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Using Security Hub in AWS

Posted on by Zubair Shaik

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Absolutely! Here’s a comprehensive and detailed guide (3000+ words) on Using Security Hub in AWS, covering everything from foundational concepts to advanced configuration and integration. This guide is ideal for security engineers, cloud architects, and DevOps professionals aiming to build a robust security posture using AWS Security Hub.

🛡️ Using Security Hub in AWS – Full Step-by-Step Guide (3000+ Words)

📘 Table of Contents

  1. Introduction to AWS Security Hub
  2. Why Use AWS Security Hub?
  3. Core Concepts of Security Hub
  4. AWS Security Hub Architecture
  5. Pricing Overview
  6. Prerequisites and Initial Setup
  7. Enabling AWS Security Hub
  8. Integrating Security Hub with AWS Services
  9. Integrating with Third-Party Tools
  10. Understanding Findings and Insights
  11. Using AWS Security Standards
  12. Automating Remediation with AWS Config and Lambda
  13. Multi-Account and Multi-Region Setup
  14. Security Hub APIs and Automation
  15. Real-World Use Cases
  16. Monitoring and Reporting
  17. Best Practices
  18. Challenges and Limitations
  19. Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
  20. Conclusion

1. 🧠 Introduction to AWS Security Hub

AWS Security Hub is a cloud-native security posture management (CSPM) service that helps you manage and aggregate security alerts and findings across multiple AWS accounts and services. It acts as a central dashboard for all security-related data, helping teams identify, prioritize, and remediate potential risks.

2. 🎯 Why Use AWS Security Hub?

  • Centralized View: Consolidates findings from AWS services like GuardDuty, Inspector, Macie, and third-party solutions.
  • Security Standards: Supports CIS AWS Foundations Benchmark and AWS Foundational Security Best Practices.
  • Automation: Enables automatic response and remediation through EventBridge and Lambda.
  • Cross-Account Management: Supports multi-account environments using AWS Organizations.

3. 🧱 Core Concepts of Security Hub

📌 1. Findings

Standardized security alerts using the AWS Security Finding Format (ASFF).

📌 2. Insights

Customized, grouped views of related findings based on filters or patterns.

📌 3. Security Standards

Pre-packaged compliance controls to check your environment’s adherence to best practices.

📌 4. Partner Product Integrations

Includes tools like CrowdStrike, Tenable, Trend Micro, Splunk, etc.

4. 🏗 AWS Security Hub Architecture

Architecture Flow:

AWS Services / 3rd-Party Tools 
      ↓
Security Findings (ASFF)
      ↓
AWS Security Hub (Aggregation & Analysis)
      ↓
Amazon EventBridge → AWS Lambda / SNS / Remediation

It integrates with:

  • AWS GuardDuty (Threat Detection)
  • AWS Inspector (Vulnerability Management)
  • AWS Config (Resource Configuration Compliance)
  • Amazon Macie (Data Privacy)

5. 💰 Pricing Overview

AWS Security Hub is charged per finding ingested, and per region.

  • $0.0010 per finding (first 100,000 findings)
  • Beyond that, the price tiers down
  • No additional charge for AWS standards

Always review AWS Security Hub pricing for the latest details.

6. 🧰 Prerequisites and Initial Setup

📋 Prerequisites

  • AWS account with necessary IAM permissions
  • AWS Config enabled in the region(s)
  • Trusted Advisor or AWS Organizations (for multi-account)

🔐 IAM Permissions

The user enabling Security Hub needs permissions like:

{
  "Effect": "Allow",
  "Action": [
    "securityhub:*",
    "config:*",
    "iam:CreateServiceLinkedRole"
  ],
  "Resource": "*"
}

7. 🚀 Enabling AWS Security Hub

✅ Option 1: Using AWS Console

  1. Go to AWS Console → Security Hub.
  2. Click “Enable”.
  3. Choose the security standards to enable (e.g., CIS, AWS Best Practices).
  4. Confirm the activation.

✅ Option 2: Using AWS CLI

aws securityhub enable-security-hub --enable-default-standards

✅ Option 3: Using CloudFormation

Security Hub can be enabled through IaC (Infrastructure as Code) for automation.

8. 🔄 Integrating AWS Services with Security Hub

Security Hub automatically integrates with the following:

🔍 GuardDuty

Provides threat detection alerts (e.g., compromised IAM credentials).

