AWS WAF

AWS WAF is a cloud-native web application firewall that helps protect web applications and APIs against common web exploits, bots, and application-layer vulnerabilities that can affect availability, compromise security, or consume excessive resources. Deployable seamlessly in front of Amazon CloudFront distributions, Application Load Balancers, Amazon API Gateway instances, and AWS AppSync GraphQL APIs, the service inspects HTTP and HTTPS traffic in real time and enforces customizable security rules.

The service incorporates AWS Managed Rules, a curated collection of rule groups maintained by AWS threat research teams and leading security partners, defending against OWASP Top 10 vulnerabilities like SQL injection, cross-site scripting (XSS), and common vulnerabilities and exposures (CVEs). AWS WAF also provides specialized Bot Control and Fraud Prevention rule groups that detect malicious automated bots, credential stuffing attacks, and account takeover attempts using advanced machine learning and browser telemetry verification. Organizations can author custom inspection rules based on IP addresses, HTTP headers, request bodies, URI paths, and rate limits. Traffic metrics and sampled web requests integrate with Amazon CloudWatch and Amazon Kinesis Data Firehose for comprehensive security analytics.

Primary enterprise use cases include web application vulnerability mitigation, automated bot and scraper mitigation, layer 7 rate limiting against denial-of-service attempts, fraud prevention for checkout and authentication portals, and regulatory compliance adherence for PCI DSS. By delivering granular application-layer protection at cloud scale, AWS WAF safeguards web assets effectively.