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Software‐defined networking security for private data center networks and clouds: Vulnerabilities, attacks, countermeasures, and solutions
Author(s) -
Abdelrahman Abdallah Mustafa,
Rodrigues Joel J. P. C.,
Mahmoud Mukhtar M. E.,
Saleem Kashif,
Das Ashok Kumar,
Korotaev Valery,
Kozlov Sergei A.
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
international journal of communication systems
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.344
H-Index - 49
eISSN - 1099-1131
pISSN - 1074-5351
DOI - 10.1002/dac.4706
Subject(s) - computer science , software defined networking , cloud computing , computer security , denial of service attack , cloud computing security , computer network , data center , networking hardware , openflow , network security , operating system , the internet
Summary Software‐defined networking (SDN) is an agile, modern networking approach that facilitates innovations in the networking paradigm. The abstracted and centralized network operating system facilitates the network management and reduces operational expenditure (OPEX). The open nature and simplicity of the data‐forwarding plane dramatically reduces capital expenditure (CAPEX) by leveraging commodity servers and switches. SDN also lends itself very well to address major cloud computing issues and complement cloud services, especially in terms of network virtualization and networking as a service (NaaS). As a new technology, SDN does involve certain security challenges, which include distributed denial of service (DDoS) threats, build and run time injected malware, insider (tenant) attacks, and security holes resulting from controller misconfigurations. These are severe threats that can cripple an entire network. It is crucial to address the SDN vulnerabilities to ensure its successful deployment in private data center networks, on cloud platforms and beyond. Some security solutions leverage the built‐in features of SDN, such as its controller software component, while other solutions provide external SDN applications running above the controller. This study reviews the security solutions for the vulnerabilities of state‐of‐the‐art SDN controllers and the available countermeasures. Furthermore, an in‐depth analysis of the SDN features that support security is presented, and some unresolved research issues on SDN controllers are identified.