Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
Don't just learn the cloud—BYTE it!
Byte the Cloud is your go-to, on-the-go, podcast for mastering AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud certifications and exam prep!
Chris 0:00
Hey everyone, and welcome to another deep dive. Today. We're tackling AWS Security Hub.
Unknown Speaker 0:06
It's a good one.
Chris 0:06
It is, and we know you guys out there are pretty familiar with AWS already, so we're gonna skip the Security Hub 101, we'll jump right into the cool stuff. Yeah, let's
Kelly 0:14
get into it.
Chris 0:15
So to get started, for anyone who may not know, can we just quickly define what AWS Security Hub is? Yeah, so
Kelly 0:20
imagine you're in charge of security for like, a big cloud infrastructure, maybe even across different AWS accounts. You have all these different services running guard duty to watch out for anything suspicious. You've got inspector looking for vulnerabilities, config, making sure everything's set up the way it should be right. But the question is, how do you keep track of all the security information, all the findings that all these services are generating, and that's where Security Hub comes in. Okay? It's like your central command center, that single pane of glass that brings together all those security findings from all those different services. So it's
Chris 0:54
like having a security analyst just constantly pouring through logs and alerts, except it's automated and super fast. Yeah,
Kelly 1:01
that's a great way to put it, and that's why Security Hub is becoming so important these days. The old way of manually checking for security issues across different consoles, it just doesn't cut it anymore,
Chris 1:11
especially when you think about how complex these cloud environments are getting. Absolutely Can you give us some real world examples of how this actually works? Sure.
Kelly 1:19
So let's say you're a financial institution and you have all these strict regulatory requirements like PCI DSS, you need to prove that you're compliant all the time. Security hub can automatically check your configurations against the PCI DSS standard. Let you know right away if there's any violations, which could potentially save you weeks of manual auditing. Oh,
Chris 1:40
wow, yeah, that's a ton of time saved, right? It's like having a built in compliance auditor that's working 24/7, another
Kelly 1:46
great example is threat detection and incident response. Let's say guard duty picks up some weird activity in one of your accounts at the same time, Inspector flags a vulnerability on an EC2 instance. Security hub takes all that information and shows it to you on a single dashboard. This allows your security team to quickly assess the situation and respond effectively. So
Chris 2:10
instead of chasing down individual alerts, they get a clear picture of what might be happening and can act faster exactly that can make a big difference when every second counts. Absolutely every second is critical. So we're seeing the value here. Yeah, let's dive a little deeper now, yeah, what are some of the features that make Security Hub so effective? Well,
Kelly 2:31
one of the coolest features is its ability to automatically check for security issues based on industry standards and best practices. Okay, this means you're not just waiting for something bad to happen. You're actively looking for potential weaknesses before they become
Chris 2:45
problems. So you're constantly hardening your security and making sure you're following best
Kelly 2:49
practices Exactly. And remember all that security data coming in from different sources. Security hub takes it all and organizes it into a common format and then prioritizes it based on how serious the issue is. So no
Chris 3:01
more jumping between different consoles trying to figure out what all these different alerts mean, right? It's all in one place, right?
Kelly 3:06
Exactly. Another great thing about Security Hub is that it lets you customize your insights and alerts. You can set it up to tell you about specific security issues, so you're not overwhelmed with information. You only see what's really important to
Chris 3:21
you. Okay? So you're not drowning in Notifications, just the critical stuff, right? And
Kelly 3:25
to make things even smoother, it integrates with other AWS services like CloudWatch and SNS. This means you can get real time alerts when something serious happens, and even trigger automatic responses to take care of the problem. It sounds
Chris 3:38
super versatile. It is. Are there any downsides or limitations we should be aware of,
Kelly 3:42
though? Well, no tool is perfect, right? One thing to remember is that Security Hub is specific to AWS. If you're using other cloud platforms, you'll need a separate solution for those, right? And keep in mind, Security Hub is a pay as you go service. You pay based on how much you use it. So
Chris 3:59
organizations need to be mindful of their usage, and security needs to manage costs Exactly. Now I'm curious, yeah, where does Security Hub fit in with all the other AWS services?
