Jul 06 2023
Cloud

4 Steps to Centralized Management for Cloud Security

Agencies need solutions that simplify security and provide cross-platform visibility in a multicloud environment.

A multicloud environment offers numerous benefits, including a high degree of scalability and flexibility, but it also presents challenges around security. Federal IT leaders should consider these four steps to remove complexity from their cloud security environments and keep resources safe from attack.

1. Adopt Cloud-Specific Security Tooling

Solutions such as cloud security posture management and cloud workload protection secure cloud-native applications and environments, from development through production. Centralized tools go a long way toward streamlining security and management for multicloud environments. Such tooling creates risk management consistency and operational efficiency that organizations with multicloud footprints should prioritize.

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2. Streamline Identity, Access and Privilege Management

New products and solutions such as cloud infrastructure entitlement management are helping agencies implement a more holistic strategy for identity and access management. This centralized, automated strategy is important, as it allows organizations to set effective access privileges according to each environment, for each user or group. This reduces the need for manual access reviews, a truly cumbersome process with multicloud organizations.

3. Enable Security Orchestration, Automation and Response (SOAR)

With the remediation and response variance inherent in multicloud, it’s crucial for organizations to be able to efficiently respond to various alarms. Security orchestration, automation and response solutions are one type of cybersecurity tool that supports this efficiency. SOAR lets agencies define incident analysis and response procedures and then deploy those responses when needed, either automatically or with the click of a button.

4. Apply Consistent Monitoring Across Environments

Implement the same monitoring policies across environments to create a consistent experience. Rather than using different monitoring tools for each cloud environment, it’s typically better to monitor all cloud resources (along with the organization’s broader security footprint) using one tool. Consistent monitoring will help an organization reap the benefits of a multicloud environment while minimizing the security management headaches that often come along with it.

MORE FROM FEDTECH: 4 ways to improve printer security.

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