Azure cloud platform
Organisations all over the world are moving to Azure to mitigate security threats with an IT solutions provider in Iraq serving as an excellent example of an organisation that instantly halted website attacks by moving its clients to Azure, thereby, stressing the powerful capabilities of the Azure cloud platform.
The business impact of cyber-attacks is very real and can occur in a very short duration of time. To highlight the financial impact of a breach, Deloitte Advisory firm released a report “ Beneath the surface of a cyberattack: A deeper look at business impacts.
The most concerning information highlighted in the report is the far-reaching implications, cost-and-time wise, that a cyber-attack can have on a business. While businesses tend to focus on direct costs, the hidden costs are reported to have a far more devastating impact with the report indicating that “Over 90 percent of cyber-attack impact is likely to accrue in categories that are intangible”.
When it comes to an organisation’s website, the impact of a security attack might seem less serious to some organisations as no data or IP was stolen. It’s just information, right?
Wrong. With the world relying on a virtual presence, the downtime resulting from attacks can be significant. Being on the World Wide Web comes with a very large responsibility and once you have built your online presence, exposed your brand and engaged audiences, your virtual presence is just as important as the physical presence of your organization to make prospects comfortable enough to do business with you.
In addition, the users you send to your website need to know that they are secure while browsing. Whereas many website attacks do result in downtime, attackers can also inject your website with malware and thereby direct your audience to pages that generate affiliate revenue or, ultimately, steal personal information.
No matter what the type of attack or the consequence, in the digital world, no company can afford to lose its online presence and this, in fact, happens often. Google blacklists websites that do not enable safe browsing or seem malicious and if your website is under attack, this could be you.
Imagine people searching for your company and finding no record of it, or losing all of the hard work you had put into your SEO rankings, or having to pause all of your digital campaigns as there is nowhere to send your users? The results would be devastating for all organisations, but for those who rely on their online presence to sell and communicate, the financial implications can be devastating.
Azure to the Rescue
Microsoft is dedicated to ensuring that web applications hosted on its Azure platform are safe and secure. With the addition of the Web Application Firewall, customers can strengthen their applications, rendering them less susceptible to cross-site scripting attacks, SQL injection and other means of exploiting or disrupting web applications.
In addition to blocking SQL injection and cross-site scripting attempts, Azure Web Application Firewall can stop other common attack methods like remote file inclusion, and can also prevent attacks that depend on HTTP protocol anomalies and violations, along with misconfigured Apache and Internet Information Services (IIS) deployments.
Automated tools, such as bots and crawlers are similarly blocked, and the firewall also helps customers stand up to debilitating HTTP denial-of-service attacks.
Microsoft is constantly watching, reviewing and mitigating existing and new threats to ensure that it can offer a secure environment for its clients, enabling them to focus on their businesses while the technology giant takes care of the rest.
It is crucial for organisations to realise that no matter what you have hosted on the World Wide Web, be it an application or a website, it is your responsibility to keep it secure for the security of both your organisation and your audience.
