Building an internal developer platform with a golden path, lifecycle management, and integrated secrets management can help avoid a majority of security and compliance risks in cloud infrastructure. By focusing on risk avoidance rather than mitigation, organizations can reduce costs associated with breaches and non-compliance problems. Key best practices include leveraging infrastructure as code to develop standardized templates for infrastructure deployment, implementing lifecycle management processes for golden components, and incorporating integrated secrets management capabilities to secure credentials, keys, and other sensitive data. These strategies enable faster time-to-market for product features while maintaining a high level of security and compliance.