Cloud Data Security: How to Protect Your Business

Not that long ago, keeping information “in the cloud” sounded futuristic or even mystical. But today, the cloud is fundamental to how we create, store, and share information — especially at work.

A whopping 94% of companies worldwide use cloud computing (that’s the term for delivering services like storage, software, servers, and databases over the internet instead of using local hardware) in their operations.

The cloud is convenient, cost-effective, and scalable for organizations. But that doesn’t mean it’s flawless. And, when an estimated 60% of corporate data is stored in the cloud, there’s one potential risk with cloud storage that immediately comes to mind: data security.

What is data security?

Data security is the process of protecting digital information from unauthorized (and potentially detrimental) access, theft, or damage. It involves using tools and processes to ensure data stays safe and is only accessible to the people you want to see it.

The term “data security” refers to protecting all types of information — whether it’s stored locally or in the cloud. In contrast, cloud data security focuses specifically on securing your data that’s stored, processed, or used in cloud environments and can be accessed anywhere with an internet connection.

Without a doubt, securing all of your data is important. However, cloud storage adoption is growing at a rapid rate in the modern workplace, with 93% of global organizations saying they planned to grow their public cloud storage capacity in 2024. So, we’ll narrow our focus and look specifically at cloud data security in this guide.

Why is cloud data security important?

Much of the importance of cloud data security can be explained simply by its prevalence. When so much company information is in the cloud — a lot of which could be sensitive or confidential — it makes sense that the security of that data needs to be a top priority.

But there are plenty of other compelling reasons why a focus on cloud data security is so pressing for organizations:

Preventing hacking and cyberattacks: Cloud data is vulnerable to hacking and data compromises saw a sharp increase in 2023. These attacks can cause major disruptions, with 23% of global organizations saying they experienced cyberattacks they’d describe as “major” in 2023. Strong security helps protect sensitive information and prevent these breaches.

Complying with industry regulations: Plenty of industries have laws in place to protect sensitive data — such as HIPAA and GDPR. Failing to comply with these regulations can lead to hefty fines or even legal consequences.

Maintaining business continuity: Data breaches or loss of important information can throw a major wrench in your business operations — like what happened with healthcare network, Ascension, during a 2024 cyberattack. Securing your cloud data ensures that you can keep things running smoothly, even during emergencies.

Keeping customer trust: Customers are increasingly wary about the safety of their personal information. And, if and when something happens, their trust is easily broken and difficult to repair. In fact, 66% of customers say that, if a company falls victim to a data breach, they would not trust that company with their data again. Solid cloud data security helps your customers keep their confidence in your organization.

Preventing data corruption: You don’t just want to prevent unauthorized people from accessing your data — you want to keep them from messing with it. Your security measures will protect against unwanted parties tampering with your data and compromising its accuracy.

Managing your reputation: While data breaches feel common, they can have a significant and negative impact on a company’s reputation. Publicly traded companies suffered an average decline of 7.5% in stock value following a data breach. Prioritizing data security ensures you can maintain your business’ reliable and trustworthy reputation.

Saving money: Data breaches are expensive. The global average cost of a data breach in 2024 was an eye-popping $4.88 million. These cyberattacks cost money to address and also often lead to downtime in your organization — which means losing out even more. According to a 2023 report, businesses lost 9% of their revenue over the last 12 months as a direct result of cyberattacks.

For all of those reasons, you can’t overstate the importance of cloud data security. It’s not a back-end IT task or something that should be treated as a periodic exercise. It underscores everything else in your business.

3 major challenges for cloud data security

According to research, 89% of organizations fall short on adequate data protection. So, if cloud data security is so important, why are so many companies missing the mark?

1. Lack of visibility

Take a quick look at the different third-party tools, platforms, and apps you use in your business. From your CRM and email marketing platform to your cloud storage solution and your analytics dashboards, you likely have a lot of different types of software in place — and most of those likely have access to your organization’s data.

That’s why visibility is one of the biggest challenges with cloud data security. An alarming 82% of companies unknowingly give third parties access to all of their cloud data. And, even if they know about that access, they have limited oversight into how their data is managed and used by those third-party providers.

