Introduction
Traditionally, when data was stored in the data centers, companies had deployed all the security measures to ensure that the data was secure. This included both physical and non-physical security measures. One of the rules that companies used to ensure that the data centers were secure is that if someone can touch the physical data center, they can easily access it (Jamsa, 2013). When companies migrated to the cloud, security concerns have emerged. This is because customers share cloud services. However, the cloud providers have tried their best to ensure that they provide the necessary security to ensure that their customers’ data is secured. Due to the fact that the providers distribute the cloud resources to various customers, they are able to benefit from economies of scale; thus, they are able to provide the security measures more easily to the customers.
Cloud storage is normally shared among various clients in the cloud. Whenever one of the clients deletes a certain file from the cloud, the systems mark the storage location in which the file had been allocated as being empty; thus, another file can be stored in that location. Therefore, if other clients allocate the storage and does not write any information on the location, the client can very easily access the information that was previously there. One of the measures that are used to avoid this is called data wiping. As far as cloud data storage is concerned, data wiping refers to the act of overriding a files’ content after the file has been deleted.
One of the advantages of data wiping is that sensitive corporate data is protected from outside threats. There are various types of data wiping that can be applied to ensure that information is completely erased. The first type is the single-pass overwrite. In this type, the data is overwritten only once. The second type is the three pass overwrite, where the data are written three times. The third method is the seven pass overwrite (Seamservices, 2018). This is where data is overwritten seven times. The sensitivity of the data will determine the type of data wiping. In addition, HIPAA has some guidelines that help cloud providers know the type of data wiping they should implement. This is one of the reasons why companies should choose a provider that meets all the HIPAA requirements.
A denial-of-service attack is an attack in which the attacker aims to consume the resource of a certain site to ensure that the resources are not available anymore. There are various DDoS attacks such as IP spoofing, SYN flooding attack, and smurf attack. Due to the fact that DDoS has become very frequent, cloud-based providers have put several measures to ensure that they do not experience the attack. One of the mechanisms that cloud providers use to prevent the SYN flooding attack is the SYN cache method (Darwish et al., n.d). This method is used in both the PaaS and the IaaS layers. The SYN cache method is used to create a connection with a legitimate connection. This helps to ensure that all malicious connections are avoided. The second mechanism that cloud providers use is disabling the IP-directed broadcast command in the IaaS layer. This mechanism is used to prevent the smurf attack. The current router has this function disabled; however, the attackers can use the cloud’s vulnerable device to access the data. The third method that cloud providers use to prevent a DDoS attack is writing a source code that is not vulnerable to buffer attack overflow. This is the best mechanism to ensure that the buffer overflow attack is avoided. This mechanism is usually applied at the SaaS layer. The only limitation of this mechanism is that it is time-consuming.
A hypervisor is a special software on which the operating systems of each virtualization server runs on. A hypervisor is an abstraction layer that exists between the virtualized machines and the physical machines. Currently, a lot of companies are virtualizing, and hypervisor is one of the major targets of hackers. A hyperjacking attack refers to an attack on the hypervisors. Hyperjacking involves the installation of a vague hypervisor with the aim of taking charge of the servers. The regular security measures that companies take are not prevent a hyperjacking attack. Thus, the operating systems may not detect that the machines have been attacked. Thus, this attack can be very expensive for a company because the attacker can get alot of information for a company for a long time without the company knowing. The hypervisor runs under the operating system (McKay, 2011). This is one of the reasons why attackers target the hypervisor. Besides, the attackers always want to be persistent in attacking the hypervisor because they cannot be easily detected. Hypervisor vendors are now implementing security measures which help to ensure that the hypervisor is of high integrity; this has helped a lot of companies to ensure that they o not experience any hyperjacking attacks. One of the ways in which companies can avoid the hyperjacking attacks is to ensure that the hypervisors are in a secure environment.
Guest operating systems are operating systems that run on one virtualized server. An attacker may attempt to attack operating system A but fail. However, the attacker may succeed in attacking an operating system B. The attacker can use the operating system B to create a peer-level attack in order to access operating system A. This kind of attack is referred to as a guest-hooping attack where an attacker uses one operating system to access the other operating system. Shared infrastructures often have a separation failure, making it very easy for attackers to use one operating system to access another operating system. There are various counter-attack measures that companies have implemented to help them avoid this kind of attack. One of the measures is the use of VM debugging tools. The VM debugging tools are important in observing any attack that is directed on the virtual machines (NT, 2019). The second method is the use of forensic debugging tools. This method works the same as the VM debugging tools in observing any attack directed towards the virtual machines. The third security mechanism is implementing a high-performance platform. This mechanism helps to ensure that the virtual machines are not interconnected in any way. Thus, the attacker cannot access one operating system by the use of the other one.
Conclusion
To conclude, there are many security issues that are associated with cloud services. With many companies migrating to the cloud, cloud providers have a huge responsibility of ensuring that the cloud resources are secure from any attack. In addition, the companies that have implemented cloud computing in order to solve their IT problems also have a role to play in ensuring that the cloud solutions are secure from any attacks. The cloud-based security concerns are mostly handled by the cloud providers, while the specific organizations mostly address the onsite security concerns. The loud providers often do not have many challenges in implementing the counter-attack measures to ensure that the cloud solutions they provide have maximum security. This is because the economies of scale favor them by ensuring that the clients share the cloud resources. Some of the most common cloud attacks include the hyperjacking attack, the distributed denial of service attack, and the guest-hooping attack. Various measures are deployed to handle each of the attacks.