Security professionals still struggle with the cloud and IoT

Organizations are using multiple cloud services and security staff are worried about the visibility problems this presents as well as the risks presented by IoT devices.

These are the findings of a survey of RSA attendees, carried out by security management and threat intelligence specialist AlienVault. A third of respondents to the survey describe the state of security monitoring within their organization as 'complex and chaotic'.

More than 10 different cloud services are used within their organization according to 39 percent of respondents, and an additional 21 percent don't actually know how many cloud applications are being used. No surprise then that lack of visibility into the cloud is a significant concern for 42 percent, but despite that 47 percent would rather monitor a cloud environment than an on-premises one.

Malware was rated as the highest concern over cloud security, with 47 percent of respondents worrying about it. 38 percent are concerned about unauthorized file sharing, and 36 percent about stolen root credentials. 27 percent are worried about compliance management and 23 percent about a lack of in-house cloud expertise.

The IoT is a concern too, with 62 percent indicating they are worried about IoT devices in their environment, yet 45 percent believe the benefits of using the IoT outweigh the risks. A worrying 43 percent of respondents say their company does not monitor IoT network traffic at all.

"The driving force behind cloud and IoT is the availability and analysis of information, but they must be managed and monitored in the right way. If data is misused, or inadequately protected, the consequences can be severe," says Javvad Malik, security advocate at AlienVault. "According to the survey findings, many companies are using these impacting technologies to reap the technological and business benefits they provide, but they are doing so without proper monitoring -- leaving their company at greater risk of attack."

You can find out more about the study and access the full report on the AlienVault blog.

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