Source: https://acsc.gov.au/publications/protect/cloud-security-tenants.htm
Timestamp: 2018-07-16 23:57:08
Document Index: 371459944

Matched Legal Cases: ['arty 4', 'arty 10', 'arty 9', 'arty10', 'arty 1', 'arty 1']

Cloud Computing Security for Tenants - Australian Cyber Security Centre (ACSC)
ACSC > Publications > Cloud Computing Security for Tenants
Download Cloud Computing Security for Tenants (PDF), April 2015
Organisations need to perform a risk assessment (PDF) and implement associated mitigations before using cloud services. Risks vary depending on factors such as the sensitivity and criticality of data to be stored or processed, how the cloud service is implemented and managed, how the organisation intends to use the cloud service, and challenges associated with the organisation performing timely incident detection and response. Organisations need to compare these risks against an objective risk assessment of using in-house computer systems which might: be poorly secured; have inadequate availability; or be unable to meet modern business requirements.
Overarching failure to maintain the confidentiality, integrity and availability of the tenant’s data 1 - General Use a cloud service that has been assessed1, certified and accredited against the ISM6 at the appropriate classification level, addressing mitigations in the document Cloud Computing Security for Cloud Service Providers2.
Tenant’s data compromised in transit by malicious third party 4 - General Use ASD-approved cryptographic controls to protect data in transit between the tenant and the CSP e.g. application layer TLS or IPsec VPN with approved algorithms, key length and key management.
Tenant’s cloud service account credentials compromised by malicious third party 10,11,12,13 6 - General Use a corporately approved and secured computer, multi-factor authentication, a strong passphrase, least access privileges14 and encrypted network traffic to administer (and, if appropriate, access) the cloud service.
Tenant’s data compromised by malicious CSP staff or malicious third party 9 - General Obtain and promptly analyse detailed time-synchronised logs and real-time alerts generated by the cloud service used by the tenant e.g. operating system, web server and application logs.
Tenant’s data compromised by another malicious/compromised tenant 15,16,17,18,19,20,21,22,23,24 11 - General Use multi-tenancy mechanisms provided by the CSP e.g. to separate the tenant’s web application and network traffic from other tenants, use the CSP’s hypervisor virtualisation instead of web server software virtual hosting.
Tenant’s data unavailable due to corruption, deletion11, or CSP terminating the account/service 12 - General Perform up-to-date encrypted backups in a format avoiding CSP lock-in, stored offline at the tenant’s premises or at a second CSP requiring multi-factor authentication to modify/delete data. Annually test the recovery process.
Tenant’s data unavailable or compromised due to CSP bankruptcy or other legal action 13 - General Contractually retain legal ownership of tenant data. Perform a due diligence review of the CSP’s contract and financial viability as part of assessing privacy and legal risks25.
Cloud service unavailable due to tenant’s inadequate network connectivity to the cloud service 14 - General Implement adequately high bandwidth26, low latency, reliable network connectivity between the tenant (including the tenant’s remote users) and the cloud service to meet the tenant’s availability requirements.
Cloud service unavailable due to CSP error, planned outage, failed hardware or act of nature 15 - General Use a cloud service that meets the tenant’s availability requirements. Assess the Service Level Agreement penalties, and the number, severity, recency and transparency of the CSP’s scheduled and unscheduled outages.
Financial consequences of a genuine spike in demand or bandwidth/CPU denial of service 17 - General Manage the cost of a genuine spike in demand or denial of service via contractual spending limits, denial of service mitigation services and judicious use of the CSP’s infrastructure capacity e.g. limits on automated scaling.
Tenant’s Virtual Machine (VM) compromised by malicious third party10 1 - IaaS Securely configure, harden and maintain VMs with host based security controls7 e.g. firewall, intrusion prevention system, logging, antivirus software, and prompt patching of all software that the tenant is responsible for.
4 - IaaS Implement network segmentation and segregation27 e.g. n-tier architecture, using host based firewalls and CSP’s network access controls to limit inbound and outbound VM network connectivity to only required ports/protocols.
5 - IaaS Utilise secure programming practices for software developed by the tenant 28,29,30.
Cloud service unavailable due to CSP error, planned outage, failed hardware or act of nature 6 - IaaS Architect to meet availability requirements e.g. minimal single points of failure, data replication, automated failover, multiple availability zones, geographically separate data centres and real-time availability monitoring.
Cloud service unavailable due to genuine spike in demand or bandwidth/CPU denial of service 7 - IaaS If high availability is required, implement clustering and load balancing, a Content Delivery Network for public web content, automated scaling with an adequate maximum scale value, and real-time availability monitoring.
Tenant’s web application compromised by malicious third party 1 - PaaS Securely configure and promptly patch all software that the tenant is responsible for.
2 - PaaS Utilise secure programming practices for software developed by the tenant 28,29,30.
Cloud service unavailable due to CSP error, planned outage, failed hardware or act of nature 3 - PaaS Architect to meet availability requirements e.g. minimal single points of failure, data replication, automated failover, multiple availability zones, geographically separate data centres and real-time availability monitoring.
Cloud service unavailable due to genuine spike in demand or bandwidth/CPU denial of service 4 - PaaS If high availability is required, implement clustering and load balancing, a Content Delivery Network for public web content, automated scaling with an adequate maximum scale value, and real-time availability monitoring.
Tenant’s data compromised by malicious CSP staff or malicious third party 1 - SaaS Use security controls specific to the cloud service e.g. tokenisation to replace sensitive data with non-sensitive data, or ASD-approved encryption of data (not requiring processing) and avoid exposing the decryption key.
Cloud service unavailable due to genuine spike in demand or bandwidth/CPU denial of service 2 - SaaS If high availability is required, where possible and appropriate, implement additional cloud services providing layered denial of service mitigation, where these cloud services might be provided by third party CSPs.
ACSC: Cloud Computing Security
ACSC: Australian Government Information Security Manual
ACSC: Strategies to Mitigate Cyber Security Incidents
ACSC: Network Segmentation and Segregation