Cloud computing has achieved traction beyond all forecasts since the pandemic.
According to e4xperts, numerous companies throughout the world are looking for shifting their operations to the cloud every day. Against this ever-expanding incidence of cloud, it is authoritative to understand the need for greater responsibility in its use.
But organizations are considering the strategic use of this technology. Also, before shifting their operations to the cloud they should understand what they are trying to achieve with it. Also, it is essential to discuss the pertinent security risks that come with cloud technology.
Otherwise, all the good work in cloud adoption will result in nothing, worse, or lead to a security disaster.
Here, in this article, we are going to discuss the security risks of cloud computing.
How protected is cloud computing?
Cloud technology provides various advantages such as excellent accessibility, improved collaboration, storage capacity, and so on. But there are also security issues in cloud computing.
Below, we are going to provide some of the security risks of cloud computing:
#1. Data Loss:
Data loss is the most common risk of cloud computing. This is also known as data leakage; in the process of data loss, the data is deleted, unreadable, or corrupted by the user, software, or program. In a cloud computing atmosphere, data loss happens when our sensitive data goes to someone else’s hands.
One or more elements of data cannot be utilized by the data owner. The hard disk will not be working properly and the software is not updated.
#2. Data Breach:
A data breach is one process where confidential data is viewed, accessed, or stolen by someone else. The third party can store the data without having any authentication by the data owner. So the organization’s data is hacked by the hackers.
# 3. Hacked Interfaces and Insecure APIs:
Cloud computing completely relies on the internet. So, it is essential to secure the Interfaces and APIs that are used by external users. APIs are the best way to communicate with most of the cloud services. In cloud computing, few services are accessible in the public domain.
These available services can be accessed by third parties, so there is a probability these services can get accessed by hackers and easily can be harmed.
#4. Unmanaged attack surface:
An attack surface is the environment’s total exposure. The acceptance of microservices can lead to an explosion of publicly available workloads. Each workload is attached to the attack surface. If there is no closed management in your environment then you can expose your infrastructure in such ways that you can’t understand it is happening until an attack occurs.
#5. Human error:
According to Gartner, more than 99% of all Cloud security failures is happening due to some level of human error. Human errors are constant risks that are associated when building business applications. But, hosting resources on the public cloud expands the risk.
The cloud’s ease of use refers that the users could be using APIs without your awareness. It is opening up holes in your perimeter. You can manage human errors by establishing strong controls that help people to make the right decision.
#6. Misconfiguration:
Misconfiguration of cloud security settings can lead to the cause of cloud data breaches. There are several organizations whose cloud security management strategies are inadequate. These are unable to protect the cloud-based infrastructure.
Various factors contribute to this factor. Cloud infrastructures are developed to be easily usable.it is enabling easy data sharing and also makes it difficult for organizations that the data is only accessible by the authorized party. Also, the organizations using cloud infrastructure do not have clear visibility and they don’t have total control over the cloud technologies.
So, they need to rely upon the cloud service provider to secure and configure the cloud deployments. Since various organizations have multi-cloud deployments and are unfamiliar with securing the cloud infrastructure- each with a different array of vendor-provided security controls-it gets easier for a misconfiguration. It leaves an organization’s cloud-based resources exposed to attackers.
#7. External sharing of data:
The cloud infrastructure is designed to make data sharing easier. Many clouds provide the option to invite a collaborator through email or to share a link that allows anyone with the URL to access the shared resources.
This easy data sharing is a key factor, it can also be a primary cloud security issue. The use of link-based sharing is one of the most popular options as it is easier than explicitly invite to each collaborator. It also makes it difficult to control shared resources.
The shared link can be shared with someone else, guessed by a cyber-criminal, or stolen as a part of a cyber-attack; providing unauthorized access to the shared resources. Additionally, link-based sharing makes it impossible to cancel access to only a single recipient of the shared link.
#8. Denial of Service attacks:
Denial of service attacks happens when the system receives too much traffic to buffer the server. Most of the time denial of service attacks aim at the web servers of bigger organizations such as media companies, banking organizations, and government organizations.
For recovering the lost data, the denial of service attackers charges a big deal of time as well as money to recover the data.
FAQ:
What is the biggest risk of cloud computing?
Ans: While cloud computing continues to transform the way businesses serve their clients and operates internally but it also comes with a lot of risk factors. Some of the biggest risk factors are- data loss, malware, inadequate due diligence, compliance, and so on.
What are the 5 security issues related to cloud computing?
Ans: Several security issues come with cloud computing; some of them are-data loss due to cyber-attacks, denial of service attacks, misconfiguration, human error, and account hijacking.
Conclusion:
Implementing cloud computing infrastructure makes it easier for the organization than ever before to adopt remote working environments while providing the tools and data to be accessed by the team need to collaborate.
Also, businesses enjoy the efficiency, scalability, and cost-saving that come from shifting from an on-premises data solution to a cloud environment.
With these numerous benefits, businesses also consider various security risks that come with cloud computing. Here, we have enlisted some of the major security risks of cloud computing.
Business organizations should not treat any security risks as unimportant. Businesses must be figuring out some of the best strategies to mitigate these security risks anyhow.