Chapter 5: Security in the Cloud

Risks of Virtualization: Attacks on the Hypervisor

Attempts to compromise the service hosting the virtualization (know as a hypervisor) could lead to massive data loss as each instance is now readily accessible

Risks of Public Cloud Operation: Escalation of Privilege

Authorized users may try to acquire unauthorized permissions

Risks of Private Cloud Operation: Regulatory Noncompliance

Breaking of national or industrial standards/litigation

Cloud-Specific Business Impact Analysis Concerns: New Dependencies

Customers have to depend on the cloud provider to meet their organization's needs, but all the downstream and upstream dependencies associated with the provider as well, including the provider's vendors, suppliers, utilities, personnel, and so on

Risks of Public Cloud Operation: Legal Activity

Data and devices within a datacenter may be subpoenaed or seized as evidence in a criminal investigation or as part of discovery for litigation purposes

Risks of Public Cloud Operation: Information Bleed

Data belonging to one customer will be read or received by another

Risks of Virtualization: Information Bleed

Data belonging to one customer will be read or received by another

Risks of Public Cloud Operation: Avoid Proprietary Formats

Data should be usuable in other environments, not just that of the original cloud provider

PAAS Hybrid Cloud Risks: Persistent Backdoors

Development tools functioning as attack vectors if discovered and exploited by malicious parties

Loss of Physical Control

Distributed ownership means not only a decrease in expenses, but a decreased amount of control as well

Risks of Public Cloud Operation: Multi-tenant Environments

Environments in which multiple customers are storing data with the same provider

Risks of Public Cloud Operation: Ensure Favorable Contract Terms for Portability

Have an exit strategy outlined and ready to execute

Risks of Private Cloud Operation:

Malware Infection internally or externally by a virus

Risks of Public Cloud Operation: Check for Regulatory Constraints

Not all cloud providers adhere or are compliant with all legal guidelines

Risks of Community Cloud Operations: Shared Costs

Overhead and cost of the infrastructure is shared among the members of the community, but so is access and control

Loss of Policy Control

Ownership is distributed in a community cloud, centralized policy promulgation and enforcement is not usually an option

SAAS Hybrid Cloud Risks: Web Application Security

Potential weaknesses within web apps used for access pose a wide variety of risks and threats

Cloud-Specific Business Impact Analysis Concerns: Data Breach/Inadvertent Disclosure

Public disclosure of deleterious internal communication and reporting; loss of competitive advantage; negative effect on customer, supplier, and vendor goodwill; and contractual violations

Customer/Provider Shared BC/DR Responsibilities: Cloud Operations, Third-Party Cloud Backup Provider

Regular operations are hosted by the cloud provider, but contingency operations require failover to another cloud provider

Community Cloud

Resources are shared and dispersed among a group, with joint ownership

Cloud Customer Key Concern

Security of their data

Cloud Provider Key Concern

Security of their datacenter

Risks of Public Cloud Operation: Core Competency

The ability of a provider to meet the needs of the customer

Risks of Virtualization: Guest Escape

The ability of a user to leave the confines of their own virtualized instance

Risks of Public Cloud Operation: Vendor Lock-Out

The cloud provider goes out of business, is acquired by another interest, or ceases operation for any reason, making it impossible to recover stored data

PAAS Hybrid Cloud Risks: Interoperability Issues

The customer's software may or may not function properly with each new adjustment to the environment

Risks of Public Cloud Operation: Legislative Environment

The effect of upcoming legal and regulatory guidelines on the customer and provider

Risks of Community Cloud Operations: Resiliency Through Shared Ownership

The environment is more likely to survive the loss of a significant number of nodes without affecting the others because the network ownership and operation is scattered among users

PAAS Hybrid Cloud Risks: Virtualization

The generic threats and risks associated with virtualization

SAAS Hybrid Cloud Risks: Virtualization

The generic threats and risks associated with virtualization

Risks of Public Cloud Operation: Physical Limitations to Moving Data

The inability to move data based on lack of ability by the provider

Risks of Public Cloud Operation: Jurisdictional Suitability

The location of the datacenter and its ability to comply with regional standards and regulations

Social Engineering

The manipulation of human resources to gain access to a system

Private Cloud

The organization controls the entire environment/infrastructure

PAAS Hybrid Cloud Risks: Resource Sharing

The possibility of information bleed and side-channel attacks

SAAS Hybrid Cloud Risks: Proprietary Formats

The provider may be collecting, storing, and displaying data in a format owned by and unique to that provider

Cloud-Specific Business Impact Analysis Concerns: Regulatory Failure

The provider might be unable or unwilling to adhere to the policies of a customer's organization

Risks of Public Cloud Operation: Supply Chain Dependencies

The provider's ability to function independently without excessive reliance on other entities

Risks of Public Cloud Operation: Conflict of Interest

The provider's employees should not be assigned to manage the data or two organizations that are in competition

Cloud-Specific Business Impact Analysis Concerns: Vendor Lock-In/Out

The reliability of the provider to store customer data in an easily accessable fashion, as well as continuing to exist as an entity

IAAS Hybrid Cloud Risks: Lack of Specific Skillsets

The significant burden on the customer's administrators and staff to provide both operational and security functions

Customer/Provider Shared BC/DR Responsibilities: Private Architecture, Cloud Service as Backup

The use of a cloud provider as the backup

IAAS Hybrid Cloud Risks: External Attacks

Unauthorized access, eavesdropping, DOS/DDoS, and so on

Risks of Private Cloud Operation: External Attacks

Unauthorized access, eavesdropping, DOS/DDoS, and so on

Brewer-Nash Model

Users are instead given permission to access datasets based on which datasets the user had previously seen, but it also takes into consideration the user's free will and ability to choose the initial sets to access

Customer/Provider Shared BC/DR Responsibilities: Cloud Operations, Cloud Provider as Backup

A backup located at another datacenter owned by the provider in case of disaster-level events

Public Cloud

A company offers cloud services to any entity that wants to become a cloud customer, be it an individual, company, government agency, or other organization

Customer/Provider Shared BC/DR Responsibilities: Declaration

A formal notice of emergency, usually initiated by one trusted member of the customer organization that results in unique business constraints or requirements being put into place

Risks of Public Cloud Operation: Provider Longevity

A history of successful operations reduces the likelihood of breaches/shutdowns

Risks of Private Cloud Operation: Natural Diasters

Acts of nature, such as fires, tornadoes, or floods

Customer/Provider Shared BC/DR Responsibilities: Testing

An interruption in normal service to practice failover or emergency procedures

Man-In-The-Middle Attack

Any attack where the attacker inserts themselves between the sender and receiver

IAAS Hybrid Cloud Risks: Personnel Threats

Inadvertent and malicious threats by employees

Risks of Private Cloud Operation: Personnel Threats

Inadvertent and malicious threats by employees

Loss of Audit Access

It may be impractical or impossible to conduct audits in a distributed environment

Risks of Virtualization: Data Seizure

Legal activity might result in a host machine being confiscated or inspected by law enforcement or plaintiffs' attorneys, and the host machine might include virtualized instances belonging to another organization

Risks of Community Cloud Operations: No Need for Centralized Administration for Performance and Monitoring

Loss of the reliability of centralized and homogenized standards for performance and security monitoring