Skip to main content

Cloud Security Foundations: Perimeter, Landing Zone, and Hub‑and‑Spoke Explained

Modern cloud architecture relies on a few foundational building blocks that determine how secure, scalable, and well‑organized your environment will be. Three of the most important concepts—Perimeter Security, Landing Zones, and Hub‑and‑Spoke architecture—often get mixed up or used interchangeably, even though each plays a very different role. Understanding how these pieces fit together is essential for designing a secure cloud environment that can handle real‑world workloads. This guide breaks down each concept in simple terms and uses a practical analogy to help you visualize how they work individually and as part of a unified cloud security strategy.


1. Perimeter Security in Cloud

  • This refers to the outermost security boundary where external traffic first interacts with your cloud environment.

  • In traditional networks, this was the firewall at the edge. In cloud, it’s often implemented using:

    • Cloud-native firewalls (e.g., GCP Firewall Rules, AWS Security Groups/NACLs)

    • Web Application Firewalls (WAF)

    • DDoS protection (e.g., Cloud Armor, AWS Shield)

    • Ingress gateways (API Gateway, Load Balancers)


2. Landing Zone

  • A Landing Zone is not the perimeter itself, but a pre-configured, secure foundation for deploying workloads in the cloud.

  • It includes:

    • Networking baseline (VPCs, subnets, routing)

    • Identity & Access Management (IAM)

    • Security controls (logging, monitoring, guardrails)

  • Think of it as the secure airport terminal, not the border checkpoint.


3. Hub-and-Spoke

  • A network topology where:

    • Hub = central VPC or project for shared services (firewalls, NAT, DNS, security appliances)

    • Spokes = individual workload VPCs/projects connected via VPC peering or transit gateway

  • The hub often enforces perimeter security for all spokes (centralized inspection).


Better Analogy

  • Perimeter Security = Border Control (first checkpoint)

  • Landing Zone = Airport Terminal (secure environment where operations happen)

  • Hub-and-Spoke = Airport with multiple gates connected to a central terminal

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Traffic journey from Client to Backend in Google Cloud

Securing cloud applications begins with understanding how request traffic moves through Google Cloud’s infrastructure. From the moment a request leaves the client machine to the moment it reaches backend services, every component along the path contributes to performance, resilience, and security. When I first explored this flow, I found myself overwhelmed by the number of services involved — and unsure which ones were essential, optional, or security‑critical. What happens at each hop? How do these services interact? And which layers truly matter when building a secure, compliant, and scalable cloud application in Google Cloud? This post breaks down those questions using a simple, intuitive analogy: an airport journey. In this model, the client request becomes a passenger navigating terminals, security checkpoints, and routing desks — eventually boarding the airplane (backend service) where your application runs. In the next post, I’ll flip the perspective and walk through the return ...
2 comments
Read more

Return Journey: From Backend to Client in Google Cloud

This post is the companion to the inbound journey (client → backend). While the forward path focuses on request security and routing, the return emphasizes response optimization, caching, and identity preservation — with most action still at the edge. The return path mirrors the forward journey, but now the response is making its way out of Google Cloud toward the client. Each milestone plays a specific role in ensuring the response is secure, optimized, and delivered efficiently — just like an aircraft preparing for departure, navigating airspace, and landing at its destination. TL;DR:  1. Backend → Service Mesh → API Gateway/Layer (Optional) + Identity Layer (Optional) The response is created, validated, transformed, and cleared for departure (aircraft at gate → ground crew → departure checkpoint → identity clearance desk). 2. Premium Backbone The response travels across Google’s private, optimized global network (private high‑speed air corridor). 3. Load Balancer Edge → GFE → GF...
Post a Comment
Read more