AWS CCP Certification Essentials Part-09 (Application Security and Data Encryption and Secrets Management Services)
Application Security Services
In today’s world, online security is of the utmost importance. With the increasing number of cyber attacks, businesses need to ensure that their web applications and data are protected. Luckily, Amazon Web Services (AWS) offers several tools and services to help businesses safeguard their online assets. In this blog post, we will explore seven AWS security tools that can help protect your web applications and data.
1. AWS Web Application Firewall (WAF)
Web Application Firewall (WAF) is an AWS security tool that helps protect your web applications against common web attacks. It protects your apps against common attack patterns, such as SQL injection and cross-site scripting. WAF works by inspecting web traffic to your applications and blocking malicious requests before they reach your servers. This helps prevent attacks and keeps your applications running smoothly.
Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS)
Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) is a type of cyber attack that is designed to overwhelm a website or web application with traffic, making it unavailable to its intended users. In a DDoS attack, the attacker uses a network of computers, often referred to as a botnet, to send a large volume of traffic to the target website or application. This traffic flood is intended to consume the target’s resources, such as bandwidth and processing power, and cause the website or application to become unavailable to legitimate users.
DDoS attacks can be launched for various reasons, including to extort money from a business, to disrupt competition, or to make a political statement. The attack can be launched from anywhere in the world, making it difficult to identify and stop the attacker. As technology has advanced, so have DDoS attacks, and they now have the potential to cause significant damage to businesses of all sizes.
To protect against DDoS attacks, businesses can use services like AWS Shield, which provides always-on detection and protection against DDoS attacks.
2. AWS Shield
Shield is a managed Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) protection service. A DDoS attack causes a traffic jam on a website or web application in an attempt to cause it to crash. Shield protects your applications against DDoS attacks by providing always-on detection. Shield Standard is a free service that comes with all AWS accounts. If you need additional protection, Shield Advanced is a paid service that provides enhanced DDoS protection. Shield Advanced supports several AWS services, including CloudFront, Route 53, Elastic Load Balancing, and AWS Global Accelerator.
3. AWS Macie
Macie is an AWS security tool that helps you discover and protect sensitive data. It uses machine learning to evaluate your S3 environment and uncover personally identifiable information (PII). Macie helps you maintain compliance with regulations by identifying and classifying sensitive data. It also provides alerts when it detects suspicious activity.
4. AWS Config
Config is an AWS security tool that allows you to assess, audit, and evaluate the configurations of your resources. It tracks configuration changes over time and delivers a configuration history file to S3. Config also provides notifications via Simple Notification Service (SNS) of every configuration change. This helps you maintain compliance with regulations and identify potential security issues.
5. AWS GuardDuty
GuardDuty is an intelligent threat detection system that uncovers unauthorized behaviour. It uses machine learning to review CloudTrail, VPC Flow Logs, and DNS logs to identify threats. GuardDuty provides built-in detection for EC2, S3, and IAM. It also provides alerts when it detects suspicious activity.
6. AWS Inspector
Inspector is an AWS security tool that works with EC2 instances to uncover and report vulnerabilities. It requires an agent to be installed on the EC2 instance and then reports on vulnerabilities found. Inspector checks access from the internet, remote root login, vulnerable software versions, and other potential vulnerabilities. This helps you identify and address potential security issues.
7. AWS Artifact
Artifact is an AWS security tool that offers on-demand access to AWS security and compliance reports. It serves as a central repository for compliance reports from third-party auditors, such as Service Organization Controls (SOC) reports and Payment Card Industry (PCI) reports. This makes it easy for you to maintain compliance with regulations and provide evidence of compliance to auditors.
Conclusion
In conclusion, AWS offers several security tools that can help you protect your web applications and data. By using these tools, you can maintain compliance with regulations and identify and address potential security issues. From protecting against common web attacks with WAF, to uncovering vulnerabilities with Inspector, and maintaining compliance with Artifact, AWS has you covered.
Data Encryption and Secrets Management Services
Data in Flight vs. Data at Rest
Data security is a top priority for businesses of all sizes, and one critical aspect of data security is understanding the difference between data in flight and data at rest. Data in flight refers to data that is actively moving from one location to another, such as when data is transmitted over a network. Data at rest, on the other hand, refers to data that is stored and inactive or stored for later use.
AWS offers a range of services to help protect both data in flight and data at rest, including:
1. AWS Key Management Service (KMS)
KMS is a service that allows you to generate and store encryption keys, which can help protect your data at rest. With KMS, you can create and manage keys, and AWS manages the encryption keys for you. KMS is automatically enabled for certain AWS services, such as Amazon S3 and Amazon EBS, and you can also use it with your own applications. By using KMS, you can help ensure that your data at rest is protected.
2. AWS CloudHSM
CloudHSM is a hardware security module (HSM) that can be used to generate encryption keys for both data at rest and data in flight. CloudHSM provides dedicated hardware for security and allows you to generate and manage your own encryption keys, which means that AWS does not have access to your keys. CloudHSM is a good choice for organizations that have strict security requirements or that need to comply with regulations like HIPAA or PCI.
3. AWS Secrets Manager
Secrets Manager is a service that allows you to manage and retrieve secrets, such as passwords or API keys, which can help protect your data in flight. With Secrets Manager, you can rotate, manage, and retrieve secrets, and the service encrypts secrets at rest. Secrets Manager integrates with a variety of AWS services, including Amazon RDS, Amazon Redshift, and Amazon DocumentDB, which makes it easy to use and deploy.
By using these services, you can help ensure that your data is secure and protected from unauthorized access or theft.
Aaaaannnnddd, That's it for security and key management services in AWS. Hope you have enjoyed this article! 😁 We will meet again with the next chapter which is Pricing in AWS. Cheers!! 🍻
