The Widespread Shift to the Cloud
Cloud computing has become integral to business operations, with organizations aggressively migrating workloads to cloud-based software, platforms, and infrastructure. By 2025, Gartner predicts public cloud spending will surpass $482 billion as over 95% of new digital workloads get deployed on cloud-native platforms.
However, this rapid embrace of the cloud significantly expands organizational attack surfaces. Shared responsibility models, transient workloads, and distributed cloud architectures create security gaps that demand robust yet flexible solutions tailored for cloud environments. The important element of online services that we want to cover is securing the Cloud Journey with Pulse Secure.
Pulse Secure emerges as an invaluable ally in cloud security journeys, empowering organizations to harness the scale and economics of the cloud alongside powerful threat protection and compliance capabilities.
Comparison Table:
| Security Challenge | On-Premises Environments | Cloud Environments |
|---|---|---|
| Identity Management | Centralized directories like Active Directory | Fragmented identities across cloud apps and environments |
| Visibility | Limited to internal network | Restricted across dynamic cloud workloads |
| Data Security | Well-defined perimeters and boundaries | Blurred lines between cloud provider and organizational controls |
| Compliance | Clear regulatory responsibilities | Shared yet unclear accountability |
With leading identity, access and compliance capabilities purpose-built for the cloud, Pulse Secure overcomes these core security obstacles organizations encounter on their cloud journeys.
The Cloud Security Imperative
Securing cloud environments necessitates addressing distinct challenges compared to on-premises models:
Shared Responsibility: While cloud providers secure the underlying infrastructure, customers must safeguard the data, platforms, applications and identities they put in the cloud.
Complex Administration: Managing security across hybrid or multi-cloud arrangements adds layers of complexity, especially with limited IT staff.
Limited Visibility: The ephemeral and dynamic nature of cloud workloads hinders threat detection, often only realized after the fact.
Evolving Compliance: Regulatory standards still apply for data in the cloud, although responsibility boundaries vary.
How Pulse Secure Protects Across Cloud Environments
Pulse Secure empowers comprehensive protection for cloud-based resources through:
Secure Access: Pulse Connect Secure verifies user and device identity before allowing access to SaaS or IaaS environments. Context-aware policies restrict access only to authorized resources.
Cloud Perimeter Defense: Microsegmentation, process isolation and threat detection capabilities prevent lateral movement between workloads.
Identity and Access Management: Tight integration with leading cloud IAM services enhances access controls and compliance.
Continuous Validation: Agent-based or agentless device posture checks validate system security before granting access.
Holistic Monitoring and Analytics: Single-dashboard visibility coupled with useful metrics and reports provide cloud oversight and support audits.
Success Stories: Cloud Security in Action
Securing Patient Records on the Cloud
A regional hospital system needed to securely migrate its electronic medical record application to Microsoft Azure while maintaining HIPAA compliance. By implementing Pulse Secure’s cloud direct connect capabilities, access to patient data became strictly restricted to company-owned devices validated through multi-factor authentication. Encrypted connectivity prevented man-in-the-middle attacks.
Safeguarding Source Code
A digital payments startup developing applications on AWS suffered a major breach through a misconfigured S3 bucket, resulting in leaked authentication keys and source code. Pulse Secure enabled fine-grained access controls and activity monitoring to secure AWS resources. Pulse Connect Secure now ensures engineers only access approved code repositories from fully patched devices.
Empowering Remote Developer Productivity
A SaaS company struggled with slow VPN connectivity hampering its distributed engineering teams accessing cloud IDE tools. By replacing VPNs with Pulse Secure’s Zero Trust Network Access, remote developers connect faster over direct links while device posture checks limit potential attack vectors.
Considerations for Effective Cloud Security
As organizations progress through cloud adoption, Pulse Secure facilitates key aspects:
Hybrid Cloud Consistency
For companies leveraging both on-premise and cloud resources, Pulse Secure ensures consistent policy enforcement, visibility and compliance across hybrid environments.
Top Cloud Platform Support
Certified integrations expedite deployments across leading IaaS/PaaS providers like AWS, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud Platform alongside SaaS apps like Office 365.
Limitless Scalability
With cloud-ready architecture, Pulse Secure solutions easily scale on-demand in alignment with dynamic business needs and changing threat landscapes.
Conclusion
Cloud environments introduce new attack vectors that legacy security tools struggle to manage. Pulse Secure purpose-built for the cloud era empowers robust protection and oversight through Zero Trust-aligned access controls, microsegmentation, compliance automation and unified monitoring.
As cybercriminals aggressively target cloud-based resources, Pulse Secure enables organizations to tap into the cloud’s potential while advancing security strategies for the future.
