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09 - Security in Cloud Computing.md

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Security in Cloud Computing

Cloud Computing Basics

Cloud Computing Types

Type Client Responsibility Provider Responsiblity
IaaS applications
data
middleware
OS
virtualization
hardware
networking
PaaS applications
data
middleware
OS virtualization
hardware
networking
SaaS applications
data
middleware
OS
virtualization
hardware
networking

Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)

  • Provides virtualized computing resources
  • Third party hosts infrastructure components, applications and services with a hypervisor running the VMs as guests
  • Good choice for day-to-day infrastructure service, for temporary or experimental workloads that may change unexpectedly
  • Subscribers usually pay on a per-use basis

Platform as a Service (Paas)

  • Geared towards software development
  • Provides development platform to develop applications without building the infrastructure
  • Provides ability to develop without having to worry about hardware or software that is hosted by provider
  • Does not replace the organizations actual infrastructure

Software as a Service (SaaS)

  • Provider supplies on-demand applications to subscribers
  • Basically a software distribution model
  • Benefits are easier administration, automated patch management, compatibility and version control

Deployment Models

Public Cloud

  • Services provided over a network that is open for public to use
  • Used when compliance and security requirements is not a major issue

Private Cloud

  • Cloud solely for use by one tenant
  • Not pay-as-you-go
  • Usually done in larger organizations, because hardware is dedicated and security nad compliance requirements can be easily met

Community Cloud

  • Infrastructure shared by several organizations, but not open to public
  • Usually shared by organizations having the same policy and compliance considerations

Hybrid Cloud

  • A composition of two or more cloud deployment models

NIST Cloud Architecture

  • National Institutes of Standards and Technology
  • Federal Risk and Authorization Management Programm (FedRAMP) - auditable framework for ensuring basic security controls for government cloud effort; provides approach tos ecurity assessment, authorization and continuous monitoring for cloud
  • PCI Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) - regulatory compliance effort for cloud
  • FIPS
  • Cloud Security Alliance (CSA) - provides cloud security best practices; general cloud enterprise architecutre model; documentation on privacy concerns, security controls and implementation

Major Roles

  • Cloud Carrier - organization with responsibility of transferring data; intermediary for connectivity and transport between subscriber and provider
  • Cloud Consumer - aquires and uses cloud products and services
  • Cloud Provider - purveyor of products and services
  • Cloud Broker - manages use, performance and delivery of services as well as relationships betwen providers and subscribers
  • Cloud Auditor - independent assor of cloud service an security controls

NIST Cloud Computing Reference Architecture

Cloud Security

  • Where does security testing starts and where does it end?
  • If the hypervisor is compromised, all hosts on that hypervisor are as well

Trusted Computing Model

  • attempts to resolve computer security problems through hardware enhancements and associated software modifications
  • Trusted Computing Group (TCG) - hardware and software providers who cooporate to come up with specific plans
  • Roots of Trust (RoT) - set of functions within TCM that are always trusted by the OS

Cloud Control Layers

Layer Control
applications Web app firewalls; software development life cycle; binary analysis; application scanners; etc.
information database monitoring; encryption; data loss prevention; content management framework, etc.
management patch and configuration management; governance and compliance; virtual machine administration; identity and access management; etc.
network firewalls; network intrusion detection/prevention; quality of service; DNS security; etc.
trusted computing hardware and software roots of trust and APIs; etc.
computer and storage host-based intrusion detection/prevention and firewalls; log management; file integrity efforts; encryption; etc.
physical physical security measures; video monitoring; guards; etc.

Tools

  • CloudInspect - pen-testing as a service from AWS for EC2 users
  • CloudPassage Halo - delivered as a service; instant visibility and continuous protection for servers in any cloud
  • Dell Cloud Manager
  • Qualys Cloud Suite
  • Trend Micro's Instant-On Cloud Security
  • Panda Cloud Office Protection

Threats and Attacks

  • Data Breach or Loss - biggest threat; includes malicious theft, erasure or modification; MFA and encryption as protection
  • Shadow IT - IT systems or solutions that are developed to handle an issue but aren't taken through proper approval chain
  • Abuse of Cloud Resources - another high threat (usually applies to Iaas and PaaS); use resources for hacking; providers counter measure is monitoring, protection and recovery
  • Insecure Interfaces and APIs - cloud services can't function without them, but need to make sure they are secure; counter measure is encryption and authorization access;
  • Service Oriented Architecture - API that makes it easier for application components to cooperate and exchange information
  • Insufficient due diligence - moving an application without knowing the security differences of the cloud environment
  • Shared technology issues - multi-tenant environments that don't provide proper isolation
  • Unknown risk profiles - subscribers simply don't know what security provisions are made in the background
  • Others include malicious insiders, inadequate design and DDoS
  • Wrapping Attack - SOAP message intercepted and data in envelope is changed and sent/replayed
  • Session riding - CSRF under a different name; deals with cloud services instead of traditional data centers
  • Side Channel Attack/cross-guest VM breach - using an existing VM on the same physical host to attack another