What Is Cloud Security?

Enterprises have been moving many resources to be hosted in the cloud due to time to market, efficiency, and cost. It’s the job of the enterprise’s security team to ensure they’re able to secure these resources as if they were hosted on their premises. Cloud technology has forced security teams to shift from thinking of placing all resources behind a digital wall and forced them to change how they handle authentication, network topologies, intrusion detection, and more.

When considering cloud data security in this modern environment, it’s essential to recognize that protecting your cloud infrastructure is a shared responsibility. It’s essential for enterprises to understand what security controls are delivered by the cloud service provider and what controls are the responsibility of the enterprise.

Different cloud services will require different levels of responsibility. Ensuring that cloud services are implemented will also fit into an enterprise’s existing security architecture by evaluating whether a new cloud service is capable of integrating into its authentication, authorization, and monitoring architecture.  

Properly evaluating services will require implementing an encryption strategy and how data is able to be protected when it no longer is hosted internally by the organization.  

Let’s discuss how you can secure your cloud computing resources effectively, defining a strategic approach that aligns with the dynamic nature of cloud technologies and your organization’s security posture.

Key Challenges in Cloud Security Today

When you manage cloud computing resources, it is critical to understand that many of the security concerns you had before continue with your resources hosted in the cloud. Security concerns like confidentiality, integrity, and availability are all still a concern. Many of the existing attacks have simply shifted.

• Attackers exploiting credentials and Single-Sign-On have moved from internal to the organization to cloud resources such as stealing SAML tokens for signing access to web resources.
• Loss of availability when a cloud service goes down impacting the entire enterprise such as Delinea Secret Server’s, experiencing outages due to compromised infrastructure.
• Attacks on third-party service providers leading to the loss of credentials, just like in the situation of Arizona agencies.

Just as misconfigurations of internal infrastructure can lead to security issues, misconfigurations in cloud settings can lead to unauthorized data exposure. It is still critical for enterprises to continue auditing and monitoring these environments. Configuration mistakes are often the root cause of security breaches, allowing threat actors to infiltrate systems and potentially remain undetected for an extended period. One recent example of that was the cyberattack of SVR hackers targeting large enterprises.

Due to the distributed nature of the cloud, compliance poses a significant hurdle as the regulatory landscape varies greatly depending on the industry and geography. You need to continuously monitor evolving requirements to avoid legal repercussions and ensure customer trust.

It’s also crucial that you address the lack of visibility into cloud resources, as it can hinder the identification of irregularities within your environment. This challenge ties closely to risks associated with security threats such as advanced persistent threats (APTs), which leverage continuous, stealthy, and sophisticated hacking techniques to access systems and remain inside for a prolonged period.

As companies begin to implement emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) it is critical to understand the implications of these and how they are managed within the cloud. Your cyber defense strategy, including the deployment of automated threat responses and predictive analytics, benefits from these innovations. However, the same innovations can be harnessed by adversaries, leading to more advanced, automated attacks.

A critical component of services communicating with the cloud is Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) adding a new attack surface. Remaining vigilant against insecure interfaces and APIs is essential, as they can present entry points for attackers. Additionally, the consequence of account hijacking is amplified in cloud environments, where compromised credentials can lead to extensive damage due to elevated privileges often required for cloud operations.

With cloud, many enterprises have implemented a DevSecOps approach which focuses on creating an automated pipeline of developing, testing, and deploying capabilities. This concern segues into the critical aspect of DevSecOps and the challenges associated with leaking and consolidating access keys and credentials, which can lead to security incidents. To mitigate these risks, it is vital to follow best practices such as ensuring development keys have restricted access and regularly scanning to ensure credentials aren’t leaking into code repositories. Additionally, implementing automated tools and processes to monitor and manage these credentials can significantly enhance your security posture and prevent unauthorized access.

Pillars and Types of Effective Cloud Computing Security

Modernizing your cloud security solution is imperative for protecting your cloud ecosystem against the myriad of modern threats. Here are some steps you can take.

Data Security: Your data is the cornerstone of cloud computing security. Methods like data encryption protect sensitive information from unauthorized access and breaches.

Identity and Access Management (IAM): Restricting data access to verified users is critical. IAM technologies ensure that only authorized individuals can interact with your data in the cloud.

Threat Detection and Management: Proactive threat detection is paramount in maintaining security. Regularly updated firewall systems are part of a robust security strategy to thwart potential cyber threats.

Network Security: In a distributed enterprise environment, network security becomes more challenging. With enterprises no longer being in complete control of their network environment, a secure setup requires gap analyses and thorough authentication logging for advanced endpoint monitoring.

Application Security: Applications in the cloud should be meticulously tested and secured to prevent vulnerabilities that threat actors could exploit.

