Cloud Computing

Architecture, IT Security, & Operational Perspectives

Steven R. Hunt
ARC IT Governance Manager
Ames Research Center

Matt Linton
IT Security Specialist
Ames Research Center

Matt Chew Spence

IT Security Compliance Consultant
Dell Services Federal Government
Ames Research Center

August 17, 2010

Agenda
 Introductions
» Steve Hunt
 What is cloud computing?
» Matt Chew Spence
 How can NASA benefit from cloud computing?
» Matt Chew Spence
 How is NASA implementing cloud computing?
» Matt Linton
 How does NASA secure cloud computing?
» Matt Linton
 Q&A
» Presentation Team

Extended Presentation
 FISMA & Clouds
» Matt Chew Spence
» Steve Hunt
 Assessment, Authorization, & FedRAMP
» Steve Hunt
Agenda OBJECTIVE: Overview of cloud
computing and share vocabulary
 Introductions
» Steve Hunt
 What is cloud computing?
» Matt Chew Spence
 How can NASA benefit from cloud computing?
» Matt Chew Spence
 How is NASA implementing cloud computing?
» Matt Linton
 How does NASA secure cloud computing?
» Matt Linton
 Q&A
» Presentation Team

Extended Presentation
 FISMA & Clouds
» Matt Chew Spence
» Steve Hunt
 Assessment, Authorization, & FedRAMP
» Steve Hunt
 What is Cloud Computing?

Cloud Computing – NIST Definition:

“A model for enabling convenient, on-
demand network access to a shared
pool of configurable computing
resources (e.g., networks, servers,
storage, applications, and services)
that can be rapidly provisioned and
released with minimal management
effort or service provider interaction”
 What is Cloud Computing?

Conventional Computing
vs.
Cloud Computing
Conventional Cloud
 Manually Provisioned  Self-provisioned
 Dedicated Hardware  Shared Hardware
 Fixed Capacity  Elastic Capacity
 Pay for Capacity  Pay for Use
 Capital & Operational  Operational Expenses
Expenses  Managed via APIs
 Managed via Sysadmins
 What is Cloud Computing?

Five Key Cloud Attributes:

1. Shared / pooled resources
2. Broad network access
3. On-demand self-service
4. Scalable and elastic
5. Metered by use
 What is Cloud Computing?

Shared / Pooled Resources:

 Resources are drawn from a common pool
 Common resources build economies of scale
 Common infrastructure runs at high efficiency
 What is Cloud Computing?

Broad Network Access:

 Open standards and APIs
 Almost always IP, HTTP, and REST
 Available from anywhere with an internet
connection
 What is Cloud Computing?

On-Demand Self-Service:
 Completely automated
 Users abstracted from the implementation
 Near real-time delivery (seconds or minutes)
 Services accessed through a self-serve
web interface
 What is Cloud Computing?

Scalable and Elastic:

 Resources dynamically-allocated between
users
 Additional resources dynamically-released
when needed
 Fully automated
 What is Cloud Computing?

Metered by Use:
 Services are metered, like a utility
 Users pay only for services used
 Services can be cancelled at any time
 What is Cloud Computing?

Three Service Delivery Models

IaaS: Infrastructure as a Service
Consumer can provision computing resources within
provider's infrastructure upon which they can deploy and
run arbitrary software, including OS and applications
PaaS: Platform as Service
Consumer can create custom applications using
programming tools supported by the provider and deploy
them onto the provider's cloud infrastructure
SaaS: Software as Service
Consumer uses provider’s applications running on
provider's cloud infrastructure
 What is Cloud Computing?

Service Delivery Model Examples

Amazon Google Microsoft Salesforce

SaaS

PaaS

IaaS

Products and companies shown for illustrative purposes only and should not
be construed as an endorsement
 What is Cloud Computing?

