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2099 01 Requirements 67524d38

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![Step](https://img.shields.io/badge/Step-1-blue?style=for-the-badge) ![Status](https://img.shields.io/badge/Status-Complete-green?style=for-the-badge) ![Agent](https://img.shields.io/badge/Agent-Requirements-purple?style=for-the-badge) <details open> <summary><strong>๐Ÿ“‘ Requirements Overview</strong></summary> - [๐ŸŽฏ Project Overview](#-project-overview) - [๐Ÿš€ Functional Requirements](#-functional-requirements) - [โšก Non-Functional Requirements (NFRs)](#-non-functional-requirements-nfrs) - [๐Ÿ”’...

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SKILL.md
# ๐Ÿ“‹ Step 1: Requirements - pci-dss-gw

![Step](https://img.shields.io/badge/Step-1-blue?style=for-the-badge)
![Status](https://img.shields.io/badge/Status-Complete-green?style=for-the-badge)
![Agent](https://img.shields.io/badge/Agent-Requirements-purple?style=for-the-badge)

<details open>
<summary><strong>๐Ÿ“‘ Requirements Overview</strong></summary>

- [๐ŸŽฏ Project Overview](#-project-overview)
- [๐Ÿš€ Functional Requirements](#-functional-requirements)
- [โšก Non-Functional Requirements (NFRs)](#-non-functional-requirements-nfrs)
- [๐Ÿ”’ Compliance & Security Requirements](#-compliance--security-requirements)
- [๐Ÿ’ฐ Budget](#-budget)
- [๐Ÿ”ง Operational Requirements](#-operational-requirements)
- [๐ŸŒ Regional Preferences](#-regional-preferences)
- [๐Ÿ“‹ Summary for Architecture Assessment](#-summary-for-architecture-assessment)
- [References](#references)

</details>

> Generated by @requirements agent | 2026-02-09

| โฌ…๏ธ Previous | ๐Ÿ“‘ Index            | Next โžก๏ธ                                                        |
| ----------- | ------------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------- |
| โ€”           | [README](README.md) | [02-architecture-assessment.md](02-architecture-assessment.md) |

---

## ๐ŸŽฏ Project Overview

### Business Context

| Attribute        | Value                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 |
| ---------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| **Project Name** | pci-dss-gw                                                                                                                                                                                                                            |
| **Industry**     | Financial Services โ€” Payment Processing                                                                                                                                                                                               |
| **Company Size** | Enterprise (500+) _(assumption โ€” validate)_                                                                                                                                                                                           |
| **System Type**  | Payment Gateway โ€” high-throughput transaction processing                                                                                                                                                                              |
| **Scenario**     | Greenfield                                                                                                                                                                                                                            |
| **Description**  | A highly available payment gateway processing 10,000 transactions per second (TPS). The system must meet PCI-DSS compliance requirements and provide sub-second latency for payment authorization, capture, and settlement workflows. |

### Stakeholders

| Role                     | Responsibility                             | Notes               |
| ------------------------ | ------------------------------------------ | ------------------- |
| Product Owner            | Business requirements, acceptance criteria | _(To be confirmed)_ |
| Security/Compliance Lead | PCI-DSS audit readiness, security controls | _(To be confirmed)_ |
| Platform Engineering     | Azure infrastructure, deployment pipelines | _(To be confirmed)_ |
| DevOps / SRE             | Monitoring, incident response, runbooks    | _(To be confirmed)_ |

### Workload Pattern

| Attribute             | Value                                                                                                                                                                                                     |
| --------------------- | --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| **Pattern**           | Container (Enterprise Tier)                                                                                                                                                                               |
| **Justification**     | User specified ACA/AKS compute; 10k TPS throughput requires container orchestration with horizontal scaling. PCI-DSS CDE isolation is best achieved via dedicated node pools and network policies in AKS. |
| **Detection Signals** | "payment gateway", "10,000 TPS", "containers", "AKS/ACA", "PostgreSQL", "Cosmos DB"                                                                                                                       |

