In today’s fast-paced digital landscape, cloud-native monitoring solutions have become a cornerstone of effective cybersecurity. They offer real-time visibility into your cloud infrastructure, allowing you to proactively manage and secure your resources. Since CSPM tools are also mostly cloud-native, and bring the deep visibility of multi-cloud environments, it is important to explore whether CSPM can be used as monitoring solutions. Let us find out how along with some other important topics.
Can CSPM tools be used as cloud-native monitoring solutions?
CSPM tools are primarily designed to ensure the secure configuration of cloud resources and compliance with security policies within cloud environments. While CSPM tools play a crucial role in enhancing cloud security, they are not typically used as direct replacements for cloud-native monitoring solutions, Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) systems, or Security Orchestration, Automation, and Response (SOAR) platforms. Let’s understand why.
CSPM focus and use case
CSPM tools focus on identifying misconfigurations, vulnerabilities, and compliance violations within cloud environments. They are primarily concerned with the configuration of cloud resources, access controls, and security group settings.
Use case: CSPM is used to improve the security posture of cloud environments by preventing misconfigurations, enforcing security policies, and ensuring compliance with industry standards and regulatory requirements. It primarily focuses on security and compliance.
Cloud-native monitoring solutions focus and use case
Cloud-native monitoring solutions, on the other hand, provide real-time visibility into the performance, availability, and behavior of cloud-native services, applications, and infrastructure components. They collect and analyze metrics, logs, and events generated by cloud resources to ensure optimal operation and troubleshoot issues.
Use case: Cloud-native monitoring solutions are used for performance monitoring, troubleshooting, capacity planning, and resource optimization. They provide insights into the operational aspects of cloud resources and help maintain service availability. Here are some examples:
- SIEM integration: Organizations often integrate CSPM tools with SIEM systems to centralize security event data from cloud environments and correlate it with data from other IT assets. This integration enhances security monitoring and threat detection capabilities.
- SOAR integration: Similarly, CSPM can be integrated with SOAR platforms to automate response actions when security misconfigurations or vulnerabilities are detected. SOAR helps orchestrate incident response workflows efficiently.
Important
CSPM tools are not cloud-native monitoring solutions in the traditional sense, but they are essential components of a comprehensive cloud security strategy. Organizations often use CSPM tools alongside cloud-native monitoring solutions such as SIEM systems and SOAR platforms to create a holistic security ecosystem. This combination allows them to address security, compliance, performance, and incident response needs effectively in their cloud environments.
In short, CSPM tools are not substitutes for cloud-native monitoring solutions such as SIEM and SOAR but rather complementary tools that focus on different aspects of cloud security and compliance. Integrating CSPM with these solutions can enhance an organization’s overall cloud security and monitoring capabilities.