Cloud efficiencies and improvements

 Cost efficiencies $ • Burst capacity (over-

provisioning)
• Short-duration projects
• Cancelled or failed missions
 Time efficiencies
 Power efficiencies
 Improved process
• Procurement
control • Network connectivity

 Improved security
 “Unlimited” capacity

• Standardized, updated base images

• Centrally auditable log servers
• Centralized authentication systems
• Improved forensics (w/ drive image)
Agenda OBJECTIVE: Discuss requirements,
use cases, and ROI
 Introductions
» Steve Hunt
 What is cloud computing?
» Matt Chew Spence
 How can NASA benefit from cloud computing?
» Matt Chew Spence
 How is NASA implementing cloud computing?
» Matt Linton
 How does NASA secure cloud computing?
» Matt Linton
 Q&A
» Presentation Team

Extended Presentation
 FISMA & Clouds
» Matt Chew Spence
» Steve Hunt
 Assessment, Authorization, & FedRAMP
» Steve Hunt
 How can NASA benefit from cloud computing?

Current IT options for Scientists

Requirements* Current Options*

* Requirements and Options documented in over 30+ interviews

with Ames scientists as part 2009 NASA Workstation project.
 How can NASA benefit from cloud computing?

Scientists direct access to Nebula cloud computing

Mission Objectives
Explore, Understand, and Share

Aeronautics Exploration Science Space Ops Mission Support

Process Run Store Share

Scale-out for Require
Large Compute mission & information
one-time infrastructure
Data Intensive science with the
events on-demand
Sets Workloads data public

High Speed
High Compute Vast Storage
Networking

Shared Resource
 How can NASA benefit from cloud computing?

Offer scientists services to address the gap

TARGET
COMPUTE
PLATFORM

Excellent example
of how OCIO- High-end
Vast Storage
High Speed
Compute Networking
sponsored
innovation can be
rapidly
transformed into
services that
address Agency
mission needs
 How can NASA benefit from cloud computing?

ROI and ARC Case Study

POWER: Computers typically require

70% of their total power requirements to
run at just 15% utilization.

*15% utilization based on two reports from Gartner Group, Cost of

Traditional Data Centers (2009), and Data Center Efficiency (2010).
 How can NASA benefit from cloud computing?

ROI and ARC Case Study

 Operational Enhancements:
» Strict standardization of hardware and infrastructure software
components
» Small numbers of system administrators due to the cookie-
cutter design of cloud components and support processes
» Failure of any single component within the Nebula cloud will not
become reason for alarm
» Application operations will realize similar efficiencies once
application developers learn how to properly deploy applications
so that they are not reliant on any particular cloud component.
 OBJECTIVE: Overview of how NASA
Agenda is implementing cloud computing
 Introductions
» Steve Hunt
 What is cloud computing?
» Matt Chew Spence
 How can NASA benefit from cloud computing?
» Matt Chew Spence
 How is NASA implementing cloud computing?
» Matt Linton
 How does NASA secure cloud computing?
» Matt Linton
 Q&A
» Presentation Team

Extended Presentation
 FISMA & Clouds
» Matt Chew Spence
» Steve Hunt
 Assessment, Authorization, & FedRAMP
» Steve Hunt
How is NASA implementing cloud computing?
How is NASA implementing cloud computing?
How is NASA implementing cloud computing?
 How is NASA implementing cloud computing?

Nebula Principles
 Open and Public APIs, everywhere
 Open-source platform, apps, and data
 Full transparency
» Open source code and documentation
releases
 Reference platform
» Cloud model for Federal Government
 How is NASA implementing cloud computing?

Nebula User Experience

Nebula IaaS user will have an experience
similar to Amazon EC2:
 Dedicated private VLAN for instances
 Dedicated VPN for access to private VLAN
 Public IPs to assign to instances
 Launch VM instances
 Dashboard for instance control and API access
Able to import/export bundled instances to AWS
and other clouds

Products and companies named for illustrative purposes only and should not be
construed as an endorsement
 How is NASA implementing cloud computing?

Architecture Drivers
 Reliability
 Availability
 Cost
 IT Security
 How is NASA implementing cloud computing?

Shared Nothing
 Messaging Queue
 State Discovery
 Standard Protocols

Automated
• IPMI
• PXEBoot
• Puppet
 How is NASA implementing cloud computing?

