Dimension Data has announced additional cloud application security capabilities to its cloud portfolio. By partnering with Blue Coat Elastica, Dimension Data’s clients now benefit from increased visibility and control of their cloud application stack.
Sean Duffy, security executive at Dimension Data Middle East and Africa, says: “Organisations are under pressure to transform into digital businesses. Rapid adoption of cloud applications means that the organisation needs to have tighter controls in the cloud, and security should be an enabler, not an inhibitor of digital transformation.”
There is a perception among organisations that only 40 to 50 cloud applications run in their environments. The reality, however, is that organisations typically have over 700 applications running in their network environment, most of which are introduced by employees without IT oversight or approval. To support this, research indicates that 71% of employees admit to using unapproved applications.
Duffy says that computing nowadays takes place outside the organisation’s premises and traditional control. He cites findings from the 2015 NTT Global Threat Intelligence Report, which highlights that end-point security remains a key weakness, and that end-users are becoming an organisation’s weakest link. The report also indicates that 74% of organisations have no formal incident response plan in place.
Duffy comments: “With the addition of Blue Coat Elastica to our security portfolio, we are bolstering our cloud application security brokerage capabilities to provide clients with a holistic view of the security risks in their cloud environments. Clients now have visibility and control over data residing in various cloud services.”
Dimension Data’s approach to cloud application security is underpinned by data lifecycle management and focuses on establishing the following cloud controls:
* Visibility – analyses clients’ cloud risk profiles, and provides visibility into all the cloud applications used within the organization;
* Compliance – adheres to governance and compliance regulations by listing authorised applications, and classifies data allowed in the cloud, as well as creating subsequent risk reports;
* Data security – applies DLP policies to authorised cloud applications to ensure authorised data is used and stored by authorised users on authorised platforms; and
* Threat prevention – identifies and mitigates the risks coming from cloud application usage by identifying anomalous user behaviour through specifics around normal usage. This allows an organisation to detect and respond to incidents like Brute force, session highjacking and a number of other threats.
By following Dimension Data’s approach to cloud application security, clients shield their data in ways that will allow them to risk less and achieve more.
