any Personal Data: statistics (such as pages visited, referrer, browser type and country) are anonymous and aggregated, and are used solely to understand and improve how the Service is used. For more information about this measurement approach, see the Plausible data policy.
Our Service may contain links to other sites that are not operated by us. If you click on a third party link, you will be directed to that third party's site. We strongly advise you to review the Privacy Policy of every site you visit.
We have no control over and assume no responsibility for the content, privacy policies or practices of any third party sites or services.
Our Service does not address anyone under the age of 16 ("Children").
We do not knowingly collect personally identifiable information from anyone under the age of 16. If you are a parent or guardian and you are aware that your child has provided us with Personal Data, please contact us. If we become aware that we have collected Personal Data from children without verification of parental consent, we take steps to remove that information from our servers.
We may update our Privacy Policy from time to time. We will post the new Privacy Policy on this page.
You are advised to review this Privacy Policy periodically for any changes. Changes to this Privacy Policy are effective when they are posted on this page.
If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy, please contact us by mail: Via Caprera 47, 10136 Torino (TO) - Italy