Implementing a Horizontal Approach to Cloud Security
Learn how to evolve your security from a vertical, siloed model to a horizontal, application-centric approach that aligns with modern, agile cloud development.
📋 Prerequisites
- Understanding of core cloud concepts (IaaS, PaaS, Serverless).
- Familiarity with common security tools (SAST, DAST, CSPM, EDR).
- Experience with the challenges of securing applications in an agile/DevOps environment.
What You'll Learn
🏷️ Topics Covered
The Problem with Vertical Security
In today's dynamic cloud environments, traditional security models are failing. We operate in silos: application security teams use SAST/DAST, infrastructure security teams use CSPM, and operations teams use EDR. Each team has its own tools and its own vertical view of the world. This creates significant problems.
❌ Lack of Attacker View
Security teams focus on organizational charts, but attackers don't. They exploit vulnerabilities horizontally across different systems and teams. A vulnerability in code, combined with a misconfiguration in the cloud, can create a critical attack path that no single vertical tool will see.
❌ Missing Developer View
Developers are bombarded with alerts from a dozen different tools, each presenting issues without context. A SAST tool finds a vulnerability but doesn't know if that code is actually running in production or exposed to the internet. This leads to alert fatigue and inefficiency.
❌ Inefficient Operations
The security "waterfall"—where security teams find issues and then chase developers to fix them—is not scalable. It creates friction and slows down the development lifecycle, making security a bottleneck instead of an enabler.
The Solution: A Horizontal Security Model
The necessary mind shift is to move from a vertical, tool-centric approach to a horizontal, application-centric one. This means viewing an application as the sum of all its parts—code, infrastructure, pipeline, and runtime—and applying consistent security policies across the entire lifecycle.
💡 The Modern Approach: CNAPP
This horizontal model is the core principle behind a Cloud Native Application Protection Platform (CNAPP). A CNAPP unifies the capabilities of siloed tools like CSPM (Cloud Security Posture Management), CIEM (Cloud Infrastructure Entitlement Management), and CWPP (Cloud Workload Protection Platform) into a single, integrated platform. It provides a comprehensive view of risk across the entire cloud native stack, from development to production.
1. Establish Clear Governance and Ownership
You cannot secure what you don't own. The first step is to establish a robust governance model that clearly defines who owns every resource, both financially and from a security perspective.
Terraform Ownership Tagging Example
Best Practice: Automate ownership assignment. When a new project or environment is created, automatically assign security and finance owners. This ensures that when a vulnerability is found, it can be routed to the correct team immediately.
{`resource "aws_instance" "web_server" {
ami = "ami-0c55b159cbfafe1f0"
instance_type = "t2.micro"
tags = {
Name = "WebApp-Prod"
Owner-Finance = "finance-team@example.com"
Owner-Security = "app-dev-team-leads@example.com"
Project = "Phoenix"
}
}`}2. Integrate Scanning Across the Lifecycle
Instead of running different scanners at different stages, use a unified approach. Scan your code, cloud configurations, and runtime environments with the same set of policies. This provides a holistic view of risk. For example, performing SAST in production allows you to see which vulnerable libraries are actually loaded and running, making prioritization far more effective.
3. Empower Developers with Self-Service
Truly **"shifting left"** means shifting the responsibility of fixing security issues to the developers who own the applications. To do this successfully, you must provide them with the right context. Don't just tell them a library is vulnerable; show them that the vulnerable code is running on a production server, exposed to the internet, and has access to sensitive data. This context turns a low-priority alert into an urgent call to action.
Horizontal Security Best Practices Checklist
Think Like an Attacker
Focus on attack paths, not just individual vulnerabilities. Understand how different weaknesses can be chained together across your environment.
Centralize Governance
Implement a clear and automated ownership model for all cloud resources. Every asset must have a designated security owner.
Provide Developer Context
Translate security findings into actionable intelligence for developers. Show them the "so what"—the real-world impact of a vulnerability.
Scan Horizontally
Apply consistent security policies and scanning across the entire lifecycle, from the earliest code commit to the production runtime environment.
Enable Self-Service
Empower development teams to own and remediate their security issues, reducing the burden on a central security team.
Break Down Silos
Consider merging traditional security teams (AppSec, CloudSec) to foster collaboration and a more integrated approach to risk management.