The adoption of Infrastructure as Code (IaC) tools —like the wildly popular Terraform— has revolutionized how platform engineering teams manage cloud resources. But in the process, it has also introduced new risks for them to contend with. 

IaC tools like Terraform offer platform engineers a better way to maintain control, security, and efficiency across sprawling digital environments. And today, according to recent data, organizations using Terraform for infrastructure provisioning reported a 75% reduction in security and compliance issues.

But nonetheless, misconfigurations, compliance violations, and runaway costs lurk behind every deployment. (And misconfigurations in cloud infrastructure were responsible for 19% of data breaches last year, with an average cost of $4.5 million per incident, according to IBM.) That’s where guardrails — protective measures that prevent unintended or harmful configurations— come into play most impactfully.

Here’s a look at how to implement guardrails in Terraform deployments, how they add value to your organization, and how to leverage Firefly to set up and manage those guardrails with ease.

Why Are Guardrails Necessary for Secure, Cost-Effective, and Compliant Cloud Infrastructure?

Guardrails are predefined policies and rules that enforce best practices and compliance standards during the deployment and management of cloud infrastructure using Terraform. And implementing them in your Terraform workflows helps automate compliance checks, reduce human error, and streamline the deployment process by catching issues early in the development cycle. Doing so also means you can address some of the top challenges platform engineers face when managing cloud infrastructure at scale, like security risks, compliance requirements, cost overrun concerns, and operational inefficiencies.

Guardrails address these challenges by automating compliance, preventing misconfigurations, optimizing costs, and enhancing visibility. (And if you didn't know, with Firefly, you can do it all from a single platform, including multi-cloud and multi-IaC visibility).

In practice, what does this mean for your team? A better way to ensure all deployments meet predefined standards without manual intervention. To catch and correct errors before they reach production. And to always have access to clear insights into infrastructure changes and their compliance status.

Still, implementing guardrails alone isn’t enough to guarantee success. It’s equally important to follow tried-and-true best practices, and to understand how the cloud infrastructure tools you invest in can make or break your ability to make the most of these guardrails.

‍Best Practices: 4 Types of Guardrails to Implement in Terraform Deployments

There’s no such thing as one best way to implement guardrails in your Terraform deployments. 

But it is important to know that you have the choice to implement various types of guardrails that can be implemented to safeguard your Terraform deployments, and that you can leverage them in tandem.

1. Policy Checks

Policy checks involve enforcing rules that ensure all infrastructure configurations comply with security standards, regulatory requirements, and organizational best practices. 

This could look like: ensuring resources like databases and storage buckets have proper encryption, access controls, and network configurations, or enforcing data residency, privacy, and protection standards. Policy checks also include adhering to organizational guidelines for resource configurations, naming conventions, and deployment strategies. 

What does this mean for your team? A reduced risk of breaches, simplified audition with automated checks, and consistent configurations across all your deployed resources. 

Our tips for implementation include making use of:

• Policy-as-Code tools like HashiCorp Sentinel or Open Policy Agent (OPA) to define and enforce policies programmatically.

• Integrated policy checks in CI/CD workflows to automatically validate configurations before deployment.

• Custom rule sets that cater to unique compliance and security requirements.

2. Cost Management

There’s a straightforward way to prevent overspending, optimize resource allocation, and offer transparency into financial planning and forecasting — and it’s top-of-mind for platform engineering teams everywhere.

Cost management guardrails focus on controlling and optimizing cloud expenditure by enforcing budgetary limits and monitoring resource utilization (like with cost alerts and notifications).

Our tips for implementation? Make use of:

• Cost estimation tools in the planning phase to predict and control expenses before deployment.

• Automated monitoring services to track real-time spending and resource utilization.

• Approval workflows for deployments that exceed certain cost thresholds to ensure oversight and accountability.

3. Tags Coverage

Tags coverage guardrails ensure that all resources are properly tagged and validated according to organizational standards, facilitating better management, tracking, and automation. In turn, this heightened standard results in enhanced automation and simplified reporting. 

Our tips for implementation? Make use of:

• Tagging standards documentation that’s available across the organization

• Scripts and tools that validate tags during the deployment process

• Automated remediation to correct or suggest fixes for tagging issues

4. Resource Enforcement

Resource enforcement guardrails control the creation, modification, and deletion of resources, ensuring that only authorized and appropriate changes are made to the infrastructure. They not only prevent unauthorized or harmful resource configurations that could compromise the system, but also help maintain regulatory compliance, operational stability and system reliability. 

Our tips for implementation? Make use of:

• Role-based access control (RBAC) to manage permissions for resource changes.

• Pre-deployment checks that validate resource configurations against predefined policies before deployment.

• Audit logging for all resource changes to improve monitoring and auditing
  
  

How Firefly Can Help Implement Guardrails Effectively

Setting up and managing guardrails without the right tools dooms you to a complex and time-consuming process. But with Firefly, that’s never the case.

As a comprehensive cloud asset management and governance platform, Firefly simplifies the implementation and management of guardrails across your Terraform deployments with:

• Unified Policy Management: Easily define, manage, and enforce policies across multiple cloud environments and services through a single interface.
• Automated Compliance Checks: Firefly automates the validation of configurations against your defined guardrails, providing real-time feedback and preventing non-compliant deployments.
• Cost Optimization Tools: Monitor and control cloud spending with integrated cost management features, including budget enforcement and cost anomaly detection.
• Comprehensive Tagging Solutions: Ensure consistent and accurate tagging across all resources with automated tagging enforcement and validation.
• Resource Control and Visibility: Gain complete visibility into your cloud assets and enforce resource configurations and access controls effectively.
• Seamless Integration: Firefly integrates smoothly with your existing CI/CD pipelines and DevOps workflows, enhancing efficiency without disrupting processes.
• Detailed Reporting and Alerts: Receive comprehensive reports and real-time alerts on compliance status, cost metrics, and resource changes, enabling proactive management and decision-making.

*NEW* Auto-Remediation with Firefly: Taking Guardrails to the Next Level

Tools like Firefly simplify the process of implementing guardrails in your Terraform deployments by providing robust, automated solutions that integrate seamlessly with your existing workflows. Our solution offers capabilities for not just detection but also automated resolution of issues. In turn, you can then focus on innovation and growth, while maintaining unshakable confidence in your infrastructure's integrity.

Here's how Firefly's auto-remediation works.

Step 1: Continuous Scanning

Firefly continuously scans your infrastructure and Terraform code for any violations of your defined guardrails.

Step 2: Issue Detection

When a non-compliant resource or configuration is detected, Firefly identifies the specific problem and its location in your IaC.

Step 3: Fixed IaC Generation 

Firefly automatically generates corrected Terraform code that addresses the identified issue while maintaining the intended functionality of your infrastructure.

Step 4: One-Click Remediation

Platform engineers can review the proposed changes and apply them with a single click, streamlining the remediation process.

Step 5: Version Control Integration:‍

The fixed IaC can be automatically committed to your version control system, maintaining a clear audit trail of changes.

Plus, over time, Firefly's auto-remediation scales effortlessly with your environment.

💡 Ready to enhance your Terraform deployments with effective guardrails? Try Firefly today, or request a demo to learn how Firefly can transform your cloud governance strategy.

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