Nebula Infrastructure Components

 Cloud Node
 Network Node
 Compute Node
 Volume Node
 Object Node
 Monitoring / Metering / Logging / Scanning
 How is NASA implementing cloud computing?

Cloud Node

LDAP
Data
Store

Nova
Cloud
Redis KVS Node
Puppet
RabbitMQ

PXE Ubuntu OS
 How is NASA implementing cloud computing?

Compute Node

Project VLAN

Running Instance
Nova
Compute
LibVirt Brctl Node
Puppet
KVM 802.1(q)

PXE Ubuntu OS
 How is NASA implementing cloud computing?

Volume Node

Exported Volume
Nova
Volume
AoE
Node
Puppet
LVM
PXE Ubuntu OS
 How is NASA implementing cloud computing?

Object Node

Nova
Object
Nginx
Node
Puppet

PXE Ubuntu OS
 How is NASA implementing cloud computing?

Network Node

Project Public
VLAN Internet
Nova
Network
Brctl IPTables Node
Puppet
802.1(q)

PXE Ubuntu OS
 How is NASA implementing cloud computing?

Pilot Lessons Learned

- Automate Everything
 No SysAdmin is perfect
 99% is not good enough
 NEVER make direct system changes
 When in doubt - PXEBoot
 How is NASA implementing cloud computing?

Pilot Lessons Learned

- Test Everything

 KVM + Jumbo Frames

 Grinder
 Unit Tests / Cyclometric Complexity
 TransactionID Insertion (Universal Proxy)
 How is NASA implementing cloud computing?

Pilot Lessons Learned

- Monitor Everything
 Ganglia
 Munin
 Syslog-NG + PHPSyslog-NG
 Nagios
 Custom Log Parsing (Instance-centric)
 OBJECTIVE: Overview of technical
Agenda security mechanisms built into Nebula

 Introductions
» Steve Hunt
 What is cloud computing?
» Matt Chew Spence
 How can NASA benefit from cloud computing?
» Matt Chew Spence
 How is NASA implementing cloud computing?
» Matt Linton
 How does NASA secure cloud computing?
» Matt Linton
 Q&A
» Presentation Team

Extended Presentation
 FISMA & Clouds
» Matt Chew Spence
» Steve Hunt
 Assessment, Authorization, & FedRAMP
» Steve Hunt
 OBJECTIVE: Overview of technical
security mechanisms built into Nebula

Technical Security Overview

• Issues with Commercial Cloud Providers
• Overview of Current Security Mechanisms
• Innovations
 How does NASA secure cloud computing?

Commercial Cloud Provider Security Concerns

» IT Security not brought into decision of how & when
NASA orgs use clouds
» IT Security may not know NASA orgs are using clouds
until an incident has occurred
» Without insight into monitoring/IDS/logs, NASA may not
find out that an incident has occurred
» No assurances of sufficient cloud infrastructure access
to perform proper forensics/investigations
» These issues are less likely with a private cloud like
Nebula
 How does NASA secure cloud computing?

IT Security is built into Nebula

 User Isolation from Nebula Infrastructure
 Users only have access to APIs and Dashboards
» No user direct access to Nebula infrastructure
 Project-based separation
» A project is a set of compute resources
accessible by one or more users
» Each project has separate:
• VLAN for project instances
• VPN for project users to launch, terminate,
and access instances
• Image library of instances
 How does NASA secure cloud computing?

Networking
 RFC1918 address space internal to Nebula
» NAT is used for those hosts within Nebula
needing visibility outside a cluster
 Three core types of networks within Nebula:
» Customer
• Customer VLANs are isolated from each
other
» DMZ
• Services available to all Nebula such as NTP,
DNS, etc
» Administrative
 How does NASA secure cloud computing?

Security Groups
 Combination of VLANs and Subnetting
 Can be extended to use physical
network/node separation as well (future)
 How does NASA secure cloud computing?

