What Are Firewalls?
Firewalls are the network security systems, which may be either hardware-based or software-based, which make use of rules for controlling the incoming as well as outgoing network traffic. Firewalls act as barriers between trusted networks and untrusted networks. It can manage access to various resources of particular systems via positive control models on both software and hardware. The network firewall is often made use of to prevent any unauthorized users attempting to access these private networks that are connected to the Internet, specifically the intranets. In this post, we are going to see the process of restricting IP using firewalls.
The Use of Firewalls
Firewalls usually provide a broad spectrum of cloud data protection against any network-related threats. Also, as an integral part of such protection, firewalls give some amount of limited visibility into the usage of cloud data, etc. For instance, conventional cloud security solutions might have difficulty mapping URLs users-access to these cloud services. These can be used to track cloud data access over corporate networks.
Some of the users tend to use their network-based security solutions for terminating SSL as well as for inspecting malware content. A firewall also buckets the cloud-based services into high-end level categories (like Business/Economy, Suspicious, Technology/Internet); but, such groups usually don’t reflect the essential underlying function of that service like file sharing, social media, or maybe CRM.
A primary use case of such network-based security solutions is to categorize and enforce access to many illicit websites containing objectionable material, including gambling and drugs, etc.
Restricting IP Using firewalls
Firewalls are configured for blocking access to some particular IP addresses. However, these solutions often lack a well-detailed and nouveau cloud registry with cloud-service URLs as well as IP addresses for extending this specific functionality of access control to cloud-based services. Most firms using firewalls often come across this issue that while they had initially blocked some of the IP addresses in the cloud services, the cloud service providers still tend to introduce new IPs routinely, which again aren’t blocked. It leads to a widespread phenomenon known as “proxy leakage,” wherein employees access cloud-based services regularly, which IT otherwise intends to prevent.
CASB IP Restriction Feature
The IP Restriction feature of a CASB solution helps to cap user access for avoiding any unexpected or inevitable data breaches, which can otherwise take roots into the system, thus inducing significant losses to the companies. Restriction policies are imposed to ensure the use of only some predefined IP addresses for gaining cloud security through better visibility into cloud usage by knowing clearly how the organizational data is put to use.
IP Restriction feature of a CASB solution would help firms in gaining much better data control for amplified cloud security. With the CASB IP Restriction feature, IT admin can White-list the IP addresses list of the locations from where that firm intends its users to access their respective cloud accounts. Those IP addresses would be public (WAN IP) of the networks of that organization.
With the IP Restriction feature, multiple policies can be created that are based on organizational units or its users, helping the admin to restrict access control from any specific devices as per their IP addresses by Whitelisting/Blacklisting IP addresses.
CASB with Firewalls
Cloud Access Security Broker solutions are complementary technologies to firewalls. By integrating CASB with these conventional solutions, enterprises can leverage a better cloud security handle in their existing corporate network infrastructure for gaining better visibility into cloud usage. The little cloud visibility rendered through the use of firewalls is increased when integrated into a CASB solution, for the benefit of the organization. At the same time, CASB solutions also enhance the value of such investments made by enterprises by really making them cloud-safe and cloud-aware.
CloudCodes IP restriction
IP-based access control in cloud computing, restricting IP using firewalls can enable IT admin, to restrict user access to business data only through one or more specified IP addresses only. This ensures that no business data is accessed in an unsecured, public, or unregistered IP address.
- Restrict a single user, a subset of users, or an entire organization to IP restriction policy
- Policy-based restriction for providing strong granular control to the business
- Customize mapping of users over one or more IP addresses
- No firewall settings or local installation are required for this feature
- Easy to set up IP restriction policies