Security Advantages of Working in the Cloud

Protecting against DDoS

DDoS attacks have continued to grow in frequency in recent years, and businesses generally spend a lot of resources and time to combat them. Working in the cloud comes with the added advantage of protecting servers against DDoS attacks. 

There are multiple ways to protect servers against a DDoS attack, with the most basic one being to discard the traffic sent to the server that has been targeted. This is also known as “blackholing”. While it does unclog the network, it leads to the loss of legitimate and malicious content. Another way to protect the servers is to scrub the data, which means looking at data before it reaches the targeted server. This is a way to discard malicious traffic with the help of an algorithm, but the downside is being limited by the bandwidth of the scrubbing center. 

When using cloud DDoS protection, the attacking traffic is scrubbed near the source, as the cloud DDoS protection uses multiple global scrubbing centers. This way, the attacking traffic doesn’t get near the targeted server. By scrubbing data near the source, this solution prevents the rest of the network from becoming congested during a malicious attack.

Data Security

Data security and integrity are crucial components of cloud security, ensuring that data remains stored where it was originally uploaded and preventing unauthorized modification and deletion. 

In an era where data breaches are becoming more common, quality cloud computing security solutions have multiple security protocols in place in order to protect transactions and sensitive information. These protocols prevent third parties from accessing or tampering with the data in the cloud. Most cloud solutions monitor and audit all data activity regularly and enforce security policies in real time.

A report from RapidScale showed that 94% of businesses saw their security improved after switching to the cloud. And investing in cloud mobility and security often translates in increased revenue growth, with Dell claiming that companies who do this grow up to 53% faster than their competitors. 

Regulatory Compliance

Choosing a top cloud computing security solution makes it easy to protect personal and financial data and make sure it complies with current regulations. Companies that have sensitive data stored in the cloud need to pay close attention to regulatory compliance and make sure they obey the laws, regulations, and guidelines that are specific to their business. Amazon Web Services offers a beneficial security and compliance tool, AWS Artifact. This service gives AWS customers access to security and compliance reports along with AWS security and compliance certifications.

Security is the most important step to take in the direction of regulatory compliance, and storing data in the cloud usually makes it very easy to achieve a good level of security and compliance, which is often better than the ones that were achieved before migrating to the cloud. 

Fault Tolerance

The cloud is a network of servers stored in secure, highly protected data centers. Since these computers are all connected, your application is unlikely to experience downtime because if a server goes down, another one will pick the application right up. 

Companies that are interested in using fault-tolerant systems can take advantage of the ability of cloud systems to continue operating without interruption even if one or more servers or components fail. Working in the cloud offers companies the continuity they need to maintain essential functions in the event of a disaster. 

User Access

When working in the cloud, companies have numerous options for setting up permissions for their users. This means that it’s easy to make sure each employee has the correct permissions for their level and also that end users can only access certain things.

Top cloud solutions make it easy to manage user permissions and restrictions with a high level of automation and minimum fuss. As such, users only get access to what they need to do their job, and admins can easily grant extra permissions as needed. Data security remains the same regardless of how many users have access.

System Updates

Unlike in the case of in-house servers, all the updates and upgrades are able to be performed automatically when companies use the cloud. This is a huge benefit because it saves time and effort for IT teams, reducing the workload or allowing team members to focus on more important tasks. 

All updates and upgrades are done by the service providers, off-sight, which is convenient for staff with busy schedules. According to an infographic published by PC World, half of the cloud adopters mentioned that they required fewer internal IT resources as a benefit. 

Loss Prevention

Companies that don’t use cloud-computing solutions have their valuable data tied to the physical location the computers reside in. In many cases, this is not an issue, but there is always a chance you may end up losing data permanently if something happens to the local hardware. 

While this might sound far-fetched for many, in reality, computers can malfunction for various reasons, ranging from age-related hardware deterioration, to viral infections and simple user error (losing laptops with valuable data on them as a result of misplacing them or being stolen is more common than you think). 

Saving data locally is less secure than working on the cloud. By choosing the cloud, all the information ever uploaded remains safe and easy to access from any computer in the world.