Securing the cloud has become increasingly complex as organizations adopt hybrid and multi-cloud resources to meet their demanding business requirements. It’s also more crucial than ever: From 2022 to 2023, CrowdStrike identified a 75% increase in cloud intrusions.

As organizations migrate their workloads and assets to the Cloud, they must take the necessary steps to protect sensitive data and ensure compliance across their Google Cloud environments. While Google Cloud is responsible for securing the infrastructure on which its services run, the organizations relying on this infrastructure are responsible for protecting their data within Google Cloud services — a process that includes crucial steps such as implementing access controls, encrypting data and monitoring for threats across the cloud.

It’s this customer responsibility we examine in this blog post. Here, we highlight five best practices for securing Google Cloud resources, with a focus on how CrowdStrike Falcon® Cloud Security helps you strengthen your cloud security posture along the way.

1. Implement Strong Identity and Access Management

Identity has become a primary target for adversaries — and a crucial area of concern for organizations. The CrowdStrike 2024 Global Threat Report states 75% of attacks were malware-free in 2023, with stolen credentials a key point of entry. It’s clear that proper identity and access management (IAM) is the foundation of cloud security. Key IAM practices include creating and managing user roles, permissions and access controls to ensure only authorized individuals can access sensitive resources.

Key strategies include:

  • Principle of least privilege (POLP): Grant users the minimum level of access necessary for their roles. Periodic evaluations should be planned to reduce access levels when they are no longer necessary.
  • Multi Factor authentication (MFA): Best MFA practices add an extra layer of security. Implement session time limits, enforce robust password policies and require regular password changes. Verify that MFA connections originate from a trusted source or IP range.
  • Regular audits: Conduct periodic reviews of IAM policies and permissions to detect and correct anomalies.

Implementing POLP and MFA and conducting regular audits makes it much harder for attackers to steal and use credentials.

CrowdStrike Falcon integration:

CrowdStrike Falcon integrates with Google Cloud IAM to provide real-time monitoring and alerts on suspicious activities. Its AI-driven insights help quickly identify and mitigate IAM-related risks.

2. Conduct Continuous Monitoring and Threat Detection

Figure 1. Threat detections as viewed in the Falcon platform

Identities aren’t the only means adversaries can use to target resources in the cloud. They also seek cloud misconfigurations and vulnerabilities, which can be used to gain initial access and move laterally throughout a victim’s cloud environment. Using threat intelligence, deep adversary knowledge and proactive threat detection is crucial to identify and mitigate potential security incidents before they escalate.

Continuous monitoring involves:

  • Real-time log analysis: Use Google Cloud’s logging and monitoring tools to analyze logs for unusual activity and capture and prioritize high-fidelity alerts. While most logs are informational and lack direct security implications, high-severity attack logs require immediate response.
  • Threat intelligence: Leverage threat intelligence to stay updated on the latest threats targeting cloud environments.
  • Enhance and automated alerts: Enhance alert quality with correlated data and context. This added information boosts confidence in alerts’ criticality, enabling more informed decisions during investigations. Set up automated alerts for anomalous activities that may indicate a breach.

Implementing continuous monitoring helps prioritize risks by identifying and mitigating the most significant threats, strengthening the overall security posture of your cloud environment.

CrowdStrike Falcon integration:

The Falcon platform provides continuous monitoring with real-time threat detection and response. By correlating telemetry and detections from across indicators of misconfigurations (IOMs), package vulnerabilities, suspicious behavior and threat intelligence, it helps organizations prevent, prioritize and respond to threats.

Google Security Operations (SecOps) and CrowdStrike: Google Cloud’s SecOps security analytics engine integrates with the Falcon platform, enabling security teams to more easily analyze endpoint and workload telemetry to find and address threats. Teams can correlate petabytes of data from Google SecOps with datasets from the Falcon platform, empowering them to thoroughly investigate stealthy long-term attacks occurring across multiple surfaces and stop new and evolving threats.

3. Segment Your Cloud Network

Cloud network segmentation is a strategy that partitions a cloud environment into smaller, isolated zones, each with its own security policies, controls and access rights based on resource sensitivity, criticality and access needs. This approach helps organizations minimize the attack surface and enhances security.

