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DiData adds more cloud security capabilities

Regina Pazvakavambwa
By Regina Pazvakavambwa, ITWeb portals journalist.
Johannesburg, 24 May 2016
Rapid adoption of cloud applications means that the organisation needs to have tighter controls in the cloud, says DiData.
Rapid adoption of cloud applications means that the organisation needs to have tighter controls in the cloud, says DiData.

ICT solutions and services provider Dimension Data has partnered with Blue Coat Elastica to offer additional cloud application security capabilities to its cloud portfolio.

The company says the additional security capabilities will give companies more visibility and control of cloud applications used by their organisation - both sanctioned and non-sanctioned.

PwC says cloud-based cyber security can improve intelligence gathering and threat modelling, better block attacks and create secure communications channels. Potential cost reductions also need to be factored in, it says.

Sean Duffy, security executive at Dimension Data Middle East and Africa, says organisations are under pressure to transform into digital businesses.

Rapid adoption of cloud applications means that the organisation needs to have tighter controls in the cloud, and security should be an enabler, not an inhibitor, of digital transformation, he adds.

The global cloud security market is estimated to be $4.20 billion in 2014 and is expected to grow to $8.71 billion in 2019, says Markets and Markets.

"With South African organisations starting to adopt cloud - for example Office 365 - we have seen a sizeable increase in interest from companies in technologies enabling cloud-based security in SA, says Duffy.

Therefore, it is essential that organisations apply the same security principles to cloud platforms as they do to on-premises platforms, he continues.

According to Dimension Data, there is a perception among organisations that only 40 to 50 cloud applications run in their environments.

However, the reality is organisations typically have over 700 applications running in their network environment, most of which are introduced by employees without IT oversight or approval, it says.

As a result, end-point security remains a key weakness, and end-users are becoming an organisation's weakest link, says the 2015 NTT Global Threat Intelligence Report.

PWC says the forces of digitisation of information, mobility, and the nascent Internet of things are pushing the technology perimeter far beyond traditional control boundaries, making information security exponentially more difficult.

At the same time, well-funded threat actors are launching technically sophisticated assaults that, when successful, can siphon off valuable data undetected for months or even years.

PwC believes cloud-based cyber security will enable organisations to leverage world-class and highly differentiated operational security capabilities in an elastic and non-capital-intensive way.

With the addition of Blue Coat Elastica to its security portfolio, Dimension Data is bolstering its cloud application security brokerage capabilities, says Duffy.

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