Security assessment of OpenStack cloud using outside and inside software tools

Companies wanting to enjoy the benefits of cloud computing are having the option to use the services of a public cloud (i.e. Google cloud, Amazon EC2, Microsoft Azure) or to make their own private cloud infrastructure. Public clouds are using proprietary cloud software and security is usually maintained by issuing companies. For private clouds the security remains a concern. There are many elements that cloud affect the cloud integrity and because the security is maintained by a third party, misconfiguration could arise. The current study performs a security analysis for private cloud solution OpenStack Pike version from outside and as well from inside the cloud using the best security scan software for this purpose: Nessus, Metasploit and OpenVAS. Inside the cloud are installed 4 virtual machines with different operating systems. The experiment also checks the hypervisor-based virtual machines isolation. The study concludes about the security threats found on multi-tenant environment on and provides concrete solutions for each situation and how to address them using patches or appropriate alternative solutions.