Five Best Practices for Cloud Security

There’s obviously still a lot of concern about the security of cloud computing, both inside and outside the data center. But in reality, cloud computing is a more secure option than what most IT organizations have in place today. But like all things IT, it needs to be properly managed to be effective.

Here are five tips from IBM on how to better secure your cloud computing environment

Click through for five cloud security best practices from IBM.

Embrace a secure-by-design approach: IT organizations need to focus on identifying controls that address the lack of direct access to information. Taking an approach that is secure by design forms the foundation of the organizations strategy for entering the cloud and allows the organization to consistently approach security needs based on the workloads and granular data represented in their cloud efforts. This also facilitates the implementation of resiliency and audit capabilities in the cloud, allowing organizations to extend their security philosophy into the cloud.

Identify alternative deployment locations where you can rapidly redeploy your images: This segment of the secure-by-design philosophy focuses on identifying alternate environments for deployment, and the selection of vendors which do not create conditions of cloud “lock-in.” This flexibility allows organizations to respond to changing conditions with minimal interruption to the business.

Implement an active monitoring solution: For organizations to address availability or instability conditions they must implement an active monitoring solution, failure to do so relies on cues from users which could result in damages ranging from poor customer satisfaction, to loss of customers. Organizations need to make determinations as to the monitoring and intervals based on data content and should implement manual or automated procedures to respond to related events.

Develop a plan and educate the response team: A large element of security is the response to threats and how rapidly an organization can respond to threats and adverse events. Organizations should document logical responses to event classes and implement education programs to facilitate response to said conditions.

Leverage Security-as-a-Service solutions: For instance, a managed backup service provides you the option to specify image storage locations. Managed security solutions allow organizations to share responsibility for monitoring and management of security functions, this is particularly useful in today’s climate where threats come faster and are far more pervasive. The threats of today, while still being variants of the threats from yesterday, require professional skills to identify and respond to efficiently.