🛡 Inspector

Finds software vulnerabilities and exposures.

📄 AWS Config

Reports on compliance with configuration rules.

🧑‍💻 Macie

Detects PII or sensitive data leaks.

To verify integrations:

aws securityhub list-enabled-products-for-import

9. 🤝 Integrating with Third-Party Tools

Commonly Integrated Tools:

  • CrowdStrike Falcon
  • Tenable.io
  • Trend Micro Deep Security
  • Splunk
  • Rapid7

Steps to Integrate:

  1. Obtain product ARN from third-party documentation.
  2. Use CLI to enable:
aws securityhub enable-import-findings-for-product --product-arn arn:aws:securityhub:...
  1. Validate findings appear in the Findings section.

10. 🧠 Understanding Findings and Insights

🧾 What is a Finding?

A structured JSON object following AWS Security Finding Format (ASFF).

Key attributes:

  • Title, Description
  • Severity (Low/Medium/High/Critical)
  • Resources affected
  • Remediation recommendation

Example:

{
  "Title": "S3 Bucket Public Access",
  "Severity": { "Label": "High" },
  "Resources": [ { "Type": "AwsS3Bucket", "Id": "arn:aws:s3:::example-bucket" } ],
  "Remediation": {
    "Recommendation": {
      "Text": "Review bucket policy",
      "Url": "https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonS3/latest/userguide/access-control-block-public-access.html"
    }
  }
}

🔍 Insights

Use filters to create custom insights, e.g.:

  • All high-severity findings
  • Findings related to EC2
  • Findings older than 7 days

11. 📐 Using AWS Security Standards

🏗 CIS AWS Foundations Benchmark

  • 43 security configuration checks
  • Covers IAM, logging, monitoring, and networking

✅ AWS Foundational Security Best Practices

  • Covers EC2, S3, IAM, Lambda, RDS, and more

🧱 PCI DSS v3.2.1

  • Available in selected regions
  • Supports compliance reporting for payment environments

12. ⚙️ Automating Remediation with AWS Config & Lambda

📈 Step 1: Detect Non-Compliance with AWS Config

Set up custom rules or use managed ones.

🤖 Step 2: Trigger Remediation

Use EventBridge rule for auto-remediation.

Example: Automatically encrypt an unencrypted EBS volume.

  1. Create EventBridge rule:
{
  "source": ["aws.securityhub"],
  "detail-type": ["Security Hub Findings - Imported"],
  "detail": {
    "findings": {
      "ProductFields": {
        "aws/securityhub/FindingId": ["..."]
      }
    }
  }
}
  1. Trigger Lambda to remediate:
import boto3
def lambda_handler(event, context):
    ec2 = boto3.client('ec2')
    # Code to snapshot & encrypt volume

13. 🌐 Multi-Account & Multi-Region Configuration

Security Hub supports centralized management via AWS Organizations.

🏢 Steps:

  1. Enable Security Hub in master account.
  2. Go to Security Hub > Settings > Accounts.
  3. Add linked accounts.
  4. Configure EventBridge to forward findings from regions to the central account.

You can also use AWS Config aggregator for a consolidated view.

14. 🧬 Security Hub APIs and Automation

Use the API or CLI for:

  • Enabling/disabling
  • Fetching findings
  • Updating insight filters
  • Creating custom actions

Example: Get all high severity findings

aws securityhub get-findings \
  --filters '{"SeverityLabel": [{"Value": "HIGH", "Comparison": "EQUALS"}]}'

15. 📚 Real-World Use Cases

🛍 E-commerce Company

  • Uses Security Hub to monitor EC2, S3, and IAM
  • Auto-remediates public S3 buckets

🏢 Enterprise SaaS

  • Integrates Security Hub with Splunk for SIEM
  • Uses Lambda for on-call alerts

🏦 Financial Institution

  • Uses PCI compliance pack
  • Federated accounts via AWS Organizations

16. 📊 Monitoring and Reporting

  • Export findings to S3 for long-term storage
  • Send alerts via SNS
  • Visualize in QuickSight or Amazon Athena

You can use tools like Security Lake to aggregate logs across regions.

17. ✔️ Best Practices

  • Use least privilege for IAM roles
  • Enable multi-region aggregation
  • Regular

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