Without question, public cloud providers have made the deployment of applications and services simpler than ever. But while complexity has never been easier, security has never been more difficult. Many organizations are failing to make significant progress in addressing the challenges posed by the rapid growth of public cloud adoption.
Visibility remains an issue and organizations still struggle for clarity around shared responsibility for public cloud security.
This post will explore the top hybrid cloud security challenges organizations are facing and explore how FireMon can streamline the process of securing complex environments.
Top Hybrid Cloud Challenges Organizations Are Facing
Security challenges in hybrid cloud infrastructures continue to grow as organizations struggle to balance the rapid pace of cloud adoption with the need for robust security measures. From managing the rapid growth of hybrid cloud security solutions to addressing the increasing complexity of hybrid cloud architectures and preventing critical security misconfigurations, these challenges demand a strategic and proactive approach.
Let’s dive into these issues to understand their impact and explore solutions that can help organizations stay secure in an evolving hybrid cloud landscape.
Rapid Growth of Hybrid Cloud Security Solutions
According to the 2023 Cloud Security Report by Cybersecurity Insiders, 39% of organizations currently have over half of their workloads in the cloud, with 58% planning to reach this level within the next 12–18 months. Despite this significant cloud adoption, security concerns remain prevalent, with 95% of security professionals expressing apprehension about public cloud security.
This rapid deployment of business services in the cloud has, in many cases, outpaced organizations’ abilities to adequately secure the expanded attack surface in a timely manner.
The increasing complexity and sheer scale of hybrid cloud environments have become so easy to scale up that many nuances and security configuration aspects are overlooked in the process. IT and data security teams need to collaborate better to prevent serious gaps in hybrid cloud security.
Complexity of Hybrid Cloud Security Architecture
As the adoption of public cloud services increases, the need for better clarity on who’s responsible for security increases. There’s an inverse correlation between complexity and visibility, which raises the likelihood of misconfigurations, raising the likelihood of compliance failures. To solve the complexity problem, we need to understand how it manifests within an organization.
Hybrid cloud security architecture complexity emerges because public cloud configuration isn’t automatically linked to firewall policy configuration. Public cloud configuration and firewall configuration both determine permissions around data, applications, and user activity, but they are treated as two separate activities.
Yet, just like firewalls, public cloud instances accumulate unused and redundant rules. As multiple clouds are connected to the infrastructure and complexity mounts, these zombie rules pile up, causing conflicts and leaving security gaps.
Hybrid Cloud Security Misconfigurations
A lack of alignment between cloud configuration and overall network security policies happens because people aren’t speaking the same language — even though everyone is talking about the same thing.
Assumptions are made about who’s securing what in the public cloud creates many hybrid cloud security challenges. Business users trust public cloud providers to have all essential security baked in and that all cloud providers handle security the same way. The reality is different.
Poor communications add more stress to the security team’s load because they can’t get all the information they need. They are asked to enable applications on short deadlines without specifics about how the apps should be secured, so they hastily create security policies they hope will serve the needs of the business. But while those policies may be the best possible based on the information available at the time, they won’t be the absolute best because the information they were based on was not complete.
Missing information results in misconfigurations that erode compliance and increase security threats, opening the door for hackers using automated tools to search the internet for this type of vulnerability. Security teams always need to know more. They need visibility into each cloud instance. They need to know how AWS, Azure, Google, and niche cloud platforms are secured. But they can’t realistically know all these things.
Hybrid Cloud Security Best Practices
Effective hybrid cloud data protection is critical to preventing security breaches and safeguarding sensitive information across diverse environments. As organizations navigate the complexities of hybrid cloud infrastructures, adopting best practices ensures they can mitigate risks, enforce compliance, and maintain seamless operations. By focusing on alignment, automation, and visibility, businesses can build a robust defense against evolving threats while optimizing their hybrid cloud strategies.
Ensure Alignment Across Your Network
Because every public cloud is configured differently, either security professionals must be in the loop when any new instance is adopted or business users must be empowered with the knowledge to securely deploy these applications themselves. Those options each depend on human actions, which we know to be inconsistent and imperfect.
A more reliable and comprehensive approach is to establish a clear understanding of who is responsible for which secure hybrid cloud activities right from the start of the process by automating the application of a global security policy to the greatest extent possible. Every deployment should be guided by a centralized policy guideline that promotes best practices in implementation.
Implement Advanced Automation
Manual processes for securing hybrid cloud environments are no longer sufficient to keep up with the pace of modern business demands. Advanced automation is essential to streamline workflows, eliminate errors, and reduce the strain on security teams. By automating repetitive and time-consuming tasks, organizations can free up resources to focus on strategic initiatives while maintaining a strong security posture.
Automation tools can align cloud configurations with established security policies, ensuring consistent enforcement across public, private, and hybrid cloud environments. They also help detect and remediate vulnerabilities in real time, reducing the window of opportunity for attackers.
To maximize effectiveness, organizations should deploy automation solutions that offer centralized visibility and control. With advanced automation in place, security teams can confidently address hybrid cloud security challenges, enforce compliance requirements, and protect against evolving threats without sacrificing agility or speed.
Maximize Network Visibility
Security efforts in the hybrid enterprise need to focus on knowing where data resides, who can access it, and what controls are in place to govern that access. This is the challenge of visibility.
Visibility enables the creation of solid security policies around applications or resources by providing complete information on what is happening within the infrastructure. Visibility also supports compliance by making known the requirements relevant to an application and its impact on security configuration controls before deployment.
Visibility should be real-time and holistic in in order to support a successful cloud management strategy, The types of information gained should include:
- Application tracking
- Continuous risk assessment
- Inventories of cloud applications
- Number of VM instances
- Amount of compute
- Storage requirements
- Performance levels
- Effectiveness of security controls
With this information, organizations can ramp up hybrid, public, and multi-cloud deployments at a rapid rate without struggling to fully secure their increasingly complex environments.
Ensure Security for Hybrid Cloud Environments with FireMon
Regardless of where data resides — on-premise infrastructure, in the public cloud, or in a hyper-converged data center — security and compliance must evolve to stay aligned with the business.
Complexity in hybrid cloud environments is inevitable, as public cloud platforms make it incredibly easy to scale up quickly. However, this ease of expansion often introduces security threats and creates gaps that malicious actors can exploit. FireMon helps organizations tackle these challenges by simplifying vulnerability management across hybrid cloud environments.
With FireMon, you gain the tools to automate and enforce best practices and security controls, ensuring they are seamlessly integrated into your cloud-first strategies. FireMon’s solutions provide visibility into potential vulnerabilities, enabling you to proactively address misconfigurations and align security policies across public cloud platforms. By leveraging FireMon, your organization can confidently scale while mitigating risks and maintaining robust security postures.
Book a demo today and see how FireMon can help you solve your organization’s hybrid cloud security challenges.