Protecting Networks and Applications
Protecting Networks and Applications
Network and application protection is vital for a secure AWS environment. Attackers can overwhelm your applications with excessive traffic, denying service to legitimate users. AWS provides built-in infrastructure protection and specialized security services to prevent and mitigate this unwanted traffic.
Network and Application Protection Video
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Common Attack Types
DoS (Denial of Service)
An attacker floods a web application with excessive traffic, preventing legitimate requests from being served.
DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service)
Multiple infected computers (zombie bots) send excessive traffic simultaneously, making attacks harder to block.
Infrastructure Protection
AWS automatically protects against low-level attacks through its global infrastructure spanning Regions, Availability Zones, and edge locations.
- Security Groups: Filter traffic at the network level using Region-wide capacity
- Elastic Load Balancing: Handles traffic before your servers, preventing overload
- AWS Regions: Massive capacity makes them extremely difficult to overwhelm
Protection Services
AWS Shield
Standard: Free, automatic protection against common DDoS attacks with real-time detection and mitigation.
Advanced: Paid service with detailed attack diagnostics, sophisticated DDoS protection, and integration with CloudFront, Route 53, and ELB. Can combine with AWS WAF for custom rules.
AWS WAF
Web application firewall that monitors incoming requests and checks IP addresses against access control lists (ACLs). Blocks requests from known malicious sources while allowing legitimate traffic.
