ARE SECURITY CONCERNS STOPPING YOU FROM MIGRATING TO CLOUD?
As the prices of storage and bandwidth continue to drop fast, cloud-based communications services are becoming more and more attractive to businesses of all sizes. Business leaders are seeking to reduce licensing costs, to avoid recruiting IT staff and to focus fully on their core responsibility – growing the business. Although the list of benefits offered by cloud (hosted) solutions is long and well accepted, every time ‘cloud’ is brought up in a discussion, the conversation invariably gravitates to the security of data in the cloud.
You can find enough arguments to support security features of both cloud-based and premise-based communications solutions. The fact is, while a premise based system may initially offer more control over your data it is not inherently more or less secure. True security has more to do with your overall communications strategy and how you are using the technology. Cloud can be as secure as you want it to be.
In order to evaluate security of a cloud-based solution we first need to understand what data security actually means in terms of communications solutions.
A few basics about cloud solutions first: It consists of off-premise servers accessed via the Internet and these servers are owned and maintained by your communication solution providers. In terms of safety, solution providers have three overriding promises to keep: Availability, Integrity, and Confidentiality.
A few other questions to ask internally are:
1) Is your IT team ahead of the adoption curve?
The rise of bring-your-own-device (BYOD) culture means that many cloud services and tools are sneaking into organizations under the noses of IT leaders. One of the biggest challenges for IT teams in regards to cloud services is to assess data security implications before users adopt these cloud applications.
2) Do you have a security policy?
Many organizations don’t have security policies. No matter how large or small your company is, you need to have a plan to ensure the security of your information assets. A security program provides the framework for keeping your company at a desired security level by assessing the risks you face, deciding how you will mitigate them, and planning for how you keep the program and your security practices up to date.
3) Who is accessing your data from outside?
Outside hackers are what most people perceive as their biggest threat to security, but employees pose an equal risk. The risk is compounded when employees work remotely or use their personal mobile device to access sensitive materials outside of the company network. Make sure you have implemented solutions for secure data access when employees login from an external network.
Your communication solution provider should be able to discuss and advise you on each of these potential security concerns.
By the experts at Introtel