• Cloud Armor: Protection against attacks.
• Cloud CDN: Content distribution optimization.
• Hybrid and private connectivity options.
• Cloud Code: Development and debugging of cloud applications.

In the digital age, it's not enough to store data or run Machine Learning models: modern organizations need to protect their infrastructure, ensure content delivery and facilitate agile application development.

Google Cloud Platform (GCP) not only offers storage and processing solutions, but it also provides a robust set of tools for networks, security and productivity for developers.

That's why we'll explore:

• How to protect applications against threats with Cloud Armor.
  
• How to optimize global content delivery with Cloud CDN.
  
• Options of hybrid and private connectivity to integrate local infrastructures with the cloud.
  
• How to simplify the development of modern applications with Cloud Code.
  

Security on GCP: Threat Protection with Cloud Armor

In an environment where cybersecurity threats are constant, strong defenses are essential.
Cloud Armor is the Google Cloud protection service that allows you to defend applications and services exposed to the Internet against a wide range of attacks.

What types of threats does Cloud Armor help mitigate?

One of the most common threats it protects is Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack.

• What is a DDoS attack?
  A DDoS attack occurs when multiple distributed systems flood a server or network with fake traffic, overwhelming its capacity and rendering it inoperable for legitimate users.
  The goal is to cause interruptions, economic losses and reputational damage.
  
  

Cloud Armor defends against attacks at different levels of the OSI model:

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Web Application Firewall (WAF)

Cloud Armor also includes a WAF (Web Application Firewall).

• What is a WAF?
  
  Un WAF (Web Application Firewall) acts as a filter that inspects all the HTTP/HTTPS traffic that reaches a web application. Its goal is to detect and block malicious requests before they reach your backend. This includes common attacks such as:

SQL injection: attacks that attempt to manipulate database queries using fields such as forms or parameters in URLs.

Cross-site scripting (XSS): malicious code injected into pages that is then executed in the user's browser.

Manipulating HTTP headers or vulnerable fields in web forms.

Cloud Armor includes a set of WAF rules preconfigured by Google, based on the set of good practices and standards known by the OWASP (Open Web Application Security Project). These rules detect attack patterns without the developer having to write rules from scratch.

This means that even without being an expert in cybersecurity, you can protect your web application with a set of up-to-date defenses, maintained by Google and adjustable to the needs of your architecture.

Integration with GCP Load Balancers

Cloud Armor integrates natively with Global Load Balancers from Google.

• What is a Load Balancer?
  A Load Balancer automatically distributes incoming traffic across multiple servers or instances to balance load and ensure high availability.
  

In GCP, the Global Load Balancer allows you to distribute HTTP (S) traffic across multiple regions of the world, improving resilience and performance.

With Cloud Armor, you can apply security rules directly at the Load Balancer level before traffic even reaches your backend. This means that attacks can be blocked long before they consume internal resources.

Cloud Armor Benefits

• Planetary-scale DDoS protection: Cloud Armor benefits from Google's global threat intelligence network, known as Google Threat Intelligence. This network analyzes traffic patterns and malicious activities collected through services such as Search, Gmail, YouTube and Android. Thanks to this, Cloud Armor can automatically block malicious IPs in real time, before they reach your infrastructure.
  This represents the same layer of defense that protects Google's global products, now available for any application deployed on Google Cloud.
  
• Granular control: filters traffic based on IPs, geolocation, HTTP, URL patterns and more.
  
• Automation: automatic alerts and adaptability to emerging attack patterns.
  
• Easy integration: it is activated directly on the Load Balancer rules without the need for additional infrastructure.
  

Example use case:

An e-commerce store launches on Black Friday and experiences a peak of traffic. Cloud Armor automatically filters fraudulent requests and protects your site from crashes due to overload.

Content Delivery Optimization: Cloud CDN

For global users, the loading speed of a site or application is critical. Cloud CDN (Content Delivery Network) Google accelerates content delivery static and dynamic, significantly reducing latency when serving resources from locations close to the user.

• In the case of static content (such as images, CSS files, JavaScript, documents, videos), Cloud CDN the Cache optimally at globally distributed points of presence. This allows heavier resources not to be requested from the backend every time, saving time and network costs.
  
• For dynamic content, although by nature it tends to change more between requests, you can also benefit from using Cloud CDN if a suitable strategy is applied. For example, configuring custom cache control headers it is possible to specify exactly what types of responses can be temporarily stored and for how long. Thus, it is possible to cache only what is truly reusable between different users or sessions, such as fragments of pages or results with temporary validity.

Cloud CDN benefits:

• Latency reduction: Thanks to Google's infrastructure, content is served from locations close to the user (more than 130 locations worldwide).
  
• Bandwidth cost savings: By serving cached content, the transfer of data between your origin servers and users is reduced.
  
• Native compatibility: It easily integrates with GCP's global Load Balancer.
  
• Automatic SSL certificates: It ensures secure deliveries without manual certificate management.
  

Example use case:

A video streaming application can use Cloud CDN to cache video fragments and serve them quickly to users on different continents, improving the user experience and reducing costs.

Connectivity Options: Hybrid and Private

Not all organizations migrate all of their services to the cloud right away. Many companies manage hybrid environments where some of the infrastructure remains in their local data centers (on-premises) while other services operate on Google Cloud.
For this, GCP offers different ways to connect in a way secure, private and efficient local environments with the cloud.