Project A
RFC1918
Public IP (10.1.1/24) Space
Space
DMZ
Services (LAN_X)

External
Scanner Operations Console
C (custom)
L
I B O
N Security Scanners
R U
T S (Nessus, Hydra, etc)
I D
E M
D
R R Log Aggregation,
G A
N E P SOC Tap
E I
T S Event Correlation
Engine

Project B
(10.1.2/24)
 How does NASA secure cloud computing?

Firewalls
 Multiple levels of firewalling
» Hardware firewall at site border
» Firewall on cluster network head-ends
» Host-based firewalls on key hosts
» Project based rule sets based on Amazon
security groups
 How does NASA secure cloud computing?

Remote User Access

 Remote access is only through VPN (openVPN)
 Separate administrative VPN and user VPNs
 Each project has own VPN server
 How does NASA secure cloud computing?

Intrusion Detection
 OSSEC on key infrastructure hosts
» Open source Host-based Intrusion Detection
 Mirror port to NASA SOC tap
 Building 10Gb/sec IDS/IPS/Forensics device
with vendor partners
 How does NASA secure cloud computing?

Configuration Management
 Puppet used to automatically push out
configuration changes to infrastructure
 Automatic reversion of unauthorized changes to
system
 How does NASA secure cloud computing?

Vulnerability Scanning
 Nebula uses both internal and external
vulnerability scanners
 Correlate findings between internal and
external scans
 How does NASA secure cloud computing?

Incident Response
 Procedures for isolating individual VMs,
compute nodes, and clusters, including:
» Taking snapshot of suspect VMs, including
memory dump
» Quarantining a VM within a compute node
» Disabling VM images so new instances
can’t be launched
» Quarantining a compute node within a
cluster
» Quarantining a cluster
 How does NASA secure cloud computing?

Role Based Access Control

 Multiple defined roles within a project
 Role determines which API calls can be
invoked
» Only network admin can request non-1918
addresses
» Only system admin can bundle new images
» etc
 How does NASA secure cloud computing?

Innovation - Security Gates

 API calls can be intercepted and security gates can be imposed

on function being called

 When an instance is launched, it can be scanned automatically

for vulnerabilities

 Long term vision is to have a pass/fail launch gate based on

scan/monitoring results
 How does NASA secure cloud computing?

Vision - Security as a Service

 Goal - Automate compliance through security services
provided by cloud provider
 Security APIs/tools mapped to specific controls
» Customers could subscribe to tools/services to meet
compliance requirements
 When setting up new project in cloud
» Customers assert nature of data they will use
» Cloud responds with list of APIs/tools for customers to use
 Currently gathering requirements but funding needed to
realize vision
 How does NASA secure cloud computing?

Vision - Security Service Bus

 Goal - FISMA compliance through continuous real-time
monitoring and situational awareness
» Security service bus with event driven messaging engine
» Correlate events across provider and multiple customers
» Dashboard view for security providers and customers
» Allows customers to make risk-based security decisions
based on events experienced by other customers
 Funding Needed to Realize Vision
 How does NASA secure cloud computing?

Nebula Open Source Progress

 Significant progress in embracing the value of
open source software release
» Agreements with SourceForge and Github
» Open source identified as an essential component of
NASA’s open government plan

 Elements of Nebula in open source release

pipeline
» Started Feb 2010. Hope for release in June.
» Working toward continual incremental releases.
» Exploring avenues to contribute code to external projects
and to accept external contributions to the Nebula code
base.
Agenda
 Introductions
» Steve Hunt
 What is cloud computing?
» Matt Chew Spence
 How can NASA benefit from cloud computing?
» Matt Chew Spence
 How is NASA implementing cloud computing?
» Matt Linton
 How does NASA secure cloud computing?
» Matt Linton
 Q&A
» Presentation Team

