Google and music service Spotify announced last week the launch of Forseti Security, a community-driven collection of open source tools designed to improve security in Google Cloud Platform (GCP) environments.
The Forseti toolkit currently includes an inventor tool that provides visibility into GCP resources, a scanner that validates access control policies, an enforcement tool that removes unwanted access to resources, and an add-on that helps users understand, test and develop Identity and Access Management (IAM) policies.
“Forseti gives us visibility into the GCP infrastructure that we didn’t have before, and we use it to help make sure we have the right controls in place and stay ahead of the game,” Spotify said.
“It helps keep us informed about what’s going on in our environment so that we can quickly find out about any risky misconfigurations so they can be fixed right away. These tools allow us to create a workflow that puts the security team in a proactive stance rather than a reactive one. We can inform everyone involved on time rather than waiting for an incident to happen,” the company added.
The Inventory tool continually generates snapshots of GCP resources and provides an audit trail. The Scanner helps detect misconfigurations and security bugs, and informs the team in charge when an issue has been discovered.
Spotify started developing security tools for GCP after moving its operations from in-house data centers to the cloud. The tools are designed to help the company automate its security processes in order to enable its engineering team to develop freely and securely.
Google had been developing its own security tools and since both companies wanted to release them as open source, they decided to collaborate, which led to the creation of the Forseti Security project.
Security experts can submit feature requests and bug reports, or they can contribute to Forseti development efforts.
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