The cloud is a game-changer in how businesses access and use technology, but it also comes with significant implementation challenges. The most fundamental of these is simply that the cloud comprises multiple services and platforms, which has made integration a critical piece of the cloud strategy puzzle.

According to Radware’s The State of Web Application and API Protection report, 70% of production web applications now run in cloud environments. Application development and deployment is also becoming more diverse, which means most organizations are now faced with hybrid and heterogeneous environments that span public clouds, private clouds, and on-premises data centers.

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To provide consistent and comprehensive application protection in a diverse environment, organizations need to start thinking about security differently. Failure to put this element in place leaves data in the cloud vulnerable, creating a world of cybersecurity risks that organizations must desperately avoid.

Radware asked its internal experts what advice they would give to organizations managing and securing applications in the cloud. Where to start ?

Decouple from your CDN and cloud hosting provider

Marius Baczynski, Radware Director of Cloud Security Services

When your apps are in the cloud, migrate your app security to a specialized cloud security service decoupled from your CDN and cloud hosting provider. This approach offers significant advantages:

• Rapid application integration capabilities and unlimited scalability to meet exponential growth in application consumption.
• Sophisticated security capabilities compared to public cloud native solutions.
• A single point of security policy control for your entire application fleet (including all applications that remain on-premises).
• Freedom to change connectivity, CDN, and hosting providers without impacting your app’s security policy.
• Native off-path deployment options to reduce single points of failure, improve application performance, strengthen your regulatory capabilities, and help maintain stringent public cloud SLAs.
• Significant reduction in operating expenses compared to an on-site alternative.

Cloud-based application security is built into the cloud and built for the cloud — the ideal solution for any organization’s cloud migration journey.

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Use a web application firewall to keep your development teams innovating without interruption

Howard Taylor, Radware CISO

Agile software development, multi-cloud deployments, and demand for more sophisticated digital experiences have combined to create an environment where data remains vulnerable. The urgency to deliver complex applications and new features with zero time to market has become common practice. Businesses are under increasing pressure to innovate and move faster, conducting sensitive business and customer transactions across a wide range of networks and devices, each with its own set of risks. So how do you stay ahead of the competition without sacrificing security?

The reality is that developer tools, middleware, and other software components are prone to vulnerabilities, backdoors, and other flaws that can bring a business to its knees. Not to mention the coding errors that go undetected due to the speed of the process.

This is where a web application firewall (WAF) shines. A WAF isolates your business web application from a myriad of threats and provides a strong, flexible defense. You can quickly tune a WAF to mitigate the latest risks, allowing your development teams to design and implement fixes for their applications without disruption. The WAF will give your teams time to perfect the imperfect!

Deploy a single pane

Gabi Malka, Chief Operating Officer of Radware

The transition to the public cloud is a journey. The reality is that hybrid environments are here to stay. Most organizations end up with a multi-cloud strategy supported by multiple vendors. To ensure that your security posture is tight and well controlled across all form factors, it is important that security flows seamlessly across on-premises and off-premises environments orchestrated and governed from a single screen. The alternative is to manage multiple separate, vendor-specific tools and integrations that are not only below average in cyber protection, but also more complex to monitor, operate, and align over time.

Conclusion: Some solutions will be small and simple, but others will require a long-term vision

Radware’s State of Web Application and API Protection report found that in 2020, 98% of respondents experienced attacks against their applications. Clearly, countering this level of threat requires that security be built in at all levels, otherwise organizations will find themselves embracing the cloud while opening the door to a new era of risk.

Cloud providers claim to offer solutions to some of these security issues, but the shared security model this entails should never be taken for granted. When problems arise, it is the organization whose reputation is at stake, not that of the supplier.