Kelly 4:10
Oh, that's a good question. It's part of the management and governance layer of AWS security services. Think of it this way. You have your security guards. That's guard duty. You have inspectors checking for problems. That's inspector. You've got architects designing and building things securely. That's config and Security Hub is like the security manager who coordinates all of them.
Chris 4:31
Okay, I love that analogy. That really paints a clear picture. Good. Before we move on to the exam prep section, I have one more question. We've talked about features and benefits, but what about the real world impact? Have you seen Security Hub actually change how organizations approach security? Oh, absolutely.
Kelly 4:49
I've worked with organizations that have used Security Hub to dramatically reduce the time it takes to prepare for audits, improve how quickly they can respond to incidents, and even. Find and fix security risks before they can be exploited. That's fantastic. Yeah, it's one thing to talk about it, but it's another thing to see it actually working and making a difference
Chris 5:09
Exactly. I think our listeners are ready to put all this knowledge to the test. Now let's do it. So let's dive into that exam prep section and see what kind of questions might come up. All right. Let's
Kelly 5:17
tackle some questions.
Chris 5:18
All right. First up, you're a cloud engineer working for a company, and they need to centralize all their security alerts and findings from multiple AWS accounts. What service immediately comes to mind? That's
Kelly 5:30
easy, AWS Security Hub, of course. Okay, that
Chris 5:33
was pretty straightforward, yeah. Let's try a trickier one. Which of the following is not a feature of AWS Security Hub? Is it A, automated security checks, B, security findings, aggregation, C, customizable insights and alerts, or D, intrusion detection and prevention.
Kelly 5:52
This one's a bit tricky. You need to understand the details of each service. Security hub works with intrusion detection systems like guardduty, but it doesn't actually do the intrusion detection and prevention itself.
Chris 6:03
Okay?
Kelly 6:04
So the answer is, D,
Chris 6:06
all right, I can see how someone might get tripped up on that one if they aren't paying close attention. Yeah, definitely. So here's another one. A company wants to use Security Hub to make sure they're following the CIS AWS Foundation's benchmark. How do they set that up?
Kelly 6:18
That's a good one. Security hub makes it really easy. You just enable the CIS AWS Foundation's benchmark standard right within Security Hub. It comes with built in support for all sorts of compliance standards. And once it's enabled, it automatically checks your environment and
Chris 6:34
tells you if anything's wrong. So it's like flipping a switch and activating these compliance checks Exactly. Super convenient. Now before we jump into the next round of questions? Yeah, I think it's time to move on to some of the more advanced features of Security Hub, and of course, we'll tackle even more exam style questions. So stay tuned. Let's
Kelly 6:51
do it. Welcome back. Everyone ready to dive back into Security Hub?
Chris 6:56
Absolutely. What's next on our agenda?
Kelly 6:58
Let's talk about a real challenge. I mean, I see a lot of organizations facing managing security when you have tons of different third party security
Chris 7:05
tools. Okay, yeah, I've seen that too, especially in larger companies, they might have their favorite
Kelly 7:09
vulnerability scanners, threat intelligence platforms, all sorts of specialized solutions. But then the problem becomes, how do you get a clear overall picture of your security posture?
Chris 7:20
Right? Because all these tools have their own separate alerts and findings, exactly.
Kelly 7:24
It can become a real mess trying to manage it all, and that's where Security Hub comes in to save the day. Okay, I'm intrigued. How does it help? Security hub can actually integrate with all these third party tools. It acts as a central point to bring all that security data together. So
Chris 7:39
even if a company isn't using just AWS tools. They can still use Security Hub to get that unified
Kelly 7:45
view exactly. It uses something called the AWS security finding format, or as FF, to make sure it can talk to all these different tools.
