The nature of cloud computing opens it to a lot of possible threats. Companies working on cloud computing security are doing their best to eliminate most of them, but as the technology evolves new ones keep appearing, so it is an ongoing battle.

The most important thing for any company using cloud computing is to keep up with the newest trends in security. 2016 is to be a year of growth when it comes to the usage of cloud computing. 2015 has seen a growth of 13.5% public-cloud services, while 80% of IT organizations are expected to increase their cloud computing investments in the next few years.

Despite this predicted growth, the market is still facing quite a few challenges. For example, open-source security software is presenting a major issue for others in the industry, especially if we take into consideration that more and more vendors are entering the marketplace, which is adding to the overall competition. This article tackles some of the latest trends emerging in the cloud computing security industry in 2016.

Evening out the battlefield

The prediction is that from 2016 onwards the attacks on cloud infrastructure are to become more and more sophisticated, automated and intense. This is why cloud security needs to be just as sophisticated and intensified in order to be prepared for such attacks. One of the directions that cloud security is currently taking is shared security responsibility. A recent research suggest that by 2020 most cloud breaches won’t be due provider vulnerabilities but in fact due to customer misconfiguration, mismanagement and insider theft.

The rise of serverless frameworks

Serverless framework will be one of the biggest challenges facing cloud computing industry in 2016. Amazon Web Services (AWS) Lambda is providing us with new possibilities for code-based Platform-as-a-Service (code-PaaS). This means that organizations won’t have to manage their own virtual machines, containers or operating systems.

Naturally this brings significant changes into the cloud computing security. The fact is that it is now opening a new attack vector, the APIs. This is something that a large number of IT teams has not come up against and is not used to. Attacks of this nature can bring about serious damages if not prevented in time.

The move to control plane

The basic idea of cloud computing or cloud architecture is to help connect users who are mobile and constantly moving between LANs, WLANs, along with the internet connections and services with applications they use. The applications themselves can move between cloud centers depending on the various business needs.

Cloud architecture needs a dynamic control plane for data monitoring and ensuring that it is constantly connected in the best way possible. In return the dynamic control plane has to have the ability to Intercept traffic as it traverses the cloud, to interpret the data, and to instruct the cloud architecture on the manner in which to efficiently connect the user to the desired application.

The fact that cloud security features are moving into the control plane, is presenting more opportunities for the IT teams to obtain the information on possible vulnerabilities and risks as quickly as they arise. This will give them a real advantage in the form of the so called firehose streams providing them with network, host and serverless-process events and updates.

Client-Side Encryption

When we are talking “pedestrian” cloud storage services that individuals and businesses use to store their data, the most common trend that experts expect in 2016 and beyond is client-side encryption. This term entails the encryption of data before it is sent to the cloud. Some services are already providing this kind of client-side encrypted cloud storage while others are expected to follow suite.

Conclusions

Cloud security has become the focus for many IT teams. The need to stay on top of the ever-changing landscape has been greater than ever. As the threat and vulnerabilities keep becoming more sophisticated and harder to detect, it is of vital importance for IT managers to demonstrate a strong and powerful presence in the industry by being alert and prepared for whatever is coming their way.