Kolkata, India – June 2025: With over 5.8 million software developers, India is fast becoming the largest software engineering hub in the world. Every year, the country adds hundreds of thousands of new coders from colleges, coding bootcamps, and startup ecosystems.
But as this developer wave accelerates, experts are beginning to ask a sobering question:
Are we teaching India’s developers to code securely?
If the data is any indication, the answer is – not yet.
The Breaches Aren’t Sophisticated – Just Negligent
According to the IBM Cost of a Data Breach Report 2024, the average global cost of a data breach reached $4.45 million, the highest ever recorded. Of all breach types analyzed, compromised credentials remained the most common initial attack vector, accounting for 16% of breaches.
Even more concerning: IBM found that breaches caused by credential misuse took 327 days on average to identify and contain, making them the longest-lingering threat of all categories.
Meanwhile, the Verizon 2024 Data Breach Investigations Report found that 74% of all breaches involved the human element, including misconfigurations, errors, and credential mishandling. Among these, secrets stored insecurely by developers like API keys and database credentials are an underreported but pervasive issue.
“The developer community is growing faster than its security literacy,” says Sawan, CEO and Co-founder of Keyshade.
“We’re seeing brilliant young coders who can build an entire app in a weekend but still don’t know the risk of putting secrets in a .env file or accidentally committing credentials to GitHub.”
We Teach Code. But Not Secure Code.
In India, most young developers learn from college curriculums, YouTube, or coding bootcamps. While these avenues emphasize shipping projects fast and deploying working software, basic security practices are often left behind.
Secrets, including API keys, cloud tokens, and internal credentials, are usually handled manually and stored in plaintext. They’re passed between teammates in Slack, screen-shared during Zoom calls, and pushed into version control systems without protection.
“Secrets management isn’t just a DevOps problem – it’s a developer responsibility. And we’re not being taught that early enough,” Rajdip Bhattacharya, CTO and Co-Founder of Keyshade adds.
A Developer-Led Fix for a Developer-Caused Problem
This is the gap that Keyshade aims to fill – an easy-to-use, developer-first secrets and configuration management tool that eliminates the need for .env files, hardcoded tokens, or insecure sharing practices.
Keyshade encrypts, stores, and injects secrets securely into your dev environment all without requiring a heavy enterprise setup. It’s built to be as fast and seamless as using environment variables, but with zero risk of exposure.
“We wanted something secure that wouldn’t slow down our workflows. If it takes 10 steps to secure a secret, developers will skip 9,” say the founders.
With more developers now working remotely, contributing to open-source, and building microservices from day one, a tool like Keyshade becomes less of an add-on and more of a foundational layer for secure codebases.
The Way Forward
India’s software revolution is not in question – its security revolution is.
To future-proof this rising generation of developers, the industry must:
- Integrate secure coding practices into education — from B.Tech classrooms to bootcamp syllabi.
- Treat secrets management as MVP hygiene, not just a production concern.
- Invest in tools and platforms that make security automatic, not optional.
The stakes aren’t hypothetical. A single leaked credential can bring down customer trust, trigger compliance penalties, or open the floodgates for cybercriminals, costing startups far more than just time.
“We don’t just need more devs. We need secure devs,” says Sawan.
About Keyshade
Keyshade is a plug-and-play secrets and configuration manager built for developers. It secures API keys, tokens, and environment variables from day one without the complexity of traditional enterprise tools. Built by two Indian engineering students, Keyshade is on a mission to help developers write secure code without breaking their flow.
