Cilium Dashboard
You set up a cilium dashboard by enabling the Hubble UI on your cluster. This web view draws live network maps and traffic logs from kernel data. Most teams start by opening a local port to view the web screen. That quick method works for one person on a test setup. When whole teams share cluster roles to open ports, problems appear fast. Broad cluster roles let users run more than a simple port check. Users with wide roles can change network rules or read private secrets. How the cilium dashb
Cilium Network Policies + GitLab Security Dashboard: the complete guide
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You set up a cilium dashboard by enabling the Hubble UI on your cluster. This web view draws live network maps and traffic logs from kernel data. Most teams start by opening a local port to view the web screen. That quick method works for one person on a test setup. When whole teams share cluster roles to open ports, problems appear fast. Broad cluster roles let users run more than a simple port check. Users with wide roles can change network rules or read private secrets.
How the cilium dashboard architecture works
The cilium dashboard relies on Hubble to gather and show traffic flows. Cilium runs an agent on every node inside your Kubernetes cluster. Each agent uses Linux kernel hooks to watch packets move between pods. Hubble reads these flow events directly from the local node agents. A central relay service then pulls flow logs from all nodes at once. The web screen asks this relay for data and draws the service map.
To reach the screen, engineers either forward a port or set up ingress. Port forwarding uses standard cluster roles to open a local tunnel. Ingress routing puts the web screen behind an external load balancer and login page. Both paths need clear Kubernetes role rules to keep cluster data safe. You must map user groups to read-only roles inside the target namespace. Without strict namespace roles, any viewer might edit active network drop rules.
What native setup solves and where gaps remain
Native cluster roles and ingress logins control who opens the web view. They stop random outside users from seeing your internal service map. Role bindings also group users by team so you can limit namespace views. This setup works well when engineers only look at the browser screen.
Still, visual maps alone do not fix broken network paths or dropped packets. Once an engineer spots a blocked flow, they need cluster terminal sessions. They run command tools to inspect pod state, node logs, or database rows. Native cluster roles only check who logs in at the start of a session. They do not inspect what individual commands or queries run in flight. An engineer with repair rights can still run a bad delete command. Broad role assignments also expose raw emails, phone numbers, or card numbers in payloads. Standard cluster roles cannot mask those fields in live terminal results.
Cilium Network Policies + GitLab Security Dashboard: architecture patterns and best practices
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Managing cluster roles for network views
Good role design splits view rights from edit rights across every cluster. Give your on-call team read-only rights for the Hubble namespace only. Do not bind cluster-wide admin roles just to let people forward ports. When engineers must run live commands to fix a network drop, scope them down. Limit their role to the exact namespace and pod group under review. Keep audit logs of every command run during a live fix session. Review these logs each week to spot unused roles and tighten rules.
Govern statements and responses across databases and APIs
Good config and scoped roles are needed setup. They do not check single queries in flight or mask sensitive fields in returned rows. Across Postgres, MySQL, SQL Server, MongoDB, ClickHouse, Kubernetes APIs, SSH, and internal HTTP endpoints, hoop.dev runs beside each supported service as an open-source proxy, a sidecar for your database or API.
First, hoop.dev guardrails block banned queries before they run. Then hoop.dev data masking rewrites matched sensitive values in responses in memory. The audit trail records every statement and verdict per resource. Furthermore, hoop.dev holds SOC 2 Type II and is open source on GitHub.
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between Cilium and Hubble UI?
Cilium is the networking tool that moves and filters packets between cluster pods. Hubble UI is the visual screen that draws maps from Cilium flow data.
Do I need cluster admin rights to view the service map?
No, you do not need full admin rights to see the service map. You only need a role that allows reading pods and forwarding the UI port.
Does the network map store historical traffic logs forever?
No, the default setup keeps recent flow events in a small memory buffer. To keep old logs for months, you must export flows to external storage.