Cloud adoption has reached stratospheric levels, and with this increased volume of workloads and applications usage, organizations require tighter controls to protect their multi-cloud environments and data from potential data leaks or breaches due to misconfigurations. Enter Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM).
Cloud has clearly redefined the IT landscape, on nearly every level in 2020 – serving as the perfect solution for increased remote collaboration while further enabling organizations to seamlessly scale and transform their business operations.
At the same time, as has been the case for years, the growing popularity of the cloud has also increased the threat of its arch-nemesis – data breaches, specifically those incidents related to improper cloud configuration. According to a recent report from Risk Based Security, the number of records exposed in Q1 2020 skyrocketed to 8.4 billion – a 273% increase compared to Q1 2019. Most of this can be attributed to one single breach – a ‘misconfigured’ ElasticSearch cluster that exposed 5.1 billion records.
Misconfigurations are undoubtedly the most significant security threat lingering in the cloud. Unrestricted access to non HTTP/HTTPS ports, lack of MFA, stale access credentials, overly permissive setting any of these factors that result in a misconfigured cloud account represents a huge exposure for your organization. For its part, Gartner has predicted that 99% of cloud security failures over the next five years will be caused by user error – with much of the issue related to configuration issues. As a result, today’s security practitioners face a complex set of challenges while working to secure their business-critical workloads, applications, and data.
What leads to misconfigurations in the cloud?
- Lack of visibility into the multi-cloud environment: With organizations adopting new cloud apps and services at lightning speed, it’s simply difficult for IT to keep up. Security teams must have proper visibility into all relevant cloud resources to ensure data security and compliance, especially in the multi-cloud world.
- Manual management of cloud configurations and settings: From resource provisioning to continuous integration and updates, the cloud is innately designed to automate workflows. However, at least from a management perspective, too much cloud security and configuration management are still handled manually. Dedicated security automation is needed to address this gap.
- Lack of alignment with compliance best practices: The limited IT security staff in organizations have developed their skill set toward on-premises network security and may not have the technical know-how to steer through the complex web of securing hybrid cloud architectures.
Lookout CSPM: An integrated solution for complex cloud security configuration challenges
Lookout’s integrated security platform approach offers a dedicated CSPM solution that offers critical administrative and configuration controls with tight security guardrails, providing continuous insight into cloud risk posture through intuitive and drill-down dashboards.
Delivered both standalone and as an integrated complement to the Lookout CASB platform, Lookout CSPM performs an automated assessment of your cloud landscape against well-defined security and compliance guidelines to prevent data loss due to misconfigurations.
Additionally, the solution offers built-in auto-remediation capabilities to reduce operational complexity in managing resources across multiple cloud applications and ensures alignment with the latest compliance guidelines, supporting GDPR, CCPA, HIPAA, and PCI for IaaS environments including Amazon AWS, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud Services.
As mentioned by Gartner in its latest Magic Quadrant Report for Cloud Access Security Brokers, “Lookout CSPM is well-developed, follows several common frameworks and can replace stand-alone tools” – making an even bigger case for addressing CSPM through an integrated CASB strategy.
Specific benefits offered by Lookout CSPM include:
- Discovery of all critical assets in leading IaaS clouds
- Continuous configuration monitoring for security and compliance
- Automated remediation actions to reduce operational complexity
- Compliance with industry best practices and regulations – CIS Foundations Benchmarks, HIPPA & GDPR compliance, PCI DSS Best Practices
- Scheduling monitoring and remediation options for continuous cloud compliance
- Detailed reporting for related security and compliance audits
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