Cloud computing security and compliance with Ubuntu Pro
Lech Sandecki
on 19 February 2023
Tags: AWS , CIS , Cloud computing security , DISA STIG , Extended Security Maintenance , FIPS certification , Google Cloud , Microsoft Azure , Open source , Support
Businesses that require cloud computing security can gain considerable advantages by choosing an open-source platform. Open-source software (OSS) provides access to the most leading-edge enterprise-grade features while keeping costs down. OSS also eliminates risks such as vendor lock-in, lack of support, or long-term security maintenance.
However, organisations in highly regulated industries such as Government, Financial Services, Healthcare and Telecommunications are facing a challenge in archiving their unique cloud computing security requirements with OSS. With this in mind, we have designed Ubuntu Pro in the cloud.
You might have already heard about Ubuntu! Ubuntu is the world’s most popular Linux distribution and the most widely used operating system across major public clouds. Thanks to its ease-of-use, performance, and stability and the fact that each Ubuntu LTS release is benefiting from up to 5 years of standard security maintenance, Ubuntu has stayed a top choice for developers for already many years.
With Ubuntu Pro, we went a step further by extending cloud security coverage to the entire collection of software packages that ships with Ubuntu for 10 years. While also providing certified components to run across multiple compliance regimes.
Long-term cloud security and stability for thousands of applications
Security continues to be the number one concern for organizations around the world. Unexpected hacker attacks can easily bring down a system that is not well protected. For example, Software as a service (SaaS) companies that are highly reliant on the cloud need to think not only about operating level security but also cover their applications.
Therefore, Pro brings long-term support to the entire ecosystem of 30,000 deb packages available with Ubuntu. These applications can be installed directly from the Ubuntu repositories, and include popular solutions such as NGINX, MongoDB, Redis and PostgreSQL.
Alongside Ubuntu itself, each of these applications is fully security patched for high and critical CVEs for 10 years. This enables organisations to take advantage of a secure and stable open-source ecosystem with none of the usual maintenance burden! No need to worry about scanning, applying, and testing the latest upstream security updates.
This approach is ideal for companies that are embracing open source and need to maximise cloud computing security for production and mission-critical workloads.
More and more industries are coming to rely heavily on always-up-to-date development tools; and with Ubuntu Pro, development environments are constantly updated with the latest security patches.
Take the automotive industry, for example. Using Ubuntu Pro, developers working on the vehicle backend can focus on delivering new services and updates to their fleets without wasting time maintaining their development tools.
Automated FIPS compliance and cloud system hardening
Traditionally, businesses in certain industries have struggled to fully utilise Linux and other open-source platforms as they have not met strict compliance requirements. FIPS 140-2, for instance, requires crypto-modules to be rewritten and certified before the OS can be used by government agencies – a process that is both time-consuming and costly.
Pro comes with official NIST certification straight out of the box. Similarly, Ubuntu Pro supports CIS hardening and DISA STIG profiles for even greater compliance coverage, such as FedRAMP, HIPAA, PCI, ISO and more.
This empowers organisations to leverage Ubuntu across their public cloud workloads more easily. It also positions suppliers building on Ubuntu to tap into markets that were previously beyond their reach due to compliance issues.
What’s more, regulations are rapidly catching up with new technologies as they mature. For example, in the smart home space, as companies are developing new products, data privacy and security are becoming critical issues. Ubuntu Pro builds in the security updates these solutions require, allowing leaner development, and lower support and maintenance costs.
Deep public cloud integration
Pro is fully integrated with all leading public clouds: Azure, AWS and Google Cloud. Rather than needing to contract with Canonical directly, users can simply choose Ubuntu Pro as an add-on to their public cloud subscription, which is transacted directly on the cloud marketplace.
Pricing for Ubuntu Pro tracks the underlying public cloud cost, varying from 3-4.5% of an average hourly compute cost for most instances. The larger the public cloud deployment, the lower the relative cost of Ubuntu Pro!
This integration makes deploying and scaling Ubuntu Pro a highly streamlined experience and allows the service to contribute to committed cloud spend.
Ubuntu Pro is available for all recent Ubuntu LTS releases – 14.04 LTS, 16.04 LTS, 18.04 LTS and 20.04 LTS. Pro is a layer of additional services on top of the standard Ubuntu LTS, and can include optional enterprise-grade support.