---

## ๐Ÿš€ Functional Requirements

### Core Capabilities

| ID    | Requirement                                                        | Priority | Notes                                                 |
| ----- | ------------------------------------------------------------------ | -------- | ----------------------------------------------------- |
| FR-01 | Process payment authorization requests at 10,000 TPS sustained     | P0       | Peak capacity should target 15,000 TPS _(assumption)_ |
| FR-02 | Support payment capture and settlement workflows                   | P0       | Batch settlement window TBD                           |
| FR-03 | Provide idempotent transaction processing (exactly-once semantics) | P0       | Critical for financial accuracy                       |
| FR-04 | Expose RESTful API endpoints for payment operations                | P0       | OpenAPI 3.x specification                             |
| FR-05 | Store transaction records in PostgreSQL with full ACID compliance  | P0       | Primary persistent store                              |
| FR-06 | Use Cosmos DB for distributed session state and caching            | P1       | Low-latency reads for token/session lookup            |
| FR-07 | Support webhook notifications for async payment events             | P1       | Event-driven notification to merchants                |
| FR-08 | Implement retry and dead-letter queue for failed transactions      | P0       | Azure Service Bus for messaging                       |
| FR-09 | Provide health check and readiness endpoints                       | P0       | Kubernetes liveness/readiness probes                  |
| FR-10 | Support API versioning for backward compatibility                  | P1       | URL path or header-based versioning                   |

### Integration Points

| System                         | Direction | Protocol     | Notes                              |
| ------------------------------ | --------- | ------------ | ---------------------------------- |
| Card Networks (Visa, MC, etc.) | Outbound  | HTTPS/mTLS   | PCI-DSS encrypted channels         |
| Merchant Systems               | Inbound   | REST API     | OAuth 2.0 / API key authentication |
| Banking / Settlement           | Outbound  | SFTP / HTTPS | Batch settlement files             |
| Monitoring (Azure Monitor)     | Internal  | OTLP / SDK   | Distributed tracing, metrics       |

> [!NOTE]
> External integration details (card network endpoints, banking protocols) are assumptions and must be validated with the integration team.

---

## โšก Non-Functional Requirements (NFRs)

### Performance

| Metric                     | Target                    | Measurement                          |
| -------------------------- | ------------------------- | ------------------------------------ |
| **Throughput**             | 10,000 TPS sustained      | Requests per second at load balancer |
| **Peak Throughput**        | 15,000 TPS _(assumption)_ | 1.5ร— sustained for burst handling    |
| **P50 Latency**            | โ‰ค 100 ms                  | End-to-end API response time         |
| **P99 Latency**            | โ‰ค 500 ms                  | Tail latency under sustained load    |
| **P99.9 Latency**          | โ‰ค 1,000 ms                | Extreme tail during peak             |
| **Database Query Latency** | โ‰ค 20 ms (P95)             | PostgreSQL read/write operations     |
| **Cosmos DB Latency**      | โ‰ค 10 ms (P99)             | Session/cache reads                  |

### Availability & Reliability

| Metric                | Target                            | Notes                                          |
| --------------------- | --------------------------------- | ---------------------------------------------- |
| **SLA Target**        | 99.99% (โ‰ˆ 4.3 min downtime/month) | Financial-grade availability                   |
| **RTO**               | โ‰ค 30 minutes                      | Recovery Time Objective                        |
| **RPO**               | โ‰ค 5 minutes                       | Recovery Point Objective (near-zero data loss) |
| **Failover**          | Automatic                         | Active-passive with geo-redundant database     |
| **Health Monitoring** | Real-time                         | Sub-minute alerting on degradation             |

> [!IMPORTANT]
> 99.99% SLA requires zone-redundant deployments across availability zones and careful SLA composition of all dependent services. AKS with availability zones + zone-redundant PostgreSQL Flexible Server achieves this.

