Cloud Misconfiguration Leaves Many Vulnerable to Data Breaches

Got cloud? Got cloud issues?

Cloud misconfiguration is one of the common, yet preventable security issues facing organizations migrating to the cloud today. It also leads to widespread misunderstanding about the security capabilities of modern cloud solutions provided by major cloud providers like Amazon, Google, Microsoft, IBM, and others.

Unfortunately, not setting up proper configurations can be costly and detrimental to a company as cloud misconfigurations continue to expose billions of records.

A recent report titled Computing Cloud Review noted that 86% of organizations cite data breaches and loss as the primary reason they hesitate to adopt the cloud.

A simple misconfiguration, even a failure to set a single option in a company’s cloud service, can create a major security risk for the organization and its customers. Almost every day, news of a new data breach spreads like wildfire online. Virtually everyone with any kind of digital footprint has fallen victim to having their personal information made public.

Forbes suggests that 83% of enterprise workloads will move to the cloud by 2020. But, the steady growth of the cloud for data storage and processing widely outruns requisite security skills and adequate training among IT personnel in charge of cloud infrastructure.

In July 2019, the world media reported a breach of Capital One, being presumably the largest data breach within the US financial sector and affecting approximately 100 million individuals in the United States and 6 million in Canada.

Reportedly, the attacker exploited a misconfigured AWS S3 bucket to download extremely sensitive data left unattended. While Capital One estimated only its direct losses stemming from the breach to attain $150 million, the FBI later disclosed that as many as 30 other organizations could have been compromised using the same AWS misconfiguration.

If you need assistance setting up your cloud configurations to create a more secure environment contact DarkHound SecOps at [email protected].

Sources: https://thehackernews.com/2019/12/cybersecurity-predictions-2020.html

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