Google Cloud Platform is a set of Computing, Networking, Storage, Big Data, and Machine Learning services that runs on the same Cloud infrastructure that Google uses internally for its end-user products such as Search, Gmail, and Drive. It empowers users to compute, store data, and facilitate application development across web, mobile, and back-end solutions. Trusted by over four million applications, GCP efficiently handles data requests through fundamental commands, making it a dependable choice for cloud computing.
What Services do GCP Provide?
GCP provides services, including Big query, cloud storage/Buckets, cloud source repository, secret manager, cloud functions, cloud build, database, cloud scheduler, and log sink.
BigQuery
BigQuery is a cloud-based serverless, scalable data warehouse used for processing massive data sets. This relational database has the flexibility to carry out diverse algorithms and queries to tune tool set-up facts, create crash reports, and examine spam.
Cloud Source Repositories
Cloud-App Sources permit you to create, share, and access a benefit or an app and drag information from third-party apparatuses. It can be considered an individual Google Cloud git store.
Cloud Storage/Buckets
The Cloud Capacity service enables Google to store vast numbers of unchanging data objects in containers called buckets, each with a unique title associated with a specific project.
Secret Manager
Google provides a secure, centralized tool for storing sensitive data, including API keys, passwords, and certificates. This sensitive information is encrypted and accessible to authorized individuals.
Cloud Functions
Cloud Functions are agile, serverless solutions for developers to craft standalone functions that respond to cloud events with exceptional scalability and fault tolerance. They are perfect for serverless backends, real-time data processing, and smart app development.
Log Sink
Google log sinks efficiently route user-requested logs to various destinations in Cloud Logging, typically associated with Cloud projects, billing accounts, folders, and organizations. You can create, customize, and manage sinks through the Google Cloud console, Cloud Logging API, and Google Cloud CLI. Resources can be configured to route log entries to specific sinks as they’re generated. Proper permissions grant you control over sink creation, management, viewing, filtering, and authorization.
GCP Services Function in Auditing Data
Google Cloud offers comprehensive auditing tools for projects, permissions, financial data, and service accounts. These tools provide insights into project details, including timestamps, access logs, user lists, deletion events, data usage, and costs tied to specific service accounts.
You can also gain insights into data operations through DDL and DML queries in BigQuery tables and various databases like SQL, MySQL, PostgreSQL, and BigQuery. This simplifies tasks such as data manipulation and retrieval.
Google Cloud supports extensive data storage in Cloud Buckets, enabling seamless data routing from log sinks to BigQuery tables. Developers can efficiently manage code distribution and maintenance using the source repository.
Performing Audits on BigQuery Projects
BigQuery generates comprehensive audit logs, recording administrative and data access actions within your BigQuery project. These logs are accessible through the GCP Console or can be exported to BigQuery for further scrutiny.
To conduct audits on BigQuery projects, data must be retrieved from BigQuery datasets and tables, achievable through two methods: utilizing GCP APIs or leveraging BigQuery modules. Subsequently, this data can be analyzed to generate a comprehensive audit report.
The audit report encompasses vital information, including user access permissions, service account privileges, project counts, dataset details, table statistics, routines, job records, storage bucket insights, and specific query characteristics such as cost and type (DDL/DML)
Advantages of Auditing BigQuery Projects and Google Cloud Storage Utilizing GCP
Enhanced Security – You may track and access activities in your BigQuery projects and Google Cloud Storage by using auditing. You can discover possible security issues and take preventive action by spotting suspicious behavior or access attempts.
Compliance – Auditing can assist you in proving your adherence to legal obligations. You may make sure that your projects and storage adhere to security and privacy standards by creating audit logs and analyzing them.
Forensic Analysis – Auditing can assist you in performing forensic analysis to identify the origin and scope of a problem if you experience a problem, such as data loss or a security breach. This might assist you in finding and fixing security flaws or vulnerabilities.
Analysis of Usage and Performance – Auditing can assist you in keeping tabs on the performance and utilization of your BigQuery projects and Google Cloud Storage. By locating underutilized resources or inefficient access patterns, you can better utilize your resources and cut expenditures.
Increased Transparency – Auditing provides better transparency into activities in your BigQuery projects and Google Cloud Storage. By showcasing how data is accessible and used within your company, you may gain the trust of stakeholders.
Conclusion
GCP provides tools for monitoring and auditing BigQuery projects and Google Cloud Storage, ensuring data control, regulatory compliance, and technology utilization. It also facilitates mainframe workload migration, attracting diverse organizations, both small and large.
