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Topic 4: Security Monitoring

Security monitoring is your early warning system for detecting threats and understanding what's happening in your cloud environment. Before implementing monitoring for your Journal API, you need to understand logging, alerting, and monitoring fundamentals.

Learning Objectives​

By the end of this topic, you will understand:

  • Cloud logging services and what events to monitor
  • Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) concepts
  • How to create effective alerts that minimize false positives
  • Key security metrics to track
  • Log analysis and threat detection techniques

Core Learning Resources​

1. Read: Cloud Monitoring Fundamentals​

Start with your cloud provider's monitoring documentation:

AWS: CloudWatch User Guide and CloudTrail User Guide Azure: Azure Monitor Overview and Activity Log GCP: Cloud Logging and Cloud Monitoring

2. Watch: Security Monitoring in Practice​

3. Learn: Security Monitoring Best Practices​

Key Concepts to Master​

Essential Log Sources​

  • Authentication Logs: Who's logging in, when, and from where
  • API Call Logs: What actions are being performed on your resources
  • Network Logs: Traffic patterns and potential intrusions
  • Application Logs: Your application's security-relevant events
  • Infrastructure Logs: Changes to your cloud resources

Security Metrics to Track​

  • Failed authentication attempts
  • Unusual API call patterns
  • Network traffic anomalies
  • Resource configuration changes
  • Data access patterns

SIEM Concepts​

Security Information and Event Management:

  • Collect: Gather logs from multiple sources
  • Correlate: Find patterns across different log sources
  • Alert: Notify when suspicious patterns are detected
  • Investigate: Provide tools to analyze security events

Alert Design Principles​

  • High Signal-to-Noise Ratio: Alerts should indicate real problems
  • Actionable: Each alert should have a clear response procedure
  • Escalation: Different severity levels with appropriate response times
  • Context: Provide enough information to understand the issue

Test Your Knowledge​

Use an AI assistant to test your understanding. Here are example prompts:

  1. "Quiz me on the different types of logs I should monitor for security"
  2. "Ask me about SIEM concepts and how they work together"
  3. "Test my knowledge of creating effective security alerts"
  4. "Quiz me on key security metrics for cloud applications"
  5. "Ask me about the difference between logging and monitoring"
  6. "Test my understanding of log correlation and analysis"
  7. "Quiz me on common security monitoring mistakes"
  8. "Ask me about incident response workflows for security events"

Next Steps​

Once you understand security monitoring concepts, move on to Topic 5.