Physical Security: While not often considered in cloud computing, physical security measures are installed in data centers to protect against unauthorized physical interactions.

Compliance and Legal: Adhering to compliance standards like the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) is not just about following laws, but also about protecting your intellectual property and customer data when storing files online. All the same security controls are expected to be maintained. It is often required to map these controls with responsibility and how they are implemented in a shared responsibility environment.

Incident Response and Recovery: Prompt detection and response to incidents is a key defense mechanism. For effective threat hunting, it’s recommended that you manage cloud logs diligently. Ensure your systems are set up to flag abnormal activity, enabling swift action when needed.

Privacy: Respecting customer privacy involves strict control measures and policies, ensuring that personal data in the cloud is handled in compliance with legal requirements.

Security Operations Center (SOC): A SOC empowers your team to oversee and coordinate security measures while supporting business continuity and reducing downtime during and after an attack. However, you need to evaluate new cloud capabilities to ensure they’re able to provide the necessary visibility of cloud resources to your SOC.

Remember, embracing these pillars of cloud security will help you establish a resilient and secure cloud computing environment. Keep in mind that the broad goal of cloud security can differ across industries, even though organizations like the Cloud Security Alliance aim to provide some guidance that applies across sectors.

In healthcare, compliance with HIPAA is paramount. Cloud service providers must adhere to strict regulations concerning the cloud storage and transmission of protected health information (PHI).

Government agencies, especially in the United States, operate within a framework of stringent security standards such as the Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP) and NIST guidelines. FedRAMP ensures that cloud services meet rigorous security requirements before they can be used by federal agencies, while NIST provides a comprehensive framework for cloud security posture management, guiding government entities in implementing robust security protocols.

How Does the Shared Responsibility Model Shape Cloud Security?

In cloud computing, your security posture hinges on understanding the Shared Responsibility Model. This framework delineates that cloud service providers (CSPs) and users share responsibility for protecting cloud environments.

For cloud providers, this obligation includes securing the cloud infrastructure itself. Public cloud, private cloud, and hybrid cloud configurations all require the CSP to cover foundational security issues, albeit to different degrees. In contrast, you as the user maintain accountability for certain elements depending on the service model selected.

• Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS): You oversee the virtual network, operating system, and applications. In services implementing this model, the enterprise must develop and maintain many of the same security controls as if the resources were hosted internally. Often this means patch management, network security controls, and host intrusion are still required to be implemented.

• Platform as a Service (PaaS): Platform as a service generally removes the responsibility of managing the underlying networking and operating system while still allowing enterprises to develop custom applications. In order to maintain security, it is critical to implement security controls such as monitoring and access control within the custom application. It is also important to understand the security controls made available to the enterprise by the PaaS provider.  
• Software as a Service (SaaS): This model removes much of the responsibility of managing the service from the enterprise and instead is provided to you as a full service. The enterprise is often reliant on the SaaS provider and what capabilities it makes available. It is important to ensure that the enterprise is able to implement all authentication, authorization, and monitoring requirements within this model. Many SaaS providers will implement APIs to allow these controls to be implemented.

Security controls and policies play a critical role as they highlight your responsibilities and ensure you can craft a security strategy that complements the cloud deployment your CSP offers. That also means assessing how a legacy system may affect your ability to follow a security policy. Ensuring transparency between you and your provider is essential for identifying who handles various components such as system patching, incident response, and compliance adherence.

Unfortunately, a common misconception occurs when one assumes the cloud provider manages all security aspects. No matter the model, you remain responsible for your data protection and identity management. Security in the cloud is not a one-off task but a continuous collaboration and monitoring process to address new threats and compliance requirements.

Regular risk assessments allow you to adjust your security strategies as your cloud usage evolves. Transitioning away from legacy systems can underscore the benefits of contemporary cloud security measures. You must however remain vigilant of your share of responsibilities.

Best Practices and Steps for Securing Data in the Cloud

To ensure the security of your data in cloud computing, it’s critical to assess its sensitivity and your compliance obligations. Data centers hosting your information should align with regulatory standards, like HIPAA for healthcare data or the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) for payment information.

When selecting a cloud service provider, consider their capabilities including deployment models (public, private, hybrid) and service offerings (IaaS, PaaS, SaaS). A strong provider will support your need for robust data protection and data privacy measures.  

Integrate an Enterprise’s authentication architecture to implement strict authentication and authorization controls and manage who has access to your data. Implementing policies like multi-factor authentication (MFA) to strengthen your security posture is critical in a cloud as your resources become more distributed and connected to the web, strong authentication becomes more critical. In setting up these controls, also consider using tools for security-enhanced information sharing, which can safeguard data while facilitating necessary access.