Extended Presentation
 FISMA & Clouds
» Matt Chew Spence
» Steve Hunt
 Assessment, Authorization, & FedRAMP
» Steve Hunt
Q&A
Extended Presentation
Agenda OBJECTIVE: Overview of Nebula C&A
with Lessons Learned
 Introductions
» Steve Hunt
 What is cloud computing?
» Matt Chew Spence
 How can NASA benefit from cloud computing?
» Matt Chew Spence
 How is NASA implementing cloud computing?
» Matt Linton
 How does NASA secure cloud computing?
» Matt Linton
 Q&A
» Presentation Team

Extended Presentation
 FISMA & Clouds
» Matt Chew Spence
» Steve Hunt
 Assessment, Authorization, & FedRAMP
» Steve Hunt
 FISMA & Clouds

FISMA Overview
 Federal Information Security Management Act
– Requires all Gov’t computers to be under a security plan
–Mandates following NIST security guidance
–Required controls depend on FIPS-199 sensitivity level
–Requires periodic assessments of security controls
–Extremely documentation heavy
–Assumes one organization has responsibility for majority of identified
security controls
 FISMA is burdensome to cloud customers
–Customers want to outsource IT Security to cloud provider
 FISMA & Clouds

FISMA Responsibilities in Clouds

 Clouds are a “Highly Dynamic Shared Management
Environment”
» Customers retain FISMA responsibilities for aspects of a cloud
under their control
» Responsibilities vary depending on level of control maintained by
customer
» Customer control varies relative to service delivery model (SaaS,
PaaS, or IaaS)

 Need to define & document responsibilities

» We parsed 800-53 Rev3 controls per service delivery model

 Nebula currently only offers IaaS

» We parsed all three service models for future planning
 FISMA & Clouds

Customer FISMA Responsibilities for Cloud

Customer FISMA
responsibilities Increase IaaS
as Customers have more OS Config Mgmt
control over security Anti-Malware
SW Install Controls
measures OS specific Controls
PaaS etc

Cloud
Software Licenses
Customer
Developer Testing
Security
App Configuration Management
Responsibility
Software Development Lifecycle
SaaS
Identifying data types
Ensuring data appropriate to system
User/Account Management
Personnel Controls

62
 FISMA & Clouds

IaaS Customer Security Plan Coverage Options

 At inception little guidance existed on cloud computing control responsibilities & security
plan coverage

 FedRAMP primarily addresses cloud provider responsibilities

» Other than control parsing definitions Customers are given little guidance on implementing and
managing FISMA requirements in a highly dynamic shared management environment

 We have developed the following options:

Option Description Issues

Customer Owned Customer responsible for
own security plan with no
assistance from provider
Facilitated Customer responsible for
own security plan using
NASA template
Agency Owned Agency or Center level
“Group” security plans
associated with Cloud
providers serve as
aggregation point for
customer.
• None to Providers
• Burdensome to customers
• May still be burdensome
to customers.
• Not scalable unless
automated.
• May be burdensome to
Agency or Center.
• Requires technology to
automate input and
aggregation of customer
data.
 FISMA & Clouds

Current NASA Requirements/Tools may Impede Cloud Implementation

 Default security categorization of Scientific and Space Science data as “Moderate”
» Independent assessment required for every major change
• Currently requires 3rd party document-centric audit
• Not scalable to cloud environments

 e-Authentication/AD integration required for all NASA Apps

» NASA implementations don’t currently support LDAP/SAML-based federated identity
management

 Function-specific stove-piped compliance tools

» STRAW/PIA tool/A&A Repository/NASA electronic forms
» Can’t easily automate compliance process for new apps

64
 FISMA & Clouds

Emerging Developments in FISMA & Clouds

 Interagency Cloud Computing Security Working Group is developing

additional baseline security requirements for cloud computing providers

 NIST Cloud Computing guidance forthcoming?

