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Cloud computing provides more efficiency and speed to market which explains why organizations are rapidly adopting this technology world over. The rise in cloud operations lets enterprises of all sizes operate more effectively in terms of costs, performance but at the same time opening your data and assets onto the Internet creates additional risk – especially around misconfigurations, security and compliance. Cloud adoption has brought into focus prevention of cyber security risks in a significant manner.
In today’s topic we will learn about Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) solution, its key features and benefits and its implementation strategy for effective threat protection.
What is CSPM?
Cloud security posture management helps to proactively and continuously monitor security in the cloud ecosystem. CSPM solution scans cloud accounts and workloads to identify risks and vulnerabilities, such as insecure data exposure, misconfigured security controls, non-compliant configurations etc. CSPM provided automated remediation solution prioritization of vulnerabilities, and detailed report on cloud posture deficiencies to help IT and security teams in fixing gaps to optimize the cloud security posture.
CSPM scans cloud configurations using various techniques such as threat discovery, visibility checks, monitoring, hardening and remediations.
Key Features of Cloud Security Posture Management
- Automation to help to identify early and error free threat identification without the need for manual intervention
- Assorted cloud ecosystem real time management
- Cloud related misconfigurations accurate detection
- Cloud policies and compliance maintenance
- Scan and alerts in real time
- Cloud security framework-based risk assessment
- Problematic configuration detection with periodic scans
Benefits of Cloud Security Posture Management
- More control – monitoring and analytics centrally to have complete control of cloud security operations.
- Posture management sorted – with CSPM all enterprises big or small have an easy to understand posture management process in place which offers automation and AI based assistance for threat discovery, integration and management rapidly.
- Real time threat management – CSPM always provides insight into cloud health in real time. And keeps an eye on every possible risk which might be overlooked and provides real time updates
- Insight into cyber security – it provides appropriate recommendations to security teams on remedial actions
- Maintaining compliance – it adheres to compliances and frameworks such as HIPAA, GDPR, NIST, CIS etc. it helps in posture supervision inline with compliance requirements.
Implementing Effective CSPM strategy
This section covers best practices and strategy to implement a robust and effective CSPM solution in your organization. Let’s look at each of them in more detail and understand its impact.
- Choosing right CSPM tool – Selection of right Cloud Security Posture Management tool will be based on its ability to perform security checks, configuration vulnerabilities, compliance violations, access management issues, network security etc. tool should have proactive insights and auto fixing capabilities for common misconfigurations. Conduct POC to evaluate tool effectiveness for your environment
- Discover misuse and compliance violations – leverage predefined compliance templates bundled with CSPM tools such as CIS and NIST. Tailor Cloud Security Posture Management policies as per organization requirement for alignment to standards and regulations. Implement continuous scan of the cloud environment for security misconfigurations and noncompliance items.
- Define controls and policies – Establish clear standards, policies and control frameworks tailored for organization compliance to industry regulations and risk appetite.
- Security assessments automation – CSPM tools help to automate security assessments as per security frameworks and standards. Implement proactive alerting and remediation workflows in CSPM tools to address security incidents promptly.
- Monitoring – monitor cloud environments on emerging threats, compliance gaps and vulnerabilities. Be informed about latest security updates and regulatory changes to tweak security strategies accordingly.
- Share insights and collaboration – encourage communication and coordination between cross functional teams such as IT, Development and security teams to provide integrated solutions in cloud for security. Share knowledge, best practices and key learnings to improve overall security posture.