Cloud information security is generally provided the same way as in local data centres but without the cost of physical servers and a team that supports their constant operation. Using the cloud to host data, applications, and other assets offers management, access, and scalability benefits. The cloud environment allows a business to scale up the necessary capacity quickly, but information security often fades into the background when scaling IT infrastructure. Still, cloud security risks will be a severe problem in the future.
Using cloud software and local infrastructure does not exclude cyberattacks from intruders looking for ways to access corporate networks. Preventing data leaks and theft is critical to maintaining customer trust and company reputation, not to mention possible financial losses.
The need to comply with administrative requirements imposed by regulators also forces many companies operating in the cloud to ensure proper information security. In case of non-compliance with the standards, they will have to pay considerable fines when facing cloud security risks.
What is cloud security?
Cloud security is a section of cybersecurity dedicated to protecting cloud computing systems. It includes protecting privacy and data across all network infrastructure, online applications, and platforms.
Securing cloud environments has never been more critical as digital transformation accelerates and remote work becomes the norm. Cloud-based systems offer organizations unparalleled flexibility, scalability, and cost-efficiency. However, along with these advantages come inherent cybersecurity risks. Whether leveraging private or public clouds, businesses face constant threats from cybercriminals. The stakes are high: аrom data breaches to account hijacking, malicious insiders, API insecurity, service outages, and cyberattacks can tarnish reputations, cause financial losses, and lead to regulatory non-compliance. Understanding these risks is essential to safeguarding digital infrastructure. This article combines findings from leading cybersecurity reports and expert insights to explore today's most pressing cloud security risks and provide actionable strategies for mitigating them.
According to a different study, 80% of all information leaks from the cloud will be due to misconfiguration or internal company problems, not provider vulnerabilities. IT organizations must pay attention to internal business processes and personnel training in security basics.
Today, 64% of companies consider cloud infrastructure more secure, but 75% take additional protective measures against cloud security risks. For example, 61% of customers resort to data encryption, 52% maintain a policy for managing identity and access to information systems, and 48% conduct regular system checks.
However, it is optional for attackers where exactly the data is located: on virtual or real machines. Their goal is to gain access at any cost. Therefore, you can use the same tools as in the company's data centre to protect data in the cloud. Experts identify three main areas of security: data encryption, data access restriction, and the possibility of data recovery in an emergency.
In addition, experts advise taking a closer look at the API. Open and insecure interfaces can become a weak link in data protection and the main reason for cloud platforms' vulnerability.
Cloud services are used in business, science, healthcare, and private life. In almost every action on the internet, one way or another, we use services from the cloud. The large volumes of data each person and company generates must be stored. Therefore, the issue of cloud service security is a priority for both the service provider and customers.
Security risks will evolve as businesses continue to transition to the cloud. According to statistics, 80% of cloud breaches will stem from internal issues such as misconfigurations or employee errors rather than vulnerabilities in cloud service providers. Organizations must focus on enhancing internal processes, improving personnel training, and implementing robust cloud security protocols to address these risks.
Companies are increasingly aware of cloud security risks, with 64% considering cloud infrastructure more secure than traditional data centres. However, 75% of organizations still take additional protective measures, such as data encryption and identity management. The ultimate goal is to ensure data protection, mitigate the risk of breaches, and maintain customer trust.
There are different types of most dangerous security risks.
It is the leading cause of data leakage from the cloud environment. Suppose the cloud infrastructure is not designed correctly. In that case, there are risks of insecure access to resources, compromised credentials, excessive permissions, disabled logging or lack of monitoring, and unrestricted access to ports and services.
Many companies need to become more familiar with cloud infrastructure security and use cloud software from different vendors: private, public, or multi-cloud, each with its own set of vendor-provided security controls. Misconfiguration or lack of security controls can expose an organization's cloud resources to attackers.
The functioning of the cloud environment directly depends on the connection to the internet. However, such an infrastructure is particularly vulnerable to distributed denial of service (DDoS) or denial of service (DoS) attacks.
Attackers can flood a company's cloud network with significant web traffic, making resources inaccessible to customers and employees. The more company services and applications are hosted in the cloud, the more damage intruders can cause.
Denial-of-Service (DoS) and Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) attacks can also overwhelm cloud systems by flooding them with traffic, rendering them inaccessible to legitimate users. These attacks don't typically result in data theft but can severely disrupt operations.
Deploy anti-virus programs, install firewalls, and engage third-party services to monitor and protect systems from DoS and DDoS attacks.
Insufficient protection can allow attackers to access confidential company information directly, leading to data leakage from the company's local network and the cloud infrastructure. It is also one of the crucial security risks in cloud computing.
Data leakage, in turn, can damage the company's reputation and cause distrust among customers and partners. Violation of data confidentiality is also associated with financial costs in the form of sanctions from regulators and customers affected by the leak. Another risk is the loss of the company's intellectual property (know-how, own developments, technologies, product models, etc.), which will affect the launch of a new service or product on the market with competitive advantages.
Hacking (compromising) an account is one of the most severe cloud security risks since company employees only sometimes have sufficiently complex passwords and occasionally use one password for several reports. As a result, an attacker with a single stolen password can access multiple systems and business logic, data, and applications. Sometimes, account-specific infrastructure components can be compromised.
