Today, no enterprise or industry is completely secure against any cyberattack. Every year a large number of organizations fall to the consequences of these cyberattacks. Cloud data breaches have emerged as the most dangerous forms of these attacks since most companies fail to understand how they can protect themselves and the data present on the Cloud.
With huge volumes of data present online, cyberattacks have increased significantly. This has made businesses irrespective of their size or industry more vulnerable to a cyberattack.
When we consider Cloud data breaches, it takes place when any unauthorized user manages to gain access to the information that is hosted on the Cloud. Behind any data breaches, it might not always be the case with outside hackers.
At times, malicious insiders present within the organization can also compromise the data with the purposeful intent to virtually ‘hurt’ the company. There can also be cases when internal employees provide data to any unauthorized person.
At times, systems and devices can also make a company vulnerable to such data breaches. In order to protect the organization’s data present on the Cloud, one needs to develop an extensive strategy that can cater to all the possible and potential vulnerabilities.
So, in this article, we shall see a few measures that one needs to take to avoid Cloud data breaches in an organization.
Preventing Cloud Data Breaches
The following are some of the best-proven methods that one can follow for avoiding data breaches in a Cloud-
Provide Training On Data Breaches
All business owners, they must teach and make aware their employees of all the dimensions of cybersecurity strategy. As of now, there is no dedicated software technology that can protect an organization against data breaches. This makes it important for everyone inside the organization to remain constantly aware of possible data breach incidents.
For an all-around awareness, business owners must incorporate training at the early stages of Cloud deployment. These pieces of training will help guide the employees about all the security threats that might take place in Cloud Hosting. The employees must have a comprehensive understanding and awareness of different forms of breaches, such as phishing.
Always Keep the Data Encrypted
To any organization, security tools can be of great help, since they serve as defense lines in events of cyberattacks. So, to ensure maximum security of the data. Encryption is a standard method that is being followed by businesses of all sizes widely. When the data is stored in an encrypted format, it becomes unreadable for anyone not having the necessary decryption keys.
In case a data breach does happen, hackers and other unauthorized users won’t be able to gain any information from the data. Talking about data hosted in the Cloud, one should ensure that hosted data remains encrypted in both states- at rest as well as in transit. Attackers are always after gaining the data, irrespective of where it is located; thus, its protection becomes indispensable essential.
Restrict the Data Stored in the Cloud
Every data that a business has needs not be hosted on the Cloud. While performing the resource migration to Cloud servers, companies must analyze the risk level, whether it is really safe or not, to store everything on the Cloud.
Certain highly sensitive information can be stored in-house rather than in Cloud hosting. By limiting the data hosted on the Cloud and using complex redaction strategies can be extremely helpful for minimizing the data breach on a Cloud.
Discuss with Experts
Cloud security can’t be accomplished with ease when one is looking to overcome the risks related to a data breach. To minimize the breach consequences, businesses must discuss with a domain expert who can help in creating a strong cybersecurity strategy. These experts will deploy the best industry practices for securing information and also creating a strong foundation for protecting the data.
These domain experts also help businesses to understand the potential security risks and make improvements towards better security mechanisms for protection against possible breaches.
Developing a Data Breach Response Plan
Most of the sophisticated mitigation plans can’t wholly secure companies against data breaches in the Cloud. To overcome the worst-possible results of data breaches, businesses need to develop a response plan that will allow them to overcome a data breach. This breach response plan needs to address several vital things.
A data breach response plan needs to have the following to reduce the damage and further protect a business organization-
- It should reduce the consequences of a breach by cutting off the remaining data present in the system
- There should be well-defined notations about the breaches and their subsequent response
- It should have mechanisms that can help in resuming business operations by offering enhanced stability
- There should be transparent communication mechanisms between the parties involved in breach recovery
Concluding Remarks
With many of the organizations moving to a Cloud infrastructure, it is essential to protect the data hosted on the Cloud. Data breaches irrespective of the hosting platform are well known for causing permanent damage to businesses. Protection of Cloud data becomes essentially important for businesses as their stakeholders, such as customers; employees can access this data from anywhere, anytime. Thus, deploying the above-mentioned techniques can be extremely helpful for minimizing and averting the risks of data breaches in the Cloud.
Reach out to Team bodHOST today for leveraging the best-in-class security mechanisms of your Cloud data.