Page 16 - Federal Computer Week, July 2019

Cloud Security Learn more at Carah.io/PaloAltoNetworks-FedRAMP
Reducing cyber risk
in cloud environments
Agencies can harvest the power of the cloud to enhance the security of on-premises systems
THANKS TO THE growing automation of cyberattacks, the volume, variety, velocity and complexity of threats are continuing to accelerate. Not knowing where to start, government agencies often (erroneously) think hiring more people is the answer.
Meanwhile, government continues to embrace cloud to reduce operating and maintenance costs and to create services with more agility. Their data and applications often span different clouds and services.
How can government ensure effective security for cloud? Cloud security is a shared responsibility between the cloud provider and the agency. Providers offer
only basic native security services and specific to only their cloud environment. This generally won’t satisfy immediate or longer-term requirements for multi-cloud, visibility, compliance and threat prevention. The outcome: limited visibility, increased operational overhead to configure and maintain security for each unique cloud environment, fragmented compliance, and increased risk.
The good news: Agencies can extend threat prevention holistically across their cloud (private, SaaS, IaaS and PaaS) environments with Palo Alto Networks’ swift, comprehensive malware analysis service, WildFire. WildFire is an advanced
analysis and prevention engine for highly evasive zero-day malware and exploits. The cloud-based service employs a unique multi-technique approach that combines dynamic and static analysis and innovative machine learning techniques.
Using data and threat intelligence from the industry’s largest global community, the service identifies first-time-seen threats, performs advanced analysis and immediately shares protections across the network, endpoint and cloud. The service ensures data privacy through flexible data collection options.
We’ve turned the automation game around: using automation (not people) to fight an automated adversary. We’re using technology that practitioners often think is years off.
This automation reduces the load on already taxed teams, swiftly addressing new threats in less than five minutes
and saving significant time by reducing the events per hour to which any analyst must respond. Security analysts can focus on what matters: the much lower number of the most sophisticated threats that require human intervention.
When it achieves its impending final FedRAMP ATO milestone, WildFire will be the only cloud-based malware analysis service certified for the federal government.
For updates regarding the WildFire FedRAMP process, visit www.paloaltonetworks.com.
Tom Conway is director of federal business development at Palo Alto Networks.
We’ve turned the automation game around: using automation (not people)
davooda/Shutterstock/FCW Staff
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