Google Infrastructure Security Design Overview

[Arthur]

If you have ever wondered how Google secures your data in their data centers, the following PDF is quite an interesting read. I didn't a quick search but couldn't see any previous threads about it.

 

PDF: https://cloud.google.com/security/security-design/resources/google_infrastructure_whitepaper_fa.pdf (January 2017)

 

This document gives an overview of how security is designed into Google’s technical infrastructure. This global scale infrastructure is designed to provide security through the entire information processing lifecycle at Google. This infrastructure provides secure deployment of services, secure storage of data with end user privacy safeguards, secure communications between services, secure and private communication with customers over the internet, and safe operation by administrators.

 

Google uses this infrastructure to build its internet services, including both consumer services such as Search, Gmail, and Photos, and enterprise services such as G Suite and Google Cloud Platform.

 

We will describe the security of this infrastructure in progressive layers starting from the physical security of our data centers, continuing on to how the hardware and software that underlie the infrastructure are secured, and finally, describing the technical constraints and processes in place to support operational security.

 

A Google data center consists of thousands of server machines connected to a local network. Both the server boards and the networking equipment are custom-designed by Google. We vet component vendors we work with and choose components with care, while working with vendors to audit and validate the security properties provided by the components. We also design custom chips, including a hardware security chip that is currently being deployed on both servers and peripherals. These chips allow us to securely identify and authenticate legitimate Google devices at the hardware level.

 

Website: https://cloud.google.com/security/security-design