🔒 Security Audit Framework

Security Frameworks & Standards

NIST Cybersecurity Framework (CSF)

The NIST Cybersecurity Framework provides a policy framework of computer security guidance for how private sector organizations can assess and improve their ability to prevent, detect, and respond to cyber attacks.

Five Core Functions:

• Identify: Develop organizational understanding to manage cybersecurity risk
• Protect: Develop and implement appropriate safeguards
• Detect: Develop and implement appropriate activities to identify cybersecurity events
• Respond: Develop and implement appropriate activities regarding detected cybersecurity incidents
• Recover: Develop and implement appropriate activities to maintain resilience plans

ISO 27001:2022 Information Security Management

ISO 27001 is the international standard for information security management systems (ISMS). It provides a systematic approach to managing sensitive company information.

Key Control Domains:

• A.5: Information Security Policies
• A.6: Organization of Information Security
• A.7: Human Resource Security
• A.8: Asset Management
• A.9: Access Control
• A.10: Cryptography
• A.11: Physical and Environmental Security
• A.12: Operations Security
• A.13: Communications Security
• A.14: System Acquisition, Development and Maintenance
• A.15: Supplier Relationships
• A.16: Information Security Incident Management
• A.17: Business Continuity Management
• A.18: Compliance

CIS Controls v8

The CIS Controls are a prioritized set of actions that collectively form a defense-in-depth set of best practices that mitigate the most common attacks against systems and networks.

Zero Trust Architecture

Core Principles

• Verify Explicitly: Always authenticate and authorize based on all available data points
• Use Least Privilege Access: Limit user access with Just-In-Time and Just-Enough-Access principles
• Assume Breach: Minimize blast radius and segment access. Verify end-to-end encryption

Zero Trust Pillars

Implementation Strategy

1. Identify and Classify Assets: Create inventory of users, devices, applications, and data
2. Map Transaction Flows: Understand how data moves across your environment
3. Architect Zero Trust Network: Design micro-segments and secure access controls
4. Create Zero Trust Policy: Define access policies based on business requirements
5. Monitor and Maintain: Continuously monitor and improve security posture

Cloud Security Best Practices

Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM)

CSPM solutions provide continuous monitoring and automated remediation of cloud security risks and compliance violations.

Key CSPM Capabilities:

• Configuration Assessment: Continuous monitoring of cloud resource configurations
• Compliance Monitoring: Automated compliance checks against security frameworks
• Risk Prioritization: Contextual risk scoring and prioritization
• Automated Remediation: Policy-based automated response to security violations
• Multi-Cloud Support: Unified security across AWS, Azure, GCP, and hybrid environments

Cloud Workload Protection Platform (CWPP)

CWPP provides runtime protection for cloud workloads including servers, containers, and serverless functions.

Protection Capabilities:

• Runtime Protection: Real-time monitoring and protection of running workloads
• Container Security: Image scanning, runtime protection, and compliance monitoring
• Serverless Security: Function-level security monitoring and protection
• Behavioral Analysis: ML-based anomaly detection and threat hunting

Multi-Cloud Security Architecture

DevSecOps Integration

DevSecOps Pipeline Security

Shift-Left Security Practices

• Static Application Security Testing (SAST): Code analysis during development
• Software Composition Analysis (SCA): Open source vulnerability scanning
• Infrastructure as Code (IaC) Scanning: Security policy validation
• Container Image Scanning: Vulnerability assessment in CI/CD pipeline
• Dynamic Application Security Testing (DAST): Runtime security testing
• Interactive Application Security Testing (IAST): Real-time code analysis

Security Tool Integration

Threat Modeling

STRIDE Threat Model

STRIDE is a model for identifying computer security threats developed by Microsoft. It provides a structured approach to thinking about threats.

DREAD Risk Assessment

DREAD is a classification scheme for quantifying, comparing, and prioritizing the amount of risk presented by each evaluated threat.

