An important decision all organizations need to make regarding their data is whether to store it on-premise or to host it in the cloud. As of 2019, more than 94 % of them have found the answer to this question and rely on the cloud for storing their data. Others are still questioning the impact that such a decision will have on their business model. But one of the most frequent questions asked relates to data security:
“What about the security of our data in the cloud?”
Below is a list of 7 aspects that make the cloud storage a safe place for your data:
1. Data Redundancy & Crash Resilience
Let’s start with the obvious: the safety of your data relates directly to the safety of the physical data-center(s) where it is stored.
Since cloud vendors store data redundantly, multiple copies of your files reside on a number of data centers spread across the globe. This gives you the certainty that in case of the worst failure (e.g. a physical server is destroyed by a natural disaster) your data is still safe and available. This makes it much easier to recover from disasters.
On the other hand, on-premise data hosting is much riskier from this perspective.
2. Technical Expertise
When an organization is already in the business of IT security services, it may be technically capable to handle the security of their own data center.
However, since that may not be the case with most businesses, we can say that the cloud service providers dispose of more technical expertise than the IT department of any organization. When hundreds of cybersecurity professionals are in charge of the security of your data, you can put your security worries aside and focus on your business solution.
In the long run, this can save your organization both time and valuable resources.
3. Up-to-date Security Software & Standards
What can be more challenging than maintaining legacy systems? Keeping them secure and fitting with the latest security standards.
Since cloud organizations take security seriously, their software and tools are constantly kept up-to-date. That makes it easier to maintain and patch them according to the latest security releases.
In the end, this means that your data will be more secure against cyberattacks.
4. Layered Data Access
Since some data is more sensitive than other data, it is often necessary to establish different security schemes. From internal and external firewalls to restricted user access and encryption of your data, the cloud service providers allow you to configure multiple layers of security.
While such services could also be configured on-premise, the cloud infrastructure is built to allow the seamless integration of such features.
This ensures that in the cloud your data will be kept safe from both internal and external threats.
5. Fine-grained Cybersecurity Tools
A cloud-based solution for your business means integrating and maintaining a variety of different services. The are various nodes of your infrastructure, be it computing, storage or networking, therefore requiring service-specific security tools.
The cloud providers offer such a wide variety of security tools, for the different services and controls you are renting. These would otherwise be expensive to deploy on-premise. Such tools enable activity monitoring, vulnerability testing, and risk assessment, among others. Moreover, these tools are offered for services at multiple layers (PaaS, IaaS, SaaS).
This means that your organization’s infrastructure can be fully protected by proven security tools.
6. Configurable Cybersecurity Tools
While the cybersecurity tools are made available by the cloud service provider, their configuration is the responsibility of their user.
As the Shared Responsibility Model suggests, the provider handles the security of the cloud, while the customer implements the security in the cloud. By means of vendor-provided cybersecurity tools, the customer organization is able to understand, implement and configure the main components of the cloud security solution.
We can even say that the availability of such tools forces their users to consider multiple security aspects at a cloud service level.
7. Security Training & Certification Programs
As stated above, the responsibility of data security in the cloud is shared between the vendor and the customer. There is no silver bullet to structuring a cloud security framework and the guidelines of the cloud vendors must be carefully followed by the security expert.
In this sense, the vendors provide extensive documentation and training programs destined for IT professionals that allow them to configure custom security solutions. This high-level guidance allows quickly setting up a cloud security solution without worrying about the low-level details that an on-premise data center would require.
Concerns about data security in the cloud are outdated. In fact, relying on self-maintained data warehousing centers is putting your company at more risk. Migrating your data to the cloud and selecting the best cloud solution for your business should not be a daunting task. The Blue Orange Digital engineers are ready to assist you with building a secure & affordable cloud solution.
Ready to enjoy the safety of the cloud?
Drop us a line!
