The demand and the functionality of the Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASBs) are exponentially rising for the past few years. CASB providers deliver the services to the IT sector, which is extensively concerned with data visibility, compliance, data security, and its protection against malware and other threat vectors.
Cloud Access Security Brokers act as the control personnel between users, the cloud storage, and the sensitive data, which is transferred and accessed across different servers. As more businesses now are storing their data on the cloud, data protection has become a pertinent issue of the present times.
Data Loss Prevention (DLP) tool has emerged as one of the pillars of CASB. With public cloud computing, any unauthorized third party can easily invade and access the data from the servers. DLP tools are designed to stop such enterprise data leaks. CASB providers often extend their own DLP policy engine to the enterprises. You can configure your CASB DLP solution and apply it to cloud services.
The DLP solution of many CASBs looks similar at the surface level; however, the providers miss out on many important features that limit the potential of covering the traffic in the cloud environment and security the data in the cloud servers. This article lists eight essential DLP capabilities that you should look for when you source out the cloud access security brokers services.
1) Inspect Cloud Traffic From On-Premises, Other Devices, And Remote Users
When you are inquiring about the DLP capabilities of a CASB vendor, you need to inquire if it can inspect and cover the users’ location. You need to make sure that the DLP solution will properly cover the cloud traffic that involves users on-premise, on devices like mobile, and the ones who are remotely located. Most of the CASBs exclusively focus only on the on-premises cloud traffic, leaving out the other devices which remotely access the cloud data.
2) Inspect Cloud Traffic from Browser, Mobile App, Desktop App, And Sync Client
Apart from the coverage of the users on-premise servers, mobile, and remote servers, you should ensure that the DLP capabilities of the CASBs cover the cloud traffic that generates through a web browser, mobile and desktop apps, and sync clients. Mostly the CASBs only inspect the web browsers without checking the sensitive data emanating from the mobile and desktop apps.
3) Inspect Content In and En Route To and from Sanctioned Cloud Services
The next crucial requirement is to make sure that the DLP solution of CASB can scan the content stored in sanctioned cloud services. You also need to inspect the content en route to and from sanctioned cloud software. This inquiry will check the unauthorized outflow of sensitive data in real-time.
4) Inspect Unsanctioned Cloud Traffic
While the DLP capabilities need to be applied to the sanctioned cloud services without fail, it also needs to the applied to the unsanctioned cloud services. A major percentage of cloud storage is “shadow IT,” and here, the sensitive data is exposed to a higher risk of leakages.
5) Inspect All Types Of Leakages
An effective DLP solution should be able to thoroughly detect all the content stored in the different file types. It should also be able to detect the various file extension changes, support the password-protected files, webmail content, social media content, metadata, and the data hidden within documents or spreadsheets. Every data manifestation needs to be protected.
6) Advanced Features For Accuracy And Precision
The DLP solution of your CASB should be able to detect false positives. Its services should extend beyond simple keyword matching, which is susceptible to false positives. The DLP solution should be able to deliver accuracy and precision with biometrics, custom keyword dictionary, and diverse global identifiers.
7) Support Accuracies With Contextual Policies
Apart from providing accuracies to support the cloud services against false positives, it should also be able to support different contextual policies concerned with the user, their device, location, and content, on their cloud service.
8) Integrate With Existing Systems
If your enterprise has some existing investment in the security services, your CASBs DLP solution should be able to integrate the on-premises DLP with your prior investments, along with your existing incident management solution and data classification software.
To conclude:
Any effective cloud access security brokers (CASBs) will ensure data loss prevention (DLP) to defend the loss of data. DLP is one of the essential data security pillars of CASB. However, you need to ensure your CASB vendor provides you with a comprehensive and accurate DLP to examine data loss prevention and protection across multiple channels. This will help you check the unauthorized access of data across the on-premise, mobile, or remote cloud services.
