Common Cloud Service Providers Are Not Immune To Cyber Attacks

Oftentimes, security managers fall into the trap of believing that a large or commonly used cloud services organization is safe to have connected to their network. Cloud services providers aren’t immune to bad actors targeting their network, and in reality can expose extremely sensitive information when they are targeted.

Investing the proper resources into cloud security posture management is crucial when establishing risk reduction strategies for your organization. But what is the right amount of investment? Will I be able to tell if I’m making an impact on cloud security posture management? What even are the cloud services my organization uses?

We’ve laid out a quick overview of how to get started with cloud security posture management.

Common cloud services your organization uses

The first thing that comes to mind when you think of cloud services is probably Amazon Web Services or Apple’s cloud storage capabilities. Cloud computing has expanded to include a multitude of functions and business applications, all of which use digital storage centers to hold and manage information without active participation from an organization.

So what types of technology should be included when thinking about cloud security posture management? Here are a few examples of services that organizations often rely on the cloud for:

• Automatic backup and storage of files 
• Communication technology with network-based access and connection to emails and calendars
• Big data analytics software, which helps enable large-scale data collection, storage, and decision making analysis
• Telemedicine services
• Business processes, including document management or CRM technology

Here are some company names included in the categories above:

• Dropbox
• G Suite/Gmail
• Social networking sites like Facebook or Twitter
• WhatsApp
• Amazon Web Services
• IBM
• Salesforce
• Slack
• Hubspot
• Adobe
• Microsoft 365
• And many more…

Are the risks worth the reward?

No matter what size organization you are a part of, it’s almost guaranteed your network is integrated into one of the cloud service areas or providers listed above. It’s also important to consider when planning cloud security process management that the cloud providers, your vendors, partners, or employees are using are also in-turn connected to your company data.

So should we avoid integrating our networks with cloud providers if they have such expansive attack surfaces? In reality, cloud services often provide some of the most value to business operations for organizations. With faster data analytics, more streamlined team communication, and easy storage for customer information, cloud providers are helping businesses operate more efficiently every day. Trusting cloud providers with sensitive data has become almost necessary to stay competitive. 

Instead of avoiding network expansion, security managers can establish efficient risk management strategies within their network to avoid improper cloud security posture management. 

Get started with cloud security posture management

Whether your organization already has developed security management strategies, or if you’re just getting started, we want to highlight three data-driven solutions for reducing risk across your network. 

Gaining a holistic view of your network

A great starting point for better cloud security posture management is to gain a complete picture of where the risk lies in your network. Bitsight’s Attack Surface Analytics offers network scanning technology to detect risky areas in your ecosystem. Manual scanning techniques, as well as some data-scanning technologies don’t provide a complete picture of your network, instead only focusing on the most-risky areas. 

The problem with cloud service posture management is that sometimes even the seemingly small open ports or compromised accounts can be indicative of a large problem on your network. It’s important to utilize technology that assess risk across your entire ecosystem, helping security managers avoid any surprises. 

External, objective verification of your analysis

Depending on the tools and information available to your security team, it might be hard to make strong cloud security posture management decisions. Gaining an external view on your organization’s attack surface will validate the information you already have, without any internal bias. 

A reliable, data-based option for gaining an external viewpoint of your network is through cybersecurity ratings. Ratings will take into account all of your publicly available network information, and provide an unbiased, objective viewpoint of your systems. With a validated view, security managers can trust that they have the complete view of their network to make decisions. 

Reports that save time, not take time

A final step that can help bring your cloud security posture management to a more mature stage is proper reporting technology. With the right reports that summarize your program improvements, you can bring the cybersecurity conversation to company decision makers successfully. Executive Reporting with Bitsight summarizes your program status while focuses contextualizing your reports to benchmark your organization against your peers, partners, and competitors. 

When security managers are able to use reports successfully it allows for a more aligned approach to cloud security posture management across the organization.

Get ahead of the game

If we can take away one thing from the state of cybersecurity management in the last six months it’s that no one is immune to the impacts of malicious activity. With SolarWinds and Microsoft Exchange still fresh on our minds, it is a great opportunity to evaluate where the inefficiencies lie in your cybersecurity program, and work to better handle your cloud security posture management.