Cloud Security

Next Tuesday Wednesday (!) I'll be part of a virtual panel as part of a on-line event organised by InformationWeek’s Dark Reading and Black Hat. I encourage you to virtually attend as it promises to be an excellent Cloud/Virtualization Security discussion. You can register for free here.

The session will be hosted by my good friend and co-host of the Cloud Security Podcast, Chris Hoff.

In addition to the expertise that Chris brings to the table, the other guests are all hardcore in their own right. I promise you'll learn something - I'm pretty sure I will!

Here's the blurb:

Virtualization, Cloud Computing, And Next-Generation Security

The concept of cloud computing creates new challenges for security, because sensitive data may no longer reside on dedicated hardware. How can enterprises protect their most sensitive data in the rapidly-evolving world of shared computing resources? In this panel, Black Hat researchers who have found vulnerabilities in the cloud and software-as-a-service models meet other experts on virtualization and cloud computing to discuss the question of cloud computing’s impact on security and the steps that will be required to protect data in cloud environments.

Panelists: Glenn Brunette, Distinguished Engineer and Chief Security Architect, Sun Microsystems; Edward Haletky, Virtualization Security Expert; Chris Wolf, Virtualization Analyst, Burton Group; Jon Oberheide, Security Researcher; Craig Balding, Cloud Security Expert, cloudsecurity.org

Moderator: Christofer Hoff, Contributing Editor, Black Hat

Register for free here.

The slides from my talk at Black Hat Europe 2009 are now available [PDF].

From comments I received afterwards, I got positive feedback despite running out of time (my fault entirely).  I’ve been pleasantly surprised by the number of people asking for copies of the slides, but do bear in mind the slides are somewhat ‘terse’ as they are primarily talking points for me to bounce off of (as it were).

Should anything not be clear, feel free to leave a comment below and I’ll do my best to clarify.

I’d also like to take this chance to thank Jeff Moss, Ping and the rest of the Black Hat crew for doing such a professional job running the conference - it was confidence inspiring to be in such capable hands.

I’m in the middle of preparing for Black Hat Europe where I’ll be speaking about Cloud Security.  Here’s the blurb:

This presentation rips apart the hype and “newfangledness” of Cloud Services (IaaS, PaaS, SaaS etc) to expose the ghost in the machine. Just as the human brain has grown, built upon earlier, more primitive brain structures, so it is with the Cloud. With the advent of commercially available, pay-as-you-go public Cloud services, CFOs are casting a weary eye to the CIO in anticipation of joining the great infrastructure linedance in the sky. Meanwhile, vendors are jockeying for position to “enable” the Enterprise Cloud and Cloud brokers are trading excess compute capacity in data centers. What does all this mean from a security point of view? What are the security risks (and benefits)? Are you ready to face the ghosts in the Clouds?

I’m really looking forward to this.  If you’re going to be there, let me know!

Full details of the conference, along with paying 200 Euros less if you register by Wednesday 8th April are here