Table of Contents
Cloud adoption is showing an upward moving curve in past few years. Global and small scale enterprises are using large scale cloud services for its computing, storage , communication , security, stability, development tools. This rapid change has expanded the attack surface across cloud landscape. Common cloud based vulnerabilities have surfaced much stronger such as IAM policies and permissions, misconfigured S3 buckets and security tokens. The need for Security event management solutions is multi-fold due to this expanded threat landscape.
Today we look more in detail about AWS CloudWatch and Azure Sentinel data collection and resource monitoring tools, their key differences, and limitations.
What is AWS CloudWatch?
AWS CloudWatch collects performance data, events, and logs from a wide range of AWS services including Virtual machines, storage, databases, CloudTrail, Security hub, GuardDuty etc. Resource logs are configured and sent to AWS CloudWatch from within each server in use. This let you send logs from non-AWS servers to CloudWatch. CloudWatch also raise alarms triggered by thresholds set on data it collects as well as provide dashboards with variety of visualizations.
Features of AWS CloudWatch
- Collection of data at high end cloud scale, for any device, users, infrastructure, and applications in near real time.
- Collection of infrastructure metrics from over 70 AWS services.
- Container insights by collection and aggregation of curated metrics and container ecosystem logs.
- Analytics rules can be set out of the box related to changes made in AWS environment such as MFA disabled for user, change to Amazon VPC settings, change made to internet facing AWS RDS databases instances, monitor AWS credentials abuse or hijacking etc.
What is Azure Sentinel?
It is a cloud-native security information and event management (SIEM) platform that is also capable of security orchestration automated response (SOAR). This tool leverages cutting-edge AI technology to enable real-time security analytics, making it an ideal choice for those seeking all-encompassing cyber defense at cloud scale. One of the standout features of Azure Sentinel is its Data Connectors, which allow for seamless integration of a wide variety of log sources and easy onboarding of diverse security solutions.
Related: Azure Sentinel: Cloud-native SIEM Solution
Features of Azure Sentinel
- Collect data from cloud scale across devices, applications, users, infrastructure for on prem and multiple hybrid clouds.
- Identification of previously undetected security threats and reduction in False+ves using AI.
- Investigation of threat vectors with detection of suspicious activities at high scale.
- Faster response for incidents with built in security automation and tasks orchestration.
Comparison: AWS CloudWatch vs Azure Sentinel
Below table summarizes the differences between the two:
Download the comparison table: AWS CloudWatch vs Azure Sentinel
Related Q&A
What is Cloudwatch Alarm?
CloudWatch alarm tool enables you to monitor a single cloud watch metric or the outcome of Match expression by leveraging cloud watch metrics. You can set custom thresholds for each service and receive notifications based on these thresholds. Furthermore, you can easily stay informed about the status of each alarm through the intuitive CloudWatch dashboard.
What are the benefits of CloudWatch?
- Real-time insights that help to optimize operational costs as well as AWS applications & resources.
- Ease to explore, analyze, and visualize your logs for effective troubleshooting of operational issues and seamless application performance.
Name the language used in Azure Sentinel.
Kusto Query Language
Is Azure Sentinel PaaS or SaaS?
When it comes to meeting the security needs of different organizations, Azure Sentinel SIEM proves to be a highly scalable SaaS (Security-as-a-Service) solution. However, from a bird’s-eye view, it also operates as a comprehensive PaaS (Platform-as-a-service), providing an entire development and deployment environment in the cloud while enabling a complete software development lifecycle. Azure Sentinel is truly a versatile tool that caters to various security requirements.