### Scalability

| Dimension                      | Approach                                             | Notes                                    |
| ------------------------------ | ---------------------------------------------------- | ---------------------------------------- |
| **Horizontal Pod Autoscaling** | CPU/memory + custom metrics (TPS)                    | KEDA for event-driven scaling            |
| **Database Scaling**           | PostgreSQL: read replicas; Cosmos DB: autoscale RU/s | Read-heavy cache offloaded to Cosmos DB  |
| **Cluster Scaling**            | AKS cluster autoscaler (min 3 โ†’ max 20 nodes)        | _(Node count assumption โ€” validate)_     |
| **Connection Pooling**         | PgBouncer sidecar or Azure-native pooling            | Prevent connection exhaustion at 10k TPS |

### Data Requirements

| Attribute                    | Value                                                         |
| ---------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------- |
| **Data Classification**      | PCI DSS Level 1 (cardholder data)                             |
| **Retention โ€” Transactions** | 7 years _(regulatory requirement โ€” validate)_                 |
| **Retention โ€” Logs**         | 1 year minimum (PCI-DSS ยง 10.7)                               |
| **Encryption at Rest**       | AES-256 (Azure platform encryption + CMK for cardholder data) |
| **Encryption in Transit**    | TLS 1.2+ mandatory on all channels                            |
| **Data Residency**           | EU (Sweden / Germany)                                         |

---

## ๐Ÿ”’ Compliance & Security Requirements

### Compliance Frameworks

| Framework         | Status        | Scope                                  | Notes                                             |
| ----------------- | ------------- | -------------------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------- |
| **PCI-DSS v4.0**  | **Mandatory** | Full CDE (Cardholder Data Environment) | Level 1 merchant/processor โ€” annual ROC audit     |
| **SOC 2 Type II** | Recommended   | Trust Services Criteria                | Security, Availability, Processing Integrity      |
| **GDPR**          | Mandatory     | EU data residency, data subject rights | swedencentral primary region ensures EU residency |

### PCI-DSS Specific Controls

| PCI-DSS Requirement                       | Azure Implementation                                                              | Priority |
| ----------------------------------------- | --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | -------- |
| **Req 1**: Network segmentation           | AKS network policies + NSGs, dedicated CDE subnet, Azure Firewall                 | P0       |
| **Req 2**: No vendor defaults             | Hardened container images, CIS benchmarks, no default credentials                 | P0       |
| **Req 3**: Protect stored cardholder data | Encryption at rest (CMK), tokenization, data masking in non-prod                  | P0       |
| **Req 4**: Encrypt transmission           | TLS 1.2+ enforced, mTLS for service-to-service, no public endpoints for data tier | P0       |
| **Req 5**: Anti-malware                   | Microsoft Defender for Containers, image vulnerability scanning                   | P0       |
| **Req 6**: Secure development             | Container image scanning (Trivy/Defender), no known CVEs in prod                  | P0       |
| **Req 7**: Restrict access (need-to-know) | Azure RBAC, Kubernetes RBAC, PIM for admin access                                 | P0       |
| **Req 8**: Identify & authenticate        | Entra ID + managed identity, MFA enforced, no shared accounts                     | P0       |
| **Req 9**: Physical access                | Azure datacenter controls (Microsoft responsibility)                              | N/A      |
| **Req 10**: Logging & monitoring          | Azure Monitor + Log Analytics, 1-year log retention, tamper-proof audit           | P0       |
| **Req 11**: Regular testing               | Penetration testing, vulnerability scanning, Azure Load Testing                   | P0       |
| **Req 12**: Security policy               | Documented InfoSec policy, incident response plan                                 | P1       |

### Security Controls

| Control                      | Implementation                                                              | Notes                                               |
| ---------------------------- | --------------------------------------------------------------------------- | --------------------------------------------------- |
| **Identity**                 | Entra ID with managed identity for all service-to-service auth              | No passwords or connection strings in code          |
| **Secrets Management**       | Azure Key Vault (Premium SKU for HSM)                                       | PCI-DSS requires HSM for cryptographic keys         |
| **Network Isolation**        | Private endpoints for PostgreSQL, Cosmos DB, Key Vault, ACR                 | No public endpoints for data services in production |
| **WAF**                      | Azure Front Door Premium with WAF policy                                    | OWASP 3.2 rule set, bot protection, rate limiting   |
| **DDoS Protection**          | Azure DDoS Protection Standard                                              | Mandatory for internet-facing payment endpoint      |
| **Container Security**       | Microsoft Defender for Containers, admission control (Azure Policy for AKS) | Image allow-listing, no privileged containers       |
| **Audit Logging**            | Azure Activity Log + Diagnostic Settings โ†’ Log Analytics                    | Immutable audit trail, 1-year retention             |
| **Vulnerability Management** | Microsoft Defender for Cloud (enhanced), Qualys/Trivy image scanning        | Continuous scanning, gated deployments              |
| **Data Masking**             | Dynamic data masking for non-prod, tokenization for cardholder data         | PAN never stored in cleartext                       |

