Key considerations for ensuring data security

[Syed]

200K Contest Question # 2: 

Your company is migrating its on-premises applications to a cloud service. What are the key considerations for ensuring data security during this transition?

[Chetan_Tiwary_]

For data security, the key considerations during migration are :

1. Backup and restore plan

2. Encryption

3. COmpliance like GDPR etc.

4. Data integirty post migration

5. Validation

[Basileawadida]

Here are some key considerations for my company's on-premises application migration to a cloud service:

Security:

• Data Security: How will your sensitive data be secured in the cloud? Look for cloud providers offering encryption at rest and in transit, access controls, and intrusion detection/prevention systems.
• Compliance: Does the cloud service meet your industry's regulatory compliance requirements 
• Identity and Access Management (IAM): How will you manage user access and permissions within the cloud environment?

Cost:

• Total Cost of Ownership (TCO): Consider not just the upfront cost of the cloud service but also ongoing expenses like data transfer, storage, and compute usage. Look for options with pay-as-you-go models to optimize costs.
• Migration Costs: Factor in the cost of migrating applications and data to the cloud, including potential licensing fees for cloud-specific tools.

Performance and Scalability:

• Application Performance: Will the cloud service provide sufficient resources and network bandwidth to ensure your applications run smoothly?
• Scalability: Can the cloud service easily scale up or down to meet fluctuating demand for your applications?

Application Suitability:

• Application Architecture: Are your applications designed for the cloud environment, or will they require refactoring or re-platforming?
• Integration with Existing Systems: How will your cloud-based applications integrate with your on-premises systems and other cloud services?

Vendor Lock-in:

• Portability: Can you easily migrate your applications to a different cloud provider if needed? Avoid vendor lock-in by choosing cloud services with open standards and APIs.

Additional Considerations:

• Downtime and Disaster Recovery: How will you handle outages and ensure business continuity during the migration and after? Look for cloud providers with robust disaster recovery plans.
• Management and Monitoring: How will you manage and monitor your cloud-based applications? Choose a cloud service with user-friendly management tools and monitoring capabilities.
• Internal Expertise: Does your IT team have the skills and knowledge to manage and maintain cloud-based applications? Consider training or hiring cloud-skilled personnel if needed.

[NaazAnjum_Sayed]

As the legacy of my company is being migrated to cloud to make most out of the technology. Every cloud provider has the Shared resposibility model, where security of the data is resposibility of the customer and other resposibilites are choosing endpoints, Accounts, and Accedss management.

The key consideration for ensuring data security during the transition are

1. Choosing the right Cloud provider
2. Encrypting the data using the services carfully and efficiently both in rest and transit
3. Continous monitoring
4. Always architect your cloud environment which has data Backup and recovery plans
5. Employee training and Awareness

[Rahulkrishnan]

Here are some key considerations to ensure your information stays safe:

• Encryption: This is crucial. Encrypt your data both "in transit" (while it's being moved) and "at rest" (once it's stored in the cloud). Strong encryption standards like AES-256 are recommended.

• Identity and Access Management (IAM): Set up clear IAM protocols. This includes defining who can access your data and what level of access they have (read-only, edit, etc.). Use multi-factor authentication for additional security.

• Secure Transport Protocols: Utilize secure protocols like HTTPS when transferring data to the cloud. This helps prevent unauthorized access during migration.

• Data Classification and Prioritization: Identify and classify your sensitive data. Prioritize the migration of highly sensitive information and implement stricter security measures for it.

• Cloud Provider Security: Carefully choose your cloud service provider. Research their security practices, compliance certifications, and track record of data breaches.

• Data Residency: Understand where your data will be physically stored by the cloud provider. This can have legal and regulatory implications.

• Post-Migration Monitoring: Security shouldn't stop after migration. Continuously monitor your cloud environment for suspicious activity and ensure your security measures remain effective.

[Ajay12]

Based on my experience following are the key points to be considered :

Data Classification Discovery and Risk Measurement: Perform a full end-to-end discovery and classification of data (public, confidential, and restricted) and prepare a risk assessment to identify potential risks and vulnerabilities regarding the migration process.

Data Encryption: Implement industry-standard encryption algorithms and key management practices for data at rest and in transit to protect it from unauthorized access.

Authentication and Authentication: Implement MFA, RBAC and zero trust principles, to ensure that only authorized personnel can access sensitive data during and after the migration.

Cloud Service Provider Security: Assess the security measures and compliance certifications of the cloud service provider you are migrating to.

Data Protection: Implement a comprehensive backup and recovery strategy for your data before, during, and after the migration. Regularly test your backup and recovery processes to ensure data integrity and availability.

Compliance and Regulatory Requirements: Make sure that the migration process and the cloud service provider comply with relevant industry regulations and standards, such as GDPR, HIPAA, PCI-DSS, or any other applicable data protection laws.