Chris 7:53
That's pretty cool. It's like a universal translator for security. Yeah, it's
Kelly 7:56
super helpful for organizations that have a more complex security setup. Now let's switch gears a bit and talk about customization, right? One of the things I love about Security Hub is that it's not a one size fits all solution. You can really tailor it to your specific needs. Can
Chris 8:12
you give me an example of what that customization looks like? Sure,
Kelly 8:15
let's say your organization has a very specific idea of what risks they're most worried about, maybe based on the industry they're in or the regulations they have to follow. You can actually tell Security Hub to prioritize certain security findings over others,
Chris 8:28
so you can focus on the things that are most likely to cause problems for your organization exactly.
Kelly 8:33
You can create these things called Custom insights, which are like saved searches that highlight the findings that are most important to
Chris 8:40
you. That makes sense? Yeah, so you're not wasting time on things that aren't a big deal for you, right? You're only seeing the stuff that keeps you up at night. That's a great way to put it. Yeah. Okay, so before we get back to those exam questions, yeah, we've talked about compliance, incident response, but what about security posture management in general? How can Security Hub help organizations continuously improve their overall security
Kelly 9:02
that's a great question. Security hub is not just about reacting to individual issues. It's about using the data it collects to understand your overall security posture and identify weaknesses. Okay, so
Chris 9:14
it's like having a security consultant constantly analyzing your environment and giving you recommendations.
Kelly 9:21
You got it. Let's say Security Hub keeps finding publicly accessible S3 buckets. That's a sign that you might need to tighten up your security policies for S3 buckets, or maybe implement some automated checks to prevent that from happening again.
Chris 9:36
So you're using the data to make your security better over time. Exactly Okay. Now for a question that might pop up on an AWS exam, AWS offers a free tier for Security Hub, right? They do. What are the limitations of that free tier? It's
Kelly 9:51
a great way to get started and play around with Security Hub, but it does have some limits. You can only analyze a certain number of security findings each month. And you only get access to some of the security standards, so it's good for trying
Chris 10:03
things out, but for larger organizations or more complex needs, you'll probably need to pay for the full version. Exactly.
Kelly 10:10
It's similar to a lot of other AWS services. You get a taste for free, but to unlock all the power you gotta pay,
Chris 10:16
makes sense. Okay, back to some of the core features. One thing I find really interesting is security Hub's ability to trigger automatic responses to security issues. Can you talk a bit more about how that works?
Kelly 10:27
Sure Security Hub itself doesn't actually fix the problems it finds. Instead, it works with other services like AWS Lambda to automate those responses. Okay, so let's say Security Hub sees an EC2 instance that was launched without the proper security groups. You can set it up so that it automatically triggers a Lambda function to go in and fix that issue.
Chris 10:47
So it's all about making your security operations faster and more efficient. Exactly. We touched on cost earlier, and I know that's always a big concern. Can you break down what factors determine the cost of using Security Hub? Of
Kelly 11:00
course, the main things that affect the cost are how many security findings you analyze each month and how many security standards you've enabled. More findings means more work for Security Hub, and that translates to a higher cost. Same thing with the security standards. The more you enable, the more checks it has to do.
Chris 11:16
So organizations need to carefully consider their usage patterns and security needs to make sure they're not surprised by the bill.
Kelly 11:23
Yeah, for sure, AWS provides tools to help you estimate those costs. Great.
Chris 11:27
This has been an awesome deep dive into Security Hub. So far, I'm feeling a lot more confident in my understanding me too. What's coming up in the last part of our deep dive, we'll talk about
Kelly 11:36
some more advanced stuff, like how Security Hub works with AWS organizations for multi account management, and we'll finish up our exam prep with some really challenging questions to test your Security Hub knowledge. Excellent.
Chris 11:48
Can't wait. Welcome back everyone to the final part of our Security Hub Deep Dive.
Kelly 11:54
I hope you're all ready for some more challenging Security Hub insights. Oh, I'm
Chris 11:58
sure you've got some tough questions lined up for us. We'll get to those.
Kelly 12:00
Don't worry. But first, let's talk about a topic that's super relevant for organizations managing multiple AWS accounts.
Chris 12:07
Okay, yeah, multi account management, that's a big
Kelly 12:09
one, it is, and AWS organizations is the key service for centrally managing all those accounts. But how do you make sure your security is consistent across all those accounts?