Encryption is non-negotiable, both for data at rest and in transit. This renders your data unreadable to unauthorized users. Effective key management strategies are also essential to ensure that encryption keys are stored securely, regularly rotated, and accessible only to authorized personnel. Utilizing hardware security modules and following best practices for key management can mitigate these risks.

For onsite teams, evaluate your existing data loss prevention training for applicability as you migrate to the cloud. Ensure that your team is well-versed in cloud-specific security and the unique challenges of the cloud environment. 

Develop an incident response plan that considers all cloud resources and how an enterprise will respond in the event of a breach. Regularly update this plan to reflect the changes in architecture and dynamic nature of cloud security and ensure that your team can respond promptly to any security incidents.

Regularly review your security practices and policies. Governance over your cloud environment should evolve to adapt to new threats and technological advances. Remember, security is not a one-time setup; it’s a continuous cycle of improvement.

Why Should Businesses Embrace Zero Trust in Cloud Computing?

Zero Trust is a response to changes in enterprise architecture as resources become more distributed.  It shifts thinking from building a single boundary to implement security controls to a more cloud-appropriate approach of implementing monitoring, authentication, and other controls in front of many of these services. Zero Trust is a rigorous security model that necessitates strict identity verification for every person and device attempting to access resources regardless of whether they are within or outside of the network’s perimeter. This approach is founded on the principle that trust is never assumed; thus, access is only granted after thorough authentication.

Requiring users to provide evidence of their identity, often implemented through multi-factor authentication, adds extra layers of security. With additional access controls, you ensure that users are only given the permissions they need to perform their job roles, minimizing unnecessary access to sensitive areas of the network.

Benefits of Zero Trust Architecture

• Enhanced Security Posture

• Decreases Public Attack Surface: By verifying each access request, Zero Trust minimizes the opportunities for unauthorized access, significantly reducing the attack surface.
• Prevents Lateral Movement: Ensuring strict access controls prevents attackers from moving laterally within the network, limiting the potential damage they can cause.
• Adapts to Modern Work Environments: Zero Trust seamlessly secures all access points, accommodating the needs of a modern, often remote workforce by providing secure access regardless of location or device.

• Centralized Control and Monitoring

• Comprehensive Resource Management: Zero Trust allows organizations to control and monitor all their resources from a central location, whether they are hosted internally or within the cloud. This centralization provides enhanced visibility and control over the entire network infrastructure.
• Simplifies Compliance and Risk Management: Implementing strict access controls simplifies adherence to regulatory compliance, ensuring that sensitive data is only accessible to authorized personnel. This also mitigates the potential impact of data breaches through limited privileged access.

• Operational Efficiency

• Facilitates Secure Cloud Adoption: Zero Trust supports a secure transition to or adoption of cloud services by maintaining a consistent security posture across all environments.
• Enhances Collaboration: By securing access points and data, Zero Trust enables secure collaboration by allowing users to access multiple resources hosted internally and in the cloud, which is essential in contemporary work settings where employees often work from various locations and devices.

• Adapting to Threats

• Addresses Advanced Cyber Threats: Zero Trust effectively mitigates advanced cyber threats, offering a robust defense mechanism that evolves with the threat landscape.
• Future-Proofs Security: The adaptable nature of Zero Trust ensures that your security profile remains resilient and responsive to new and evolving threats.

By embracing a zero-trust approach, you’re creating a resilient and responsive defense for today’s dynamic and threat-plagued cyber environment.

Shaping the Future of Security Measures for Sensitive Data

SealingTech continues to influence the landscape of cloud security solutions. By employing advanced encryption technologies and advocating for zero-trust architectures, our team ensures robust protection strategies for network and systems defense. Partnering with SealingTech enables you to safeguard your cloud environments against a wide range of cyber threats.

When it comes to innovative technologies, SealingTech stands out by integrating enhanced endpoint security measures and secure cloud solutions. We designed our comprehensive cyber defense solutions to provide you with not just tools, but also the expertise required to maintain a resilient cyber posture.

Furthermore, SealingTech recommends bolstering your organization’s cybersecurity training and awareness. This facet of our service ensures that you’re empowered with the right knowledge to make the best use of the very technology that’s supposed to protect your assets, making your workforce a critical component of your defense strategy.

Our involvement in collaborations with government agencies and the Department of Defense reflects our commitment to advancing cloud security nationwide. By working closely with government and private organizations, SealingTech delivers solutions that align with high-impact security initiatives, thus reinforcing its role as a trusted partner in your cybersecurity ecosystem.

Prepare for the Future of Security Threats with SealingTech

Ensure compliance with regulations like HIPAA and FedRAMP while implementing robust measures such as encryption and zero-trust architecture to safeguard your data effectively. Partner with SealingTech to build a resilient cloud security ecosystem tailored to your organization’s needs.