Will Cloud Security Remain Elusive?

Cloud  |     |  

No, Use This Tool and See The Difference

This is the age of digital transformation. Companies are aiming for a smooth digital transformation and cloud computing has come as a God-send. Today more and more organisations are opting for off-prem infrastructure. This gives these companies the flexibility to scale up or scale down the IT infrastructure at ease. Cloud-based IT infrastructure gives these organisations the advantage of smooth operations coupled with flexibility in costs and expenses.

However, with ease come problems, although it has been more than 10 years since AWS came into existence, people are still not able to wrap their heads fully around cloud computing. As a result, people tend to misconfigure cloud platforms that lead to security issues. It is the security aspect that is hindering many people from opting for cloud computing.

Cloud Security Stats

  • According to a survey conducted by Statista, 83% of the respondents found security as a challenging factor in cloud computing adoption.
  • According to Sophos, 70% of the companies that use cloud platforms experienced some or the other kind of security accidents in 2019.
  • According to Redlock, only 7% of the cloud users have good visibility of all the critical aspects of the cloud platforms.

But the most important point has been raised by Oracle. According to its survey, 75% of the IT professionals concede that cloud platforms are more secure than on-premise infrastructure. However, cloud computing is way above its time. Most of the IT professionals still use the on-prem IT best practices to manage the off-prem platforms, As a result, 95% of the IT professionals feel that it is their lack of a robust cloud computing knowledge that puts cloud resources at risk.

The Shared Responsibility Model

If you compare the report by Oracle mentioned above with the Shared Responsibility Model of the cloud platforms you get the perfect recipe for disaster. Managing the security of cloud platforms is not just the responsibility of the cloud service provider- the clients, too, have to shoulder this heavy responsibility.

For example, AWS says that it will maintain the security of the physical hardware. It will also ensure that the EC2 server (not the EC2 itself) is secure, the S3 Bucket cannot be accessed by anybody other than specified by the client, the Amazon network is secure. In short – AWS is responsible for the security OF the cloud. On the other hand, the client is responsible for securing the EC2, configuring the S3 buckets and network properly, using the IAM roles with best practices in mind. In short, the clients are responsible for security in the cloud.

Cloud Security In Azure And AWS

Both AWS and Azure take cloud security seriously. They have many state-of-the-art tools that we can use to secure our workload and data.

AWS provides Identity and Access Management. Using this tool, we can ensure what roles we want to give to different people in the organisation. This prevents the use of root accounts for day to day tasks. With AWS IAM (along with Multi-Factor Authentication) it is possible to prevent unauthorized access to the cloud platform console.

AWS has three great security tools – Amazon Guard Duty, Amazon Inspector, and Amazon Config. With these three tools, you can detect security loopholes in all the modules of your AWS account and network configuration. With AWS CloudTrail you can stay on top of all the log data. This tool can search for the events that happen in your AWS account to look for security red flags. There are other tools like Amazon Macie or Amazon Detective that further secure your AWS account.

But the Queen Bee of the security tools in AWS is AWS Security Hub. It unifies the findings of the various AWS security tools and gives you a centralised security picture of your cloud account. AWS security automatically collects security data from the security tools and presents before you the overall health of your cloud platform.

Azure, too has its centralised security centre known as the Azure Security Center. It gives you a bird’s eye view of the Azure workloads. You can see what security issues are there in your cloud resources. It even recommends ways to secure your cloud workloads. Along with this, Azure has its own Identity and Access Management tools to prevent unauthorized access. Just like Amazon config, it has Azure Gateway to prevent security loopholes in the networking system. With Azure Information Protection, you can protect the sensitive data.

So Where Exactly Is The Problem?

  • If Azure and AWS have so many security tools, why do companies still fall prey to a security breach? To understand this, let’s go back to the statistics part. Redlock says that only 7% of the cloud users have good visibility regarding what security tools to use and where. This is in line with the fact that the AWS and Azure dashboards are rather confusing. It becomes a nightmare to find even the simplest of security tools.
  • The security options in AWS can easily overwhelm you. There are so many options. Of course, these options make managing the security of the AWS platform efficient, the sheer number of the tools can confuse a normal user.
  • Then there is the learning curve. According to the Oracle survey, 95% of the IT personnel still think that they are yet to grasp the intricacies of cloud computing. As a result, there is a severe shortage of knowledgeable cloud security professionals.
  • Today many companies use more than one cloud platform. This adds to the confusion. It becomes practically impossible to manage two different cloud platforms independently. The result – multi-cloud users are more likely to suffer from security issues
  • Lastly, all these advanced security tools do not come free. You have to shell out a lot of money to subscribe to the myriad of security tools. So the plan of cutting costs by opting for cloud computing is defeated.