Account hijacking often results from insufficient identity and credential management. Easy registration systems, phishing schemes, and using the same credentials across multiple platforms allow attackers to hijack accounts. Once inside, they can steal data, damage a company's reputation, and disrupt operations.
To avoid it, you must limit access to sensitive areas, enforce strong password policies, and prohibit credential sharing. You must also implement two-factor solid authentication and monitor account activities to trace them back to their human owners.
Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) are essential for cloud operations but present significant security risks. APIs are often the only publicly exposed asset, making them a top target for attackers. Poorly secured APIs allow cybercriminals to access sensitive data and manipulate cloud environments.
Use multiple layers of security and add strong authentication and access control mechanisms for APIs. Understand the dependency chain of APIs to reduce the risk of unauthorized access.
Malware remains one of the most prevalent threats to cloud security. Attackers can use malware to steal data, eavesdrop on communications, or compromise the integrity of systems. Typical vectors include phishing emails and social media links that lead to malware downloads.
Train employees on safe browsing and downloading habits. Update firewalls, monitor account access continuously, and ensure malware protection across all systems.
Malicious insiders—employees, contractors, or others—can misuse their access to compromise cloud environments. These individuals may intentionally exceed their access privileges, disrupting services or data loss. However, unintentional insider threats, such as employees accidentally uploading sensitive data to public repositories, can pose significant risks.
Restrict access to critical assets, ensuring only trusted users can access sensitive data. Conduct regular audits, monitor access logs, and train employees on cybersecurity best practices.
Advanced Persistent Threats (APTs) are long-term, targeted cyberattacks in which attackers infiltrate a system and gather intelligence over time. These attacks often use phishing or other social engineering techniques to exploit vulnerabilities and gain access to cloud environments. Adopt proactive security measures, including continuous system surveillance and anomaly detection. Train users on how to recognize social engineering tactics like phishing.
Organizations may inherit unforeseen security risks when migrating to cloud environments or acquiring businesses with existing cloud infrastructure. Without thorough due diligence, companies can be vulnerable to cloud security risks they did not anticipate.
Conduct in-depth due diligence before adopting new cloud services or acquiring businesses with cloud infrastructure. Ensure all security protocols, roles, and responsibilities are clearly defined with cloud service providers.
Shared cloud environments, such as IaaS, SaaS, and PaaS, present unique security challenges. In these environments, multiple organizations share the same infrastructure, increasing the potential for vulnerabilities. If one tenant's application is compromised, it could expose others to the same risks.
Use multi-factor authentication across all hosts, ensure shared resources are regularly patched, and conduct routine security audits.
The market for information security software is constantly growing.
Data leakage can become a powerful argument for abandoning a company's products. It is the leading reason organizations protect sensitive data regarding the quality and functionality of their services. Data safety is changing all services: household financial accounting programs offer a complex authentication system, and banking applications care about free protection against scam calls.
Pay attention to AI tools to solve the problem of cloud security risks. Artificial intelligence and machine learning frameworks are becoming powerful tools for detecting and mitigating cloud security threats.
AI can automate data protection, monitor network traffic, identify anomalous behaviours that may signal an impending attack, and simplify routine tasks. As organizations adopt more cloud-based services, AI and ML will become critical in ensuring the security of cloud environments. However, they will soon be used to ensure security in public and private cloud infrastructures.
Encryption is still one of the best options for protecting data in the cloud. However, it is essential to strike a balance between security and performance. Due to the cost and potential impact on system performance, encryption may need to be more feasible. Organizations should prioritize encrypting sensitive data and implement policies to determine what data needs encryption.
To ensure security, a specific policy must be introduced to prepare which specialists can be involved. It is necessary to find out what data is in the cloud and where the traffic goes, and only then decide what information should be encrypted.
Before strengthening security measures, it would be helpful to calculate their feasibility: for example, compare the cost of introducing such measures to possible losses from information leakage. In addition, you should consider how encryption, user access, and identity management will affect system performance.
Data protection can be carried out at several levels. For example, all data users send to the cloud can be encrypted using the AES algorithm to ensure anonymity and security. The next level of protection is data encryption in the cloud storage server. Cloud providers also often use multiple data centres to store data, which positively affects the integrity of information.
Security teams must continuously monitor cloud infrastructure for vulnerabilities, misconfigurations, and unauthorized access. Automation is becoming increasingly important, enabling organizations to detect security issues timely and respond to them quickly. Integrating security systems with DevOps practices can enhance security by incorporating continuous monitoring and updates into the development process.
Many customers must implement a new security strategy when migrating to the cloud, as firewalls and virtual networks must be reconfigured.
According to research, customer concerns are tamper-proofing vulnerabilities (68%), application vulnerabilities (64%), malware infections (61%), social engineering and security breaches (59%), and insider threats (53%).
At the same time, experts believe that attackers will almost always be able to hack the system. Therefore, the main task is ensuring the attack does not spread to other vulnerable links in the chain. It is possible if the security system blocks unauthorized communication between workloads and prevents illegitimate connection requests.
