Vulnerabilities and mitigation techniques toning in the cloud: A cost and vulnerabilities coverage optimization approach using Cuckoo search algorithm with Lévy flights

Information and Communication Technology (ICT) security issues have been a major concern for decades. Today's ICT infrastructure faces sophisticated attacks using combinations of multiple vulnerabilities to penetrate networks with devastating impact. With the recent rise of cloud computing as a new utility computing paradigm, organizations have been considering it as a viable option to outsource major IT services in order to cut costs. Some organizations have opted for a private or hybrid cloud to take advantage of the emerging technologies and services. However, ICT security issues have to be appropriately mitigated. This research proposes a cloud security framework and an approach for vulnerabilities coverage and cost optimization using Cuckoo search algorithm with Lévy flights as random walks. The objective is to mitigate an identified set of vulnerabilities using a selected set of techniques when minimizing cost and maximizing coverage. The results show that Cloud Computing providers and organizations implementing cloud technology within their premises can effectively balance IT security coverage and cost using the proposed approach.