Organizational Security
Organizational security in Google Cloud focuses on enforcing guardrails, reducing risk, and improving overall security posture. Security is most effective when it is implemented early and applied consistently across the organization.
Two foundational components of organizational security are organization policies and Security Command Center.
Organization policies
Organization policies define compliance guardrails that control how resources can be created and used.
Policies can be applied at multiple levels:
- Organization
- Folder
- Subfolder
- Project
Policies are inherited top down by default. The effective policy applied to a resource is the combination of policies inherited from parents and policies defined locally.
Recommended organization policies
Some organization policies are strongly recommended to be applied at the organization level.
Disable external IP addresses
Disabling external IP addresses on virtual machines reduces the attack surface by preventing direct internet exposure.
Domain restricted sharing
Domain restricted sharing ensures that IAM access is granted only to identities from approved domains. This prevents accidental sharing with external accounts.
Skip default network creation
Skipping default network creation avoids automatically creating subnets in all regions and prevents overly permissive firewall rules such as open SSH and RDP access.
Applying these policies at the organization level establishes strong security baselines.
Managing organization policies
Managing organization policies requires the IAM Organization Policy Administrator role. Policies should be reviewed and updated regularly to align with security and compliance requirements.
Security Command Center
Security Command Center provides centralized visibility into security risks and threats across Google Cloud environments.
It helps organizations prevent, detect, and respond to security issues using a single unified view.
Core capabilities
Security Command Center provides several core capabilities.
- Asset and resource inventory across all projects
- Detection of misconfigurations and vulnerabilities
- Threat detection including malware and data exfiltration
- Compliance reporting against industry benchmarks
Security Command Center tiers
Security Command Center is available in two tiers.
Standard tier
The Standard tier is included at no cost and provides asset visibility and detection of high risk misconfigurations.
Premium tier
The Premium tier provides advanced threat detection, compliance monitoring, and automated security insights.
Foundation security setup
As part of foundation setup, organizations typically:
- Enable recommended organization policies
- Enable Security Command Center
- Grant required roles automatically during setup
These steps establish centralized visibility and consistent security enforcement.
Outcome
Strong organizational security provides protection, visibility, and confidence. By enforcing guardrails and enabling centralized security services, organizations can reduce risk, meet compliance needs, and securely scale their Google Cloud environments.