In my previous blog on Kubernetes security foundations, we discussed the growing adoption of cloud-native applications and the security challenges they present. We highlighted the limitations of traditional network firewalls in securing these applications and emphasized the importance of implementing cloud-native security policies to protect network traffic effectively.
Established in 1875, HanseMerkur is one of the oldest private health insurance companies in Germany, with customers across Europe. The company ran multi-tenant clusters on premises with Kubespray, with around 150 internal software developers as users. As the company must handle personal information and confidential data, it adheres to ISO 27001, the German equivalent of SOC 2, as per industry standards.
One of the common concerns about migrating applications to Kubernetes is the control over the network traffic egressing your environment. Due to its highly dynamic architecture, Kubernetes will not tie a specific IP address to an application by default. Instead, it will lease a different IP address from an IP pool whenever the application restarts.
Kubernetes documentation clearly defines what use cases you can achieve using Kubernetes network policies and what you can’t. You are probably familiar with the scope of network policies and how to use them to secure your workload from undesirable connections. Although it is possible to cover the basics with Kubernetes native network policies, there is a list of use cases that you cannot implement by just using these policies.
The concern about securing the clusters has grown exponentially and one of the ways to secure it is by isolating the cluster from the Internet to lower the risk of eventual attack. Enterprises that deal with confidential customer data and work with regulatory agencies, such as financial and insurance institutions, require air gap environments for their clusters to create highly secure environments.
Box is a content cloud that helps organizations securely manage their entire content lifecycle from anywhere in the world, powering over 67% of Fortune 500 businesses. As a cloud-first SaaS, the company provides customers with an all-in-one content solution within a highly secure infrastructure, where organizations can work on any content, from projects and contracts to Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP)-related content.
We are excited to announce the release of Calico v3.26! This latest milestone brings a range of enhancements and new features to the Calico ecosystem, delivering an optimized and secure networking solution. This release has a strong emphasis on product performance, with strengthened security measures, expanded compatibility with Windows Server 2022 and OpenStack Yoga, and notable improvements to the Calico eBPF dataplane.
Kubernetes has become the de facto standard for container orchestration, providing a powerful platform for deploying and managing containerized applications at scale. As more organizations adopt Kubernetes for their production workloads, ensuring the security and privacy of data in transit has become increasingly critical.
Almost all modern network systems, including stateful firewalls, make use of connection tracking (“conntrack”) because it consumes less processing power per packet and simplifies operations. However, there are use cases where connection tracking has a negative impact, as we described in Linux Conntrack: Why it breaks down and avoiding the problem.
Organizations are adopting Kubernetes on Amazon Web Services (AWS) to modernize their applications. But Kubernetes clusters and application lifecycles demand a considerable investment of cost and resources, especially for edge applications.
