The cloud-mobile environment that we operate in today is a brave new world for many organizations. Mobile devices, both managed and unmanaged, connecting to cloud apps and infrastructure, that is off premises, render existing security equipment and infrastructure virtually useless. Furthermore, most organizations are adopting a cloud-first mobile-first strategy as a part of their digital transformation. Shifting future investments to enabling and therefore securing the new cloud-mobile environment. This is exactly what CipherCloud and Cloudflare are solving for.
Before we move forward, let’s assess what exactly has changed.
For many of us in the security world, not much. We are playing the same game on an updated board. Sure, there are some new pieces and slightly different rules, however the fundamentals are the same. We need to secure the users identity, the devices they are using, the network they are connecting with, the applications, and the data they are creating and sharing. This has always been true and will always be true.
What is different today? Location, location, location.
We shifted our data centers to cloud infrastructure and adopted cloud apps. With that shift, our data (intellectual property, personal identifiable information) now is created, stored, and shared in the cloud. Users can connect to cloud apps simply with a username and password with any web enabled device – managed or unmanaged. Furthermore, users can connect from any location using public networks. It’s a brave new world.
This new world bypasses the on-premises security stack leaving many organizations wondering why they have to support two security models – one that support the legacy way of doing business, and one that supports their digital transformation strategy – cloud-first, mobile-first.
The legacy security tools such as VPNs requiring agents, network gateway firewalls, and UTMs for example, can serve the needs of a siloed network, but their limitations come out to the open when cloud is brought into the mix. Organizations need to ask and solve the following questions.
- How do you ensure a smooth transition of your data from on-premise to cloud?
- How do you protect your cloud data and services that can be accessed by any user, any time? How do you protect your sensitive data in the cloud and SaaS apps, and when it’s downloaded at endpoints and forwarded to 3rd-party?
- How do you ensure authenticity of the user accessing the cloud data and services?
- How do you maintain security for all network connectivity?
This is exactly what CipherCloud and Cloudflare have set out to accomplish. Cloudflare provides network security, performance and reliability for on-premises, hybrid, cloud, and SaaS apps. CipherCloud provides a full stack of CASB functionality aimed at maintaining visibility, protection, and control of sensitive data in the cloud-mobile environment.
The joint solution now allows users to not only access their cloud services faster, but enable secure wrapper around their data right from the source, allowing safer collaboration and sharing. For more details on the partnership, read this press announcement.
