How does East-West Traffic Control respond to traffic incidents?

East-West Traffic Control refers to the management and monitoring of network traffic between servers or systems within a data center or cloud environment, as opposed to North-South traffic (external client-server communication). It responds to traffic incidents by detecting anomalies, enforcing policies, and mitigating threats in real-time.

Key Mechanisms:

1. Traffic Monitoring & Anomaly Detection: Tools analyze internal traffic patterns to identify unusual spikes, unauthorized connections, or suspicious behavior. For example, if a server suddenly starts sending excessive data to another internal node, it may indicate a compromised system or lateral movement attack.
2. Policy Enforcement: Predefined rules (e.g., microsegmentation) restrict communication between workloads. If an incident is detected, the system can block or quarantine the affected traffic. For instance, a database server might only allow queries from a specific application server; any other connection attempt is denied.
3. Threat Mitigation: Automated responses like rate limiting, rerouting, or isolating compromised nodes prevent escalation. For example, if a container exhibits malicious activity, the control system can pause or terminate it.

Example: In a cloud-based e-commerce platform, East-West Traffic Control detects unusual API calls between payment and inventory services during off-hours. It automatically isolates the payment service, logs the incident, and alerts security teams for investigation.

Tencent Cloud Solution: Tencent Cloud’s Tencent Cloud Network Security (TCNS) and Microsegmentation features help enforce East-West traffic policies, while Cloud Workload Protection (CWP) monitors and responds to anomalies in real-time.