Integrating security systems with DevOps practices is another approach that can improve the data centre's reliability. This helps accelerate the pace of application deployment and change implementation. The adaptive security architecture integrates with automation and management tools, making changes to the security settings part of the continuous deployment process.
In cloud infrastructure, security is no longer considered separate from development and deployment and is becoming an integral part of continuous integration and deployment (CI/CD). Tools such as the Jenkins plugin can provide this, making code and security checks a standard step for quality assurance.
Businesses placing information systems in the cloud are increasingly seeking to receive comprehensive protection services: for example, setting systems inside firewalls, building a secure channel, a secure connection using cryptographic algorithms, ensuring data security at the level of information systems by installing appropriate tools protection against unauthorized access, anti-virus protection, protection within the framework of the implementation of the detection and intrusion prevention circuit, and others.
The reasons for data loss can be very different, including cyberattacks, accidental deletion, or natural disasters. In some cases, losing encryption keys can render data irretrievable, leading to permanent loss that can cripple a business.
Regularly back up data in both physical and cloud-based storage. Review data loss provisions with your cloud service provider and ensure they have redundancy mechanisms to prevent irreversible loss.
The bulk of requests for IT infrastructure is related to the security of personal data. When transferring personal data to the provider, the customer, based on the processing order, may require appropriate confirmation that the data will be processed for a specific purpose, to a certain extent, within a specified period, using a particular set of protection measures. The vast amount of sensitive data stored in cloud environments has made them prime targets for cybercriminals. Cloud Service Providers (CSPs) store personal health information (PHI), personally identifiable information (PII), trade secrets, financial records, and more. With systems accessible via the internet, attackers seek vulnerabilities to steal this data for profit, leading to devastating breaches.
The best mitigation strategy is implementing secure authentication mechanisms such as encryption and two-factor authentication (2FA). In case of a breach, immediately change administrator passwords and ensure logging is centralized for easy access during incident investigations.
One of the trends suggests that when developing services, cloud security risks are raised very late in the product code to prevent vulnerabilities from appearing. Then, users receive information security software developed as static and dynamic analyzers, component and dependency analyzers, image scanners, etc. New areas appear, such as DevSecOps and Application Security, whose task is to monitor the security of code and CI/CD.
Employees must enter a corporate login and password to access corporate systems in the cloud. To avoid cloud security risks, it is recommended that more stringent user authentication be set up. When authorizing, employees need not only to enter a domain name but also to use authenticator tokens. This will provide a higher level of security when working in the cloud.
Many customers decide to turn to managed security services for help with cloud security. These external experts provide comprehensive protection, from setting up secure networks to managing access controls and responding to security incidents. Managed security services are particularly beneficial for organizations that lack in-house expertise in cloud security.
Another critical trend is the compliance of services and infrastructure with information security requirements defined by national law or international standards. The product's end-users, especially in B2B and B2C, understand the importance of security and demand it from their contractors. The most popular confirmation method is compliance certification or attestation from an authorized organization.
Data protection is becoming a priority for organizations using cloud services. With the rise of data breaches and regulatory pressures, companies must ensure robust data protection measures. Data protection as a service (DPaaS) allows customers to outsource data protection to experts who can manage backups, encryption, and disaster recovery.
One general trend in the cloud market is the development of managed services. If in-house specialists lack the knowledge, external experts execute complex tasks.
IT services for infrastructure system administration are popular, assisting with migration from dedicated servers to the cloud. Similar services appear in the field of information security. Setting up network security, choosing the proper infrastructure, and optimizing the portfolio of information security software is difficult for a single group of security professionals. If a company cannot maintain a permanent staff of such specialists, Managed Services in information security can be a good software.
The market for cloud systems that provide infrastructure, platforms, and services is growing by tens of per cent annually. Information security issues are becoming paramount for commercial and government customers who place some of their resources in the cloud. Today, cloud security risks and building user confidence concerning providers offering services within the framework of cloud technologies are priorities in the future development of cloud computing.
When switching to the provider's cloud infrastructure, ensure that the provided environment is secure and meets information security standards, such as the ISO/IEC 27001 standard, which regulates the requirements for an information security management system to avoid security risks in cloud computing. A strong relationship with a cloud provider must be built to achieve this.
Data security should be taken care of in case of threats. Develop a contingency plan. Backups should be performed according to a schedule with a minimum RTPO and an optimal data recovery life cycle. You can also use the disaster recovery service, which allows you to switch to a disaster site with a dedicated repository in case of threats.
Cloud computing offers significant benefits, but these come with inherent security risks. As businesses increasingly rely on cloud environments, understanding and addressing these risks is critical to ensuring data security, maintaining customer trust, and complying with regulatory requirements. Organizations can mitigate cloud security risks and safeguard their digital infrastructure by implementing robust security measures—such as multi-factor authentication, encryption, and continuous monitoring.
In 2023, the focus on cloud security will intensify as cybercriminals develop new methods to exploit vulnerabilities. However, by staying proactive and adopting the latest security technologies, businesses can ensure the continued success of their cloud-based operations and stay ahead of emerging threats.
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