Who can access AWS resources? What kind of traffic should be allowed on the network? To ensure these questions are answered appropriately, organizations must have a thorough understanding of the applicable AWS WAF rules. AWS WAF is an integrated web filtering service to protect websites from attacks and malware.
It works by analyzing incoming and outgoing requests for your organization's websites and services. The service analyzes input from sources such as user profiles, browser details, operating system, etc. This article explains why you should be interested in an integrated WAF solution, the three most common types of WAF rules you will encounter, how to choose the right WAF Choosing a rule for your needs and what risks these rules pose if they are not configured correctly.
What is AWS WAF?
AWS WAF is an integrated web filtering service to protect websites from attacks and malware.
It works by analyzing incoming and outgoing requests to your organization's websites and services based on input from sources like user profile, browser details, operating system, etc. The service analyzes input from sources like user profile, browser details, system, etc.
Top 3 AWS WAF rules you should know about pose if not properly configured or managed. One of the most common AWS WAF rules is known as a CORS rule.
CORS (Cross-Origin Resource Sharing) is a set of rules that determine which HTTP requests can be sent to a specific website on different domains. If a specific domain wants to send a request outside of its domain, but still needs to be trusted by your website's firewall (e.g. Amazon Web Services), it should use CORS. For example, if you want to make a request to come from your Facebook page's IP address without actually doing this (e.g.. so the person doesn't know it's from your side.
Why is it important to have a WAF?
WAF is important because it helps protect sensitive resources like websites and applications from attacks. Manage the traffic coming into your network and make sure the right people are accessing your network.
This is why WAF is important to give you security. When your WAF is set up and configured correctly, you know that nobody can hack into your valuable data or system resources. However, if you don't have a WAF, you may be vulnerable to cyberattacks and threats on your network
Different Types of WAF Rules
The most common types of WAF rules are:
Whitelist: This type of rule allows traffic that meets certain criteria. Blacklist: This type of rule blocks network traffic that doesn't meet certain criteria. Whitelist during the day and blacklist at night or at certain times. The whitelist only allows traffic if it meets a number of requirements, e.g. B. if it comes from an IP address that is in the range specified in the rule. The blacklist blocks all traffic from addresses outside the specified range.
Another option is to create two separate rules that allow traffic at different times, for example during the day when users are more likely to authenticate via a browser, and when they are sleeping or not using their computer at all (at night). ).
How to Choose the Right WAFPolicy for Your Network
As a security-conscious organization, you likely have several reasons for choosing AWS WAF. It's important to understand the types of security that rules provide. Some common types of WAF rules only allow traffic from pre-approved IP addresses, traffic to specific ports, and traffic with an SSL certificate. For example, if you want to ensure that your website visitors can only access your website when they're connected to a Wi-Fi network, you can set up a rule that allows traffic from pre-approved IP addresses and only over HTTP .
This would allow users with a public IP address to visit your website, but would also prevent users from connecting through a VPN or Tor connection. To determine the right policy for your network, you must determine what type of protection it provides and how it affects different types of service requests. Here are some questions to ask yourself when considering implementing this type of rule: What type of protection does this rule provide? How does this affect incoming requests? What is the risk of this rule if not properly configured or managed?
Which WAF rule should I use?
It's important to determine the type of traffic you want to bring into your AWS environment. There are three main types of WAF rules, with varying levels of detail and intensity.
Rule Type: Deny All - This rule denies all requests with a 404 (not found) response code. If you select this rule, ensure that the incoming request to your application is HTTP only, otherwise it will not be processed.
Rule type: Allow all - This rule allows all incoming requests into the network as long as they are not associated with a malicious payload.
Rule type: Whitelist: This rule allows only specific whitelisted IP addresses to access the network. The whitelist can contain IP address ranges, address ranges, subnets, etc. For example, if you want to allow customers from a specific country in North America to access your website, you can allow those countries with those countries listed in the appropriate Amazon Web Services country whitelists.
Conclusion
The AWS WAF rule is a type of security layer configured to protect your AWS infrastructure from traffic deemed malicious. You need to determine what type of WAF rule to install and what it should look like, as well as what type of traffic you want to allow and what type of traffic you want to block. Because WAF policies are constantly changing, it's important that you understand what types of rules exist and how they work so you can protect your infrastructure.
