Kubernetes Cluster Security - Starting 2026 the Right Way 🛡️

Sooooo finally writing the first blog of 2026 — and what better topic to kick things off than Kubernetes cluster security.

Kubernetes has become the backbone of modern infrastructure. From startups to large enterprises, everyone is running workloads on Kubernetes. But with great power comes… well, a massive attack surface.

Security in Kubernetes isn’t optional anymore. It’s foundational.

Let’s break it down.

How to secure kubernetes cluster?

1. cluster and infrastructure security

• Restrict access to:
  • Kube-apiserver
  • etcd
• Never expose API server port to public internet.

Restrict global access port of API server.
Disable Anonymous auth:

--anonymous-auth=false

2. Authorization and Authentication

• RBAC

3. Pod and Container security

• Use pod security standards (PSS)

kubectl label ns prod pod-security.kubernetes.io/enforce=restricted

Restricted means:

• No privileged pods

• No hostPath

• No root user

• Run Containers as non-root user.

securityContext:
  runAsNonRoot: true
  readOnlyRootFilesystem: true

🚫 Disable dangerous settings:  

privileged: true
hostNetwork: true
hostPID: true

4. Image security

• Scan images ( Trivy )
• Example of image scan with trivy:

docker run -v /var/run/docker.sock:/var/run/docker.sock -v $HOME/Library/Caches:/root/.cache/ aquasec/trivy:0.68.2 image python:3.4-alpine

• This will show all the vulnerabilities of the image.

• Use Trusted registry with cosign

cosign verify myimage:1.0

5. Network Security

• Network policy
  • Deny Traffic and then explicitly allow traffic.
• Service Mesh istio

6. Secret Management

• Do not store secret in Plane YAML. instead of use kubernetes secrets.

kubectl create secret generic db-secret --from-literal=password=xyz

7. Runtime Security

• Use Runtime security tools ( Falco, Tetragon )
• Alert if shell executed inside container

8. Logging, Auditing & Monitoring

📜 Enable Audit Logs

--audit-log-path=/var/log/kube-apiserver.log

Track:

• Who deleted pod
• Who accessed secrets

Monitoring

• Prometheus
• Grafana
• Alertmanager

9. Kubernetes API Hardening

• Disable unused APIs
• Disable legacy auth

Use admission controllers:

• PodSecurity
• OPA Gatekeeper
• Kyverno

Example Kyverno policy:

require runAsNonRoot=true

10. Node Security

🔐 Harden nodes

• Minimal OS (COS, Bottlerocket)
• Regular patching
• Disable SSH where possible

 

In next Blog will see how to use Falco as a run time security.