Modern computing, driven by the fast-paced evolution of technology, has led to immense focus on various things. In recent years, serverless computing has emerged as a powerful paradigm for building and deploying applications. The serverless model abstracts away the infrastructure management tasks, allowing developers to focus on writing code and delivering features. While serverless brings many advantages, it also introduces unique security considerations. However, if we were to speak strictly in the context of business and modern computing, the spotlight has been squarely on serverless architectures, especially their security.
In this blog post, I will explore the top serverless security best practices to help you fortify your applications in this dynamic and evolving landscape.
What is Serverless Security?
Dedicated to safeguarding apps in the absence of conventional servers, serverless security is essentially a collection of strategies and best practices meant to help companies protect their serverless apps and data from unauthorized access and modification or destruction. Unlike what happens in your run-of-the-mill IT environments, where security controls are often implemented at either the network or server level, serverless architectures necessitate a more granular approach to ensuring security.
Now that we have clarified what serverless security means, it is time for me to walk you through some top best practices. Here we go.
Best Practices for Serverless Security That You Should Keep in Mind
- Tread beyond WAF protection: There is no denying that Web Application Firewalls (WAFs) are essential for protecting against web-based attacks. However, they should not be your defense against such attacks since serverless apps comprise several components besides conventional web layers. This is why it is essential to grow your security measures beyond WAFs, including the whole serverless architecture to ensure comprehensive protection against different attack factors.
- Leverage custom function permissions: Another good practice to remember here is the principle of least privilege. You can do so by defining and assigning custom permissions to serverless functions. Oh, that does not mean you have to be overly permissive, i.e., grant unnecessary access to resources. What you can do, instead, is take a granular approach to permissions to help restrict the potential impact of a security breach and limit the attack surface.
- Code audit: I cannot insist enough on the importance of conducting code audits regularly. Code audits, ideally including the app's code and third-party dependencies and libraries, are a terrific way to find and address potential security vulnerabilities. Besides that, it is also a good idea to use safe coding practices and stay updated about the latest security threats. Such a proactive approach to ensure security-driven solutions enables you to determine and fix security issues before they become a big problem.
- Monitor all attack indicators: One must ALWAYS capture and analyze all relevant security events and indicators of compromise. Ideally, it would help if you integrated rock-solid monitoring and logging mechanisms, including monitoring authentication attempts, unauthorized access, and anomalous behavior within serverless functions. Monitoring these indicators in real-time enables you to, first, timely detect any potential security incidents and, then allow your team to respond to the threat swiftly. Quick mitigation, after all, plays a key role in minimizing the impact of security breaches.
Folks, never forget that tending to the security requirements of serverless technology is an ongoing process — like it is for any other technology, to be honest. So, while you must integrate these serverless security best practices into your deployment workflows, a continuous and proactive approach is imperative too.
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