Breaches and cyber attacks dominate headlines today. Hardly a week goes by without news of another massive data leak or ransomware attack bringing a company to its knees. In fact, studies show that the
The average enterprise uses a ridiculous
This rising tide of alerts threatens to drown security teams. A
New cybersecurity vendors like Kivera are pioneering preventative approaches to cloud security. Rather than just detecting threats,
The Root Cause of Most Cloud Breaches
The root cause behind most cloud breaches is misconfigured resources and permissions. Research suggests
All those misconfigured cloud resources trigger floods of policy violation alerts. But detecting problems after they occur is too late. The damage is already done. Attackers move quickly to take advantage of any slip-up. By the time an alert is triggered, sensitive data may have already been stolen.
That's why forward-thinking organizations are shifting to preventative security controls. The traditional reactive model of detect-alert-respond is simply unsustainable. Prevention stops mistakes and policy violations before they ever happen.
The Limitations of Detection-Focused Tools
Cloud-native security tools on the market today focus heavily on detection and response. These tools are valuable layers of defense but come with inherent limitations:
Cloud security posture management (CSPM) solutions from vendors such as Wiz and Orca continuously monitor cloud configurations and permissions. They identify resources that violate security policies or best practices. But again, problems are only detected after misconfigurations occur.
The latest evolution in cloud security is cloud-native application protection platforms (CNAPP). Companies like Sysdig and Palo Alto Networks provide CNAPPs that combine security tools such as CSPM and CWPP with code scanning for cloud security.
While these platforms embed security in code and templates, they face limitations in infrastructure-as-code scanning, restricted to specific programming languages. Kivera overcomes this by operating at the API level, offering a more universal and adaptable security solution.\
However, CNAPPs still rely heavily on threat detection and response. They aim to identify anomalies in cloud applications and resources. However, gaps that allow the attacks in the first place are not directly addressed.
The Preventative Security Model
The limitations of these detection-focused tools highlight the need for a preventative approach to cloud security. The ideal security model employs a mix of preventative and detective controls, commonly referred to as the “layered security model.”
Preventative controls stop policy violations and misconfigurations before they happen. Rather than reacting to events, preventative controls proactively enforce security requirements within systems. Prevention provides a first line of defense to maintain a strong security posture.
Detective controls then provide a second line of defense to identify threats that make it past the preventative line. Detective controls are still vital for monitoring, investigation, and incident response. Historically, implementing detective controls in a preventive manner has been challenging, but new tools provide an effective solution to enforce these common detective controls preventively, enhancing overall security posture.
Why We Need Preventative Cloud Security
This is where preventative approaches to cloud security become essential. Adopting such methods involves deploying inline security measures between users and the cloud.
As deployment requests are made, these security systems analyze them against configured security policies. Any requests that violate these policies are immediately blocked, ensuring that only compliant resources are created. This approach emphasizes prevention over detection, eliminating the flood of policy violation alerts by avoiding misconfigurations in the first place. Security teams can then concentrate on real incidents rather than addressing misconfiguration.
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Best practices for implementing a prevent-first strategy include phasing in prevention by starting with the highest-risk misconfiguration threats and then incrementally expanding policies. Prevention should also be combined with detection tools for layered defenses to catch novel threats while tuning alerting to focus only on critical issues not prevented outright. Processes and training must align with prevention, emphasizing configuring policies over correcting violations. And any violations that still occur should be regularly reviewed to identify and address gaps in coverage.
The Future of Cloud Security
Today's cloud-first world demands a new approach to security. The volume and pace of threats have rendered traditional reactive models ineffective. Organizations need to prevent threats upfront before damage occurs.
The future of security is prevention combined with detection. Organizations still need layered defenses to catch evolving threats. But prevention must come first to establish a robust security posture.