> [!WARNING]
> PCI-DSS Level 1 requires a Qualified Security Assessor (QSA) for annual audit. Architecture decisions must be validated with QSA before implementation.

### Authentication & Authorization

| Layer                  | Method                                          | Notes                              |
| ---------------------- | ----------------------------------------------- | ---------------------------------- |
| **External API**       | OAuth 2.0 + API keys (Azure API Management)     | Rate limiting per merchant         |
| **Service-to-Service** | Managed Identity (workload identity for AKS)    | Zero-trust between microservices   |
| **Admin Access**       | Entra ID + PIM (Privileged Identity Management) | Just-in-time, time-bound elevation |
| **Database**           | Entra ID authentication only                    | `azureADOnlyAuthentication: true`  |

---

## ๐Ÿ’ฐ Budget

### Estimated Monthly Cost

| Category                  | Service                                       | SKU / Tier                                     | Est. Monthly Cost        | Notes                                          |
| ------------------------- | --------------------------------------------- | ---------------------------------------------- | ------------------------ | ---------------------------------------------- |
| ๐Ÿ’ป **Compute**            | Azure Kubernetes Service                      | Standard tier, D8s_v5 nodes (3-20)             | $2,500 โ€“ $8,000          | Zone-redundant, system + user node pools       |
| ๐Ÿ’พ **Database (Primary)** | Azure Database for PostgreSQL Flexible Server | Memory-optimized, 16 vCores, zone-redundant HA | $1,500 โ€“ $2,500          | Read replicas add ~$800/ea                     |
| ๐Ÿ’พ **Database (Cache)**   | Azure Cosmos DB                               | Autoscale, 10,000 โ€“ 50,000 RU/s                | $800 โ€“ $3,000            | Session state, caching                         |
| ๐Ÿ” **Security**           | Azure Key Vault Premium                       | HSM-backed keys                                | $200 โ€“ $500              | PCI-DSS HSM requirement                        |
| ๐ŸŒ **Networking**         | Azure Front Door Premium + WAF                | Premium tier with DDoS                         | $500 โ€“ $1,200            | PCI WAF requirement                            |
| ๐ŸŒ **Networking**         | Azure Firewall Premium                        | Premium for IDPS                               | $1,800 โ€“ $2,500          | CDE network segmentation                       |
| ๐Ÿ“Š **Monitoring**         | Azure Monitor + Log Analytics                 | Per-GB ingestion, 1-year retention             | $500 โ€“ $1,500            | PCI log retention                              |
| ๐Ÿ“ฆ **Container Registry** | Azure Container Registry                      | Premium (geo-replicated)                       | $170                     | Production image registry                      |
| ๐Ÿ“จ **Messaging**          | Azure Service Bus                             | Premium (1 MU)                                 | $700                     | Dedicated capacity for transaction queues      |
| ๐Ÿ‘ค **Identity**           | Entra ID P2 + PIM                             | Per-user licensing                             | $200 โ€“ $500              | PIM for admin access                           |
| ๐Ÿ›ก๏ธ **DDoS**               | Azure DDoS Network Protection                 | Standard (per VNet)                            | $2,944                   | Full VNet coverage for CDE                     |
| ๐Ÿ”€ **API Gateway**        | Azure API Management                          | Premium (1 unit, VNet-integrated)              | $2,800                   | VNet integration for CDE, rate limiting, OAuth |
|                           | **Total Estimate**                            |                                                | **$14,814 โ€“ $26,514/mo** |                                                |

> [!NOTE]
> ๐Ÿ’ฐ Budget range reflects Dev ($14,814) vs Production with full HA ($26,514). Reserved instances (1-year) can reduce compute costs by 30-40%. DDoS Network Protection ($2,944/mo) and API Management Premium ($2,800/mo) are significant fixed costs. Exact costs depend on actual TPS sustained load and data volumes. Validate with Azure Pricing Calculator.

