From Firewalls to eBPF: How Cloud-Native Security Is Being Rewritten

Cloud-native architectures have fundamentally changed how software is built—but security models are still catching up. Firewalls, perimeter defenses, and IP-based controls were never designed for ephemeral workloads, service-to-service communication, or zero-trust environments. As a result, security has become increasingly complex, brittle, and misaligned with how modern platforms actually operate.

This session explores a paradigm shift in cloud-native security, driven by open-source technologies like eBPF. By moving security controls closer to the Linux kernel, eBPF enables a new class of identity-aware, observable, and high-performance security primitives—without sidecars, proxies, or performance penalties.

We’ll examine how projects such as Cilium are redefining networking, security, and observability as a unified platform capability rather than an afterthought. Through real-world enterprise examples, this talk highlights how organizations are transitioning from perimeter-based thinking to workload-centric, intent-driven security models that scale with modern platforms.

Attendees will gain a forward-looking understanding of:

Why legacy security abstractions no longer work in cloud-native systems

How eBPF is reshaping the security stack from the kernel up

What this shift means for platform engineering, DevOps, and security roles

Where the open-source ecosystem is headed next

This session is a call to rethink cloud security, not as layered controls bolted on top of platforms, but as a native capability of the platform itself.