With the average data breach now costing companies around $4 million, there are few businesses of any size that can withstand the cost. Without proper preparation, your business could go under with one minor data slippage. If you’re not prepared with cloud computing security, the convenience of cloud computing could cost more than it’s worth.
Here is everything you need to know about keeping your data safe when cloud computing.
Physical Locations Matter
While you might not think about a correlation between climate change and the security of your data, one surely exists. If your paper records were once subject to flooding, fire, or earthquakes, your servers and equipment are certainly equally fragile.
If you keep all of your data in one place, one act of god could end up deeply damaging your company. That’s why could computing has become so popular in recent years. If you have data stored on the cloud, it’s accessible from anywhere and protected against any problems that occur on your site.
If you have secure data that your customers or employees trust you with, hackers could be interested in getting ahold of it for profit. If it sits in one building, all it would take is leaving one wireless hub unsecured or for hackers to get credentials from a former employee. The most intermediate of hackers can pull off a data breach like this from a laptop connected to your system from outside in your parking lot.
If someone really wants to get in, all they have to do is find a way into your server room and start messing with your data. If they want to hook up directly to your servers, they’ll have access to your system in a matter of minutes.
While you can have safeguards in place to shut them out or shut down your system ASAP, if you don’t have backups, you’ll be stuck. Off-site storage or off-site backups protect you from this kind of breach.
Cloud Storage Uses Encryption
If you work at a small business and aren’t an expert in data, you might not know the simple encryption methods to protect your information. Without these measures in place, your data is sitting on machines waiting to be read. If you trust a cloud solution that doesn’t include encryption, you’re just sending your data to another place for it to get released to the wrong hands.
When data is encoded, there’s a special encryption key that’s meant for the owner of the data. If data gets hacked without the key, your hacker only gets a bunch of nonsense, not real information that makes any sense.
Who has access to the key really matters in this case. When the key is stored by the cloud service, it keeps those keys safe from falling into the wrong hands and tracks how often they’re used. Even if you have access to the key as the owner of the data, it’ll be protected and tracked by the company who stores your data.
Stay In Control
If you want to maintain control over your data, there are services that allow you to upload and download files. These companies use proprietary services to lend control to users while also maintaining a separate layer between potential hackers and your data. This ensures that encryption keys aren’t in the hands of users.
If you set limits to the functionality, you can eliminate the ability for the wrong people to start messing around with your files.
These services aren’t the end-all-be-all to keeping yourself safe from hacking, but they can help a lot. When you use these tools, there is always the possibility of the tools or apps getting hacked and your data could be released. When you are selecting your tool, make sure that you do your research to find a partner that use industry standards and best practices to ensure your data is safe.
Apps that say that information is encrypted from the moment it’s written are now flooding the market. These apps keep data encrypted as it’s transferred or stored in the cloud. Since the data stays connected to these apps, you can be sure that if it’s hijacked, it can’t be abused or used without your permission.
Combine the Best Features For the Most Protection
If you want to get the most out of cloud storage security, get a combination of the best features and combine your approach. Before you upload any data to the cloud, be sure that it’s encrypted. Use a piece of software on your end and keep control of the password.
When you want to get access to your file, you’ll have to download and decrypt it, but you can be sure that your data is protected.
With these extra steps, you’ll be sure that no one can take advantage of your data. However, it also limits how you can share your data and get the most out of sharing and searching with those cloud storage tools.
Cloud computing security comes with a lot of costs and benefits that need to be weighed at all times. If you want convenience, you often sacrifice some security. If you want security, you often sacrifice convenience.
Cloud Computing Security is Vital
If you’re using cloud computing, you need cloud computing security to go with it. Otherwise, you’ll lose out on the advantages that cloud computing is supposed to offer you and your business.
To have 360 degrees of security, follow our guide for securing your network.