Cloud Threat Report Shows Need for Consistent DevSecOps

Developers might feel pressure to deploy in a hurry, yet skimping on security to save time can open the door to persistent risks. The findings of the latest Cloud Threat Report released by Unit 42 point to a rather unfortunate marriage of fast-moving, competitive strategies and lax attention to security policy. Unit 42 is the threat intelligence unit of cybersecurity provider Palo Alto Networks.

The necessity for robust security may seem all but academic as organizations migrate more workloads to the cloud. The trouble is those same organizations are driven by the need to stay ahead of their rivals, which can lead to exposure, says Matthew Chiodi, chief security officer for public cloud at Palo Alto Networks. “In our previous report, released last July, one of the big things we found was that 65% of publicly disclosed cloud security incidents were the result of customer misconfigurations,” he says. The latest report, he says, aims to address why the rate was so high.

Traditional, on-prem data centers might report fewer security incidents, Chiodi says, in part because of extensive change management and control. “To make a change in those environments, you typically have to go through multiple approvals,” he says. Such protocols might be relaxed in the cloud because of a continuous need to be relevant and stay ahead of the competition, Chiodi says. “CEOs are prioritizing growth and speed of innovation over cost. That push has caused DevOps teams to look for ways they can move quicker and push out apps faster.”

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