Key practices include:

  • Network segmentation: Divide the network into segments to limit lateral movement of attackers.
  • Firewalls and security groups: Use Google Cloud’s firewall rules and security groups to control inbound and outbound traffic. Security groups in cloud environments enable effective network segmentation. Acting as virtual firewalls, security groups offer granular control over traffic flow at the instance level.
  • Private access: Restrict access to sensitive resources by configuring private Google Cloud IP addresses.

CrowdStrike Falcon integrations with Google:

Google Cloud’s BeyondCorp shifts access controls from the network perimeter to individual users, enabling secure work from virtually any location without a traditional VPN. It integrates with Falcon Zero Trust Assessment, allowing joint customers to create and enforce granular access policies to applications using CrowdStrike’s unique risk signals. The integration enables seamless sharing of telemetry and data between the two security platforms, helping maintain the highest levels of security across a customer’s entire cloud or hybrid environment.

CrowdStrike Falcon® Next-Gen SIEM:

The Falcon platform’s network security features complement Google Cloud’s native tools. They can be fed directly into Falcon Next-Gen SIEM to provide detailed log analysis and anomaly detection to help identify and stop threats quickly, while providing remediation steps to simplify response for cloud security teams. Its integration with Google Cloud can help enforce security policies and monitor behaviors for potential threats in a customer’s environment.

4. Encrypt Data at Rest and in Transit

Figure 2. Monitor the movement of data through web applications to protect your sensitive data

Every reputable cloud service provider offers basic encryption, a vital component of data security that ensures data remains protected — even if it falls into the wrong hands. However, organizations should implement additional data security measures.

Best practices include:

  • Encryption at rest: Use Google Cloud’s encryption services to protect stored data.
  • Encryption in transit: Encrypt data in transit using SSL/TLS protocols.
  • Key management: Implement robust key management practices, such as using Google Cloud Key Management Service.

CrowdStrike Falcon integration:

CrowdStrike Falcon enhances data security with its advanced encryption capabilities. It ensures that data, whether at rest or in transit, remains encrypted and secure. Falcon’s encryption management integrates seamlessly with Google Cloud’s native encryption services.

5. Implement Robust Compliance and Governance

Figure 3. Simplify cloud security with a centralized view of risky misconfigurations

Organizations handle vast amounts of sensitive data including customer information, proprietary business data, financial records and intellectual property. To safeguard sensitive information and mitigate security risks, organizations must adhere to industry, national and international regulations and frameworks, which help ensure robust security measures and prevent breaches. Noncompliance can result in severe penalties, loss of competitive advantage and significant reputational damage. Organizations must prioritize cloud compliance to address security concerns, manage reputational risks and maintain operational integrity.

This involves:

  • Compliance frameworks: Adopt industry-standard compliance frameworks such as GDPR, HIPAA and PCI DSS.
  • Regular audits: Conduct regular security audits and assessments to ensure compliance.
  • Policy enforcement: Implement and enforce security policies across the organization.

CrowdStrike Falcon integration:

Falcon Cloud Security covers the four major security compliance frameworks, including MITRE ATT&CK®, CIS, NIS and ISO, as well as industry-specific requirements, including GDPR and PCI DSS for financial services and payments, FedRAMP and FISMA for government, and HIPAA and HITECH for healthcare. With Falcon Cloud Security, you can identify risks and security gaps, address misconfigurations and vulnerabilities, and enforce gold-standard policies to meet industry regulations while securing your business in the cloud.

Falcon Cloud Security: The Natural Fit for Google Cloud Users

CrowdStrike Falcon Cloud Security stands out as an exceptional solution for securing Google Cloud resources. Its robust features, seamless Google Cloud integration and AI-driven insights provide unparalleled protection. By implementing these best practices, organizations can ensure their Google Cloud environment remains secure and compliant.

Key benefits of CrowdStrike Falcon:

  • Seamless integration: Easily integrates with Google Cloud services.
  • AI-driven threat detection: Leverages artificial intelligence to detect and respond to threats in real time.
  • Comprehensive protection: Offers end-to-end security, from IAM and network security to data encryption and compliance.

Securing your Google Cloud resources doesn’t have to be a daunting task. With CrowdStrike Falcon Cloud Security, you can confidently protect your environment, knowing you have a powerful ally in your corner. Implement these best practices today to take your cloud security to the next level.

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