The Security Metrics That Actually Get Engineering Buy-In

Security teams have a measurement problem. 

We’re drowning in compliance dashboards that make executives happy and vulnerability counts that overwhelm engineering teams. 

Meanwhile, the metrics that could actually drive security improvements, the ones that speak engineering’s language, get buried in quarterly reports or ignored entirely.

The disconnect is real.

Security feedback loop time is a metric in DevSecOps that measures the time it takes to address and resolve security issues identified during the software development lifecycle. The challenge is many organizations still measure success through static compliance checkboxes rather than dynamic remediation velocity.

Here are the seven metrics to know that bridge the gap between security needs and engineering reality, plus practical frameworks for implementing them without creating more bureaucratic overhead.

Table of Contents

1. Mean Time to Acceptable Risk (MTTAR) vs. Mean Time to Remediate (MTTR)
2. Security Debt Velocity
3. Security Coverage Drift
4. Security Signal-to-Noise Ratio
5. Security Integration Friction Score
6. Vulnerability Escape Rate
7. Security Champion Engagement Index
8. How to Make These Metrics Work
9. Connecting Engineering Metrics to Compliance Reporting

Mean Time to Acceptable Risk (MTTAR) vs. Mean Time to Remediate (MTTR)

Traditional MTTR assumes every vulnerability needs complete elimination. MTTAR recognizes engineering reality: not every security issue requires the same response, urgency or depth.

How to measure it:

• Track time from vulnerability discovery to reaching an agreed-upon risk threshold
• Include temporary mitigations, compensating controls, and architectural changes
• Separate MTTAR by severity: Critical (2-7 days), High (14-30 days), Medium (60-90 days)

Why engineers care: This metric acknowledges that good enough security exists and that engineering teams can make informed trade-offs rather than being expected to fix everything immediately.

Security Debt Velocity

Borrowed from technical debt concepts, security debt velocity measures how quickly your backlog of security issues is growing or shrinking relative to your team’s capacity to address them.

The formula: (New vulnerabilities introduced per sprint) - (Vulnerabilities resolved per sprint) = Security debt velocity

Implementation tips:

• Track this at the team level, not just organizationally
• Include both new findings and architectural security improvements
• Celebrate teams with negative security debt velocity (reducing backlog faster than creating it)

This metric helps engineering managers understand security workload impact on development velocity and plan capacity accordingly.

Security Coverage Drift

This tracks the percentage of your codebase, infrastructure, or applications covered by automated security testing over time. 

Scan Coverage: Percentage of code/containers covered by automated security testing (

Try and aim for 100%!

Key measurements:

• Static Application Security Testing (SAST) coverage percentage
• Dynamic scanning coverage for APIs and web applications
• Container and infrastructure-as-code scanning coverage
• Dependency and license scanning coverage

Why it matters: Coverage drift identifies blind spots before they become incidents. Engineering teams appreciate this metric because it focuses on prevention rather than punishment.

Security Signal-to-Noise Ratio

Engineering teams hate false positives. This metric tracks the percentage of security alerts that result in actual remediation work versus those dismissed as false positives or accepted risks.

Calculation: (Valid security findings / Total security alerts) × 100

Target ratios by tool type:

• SAST tools: 60-80% valid findings
• Dependency scanners: 70-90% valid findings
• Infrastructure scanners: 50-70% valid findings

Improving this ratio reduces alert fatigue and increases engineering trust in security tooling.

Security Integration Friction Score

This measures how much security requirements slow down development workflows. Track these specific friction points:

• Average time added to pull request reviews due to security checks
• Percentage of builds that fail security gates
• Number of security-related deployment rollbacks per month
• Time spent in security-related meetings per developer per week

Healthy targets:

• Less than 10% increase in PR review time
• Under 5% of builds failing security gates
• Zero security-related deployment rollbacks
• Less than 2 hours per developer per week in security discussions

Vulnerability Escape Rate

This measures security issues that make it to production despite your development-phase security controls. This DevOps security KPI is an indication of the total number of unresolved issues in production

Formula: (Vulnerabilities found in production / Total vulnerabilities found) × 100

Track this by severity and source:

• What percentage of critical vulnerabilities escape to production?
• Which types of security issues (XSS, injection, auth, etc.) escape most frequently?
• Are escapes due to tool gaps, process gaps, or team knowledge gaps?

Security Champion Engagement Index

This composite metric tracks the health of your security champion program:

• Number of active security champions per team
• Security-related commits per champion per month
• Security training completion rates among champions
• Champion-initiated security improvements

Strong security champion engagement correlates with better overall security posture and reduced friction between security and engineering teams.

How to Make These Metrics Work

Here are a few best practices to keep in mind when implementing these key metrics. 

Start small, Measure what matters

Don’t implement all seven metrics simultaneously. 

Begin with MTTAR and Security Debt Velocity as they provide immediate insights into your current security posture and engineering capacity.

Gamification without gimmicks

Create friendly competition around these metrics, but avoid turning security into a simplistic points system. 

Celebrate teams that improve their security debt velocity or reduce their vulnerability escape rate, but always provide context about why these improvements matter for business outcomes.

Align with engineering rituals

Present these metrics during existing engineering ceremonies in the following ways: 

• Sprint retrospectives: Discuss security debt velocity and integration friction
• Quarterly planning: Set targets for coverage drift and escape rates
• Architecture reviews: Reference security champion engagement and signal-to-noise ratios

Connecting Engineering Metrics to Compliance Reporting

Here’s where many organizations struggle: engineering teams need actionable metrics, but executives need compliance evidence. The solution isn’t choosing one over the other but showing how engineering-focused metrics support compliance objectives.

SOC 2 Alignment:

• MTTAR demonstrates timely vulnerability management (CC6.1)
• Security coverage drift shows systematic monitoring (CC7.1)
• Vulnerability escape rate evidences change management controls (CC8.1)

ISO 27001 Alignment:

• Security debt velocity supports risk treatment tracking (A.12.6.1)
• Security champion engagement demonstrates security awareness (A.7.2.2)
• Integration friction scores show security control effectiveness (A.14.2.5)

Create a simple mapping document that shows how each engineering metric contributes to compliance requirements. 

This allows security teams to generate audit-ready reports from the same data that drives engineering improvements.

The Bottom Line

Security metrics that work share three characteristics: they’re actionable, they respect engineering constraints, and they measure outcomes rather than activities. 

The seven metrics we covered focus on improving security posture through better engineering collaboration rather than compliance theater.

Stop measuring what’s easy to count and start measuring what actually drives security improvements. Your engineering teams will thank you, and your security posture will improve as a result.

After all, the goal isn’t perfect security. You should be focused on building systems and processes that continuously reduce risk while maintaining development velocity. 

These metrics help you measure progress toward that goal in ways that both engineers and executives can understand and act upon.