Monitoring and Logging: Implement security monitoring and logging mechanisms to detect and respond to potential security incidents or data breaches during the migration process and after the migration is complete.

Employee Training and Awareness: Provide proper KT and awareness to ensure that employees involved in the migration process understand their roles, responsibilities, and best practices for data security.

Third-Party Risk Management: If you are working with 3rd party vendors during the migration process, assess their security practices and implement appropriate controls to mitigate any potential risks.

[hi5]

Most of the points already answered. other things-

1- agreement bewtween CSP and company related to data security, clarity on  responsibility and ownership between parties for personal data and infrastructure at what extent.

2- Usually infrastructure is owned by CSP and cusotmer data ownership remains with customer, customer has to identify and implement efficient controls for data security without relying automatic or inbuilt security features provided by CSP's. e.g. data encryption in rest could be provided by CSP's also in terms of automatic key mgmt, this is company's responsibility to take care about such usage as if key mgmt is compromised , data would be compromised too.

3- Agreement on SoC related reports and what kind of reports should be shared for security validation of infra.

4- proper backup of data with other cloud provider or "somewhere else" if possible. recently a major cloud provider deleted a big $125B customer pension fund account including all its back ups too. fortunately pension fund had a backup with other service providers too.

[OtengGwapela]

Migrating on-premises applications to a cloud service involves transferring sensitive data from one environment to another. Ensuring data security during this transition is paramount. Here are key considerations to keep in mind:

1. Data encryption: Encrypt data both in transit and at rest. Use strong encryption algorithms to protect data while it's being transferred to the cloud and when it's stored in the cloud environment. Implement Transport Layer Security (TLS) for data in transit and encryption mechanisms provided by the cloud service provider for data at rest.

2. Identity and access management (IAM): Implement robust IAM policies to control access to resources in the cloud environment. Use techniques like role-based access control (RBAC), multi-factor authentication (MFA), and least privilege principles to ensure that only authorized users have access to sensitive data.

3. Secure network connections: Ensure secure network connections between your on-premises environment and the cloud service. Use Virtual Private Network (VPN) tunnels or dedicated private connections, such as AWS Direct Connect or Azure ExpressRoute, to establish secure communication channels.

4. Data residency and compliance: Understand data residency requirements and compliance regulations relevant to your industry and geography. Ensure that the cloud service provider complies with applicable data protection laws and regulations, such as GDPR, HIPAA, or PCI DSS, and that data residency requirements are met.

5. Data backup and recovery: Implement robust data backup and recovery mechanisms in the cloud environment. Regularly backup data and test the recovery process to ensure that critical data can be restored in case of data loss or corruption.

6. Security monitoring and logging: Implement security monitoring and logging capabilities to detect and respond to security incidents in real-time. Use cloud-native security tools and services, such as AWS CloudTrail, Azure Security Center, or Google Cloud Security Command Center, to monitor and analyze security events.

7. Regular security assessments: Conduct regular security assessments and audits of the cloud environment to identify vulnerabilities and ensure compliance with security best practices. Perform penetration testing, vulnerability scanning, and security audits to evaluate the effectiveness of security controls and address any gaps.

8. Data segregation and isolation: Ensure proper data segregation and isolation within the cloud environment. Use techniques like virtual private clouds (VPCs), network segmentation, and resource tagging to logically separate and isolate sensitive data from other resources.

9. Vendor security evaluation: Evaluate the security practices and capabilities of the cloud service provider before migrating data to their platform. Assess factors such as data encryption, access controls, compliance certifications, and incident response procedures to ensure that the provider meets your security requirements.

10. Employee training and awareness: Provide comprehensive training and awareness programs to educate employees about security best practices, data protection policies, and their responsibilities when handling sensitive data in the cloud environment.

[Prasun]

According to me the key considerations for ensuring data security during migration of on-premise applications could encompass some of the following :

1. Data Encryption
2. Access Control
3. Compliance
4. Data Backup
5. Network Security
6. Vendor Security
7. Monitoring and Logging
8. Data Classification
9. Security Training
10. Incident Response Plan

[Sokkhoin_RHEL]

For my answer, the key considerations for ensuring data security during this transition should check the following:

1. Assessment and planning: identifying all the data that needs to be migrated, choose the right cloud services.

2. Data cleansing and transformation:clean and de-duplicate the data to ensure it is of high quality and perform necessary data transormation.

3. Data security and compliance: Encrypt data both in transit and at rest to maintain data security. Ensure that data migration complies with relevant data protection.

4. Network and bandwidth considerations: determine the network bandwidth is sufficient for data migration. 

5. Data backup and recovery: backup data and recovery plan in case of unexpected issue during migration.

6. Testing and validation: perform a trail migration to identify any potential issues. And verfify the migrated data by compare it to the source data.