2. Poor access control

Access control — meaning regulating who can access specific systems and data to ensure only people with the right level of permissions can get to it — can be a challenge for organizations, especially as the business grows.

Too strict of security protocols can cause friction and frustration in your workflows (such as a team member not being able to open the document they need) and slows down productivity and innovation.

But being haphazard with access exposes your data and leads to breaches. And, unfortunately, it’s common in organizations. In one recent study, 99% of cloud users, roles, services, and resources across the businesses had excess privileges.

3. Hacks and cyberattacks

For a while, cloud environments were looked at as bulletproof. But hackers will go where the information is — and, with so much information living in the cloud, cloud infrastructure has become a popular and common target for hackers.

Other research goes so far as to say that cloud resources are the biggest target for cyberattacks, with 44% of organizations saying they’ve experienced a cloud data breach.

5 tips to tighten up your cloud data security

The thought of an attack on your cloud data is enough to make your stomach drop to your shoes. The good news is that there are steps you can take to secure your information and protect your company.

One of the best things you can do is ensure you have a team (or, at the very least, person) in place to handle your data security. 70% of organizations have established these dedicated security teams. But, while that sounds promising, it means that 30% of companies are likely not taking an intentional approach to data security.

If you want to prioritize security, you need to invest in it — and that should start with knowing who is overseeing those procedures and operations.

Once you know who is leading the charge on your data security, here are five more strategies you can put into place to keep your data (and your organization) safe.

1. Provide thorough employee training

It’s easy to point the finger at third-party tools, but those aren’t the only things accessing your company’s sensitive information — your employees are too. Unfortunately, one in five employees say they have no cybersecurity training at all.

It’s your responsibility to teach employees how to handle company data responsibly. So, provide thorough and regular training on relevant topics like:
 

• Identifying phishing attempts

• Creating and maintaining strong passwords

• Using multi-factor authentication

• Navigating the internet safely

• Handling sensitive data

• Updating software

• Reporting incidents and concerns

2. Check (and maintain) your access controls

Turn your attention to your user permissions and access controls to ensure they’re correct. Have you neglected to remove former employees? Or do certain team members have bloated access that they don’t actually need?

Correct those errors and then put a process in place to ensure you reliably revisit your permissions and keep them up-to-date.

3. Test and update frequently

Your data and your risks are constantly changing, so you need to commit to data security as an ongoing process — not a one-time event. Conduct routine checks to confirm that all of your cloud services, applications, and integrations are updated and protected.

You can also enlist the help of a cybersecurity expert who can simulate attacks and identify any weaknesses in your cloud environment. After all,  you’d rather catch a vulnerability before a real hacker does.

4. Take extra security steps

There are plenty of other tactics and security measures you can put in place within your organization, including:
 

• Data encryption:Encrypting your data gives extra peace of mind that, even if it’s intercepted or accessed without authorization, it can’t be read.

• Multi-factor authentication (MFA): Requiring MFA for all accounts (especially administrative or privileged accounts) gives you an added layer of protection.

• Restricted devices: Implement policies to restrict the use of personal devices and limit access to cloud systems from unapproved devices. If you need workers to be able to use personal devices, then enforce strict security requirements for those.

• Data backups: Maintain regular, secure backups of your critical data. If you do experience data breaches or loss, you’ll know you can recover that information quickly.

5. Create an incident response plan

While you can take all of the right steps to protect your company and your data, incidents still happen. If and when they do, you’ll want a clear plan in place to respond to those security events — including communication protocols and recovery steps.

Take the time to document that plan now. Again, enlist the help of a cybersecurity expert if you’re not sure what your plan should include.

Invest in cloud data security now (or pay later)

Cloud data is becoming increasingly common in organizations. And, when you entrust a third-party cloud storage provider, it’s easy to write off the security of your information as their responsibility. However, you share equal responsibility in ensuring you’re being diligent with your data in the cloud.

Solid cloud data security requires time, resources, and oftentimes money — and it’s tempting to continue pushing it to the backburner while claiming you can’t afford to invest in adequate security right now. But this is likely the more appropriate question to ask: Can you afford not to?