On 22/08/2010, at 7:48 AM, Simon wrote:

> yeah, we've done a few of those self assement things, and we could answer yes 
> to everything with amazon.
> 
> i guess there is some confusion about cloud computing rather than pci 
> compliance. those questionnaires are all fussed about patching policies, root 
> access, firewalls etc. with amazon you get all of that. it's not this big 
> cloudy thing that you have zero control over..

You cannot possibly answer Yes to all the self assessment questions when 
exclusively using Amazon cloud services for card processing because a bunch of 
the questions are about the physical security of the data and unless Amazon can 
provide you with a guarantee of PCI compliance then you cannot answer Yes.

For example you cannot guarantee that an unscrupulous employee at amazon cannot 
access, intercept or otherwise alter any of your  "compliant" systems without 
detection because it involves physical (or virtual in this case) access and 
audit control guarantees that Amazon do not provide (in fact they explicitly 
state the exact opposite in the usage agreement).

To be compliant you would need to do your card processing elsewhere that can 
provide such a guarantee.

> Simon
> 
> On 21 August 2010 22:15, Miguel Arroz <[email protected]> wrote:
> Hi!
> 
>   PCI compliance is way more complex than simply passing the port-scan and 
> automated tests. I don't recall all the details, but you have to answer a 
> self-assessement form, and in that form I think they ask some stuff that 
> can't be answered "Yes" if you are using Amazon (or any other cloud service).
> 
>   On the other hand, some of those questions have a very vague 
> interpretation, and others are just plain stupid (like asking if you have an 
> anti-virus installed on all your company computers, or asking if you have a 
> proper configured firewall, whatever that means). I'm not defending PCI here, 
> just saying you can get burned.


That's what the compensating controls section is for. The questions have an 
underlying risk that they try to protect against. In the case of antivirus 
software, it is to prevent the surreptitious installation of malicious or 
otherwise unauthorised software on your systems. If you can provide this 
security by other means then you detail it as a compensating control.



-- 
Seeya...Q

Quinton Dolan - [email protected]
Gold Coast, QLD, Australia (GMT+10)




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