### Cost Optimization Opportunities

- **Reserved Instances**: 1-year RI for AKS nodes and PostgreSQL โ€” estimated 35% savings
- **Cosmos DB Autoscale**: Scale down during off-peak; avoid provisioned throughput over-allocation
- **Spot Nodes**: Use for non-CDE workloads (dev/test, batch processing) โ€” up to 80% savings
- **Log Analytics Commitment Tier**: 100 GB/day commitment tier for predictable log volumes

---

## ๐Ÿ”ง Operational Requirements

### Environments

| Environment | Purpose                                | SLA Tier    | Notes                              |
| ----------- | -------------------------------------- | ----------- | ---------------------------------- |
| **dev**     | Development & testing                  | Best-effort | Single-zone, reduced SKUs          |
| **staging** | Pre-production, PCI compliance testing | 99.9%       | Mirror prod config, synthetic data |
| **prod**    | Live payment processing                | 99.99%      | Full HA, zone-redundant, PCI CDE   |

### Deployment

| Attribute               | Value                                                |
| ----------------------- | ---------------------------------------------------- |
| **IaC Tool**            | Bicep (Azure Verified Modules)                       |
| **CI/CD**               | GitHub Actions                                       |
| **Container Strategy**  | Multi-stage Docker builds, image scanning pre-push   |
| **Deployment Strategy** | Blue-green for AKS, canary for critical services     |
| **Rollback**            | Automated rollback on health check failure (< 2 min) |

### Monitoring & Alerting

| Component                  | Tool                                     | Retention  | Notes                              |
| -------------------------- | ---------------------------------------- | ---------- | ---------------------------------- |
| **Application Metrics**    | Azure Monitor + Prometheus               | 90 days    | TPS, latency, error rates          |
| **Application Logs**       | Log Analytics workspace                  | 1 year     | PCI-DSS ยง 10.7 requirement         |
| **Distributed Tracing**    | Application Insights (connection string) | 90 days    | End-to-end transaction tracing     |
| **Infrastructure Metrics** | Azure Monitor for Containers             | 90 days    | Node, pod, container metrics       |
| **Security Alerts**        | Microsoft Defender for Cloud             | Continuous | Threat detection, anomaly alerting |
| **Uptime Monitoring**      | Azure Monitor Availability Tests         | Continuous | External synthetic probes          |

### Alert Thresholds _(assumptions โ€” validate with SRE team)_

| Alert                    | Condition                          | Severity | Action                      |
| ------------------------ | ---------------------------------- | -------- | --------------------------- |
| Error Rate > 1%          | 5xx responses / total requests     | Sev 1    | Page on-call, auto-scale    |
| P99 Latency > 1s         | 99th percentile response time      | Sev 2    | Investigate, alert team     |
| TPS < 5,000              | Sustained 5-min drop from baseline | Sev 1    | Investigate capacity        |
| Database CPU > 80%       | PostgreSQL CPU sustained 10 min    | Sev 2    | Scale up / add read replica |
| Pod Restart > 3          | Container restart loop detection   | Sev 2    | Investigate crash, rollback |
| Certificate Expiry < 30d | TLS certificate approaching expiry | Sev 3    | Rotate certificate          |

### Required Tags

| Tag           | Value                      | Enforced By  |
| ------------- | -------------------------- | ------------ |
| `Environment` | `dev` / `staging` / `prod` | Azure Policy |
| `ManagedBy`   | `Bicep`                    | Azure Policy |
| `Project`     | `pci-dss-gw`               | Azure Policy |
| `Owner`       | _(To be confirmed)_        | Azure Policy |

### Backup & Recovery

| Resource   | Backup Method                  | Frequency        | Retention   | Notes                        |
| ---------- | ------------------------------ | ---------------- | ----------- | ---------------------------- |
| PostgreSQL | Azure-native automated backup  | Continuous (WAL) | 35 days     | Geo-redundant backup storage |
| Cosmos DB  | Continuous backup (PITR)       | Continuous       | 30 days     | Point-in-time restore        |
| Key Vault  | Soft delete + purge protection | Continuous       | 90 days     | Immutable by design          |
| AKS Config | GitOps (Flux/ArgoCD)           | Every commit     | Git history | Infrastructure as Code       |

