How secure is Microsoft Azure?

Today's businesses, especially small to medium-sized organizations, have two priorities when it comes to managing cloud software. The first is finding a solution that is affordable, configurable and intuitive for use. The second is keeping their products and overall data secure and confidential. While cloud computing has greatly enhanced the software available to new companies, some might wonder just how secure it all is.

One of the leading cloud computing platforms is Microsoft Azure, formally Windows Azure. Since Microsoft is a huge company with a long lifespan, it has released dozens of products to various receptions. Nevertheless, when it comes to the business-end, organizations should not shy away from working with Azure. It is a stable, secure platform that recently took another major step toward increasing its cybersecurity.

The security development lifecycle

According to Microsoft, Azure has been designed utilizing a security development lifecycle. Essentially, designing a product with SDL means that security was factored in at every phase of product development. Part of this meticulous design involved the Attack Surface Analyzer (ASA), a tool created by Microsoft to give the company an intuitive checklist to see how feature changes would impact platform security.

When Microsoft created Azure and all its subsequent patches, it has done so with a confidence born out of ASA monitoring. The principle of least privilege was also utilized. Any SMB that has worked with Microsoft Azure knows that, for as configurable as the platform is, there are certain changes that cannot be made. These are largely for security reasons - based on the principle that reduced access in general will lead to less security breaches.

Microsoft Azure has been tested extensively by its parent company for weaknesses that could lead to a security breach. In such instances where a cyberattack did occur, the organization has run threat scenarios to have prepared plans in place to strike back against the aggression and restore platform security.

" Microsoft recently funneled $1 billion into cybersecurity programs."

Size matters for support

Of course, many corporations could take this approach but resources help. This is where Microsoft Azure leans on the strengths of its parent company. According to Tech Republic, Azure has 71 unique certifications, allowing it to meet the needs of customers across a diverse spectrum of industries.

"By focusing on different industry verticals, nation state requirements, and best practice cybersecurity requirements from commercial entities, we can ensure we meet all of the unique challenges and roles of our customers," said Azure Government Chief Information Security Officer Matthew Rathbun. It is an ambitious goal and only possible with the investment capital present at companies like Microsoft, which recently funneled $1 billion into cybersecurity programs.

The company has the infrastructure in place to process roughly 7 trillion cyber occurrences per day to monitor the situation for potential incidents before they can become serious. Smaller cloud platform providers cannot offer a system like this.

The Symantec advantage

Part of what drives Azure's security is its ambition. Microsoft is not content to sit on its product but instead works on new ways to improve it. Symantec entered into a partnership with the company as part of this initiative. Long known as a leader in cybersecurity innovation, Symantec is working on Azure's hybrid cloud infrastructure, specifically enabling clients to utilize the new system with greater ease.

Symantec's Web Security Service will allow SMBs to transfer network security stacks to the cloud in bulk without worrying about latency issues or increased costs. This will be especially helpful for companies working with Azure or Office 365.

Current Azure system pains

With all the money and expertise behind it however, Microsoft Azure still occasionally has hiccups. The service went offline unexpectedly twice in 2017. The first failure, as Venture Beat outlined, was due to storage problems. These arose in Microsoft's data centers and were caused by a power incident at one location.

The second disturbance was connected to an accidental fire-suppression gas release in a data center in Europe, according to DataCenter Knowledge. This led to a spike in glitches over the next seven hours.

By current standards, Microsoft Azure is a secure cloud platform that SMBs should be quick to take advantage of. Microsoft as an organization appears to be taking its security incredibly seriously and, while this does not eliminate the chance of a breach, it does go a long way to decrease its likelihood.