Cloud services offer cost-effective IT solutions. Over the past ten years, the benefits of migrating data center service to the cloud have been well known. Companies realize reduced capital expenditures, enhanced productivity, and greater agility with the cloud. Yet despite the proven gains, many CIOs are still reluctant to make the transfer, citing security concerns as one of the top reasons for caution. Believing that legacy infrastructure is more secure, cloud data centers are rejected by many companies despite their advantages over on-premise platforms.
However, the innovations surrounding virtual technology continue to develop and expand. Cloud service providers are in a position to deliver extensive monitoring, auditing, data protection, and threat identification, while third-party developers are continually generating advanced security tools for cloud deployment. This combination establishes an infrastructure environment that exceeds the security capabilities of an in-house data center.
Overcoming Traditional Data Center Security Challenges
Cloud service providers have developed successful methods for overcoming security challenges in traditional data centers, namely:
- Visibility—a comprehensive look at how users, applications, servers, and other IT resources are operating, including network activity, service management, user activity, and account usage.
- Identity and Access Control Management—user roles and responsibilities, including privileges, are managed through authentication credentials based in the cloud platform.
- Holistic Policy Enforcement—export log services enable ad hoc and continuous auditing capabilities according to pre-defined declarations made by the company.
Reducing the Attack Surface Through Endpoint Monitoring
Because configuration management cannot defend against unknown threats or employee vulnerabilities such as stolen credentials, misuse, or deliberate inside attacks, gaining visibility into network behaviors is crucial. Endpoint monitoring delivers effective mitigation techniques for identifying these types of threats and alerting administrators about possible attacks.
Endpoint monitoring operates in a real-time atmosphere, maintaining a behavioral model of each resource in the data center. That means if an asset begins to function abnormally, an alert is generated for immediate investigation. Administrators are able to determine whether the unusual behavior represents a potential threat or not, and then take action to resolve it.
Companies that hesitate to adopt cloud services because of a misguided perception that security features are lacking are most likely operating a data center with significantly less protection than what is available. Believing that the risks are too high puts businesses at a disadvantage. The security measures included in today’s cloud environments are both inexpensive and effective.