 Move towards automated risk models and security management tools

over documentation

 On the bleeding edge - changing guidance & requirements are a key

risk factor (and opportunity)

65
 FISMA & Clouds

Nebula is Contributing to Cloud Standards

 Federal Cloud Standards Working Group

 Fed Cloud Computing Security Working Group
» Federal Risk & Authorization Management Program
(FedRAMP)
 Cloud Audit project
» Automated Audit Assertion Assessment & Assurance API
 Providing Feedback to NIST and GAO
 GSA Cloud PMO

66
Agenda OBJECTIVE: Overview of how Nebula
concepts may integrate with FedRAMP
 Introductions
» Steve Hunt
 What is cloud computing?
» Matt Chew Spence
 How can NASA benefit from cloud computing?
» Matt Chew Spence
 How is NASA implementing cloud computing?
» Matt Linton
 How does NASA secure cloud computing?
» Matt Linton
 Q&A
» Presentation Team

Extended Presentation
 FISMA & Clouds
» Matt Chew Spence
» Steve Hunt
 Assessment, Authorization, & FedRAMP
» Steve Hunt
 FedRAMP

Federal Risk and Authorization

Management Program

 A Federal Government-Wide program to provide

“Joint Authorizations” and Continuous Monitoring
» Unified Government-Wide risk management
» Authorizations can be leveraged throughout
Federal Government
 This is to be an optional service provided to
Agencies that does not supplant existing
Agency authority
 FedRAMP

Independent Agency Risk Management of Cloud Services

Federal Agencies
: Duplicative risk
… management efforts

: Incompatible agency
policies

: Acquisition slowed by
lengthy compliance
processes

: Potential for inconsistent

… application of Federal
Cloud Service Providers (CSP) security requirements
 FedRAMP

Federated Risk Management of Cloud Systems

Federal Agencies : Risk management cost

savings and increased
effectiveness
…
Risk Management
• Authorization
• Continuous
: Interagency vetted
FedRAMP Monitoring approach
• Federal Security
Requirements

: Rapid acquisition
through consolidated
risk management
…
Cloud Service Providers (CSP)
: Consistent
application of Federal
security requirements
 FedRAMP

FedRAMP Authorization process

Agency X gets
security requirements
Agency X has a need
for the new IT system
for a new cloud based
from FedRAMP and
IT system
adds requirements if
necessary

Agency X releases
Agency X submits
RFP for new IT
request to FedRAMP
system and awards
office for CSP To be
contract to cloud
FedRAMP authorized
service provider
to operate
(CSP)

CSP is put into FedRAMP

priority queue
(prioritization occurs
based on factors such as
multi-agency use,
number of expected
users, etc.)
 FedRAMP

FedRAMP Authorization process (cont)

CSP, agency
CSP and agency sponsor and FedRAMP office
sponsor begin FedRAMP office coordinates with
authorization review security CSP for creation
process with requirements and of system security
FedRAMP office any alternative plan (SSP)
implementations

CSP has
independent
assessment of FedRAMP office
security controls JAB reviews final
reviews and
and develops certification
assembles the
appropriate package and
final authorization
reports for authorizes CSP to
package for the
submission to operate
JAB
FedRAMP office

FedRAMP office
adds CSP to
FedRAMP
authorized system
provides
inventory to be
continuous
reviewed and
monitoring of CSP
leveraged by all
Federal agencies
 FedRAMP

Issues & Concerns

 FedRAMP doesn’t provide much guidance for customer
side … e.g. Agency users of cloud services
 Current NIST guidance oriented primarily towards “Static
Single System Owner” environments
 Lack of NIST guidance for “Highly Dynamic Shared
Owner” environments … e.g. Virtualized Data Centers &
Clouds
» SSP generation & maintenance
» Application of SP 800-53 (security controls)
» Application of SP 800-37 (assessment & ATO)
» Continuous Monitoring
 Guidance may be forthcoming but NIST is resource
constrained
 FedRAMP

Potential Solution

 Agency/Center level Aggregated SSPs:

» Plan per CSP … e.g. Nebula, Amazon,
Google, Microsoft … etc.
» Plan covers all customers of a specific CSP
» Technology integration may be needed with
SSP repository to dynamically update SSP
content via Web Registration site.
» Or … SSP may be able to point to dynamic
content entered and housed on Web
Registration site ... maintained in Wiki type
doc.
Presentation Title
—74—
March 5, 2010
Q&A