A hybrid model integrating zero trust principles and blockchain technology for cloud environment

The use of cloud computing is central to IT systems today because it provides the best balance between flexibility, scalability, and low-cost data management. Nevertheless, because of its spread-out data storage and resource sharing, security for multi-tenant environments is especially difficult when using traditional edge security models. Systems that rely on fixed trust limits aren’t well matched to the changing, flow-of-control, and sometimes unclear world of the cloud. As a result, Zero Trust Networking (ZTN) has become a popular way to secure networks with the principle of not trusting and always verifying. Through ZTN, experts assume dangers can arrive from either inside or outside the network and therefore focus on ongoing verification, strict control of who can access systems, and dividing networks into smaller parts as a defense. Meanwhile, blockchain is proving its ability to maintain data integrity and trust among decentralized users. Because it records all transactions on an unchangeable, understandable, and safe platform, blockchain allows full and fair auditing with decentralized control, suitable for following Zero Trust principles. In this paper, a new security model has been proposed that helps cloud computing services to meet the security needs. The proposed model uses zero trust networking with blockchain technology to enhance security in the cloud environment. Furthermore, the security has been analyzed by considering parameters like confidentiality, integrity, non-repudiation, and insider threats. Also, the performance of the proposed model has been analyzed on the basis of access accuracy, security threat mitigation, trust score acceptance rate, and throughput.