A Simple Solution

So, is there no way to enjoy cloud computing without worrying about being hacked? Fortunately yes. Today, more and more cloud adopters are opting for Cloud Management Platforms. Although Amazon and AWS provide great security tools, these tools are rather way ahead of time – it takes a lot of time and head-scratching to make sense of the way the tools work. This is where the role of Cloud Management Platforms comes in.

PowerBoard – Cloud Security Simplified

PowerBoard is a cloud management platform that aims to solve the problems regarding cloud security, cloud cost and governance. Let us see how PowerBoard can solve the 5 cloud security problems mentioned above-

  • No Need To Look For Information – Everything Will Be In Front Of You: PowerBoard gives you visibility. Once connected to your cloud platform, PowerBoard shows you all the major security aspects related to your cloud resources. You don’t need to drill down one link under another to manage the security of the cloud platform. With data visualisation right at the home page, you don’t have to stumble upon here and there to know how well your cloud resources are doing.
  • Simplicity Meets In-Depth Analysis: To have a comprehensive security audit, you have to use so many security tools in Azure. PowerBoard organises the security issues in groups. It is there in front of you in the security tab. You don’t need to click on links after links. Just go to the security section of PowerBoard and you will find the security issues separated based on the modules, EC2 issues are in one box, S3 issues are in another box and so on… Now if you click on any of these boxes, you will get to know exactly what security issues there are.
  • Data Visualisation With Bars, Charts and Tables – No Learning Curve: PowerBoard mitigates the problem that comes with a steep learning curve. You get complete visibility of the security configurations of your cloud resources. The reports shown by PowerBoard are in the form of bars, charts, trends, tables and insights. One look at the security tab and you will have a fair idea of the health of your cloud resources. The reports are also categorised on the basis of severity. So you know what needs your immediate attention.
  • PowerBoard Can Be Your Only Security Tool – No Need of Any Additional Tools: With PowerBoard beside you, you don’t need to subscribe to so many security tools. PowerBoard can make a comprehensive security audit and report to you any security issue that is there. The expensive cloud security tools will not be required for PowerBoard to work. PowerBoard keeps on checking your cloud resources and proactively looks for security loopholes in your workload.
  • Actionable Recommendations: PowerBoard not only detects weaknesses in your cloud infrastructure but it also gives you actionable recommendations to remedy the weaknesses that are there in your cloud resources. By actionable, we mean that these recommendations are told in a jargon freeway with no assumption that you already know many things about cloud computing. You can follow the instructions easy to secure your cloud platform.
  • PowerBoard Lets You Download and Share The Security Report: If you are the top-level executive of a company but do not administer the cloud resource yourself, you can still have control over the activities in your cloud resources. You can easily download and share the security issues to relevant departments and ask them to correct these issues. So for example, you see some recommendations in the VPC section, you can share the report generated by PowerBoard and send them to the department that handles networking.
  • Work With Azure In A Centralized manner: PowerBoard works with Azure. So, if a company uses Azure, it can use PowerBoard to manage it’s cloud platforms in a centralized manner. What this will do is, it will make sure none of the security issues in either of the platforms is overlooked.The great thing about PowerBoard is you don’t need to be a cloud computing guru to maintain the security of cloud resources once you start using PowerBoard. All the security issues and recommendations are stated in simple English. Anybody can follow these recommendations. PowerBoard is made for humans.

With PowerBoard You Get to Talk to Cloud Security Professionals – One on One

There is a severe lack of experienced cloud security professionals. The organisations are finding it hard to stay on top of cloud security. But with PowerBoard, you can not only simplify cloud security, but you get much more. With PowerBoard you become eligible to consult with our cloud experts. They will analyse the findings of PowerBoard and recommend to you how to secure your cloud platform in a much more comprehensive way.

This human touch is necessary to manage the security of your cloud infrastructure in a customised way. One size does not fit all.

Cloud security is becoming complex with each passing day. Ensuring the security of your cloud resources with built-in tools is practically impossible. It is only with cloud management platforms like PowerBoard you can get back the control of your cloud resources. PowerBoard makes you feel empowered.