---

## ๐ŸŒ Regional Preferences

| Attribute                 | Value                | Notes                                                    |
| ------------------------- | -------------------- | -------------------------------------------------------- |
| **Primary Region**        | `swedencentral`      | EU GDPR-compliant, full service availability             |
| **Failover Region**       | `germanywestcentral` | EU paired alternative                                    |
| **Data Residency**        | EU only              | GDPR + financial data sovereignty                        |
| **Multi-Region Strategy** | Active-Passive       | Primary handles all traffic; failover on regional outage |

### Region Service Availability _(validate before implementation)_

| Service                    | swedencentral | germanywestcentral | Notes                          |
| -------------------------- | ------------- | ------------------ | ------------------------------ |
| AKS                        | โœ…            | โœ…                 | Availability zones supported   |
| PostgreSQL Flexible Server | โœ…            | โœ…                 | Zone-redundant HA available    |
| Cosmos DB                  | โœ…            | โœ…                 | Multi-region writes if needed  |
| Key Vault                  | โœ…            | โœ…                 | Premium with HSM               |
| Azure Front Door           | Global        | Global             | Anycast โ€” no region dependency |
| Azure Firewall             | โœ…            | โœ…                 | Premium tier for IDPS          |
| Container Registry         | โœ…            | โœ…                 | Geo-replication to failover    |

---

## ๐Ÿ“‹ Summary for Architecture Assessment

### Recommended Architecture

| Component                  | Recommendation                                                             | Justification                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                           |
| -------------------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------------- | --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| **Compute**                | **Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS)** over Azure Container Apps               | AKS provides: dedicated node pools for CDE isolation, Kubernetes network policies for micro-segmentation, KEDA for event-driven autoscaling, mature PCI-DSS compliance tooling (Falco, OPA Gatekeeper), and fine-grained control needed at 10k TPS. ACA lacks dedicated node isolation and granular network policy required by PCI-DSS. |
| **Database (Primary)**     | Azure Database for PostgreSQL Flexible Server                              | ACID transactions for payment records, zone-redundant HA, read replicas for reporting                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   |
| **Database (Cache/State)** | Azure Cosmos DB (NoSQL API)                                                | Sub-10ms latency for session state, distributed caching, autoscale RU/s                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 |
| **API Gateway**            | Azure Front Door Premium + Azure API Management (Premium, VNet-integrated) | WAF, DDoS, global load balancing, API rate limiting, OAuth, VNet integration for CDE                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    |
| **Networking**             | Hub-spoke VNet with Azure Firewall Premium                                 | CDE isolation, IDPS, east-west traffic inspection                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       |
| **Messaging**              | Azure Service Bus Premium                                                  | Dedicated capacity for transaction queues, dead-letter handling                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         |
| **Secrets**                | Azure Key Vault Premium (HSM)                                              | PCI-DSS cryptographic key management                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    |
| **Monitoring**             | Azure Monitor + Log Analytics + Defender for Cloud                         | Full observability stack with 1-year PCI log retention                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                  |
| **DDoS Protection**        | Azure DDoS Network Protection (Standard)                                   | Full VNet coverage for CDE network                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      |
| **Container Registry**     | Azure Container Registry Premium                                           | Geo-replicated, vulnerability scanning, content trust                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   |
| **Identity**               | Entra ID + Workload Identity + PIM                                         | Zero-trust, managed identity everywhere, JIT admin access                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               |

### Key Architecture Decisions for Architect Agent

1. **AKS over ACA**: PCI-DSS CDE isolation requires dedicated node pools and Kubernetes network policies not available in ACA
2. **Dual Database**: PostgreSQL for ACID transactions + Cosmos DB for low-latency cache/session โ€” reduces load on primary DB
3. **Hub-Spoke Network**: Azure Firewall Premium provides IDPS and east-west inspection required by PCI-DSS Req 1
4. **Azure Front Door Premium**: WAF + DDoS + global anycast required for internet-facing payment endpoint
5. **Key Vault Premium (HSM)**: PCI-DSS requires hardware security modules for cryptographic key storage