Why is hybrid connectivity important?

Hybrid connectivity is key because not all organizations migrate completely to the cloud right away, so solutions of this type ensure operational continuity while also adding the following benefits:

• Keep legacy systems integrated with modern services
  
• Comply with regulatory requirements that require control over certain data or services.
  
• Minimize latency between local systems and cloud loads.
  
• Facilitate gradual migrations to the cloud.
  

Available options in GCP:

VPN (Virtual Private Network)

• It uses standard IPsec tunnels to encrypt communications.
  
• It's a good option to get started with hybrid connectivity quickly.
  
• The bandwidth depends on the quality of the available Internet link.
  

Dedicated Interconnect

• It consists of physical cables that connect the customer's datacenter to Google Cloud at an Interconnect location.
  
• It offers 10 or 100 Gbps links with redundancy included.
  
• Ideal for replicated databases, mass backups, video streaming, or heavy analytical loads.
  

Interconnect partners

• Similar to Dedicated, but the connection is made through a certified partner.
  
• It allows speeds from 50 Mbps to 50 Gbps.
  
• More flexible if your datacenter isn't close to a physical Google location.
  

Direct Peering

• Connect your network directly to Google in strategic locations without using the public Internet.

Carrier Peering

• Connect through telecommunications providers that already have direct links with Google.
  

Private Service Connect

• It not only connects networks, but also services (such as Cloud SQL, Vertex AI APIs) directly within your private network.
  
• It is used to ensure that critical services don't rely on the public Internet to communicate.
  
  

Example of hybrid architecture:

A banking company could use:

• Dedicated Interconnect for critical data traffic between your main datacenter and GCP.
  
• VPN as a secondary backup in the event of an Interconnect failure.
  
• Private Service Connect to access services such as Cloud SQL without ever leaving your sensitive data on the public Internet.
  

Benefits of GCP Connectivity Options

• Low latency and high performance: optimized connections to minimize distance and network hops.
  
• Improved security: encrypted or completely private communication, avoiding unnecessary exposure to the public Internet.
  
• Deployment flexibility: variety of options that adapt to different company sizes and traffic needs.
  
• Built-in redundancy: possibility of high availability configurations to avoid single points of failure.
  
• Predictable cost: especially with Dedicated Interconnect, where transfer costs are lower than over the Internet.
  
  

Developer Tools: Cloud Code

Development in the modern cloud must be agile, automated, and deeply integrated with the platforms that host the applications.
Cloud Code is the Google Cloud toolset designed to improve the development experience, allowing you to create, debug, test and deploy applications directly from the most popular development environments (IDEs).

What exactly is Cloud Code?

Cloud Code provides extensions for IDEs that allow developers to work on applications that will run on Google Cloud, much more smoothly. It automates repetitive tasks, makes it easy to connect to services in GCP, and offers ready-to-use configurations in environments such as Kubernetes, Cloud Run, App Engine and Cloud Functions.

Key Cloud Code capabilities:

What Google Cloud services can I easily use from Cloud Code?

• Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE): Container deployment and management
  
• Cloud Run: Creation of serverless microservices.
  
• App Engine: Scalable platform-as-a-service (PaaS) applications.
  
• Cloud Functions: Serverless event-driven functions.
  
• Secret Manager, Cloud SQL, Pub/Sub, and more.
  

Practical examples of using Cloud Code:

• A technology startup create a backend in Flask, dockerize it, test it locally on Minikube, and deploy GKE without leaving VSCode using Cloud Code.
  
• An e-commerce team develops microservices in Node.js, monitors log consumption and performs live debugging on a Kubernetes cluster using Cloud Code plugins.
  
• A media company create and deploy serverless functions in Cloud Functions directly from IntelliJ IDEA to process images uploaded by users.
  
  

Benefits of Cloud Code

• Higher productivity: It automates tedious configuration and deployment tasks.
  
• Accelerated Development: Templates, snippets and wizards optimize project start time.
  
• Shorter learning curve: Ideal for developers who are just migrating to the cloud or Kubernetes.
  
• Easier debugging: You can test locally or against real GCP environments without complicated manual changes.
  
• Improve delivery quality: Native integration with GCP CI/CD tools encourages good DevOps practices.

Conclusion

Network, security and productivity infrastructure for developers is a fundamental pillar in the Google Cloud Platform value proposition.
Through services such as Cloud Armor and Cloud CDN, GCP not only protects applications against large scale threats and attacks, but it also optimizes content delivery, ensuring fast and secure experiences for users around the world.

La hybrid and private connectivity allows organizations to integrate their on-premise environments with the cloud in a flexible and secure way, adapting to any stage of cloud adoption and reducing operational complexity.

For its part, Cloud Code democratizes cloud development, bringing the power of GCP closer to the daily work environments of developers. It facilitates the creation, testing, debugging and deployment of modern applications, reducing friction and accelerating the delivery time of new functionality.

With this combination of robust security, optimized global networks and agile development tools, Google Cloud not only responds to today's cloud computing challenges, but it also equips companies and developers to build scalable, resilient and innovative solutions for the future.

Does your company need to strengthen its digital infrastructure, accelerate deployments and improve security? 👉 Contact us and we'll help you get the most out of Google Cloud.