Confluera released the findings of their latest research report,
which explores how IT leaders detect, evaluate, and act against cybersecurity
threats in today's cloud environment. The study, 2022 Cloud Cybersecurity
Survey Report, showcases the perspective of 200 U.S. IT leaders at medium to
large sized organizations and how they are tackling the increasingly complex
remote, cloud-centric IT security landscape.
Majority of organizations are accelerating their cloud
adoption with 97% of IT leaders surveyed stating that their strategy includes
the expansion of cloud deployments. The strategy includes expansion in scale
and in many cases, the adoption of multiple platforms such as AWS, Google Cloud
and Azure. This strategy is not without its challenges, however. Approximately,
63% of IT professionals identified cyberthreats designed to target cloud
services as the top obstacle to their cloud strategy.
Cloud and multi-cloud adoption has greatly increased the
workload of already burdened IT teams. Of the 200 IT leaders surveyed, only
about half of the respondents said that they are adequately staffed to manage
the frequency of alerts they receive. IT teams spend 54% of their time
investigating security alerts, with over half of those alerts turning out to be
false or benign alarms. As threats within the cloud proliferate, IT leaders are
looking for solutions to help them quickly separate the signal from the noise
so they can act on the real threats promptly. Some key findings of the
survey as it relates to cloud deployments are below.
- More than 65% of IT
leaders said cloud IaaS adoption (AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, etc.) was the
primary contributor to their increased workload in 2021
- When asked what
challenges were associated with adopting multiple cloud platforms,
- 69% said maintaining
consistent cybersecurity coverage across all cloud infrastructures
- Nearly 50% said
securing the resources to manage different cloud infrastructures
- Nearly 45% identified
the difficulty detecting threats progressing from one cloud
infrastructure to another
"While accelerated cloud adoption continues to be
a critical element in adapting to the new way of doing business, it has
strained IT leader's ability to manage their workload," said John Morgan, CEO
of Confluera. "Organizations need to ensure proper people, processes, and tools
are in place for the team to expand the complex cloud environments without
sacrificing their attention to security."
Morgan continued, "To make matters worse, the Great
Resignation has demonstrated the burnout that workers across the U.S. economy
are feeling, and nowhere is this burnout more obvious than in the cybersecurity
teams. Organizations must ensure frequent conversations between executives and
cybersecurity managers to ensure they are well equipped to adequately manage
alerts, maintain systems, and avoid burnout within their teams.
Other key findings include the following:
- 85% of IT leaders said
that they experienced increased workload due to shift in work model
including remote workers
- Nearly 70% of IT leaders
said that the change in work model has made it more difficult to keep
company resources secure
- Nearly 59% of all alert
investigations turn out to be false alarms or benign activities
- 90% of IT leaders said
they create threat storyboards but close to 60% rely on third-party
services to create storyboards after the incident
Not all findings in the report were so glum, however. In a
positive sign, 84% of IT leaders were optimistic about their cybersecurity
readiness for 2022. The majority of respondents note the availability of new
cybersecurity tools as the reason for their positive outlook, with 59% saying
that a Detection and Response solution for the cloud, or CxDR, is the
innovation they are most excited about for future deployment.
"2021 was a tough year for many IT leaders, but the
market is now providing organizations with the tools they need to effectively
manage the infrastructures they have and even expand them further," added
Morgan. "Given proper resources and effective communication, IT leaders
have every right to be positive as we move into the new year."
Download the full report
www.confluera.com/2022surveyreport.