• Damage: How bad would an attack be?
• Reproducibility: How easy is it to reproduce the attack?
• Exploitability: How much work is it to launch the attack?
• Affected Users: How many people will be impacted?
• Discoverability: How easy is it to discover the threat?

Threat Modeling Process

1. Define Security Objectives: Establish what you're trying to protect
2. Create System Model: Document system architecture and data flows
3. Identify Threats: Use STRIDE or other methodologies to identify threats
4. Assess Risk: Evaluate likelihood and impact of each threat
5. Define Mitigations: Implement controls to reduce risk
6. Validate and Monitor: Test effectiveness and monitor for new threats

Vulnerability Management

Vulnerability Management Lifecycle

1. Discovery: Identify assets and potential vulnerabilities
2. Assessment: Evaluate vulnerability severity and business impact
3. Prioritization: Rank vulnerabilities based on risk and exploitability
4. Treatment: Apply patches, mitigations, or accept risk
5. Verification: Confirm remediation effectiveness
6. Monitoring: Continuous monitoring for new vulnerabilities

CVSS v3.1 Scoring

The Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) provides an open framework for communicating the characteristics and severity of software vulnerabilities.

Base Metric Group:

• Attack Vector (AV): Network, Adjacent, Local, Physical
• Attack Complexity (AC): Low, High
• Privileges Required (PR): None, Low, High
• User Interaction (UI): None, Required
• Scope (S): Unchanged, Changed
• Confidentiality Impact (C): None, Low, High
• Integrity Impact (I): None, Low, High
• Availability Impact (A): None, Low, High

Severity Ratings:

Compliance Requirements

Major Compliance Frameworks

GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation)

EU regulation for data protection and privacy for individuals within the European Union and European Economic Area.

• Article 32: Security of processing
• Article 33: Breach notification to supervisory authority
• Article 34: Breach notification to data subject
• Article 35: Data protection impact assessment

HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act)

US legislation that provides data privacy and security provisions for safeguarding medical information.

• Administrative Safeguards: Policies and procedures
• Physical Safeguards: Physical access controls
• Technical Safeguards: Access controls, audit controls, integrity controls

SOC 2 (Service Organization Control 2)

Auditing procedure that ensures service providers securely manage data to protect organizations and privacy of clients.

• Security: Protection against unauthorized access
• Availability: System operation and usability
• Processing Integrity: System processing completeness and accuracy
• Confidentiality: Protection of confidential information
• Privacy: Personal information collection, use, retention, and disposal

PCI DSS (Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard)

Information security standard for organizations that handle branded credit cards from major card schemes.

• Requirement 1: Install and maintain firewall configuration
• Requirement 2: Do not use vendor-supplied defaults
• Requirement 3: Protect stored cardholder data
• Requirement 4: Encrypt transmission of cardholder data
• Requirement 5: Protect against malware
• Requirement 6: Develop and maintain secure systems

Incident Response Procedures

NIST Incident Response Lifecycle

Incident Severity Classification

Key Performance Indicators

• Mean Time to Detection (MTTD): Average time to identify incidents
• Mean Time to Response (MTTR): Average time to begin response activities
• Mean Time to Recovery (MTTR): Average time to restore normal operations
• Incident Volume: Number of incidents per time period
• False Positive Rate: Percentage of alerts that are not actual incidents

Security Tools Comparison

SIEM/SOAR Platforms

Vulnerability Scanners

Cost vs Risk Analysis

Security Investment Framework

Risk Assessment Components:

• Asset Value: Worth of assets being protected
• Threat Probability: Likelihood of threat occurrence
• Vulnerability Impact: Potential damage from exploitation
• Control Effectiveness: Risk reduction from security measures

Cost Considerations:

• Direct Costs: Technology, personnel, training, compliance
• Indirect Costs: Productivity impact, user experience, maintenance
• Opportunity Costs: Alternative investments, business enablement
• Hidden Costs: Integration complexity, change management

ROI Calculation Methods

Security Metrics for Business Value

Business Impact Categories

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