Shadow cloud services pose a growing risk to enterprises

2/3/2015  By Jai Vijayan
 
More than 85 percent of cloud applications used in the workplace are unsanctioned, study shows.
 The dangers posed by shadow IT, where workgroups and individual workers use applications that are not sanctioned by IT, are well understood. What few may realize is just how extensive the problem has become in an era of cloud computing and personal mobile devices in the workplace.
 
Security vendor CipherCloud analyzed a year’s worth of cloud usage data from its enterprise customers and discovered that on average, North American companies used about 1,245 cloud applications. Of that number, an astounding 86 percent were unsanctioned applications that IT groups had little idea were being accessed from inside the enterprise network.
 
The numbers highlight the scope of the shadow cloud problem within enterprises, says Willy Leichter, global director of cloud security at CipherCloud. While enterprises often know they have unsanctioned applications running within the enterprise, few have any idea of just how widespread that use really is, he says.
 
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