### Assumptions Requiring Validation

| #   | Assumption                                       | Impact if Wrong                       | Validate With           |
| --- | ------------------------------------------------ | ------------------------------------- | ----------------------- |
| 1   | Company size is Enterprise (500+)                | Budget tier, security posture         | Product Owner           |
| 2   | ~~Peak TPS is 1.5ร— sustained (15,000 TPS)~~      | ~~Node count, cost estimate~~         | **Confirmed** โœ…        |
| 3   | Transaction retention is 7 years                 | Storage costs, archival strategy      | Compliance / Legal      |
| 4   | P99 latency target is 500 ms                     | Service tier, architecture complexity | Product Owner           |
| 5   | Blue-green deployment strategy                   | CI/CD pipeline design                 | DevOps team             |
| 6   | Active-passive multi-region (not active-active)  | Cosmos DB config, cost, complexity    | Architecture team       |
| 7   | OAuth 2.0 for external API auth                  | APIM configuration                    | Security team           |
| 8   | Service Bus for async messaging (not Event Hubs) | Messaging architecture                | Architecture team       |
| 9   | AKS node range 3-20 nodes (D8s_v5)               | Compute cost, scaling headroom        | Performance team        |
| 10  | KEDA for event-driven autoscaling                | AKS add-on configuration              | Platform team           |
| 11  | PgBouncer for connection pooling                 | Database connectivity pattern         | Database team           |
| 12  | Alert thresholds (error rate, latency, TPS)      | Alert fatigue vs. missed incidents    | SRE team                |
| 13  | Staging mirrors prod configuration               | Staging environment cost              | Finance / Product Owner |
| 14  | Owner tag value not yet confirmed                | Azure Policy enforcement              | Project lead            |

### Handoff to Architect Agent

The Architect agent should:

1. Validate the AKS vs. ACA decision with WAF pillar assessment
2. Confirm SKU recommendations with Azure Pricing MCP
3. Assess hub-spoke network topology for PCI-DSS compliance
4. Evaluate Cosmos DB consistency model (Strong vs. Session for payment state)
5. Produce cost estimate with reserved instance pricing
6. Score all 5 WAF pillars for the proposed architecture

---

## References

> [!NOTE]
> ๐Ÿ“š The following Microsoft Learn resources provide additional guidance.

| Topic                            | Link                                                                                                                  |
| -------------------------------- | --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| PCI-DSS on Azure                 | [Payment processing blueprint](https://learn.microsoft.com/azure/compliance/offerings/offering-pci-dss)               |
| AKS Security Best Practices      | [AKS security concepts](https://learn.microsoft.com/azure/aks/concepts-security)                                      |
| AKS PCI-DSS Guidance             | [AKS regulated workloads](https://learn.microsoft.com/azure/aks/operator-best-practices-cluster-security)             |
| PostgreSQL Flexible Server HA    | [High availability concepts](https://learn.microsoft.com/azure/postgresql/flexible-server/concepts-high-availability) |
| Cosmos DB Consistency Levels     | [Consistency levels](https://learn.microsoft.com/azure/cosmos-db/consistency-levels)                                  |
| Azure Key Vault HSM              | [Managed HSM overview](https://learn.microsoft.com/azure/key-vault/managed-hsm/overview)                              |
| Azure Front Door WAF             | [WAF on Front Door](https://learn.microsoft.com/azure/web-application-firewall/afds/afds-overview)                    |
| Azure Well-Architected Framework | [WAF overview](https://learn.microsoft.com/azure/well-architected/)                                                   |
| Managed Identities               | [Managed identities overview](https://learn.microsoft.com/entra/identity/managed-identities-azure-resources/overview) |
| Azure Pricing Calculator         | [Pricing calculator](https://azure.microsoft.com/pricing/calculator/)                                                 |

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_Generated by **Azure Agentic InfraOps** | [GitHub](https://github.com/jonathan-vella/azure-agentic-infraops)_

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