Tips on safe cloud computing practicies

BANGALORE, INDIA: Despite widespread interest in adopting cloud computing technologies, many organizations are caught in unaware with respect to their own security.

This situation puts their operations, intellectual property and customer information at risk. CISO’s and other security professionals worry that with the growth in adoption of cloud-based applications, their organization’s information is strewn across multiple service providers. In this distributed environment, they’ve lost control, but they are still accountable.

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Here are some tips on safe cloud computing from Symantec:

• It is recommended that companies assess what specific, proactive steps they should take to protect sensitive information stored in the cloud. 

Recommendations to implement include:

1. Ensure that policies and procedures clearly state the importance of protecting sensitive information stored in the cloud. The policy should outline what information is considered sensitive and proprietary.

2. Evaluate the security posture of third parties before sharing confidential or sensitive information. As part of the process, corporate IT and/or IT security experts should conduct a thorough review and audit of the vendor’s security qualifications.

3. Prior to deploying cloud technology, companies should formally train employees how to mitigate the security risks specific to the new technology to make sure sensitive and confidential information is not threatened.

4. The use of cloud computing in business environments raises an important point about how to secure information in the cloud. As people adopt more dispersed systems, data becomes more fluid and protecting access to that data is critical. In this environment, the cloud is driving the trend that IT governance requires a combination of both business and IT management and leadership.

(Source: Symantec India)

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