It seems like every day; there’s a new acronym to learn in the tech world. Cloud Access Security Broker (CASB) might be one of the newer ones, but what does a Cloud Access Security Broker Do? Turns out, it’s pretty important! Keep reading to find out more.
What does a Cloud Access Security Broker Do?
A cloud access security broker, or CASB, is software that host in the cloud or on-premises software or hardware that acts as an intermediary between users and cloud service providers. A CASB can solve security weaknesses in software-as-a-service (SaaS), platform-as-a-service (PaaS), and infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) settings.
A CASB, in addition to providing visibility, enables enterprises to extend the reach of their security rules from on-premises infrastructure to the cloud and establish new policies for cloud-specific contexts.
CASBs have become an essential component of organizational security, allowing firms to access the cloud safely while safeguarding critical corporate data.
The CASB acts as a policy enforcement center, combining different forms of security policy enforcement and applying them to anything your company uses in the cloud—regardless of the device seeking to access it, such as unmanaged cellphones, IoT devices, or personal computers.
With the advent of BYOD and the appearance of unofficial employee cloud usage, or Shadow IT, the ability to monitor and manage the use of cloud apps such as Office 365 has become critical to the objective of organizational security.
Rather than flatly prohibiting cloud services and possibly affecting employee productivity, a CASB enables organizations to adopt a granular approach to data security and policy enforcement, securely using time-saving, productivity-enhancing, and cost-effective cloud services.
What CASBs provide
Many CASB security characteristics are distinct from those provided by conventional security controls, such as enterprise/web application firewalls and secure web gateways, and may include the following:
- Risk assessment and cloud governance
- Preventing data loss
- Control over native cloud service capabilities such as collaboration and sharing
- Analytics of user and entity activity uses for threat prevention (UEBA)
- Auditing configuration
- Detection of malware
- Key management and data encryption
- Integration of SSO and IAM
- Controlling access based on context
Why do I require a CASB?
As previously offered on-premises services migrate to the cloud, maintaining visibility and control in these environments is critical to meeting compliance requirements, protecting your enterprise from attack, and allowing your employees to use cloud services safely without introducing additional high risk to your enterprise.
However, while the deployment of a CASB is critical for organizations looking to safeguard cloud usage in their operations, it is only one component of the total security approach that firms should employ to provide defense from device to cloud.
Businesses should consider expanding the capabilities of their CASB by deploying a secure web gateway (SWG) to help safeguard internet usage and a device data loss prevention solution (DLP) to help protect intellectual property and sensitive corporate data across the network for a comprehensive protection plan.
How does a CASB function?
To satisfy organizational security needs, a cloud access security broker must give visibility and control over data and risks in the cloud. This accomplishes in three steps:
- Auto-discovery uses by the CASB solution to generate a list of all third-cloud services and who is utilizing them.
- Classification: After ascertaining the complete scope of cloud usage, the CASB assesses the risk level associated with each application. It does it by assessing what the application is, what type of data is within the app, and how it is shared.
- Remediation: Once the relative risk of each application did determine, the CASB may utilize this information. It is to establish policies for the organization’s data and user access to fulfil their security needs and automatically take action when a violation occurs.
CASBs also provide extra levels of security by preventing viruses and encrypting data.