When employees leave G Suite and a company, there are normally certain procedures and policies that companies institute to take care of access to various business critical resources the employees may have had access to. This would include file shares, email access, VPN access, company devices, and other items.

In the last 20 years the global economy became increasingly digitized, and many companies hold highly sensitive and personal customer information obtained from various sources. Data is associated with a significance of risk if it’s stolen or abused.

The importance of Cloud Access Security Brokers (CASBs) grows as businesses rapidly adopt new cloud collaboration technologies and platforms. Enterprise security professionals need to thoroughly assess the risks, communicate those to business leaders, and develop practical cybersecurity, risk management, and compliance strategies to build a secure and resilient digital business environment. Cloud computing has fundamentally transformed the business paradigm: according to Morgan Stanley 2016 CIO Survey, 30% of all applications will be migrated to the Public Cloud by 2018.

In today’s world of hybrid cloud infrastructures using both on-premise resources as well as public cloud Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) or Software-as-a-Service (SaaS), the security boundary lines are being blurred for organizations taking advantage of public cloud resources. While hosting infrastructure both on-premise and in the public cloud, organizations have to address cyber security concerns as well as enforce compliance of on-premise network security policies with infrastructure that lives in the cloud.

On July 29, 2017, arguably the most shocking breach of PII (personally identifiable information) was discovered by Equifax. Over 143 million people and their most sensitive data were exposed by attackers. This was the holy grail of sensitive data leakage as it contained all the personal information for each individual in one place – name, age, address, social security number, etc. It underscores in a large way how much we value protecting sensitive data especially when it relates to our personal information. Of tremendous importance for G Suite administrators thinking about securing G Suite environments is moderating and controlling sensitive data in the G Suite environment to prevent data leaks.

One of the powerful features of public cloud environments such as Google G Suite is the ability to take advantage of the huge ecosystem of third-party apps available. The third-party apps found in the G Suite marketplace offer a wide range of quality, enterprise focused apps that add functionality and features to the native G Suite environment. These can include many useful applications to organizations such as CRM apps, Project management apps, and Admin tools. These are easily accessed from the G Suite environment with a Google account. While third-party apps offer tremendous business value to a G Suite organization, they also present an inherent danger to the overall security stance of a G Suite environment.

Google’s G Suite software as a service offering provides organizations with tremendous functionality. Organizations today utilizing Google G Suite are taking advantage of cloud email, calendaring, file storage, and many other features provided by Google G Suite. With the tremendous advantages that moving to the cloud provides, there are also additional manageability issues that come with organizations moving to the cloud. Organizations may find it more difficult to keep a handle on data that exists in the cloud. This can be especially challenging when it comes to archiving data and any requests for that data that may come due to a legal issue that is presented.

Often in the world of cyber security, many IT administrators focus on outside threats that exist on the perimeter of the datacenter. The risks presented to organizations from outside threats is very real, whether in the form of an attacker, or a malicious bit of code trying to infiltrate vital systems. However, it is often the case that dangerous insider threats come from within the internal networks used by organizations for business-critical functions. Insider-threats are very real and need to be addressed accordingly.

As we discussed in the previous post, G Suite administrators have to take security concerns very seriously, especially when it comes to keeping their organizational data secure. This involves two aspects: Data Loss prevention and Data Leak prevention. As we discussed previously, data loss can be the result of accidental deletion, such as when an employee may inadvertently delete files. However, even more alarming is data loss as the result of intentional means, such as targeted ransomware attacks.

G Suite administrators with organizations today are looking at how they can most efficiently carry out IT operations, including delivering of services to end users. Most are looking at cloud-based solutions to deliver on current IT infrastructure and service demands. This is not limited to corporate environments but also includes today’s educational institutions. When it comes to education environments, Google’s G Suite for Education provides tremendous benefits that allow IT administrators in the education realm to transform the way services are delivered to campuses and streamline the administration and technology utilized to deliver those services.