Chris 12:20
That's a great question, and I bet Security Hub has something to do with the answer.
Kelly 12:24
You know it. Security hub and AWS organizations work together like a dream team. Okay?
Chris 12:29
So instead of setting up Security Hubs separately in each account, you can manage it all from one place exactly.
Kelly 12:35
You choose a Security Hub administrator account, and from there you can enable Security Hub in all the other accounts, set security standards, define your configurations, and even see all the security findings from all your accounts in one place. Wow. That's a
Chris 12:50
game changer for large organizations. It really is.
Kelly 12:52
It simplifies everything and makes sure your security policies are consistent. It's like
Chris 12:56
having a Central Security Command Center that oversees all your different teams Exactly. Now let's shift gears a bit and talk about a concept that can be a little confusing, the difference between standard insights and custom insights in Security Hub. Ah,
Kelly 13:10
yes, that's a good one to clarify. It is so standard insights are like pre built queries. They come right out of the box with Security Hub. They're designed to highlight common security issues, things that could potentially cause problems.
Chris 13:23
Okay, so they're a good starting point for identifying those basic security gaps
Kelly 13:27
Exactly. They're like having a security expert give you a checklist of things to watch out
Chris 13:32
for. Okay, but what if you have specific security concerns that go beyond those standard insights? That's
Kelly 13:37
where custom insights come in. Okay, you can create your own insights based on specific criteria that matter to your organization, so
Chris 13:44
you can really fine tune Security Hub to focus on your unique risks precisely.
Kelly 13:48
It's about making Security Hub work for you.
Chris 13:52
All right, here's a classic AWS exam question hit me with it. What are the different severity levels for security findings in Security Hub, and what do they actually mean? All right,
Kelly 14:01
good question. So Security Hub uses four levels, critical, high, medium and low. They tell you how serious the security issue is. Critical means it's a really big deal. You need to drop everything and fix it right away. High, GH means it's serious and needs to be addressed quickly. Medium, you should deal with it, but it's non emergency, and low jib you is something you can probably take care of during routine maintenance. So it's
Chris 14:25
a way to prioritize those security findings and make sure you're focusing on the most urgent issues first. Now thinking practically, are there any tips or best practices for using Security Hub effectively in a real company? Of
Kelly 14:37
course, first things first, you need to define your security goals. What are you trying to achieve with Security Hub? Are you focused on compliance, threat detection, improving your overall security posture?
Chris 14:51
Okay, so have a clear understanding of what you want to accomplish
Kelly 14:54
exactly once you know what you want, then you can configure Security Hub to help you get there. Yeah. To enable the right security standards, create those custom insights, set up notifications for
Chris 15:04
the things that matter most. So don't just turn everything on and hope for the best. Yeah,
Kelly 15:07
be strategic. Make sure Security Hub is working for you, not the other way around. Makes sense. What else? Another important tip is to integrate Security Hub with your other security tools. Connect it to your some your ticketing system, whatever you use to manage security incidents. That way, Security Hub becomes part of your overall security workflow.
Chris 15:26
So it's not just a standalone tool. It's part of a bigger security ecosystem,
Kelly 15:31
exactly. And lastly, remember, security is an ongoing process. It's not a one time thing. You set it and forget it. You need to regularly check your Security Hub configuration. Make adjustments as needed as your environment changes and your security needs evolve, so should your Security Hub set up?
Chris 15:49
So continuous improvement is key. Absolutely. Well, I think we've covered a ton of ground in this Security Hub Deep Dive. I'm feeling much more confident in my understanding awesome.
Kelly 15:57
Me too. I hope everyone listening feels the same way. I'm sure they do. Thanks
Chris 16:01
to everyone out there for joining us on this Security Hub adventure. We hope you found it valuable and insightful. Remember, Security Hub is a powerful tool, but it's only as effective as the people using it, so take the time to experiment, explore and really integrate it into your security workflows.
Kelly 16:17
Stay curious, keep learning and never stop improving your cloud security until next
Chris 16:22
time cloud gurus keep on diving deep so.