In the past few years, online data privacy has been one of the most known topics in the IT industry. With the continuous data transfer from analog to digital devices and applications, our data is compromised and becomes susceptible to risks and vulnerabilities.
And, the most effective way to data protection?
Cloud Encryption.
Cloud encryption is the process of encoding or converting data before it’s transferred to cloud storage. Encryption uses mathematical algorithms to transform data (plaintext), may it be a text, file, code, or image, to an unreadable form (ciphertext) that can conceal it from unauthorized and malicious users. It is the simplest and most essential way to make sure that cloud data can’t be breached, stolen, and read by someone with an anomalous intention.
Cloud storage providers encrypt data and pass encryption keys to the users. These keys are used to safely decrypt data when needed. Decryption transforms the concealed data back into readable data.
The data that’s encrypted has three types: in transit, at rest and in use:
- Data in Transit
An important portion of data in motion is encrypted automatically through the HTTPS protocol, which adds a security sockets layer (SSL) to the standard IP protocol. The SSL encodes all activity, ensuring that only authorized users can access the session details. As such, if an unauthorized user intercepts data transmitted during the session, the content would be meaningless. Decoding is completed at the user level through a digital key.
- Data-at-rest
This is saved somewhere without being used or transferred to anyone or anywhere, which involves human beings, thirds-parties, software, among others. There are devices or units that this type of data can be stored or restrained. This includes database servers, system folders, mobile devices, USB pen drives, Network Attached Storage, local Hard Drives, and any physical or logical storage system.
- Data-in-use
The data is intended to be in use when it is not stored in external storage or hard drive but is processed by one or more applications. This means that it is in the process of being erased, affixed, updated, viewed, or generated. Basically, data in use are vulnerable to different kinds of threats and depending on who is able to access it or where it is located in the system. This kind of data is difficult to encrypt because it will possibly crash the application which has access to it.
Cloud encryption is necessary to secure and protect confidential information transmitted through the web. It makes sure that it sends the data to its intended user and not to malicious attackers.
Better encryption key management and access control can effectively delivers secure, centralized, and highly interoperable key and policy management across your enterprise or computing devices.
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