Ready to join CIA on the cloud?

Despite what some skeptics say, the move of major organizations to Cloud shows that Cloud is here to stay. CIA has moved to the cloud, so have many other major companies like Coca Cola, Philips Medical Devices,  Netflix, Xerox, etc. Cloud’s virtues, like its ability to seamlessly fit into the different ways that businesses work today, has made it the new favorite kid on the block. Whether your business is local, global or remote, Cloud works for everyone. It’s financially viable, can be accessed from anywhere, supports a number of applications, is flexible and storage on it is much safer and recoverable than on USBs and hard drives. But like every technology, Cloud also has its Achilles heel, its security, and this is the thing that has been holding back people from accepting Cloud with open arms.

There was a time when Cloud security was a difficult issue to tackle, it was a new technology, virtually located, no one was sure what exactly the threats were and how to mitigate them. But that was a long time ago. In today’s world, if anyone says that they are not adopting the cloud due to security reasons, then, unfortunately, it’s just a lame excuse to stay away from this amazing technology.

Cloud Security and its Thunders

According to a report, before adopting cloud services, 81% of organizations said that security will be the main criteria to consider when selecting a potential cloud provider. But after they had adopted cloud services, the focus shifted to the reputation of the service provider. Does this mean, that once a company adopts Cloud, they are not worried about security anymore? Or is it that they move it to a place in their minds, where they think, “Oh, this won’t happen to us.” or “We will see when it happens”.

Or maybe organizations have realized, that Cloud, like any other solution today if used with proper security measures in place, is an asset and not a liability.

So the question today is not that what to do “If we use cloud” but what to do “When we use cloud” because sooner or later, you will have to walk this path. *According to a survey, 40% of respondents (company decision-makers) who described themselves as “cloud-wary” quoted security as the biggest reason for not adopting cloud, while only about 15% of “cloud-wise” respondents felt the same way.

This means that cloud-wary companies are thinking too much about the security risks, which with the right solutions can easily be avoided, but some companies are not too worried about the cost and performance challenges that non-cloud users are facing.

The benefits of Cloud are far more than the precautions needed to keep its Cons in check, and this is something that you don’t even have to do yourself. There are Cloud Security vendors that are great at what they do.

Cloud Security-Simple or Complicated?

Organizations can follow the “DIFM” (Do It For Me) approach and use Cloud security vendors who are experts at this. In fact, keeping your data and applications secure can be one main reason to move to the cloud.

Also, if you are moving your cloud to bigger cloud infrastructures like AWS, you cannot assume that your responsibility for its security is completely over now. If proper guidelines and practices are not followed any secure infrastructure can also become insecure. Let’s not blame cloud for those instances.  There are certain steps that need to be followed for you to ensure that your data on the cloud remains safe. Please refer to our other blog: Ten tips to secure your data on the cloud.

We need to stop thinking that Cloud by default should be like Fort Knox. Nothing is. Till the time we think of security as an afterthought, we will have to face obstructions in using any technology with fear of hackers. Our apps, laptops, mobiles, everything needs to be secured, then why should Cloud be any different?

*Industry Sources