Authors: Sathya Seelan J, Dharshini S
Abstract: Cloud computing has become a foundational technology for modern organizations, enabling scalable, flexible, and cost-efficient access to computing resources through the internet. Enterprises across sectors increasingly rely on cloud services for data storage, application deployment, business operations, and critical decision-making processes. The flexibility offered by cloud computing allows organizations to dynamically scale resources, reduce operational costs, and rapidly deploy innovative applications. Despite these significant advantages, the widespread adoption of cloud computing has introduced complex cybersecurity challenges that threaten data confidentiality, integrity, and availability, creating an urgent need for robust security frameworks. The shared and distributed nature of cloud environments, coupled with multi-tenancy, virtualization, and third-party service management, expands the attack surface and exposes systems to a variety of sophisticated cyber threats. These threats are further amplified by rapid technological advancements, including the integration of Internet of Things (IoT) devices, edge computing, and artificial intelligence (AI) applications in cloud platforms, which increase connectivity but also add layers of vulnerability. Malicious actors exploit misconfigurations, weak authentication mechanisms, and software vulnerabilities to gain unauthorized access, steal sensitive information, or disrupt services, highlighting the importance of proactive security measures. This research paper provides a comprehensive analysis of major cybersecurity threats associated with cloud computing and evaluates existing and emerging security mechanisms employed to mitigate these risks. Key threats discussed include data breaches, account hijacking, insecure application programming interfaces (APIs), insider threats, denial-of-service (DoS) attacks, ransomware, and compliance-related vulnerabilities. Data breaches remain one of the most critical concerns, as attackers can access sensitive information stored in cloud systems through technical exploits, human errors, or inadequate security policies. Account hijacking, often achieved through phishing attacks, malware injection, or credential theft, allows attackers to manipulate cloud resources, disrupt services, or launch further attacks within an organization’s network. Insecure APIs, which serve as communication gateways between applications and cloud services, pose substantial risks if improperly designed or inadequately secured, enabling unauthorized access, data manipulation, or denial-of-service attacks. Insider threats, whether intentional or accidental, continue to be a persistent challenge due to the trusted access employees or contractors have to cloud resources. The paper also explores the shared responsibility model in cloud computing security, which delineates the division of security obligations between cloud service providers and cloud users. While providers are tasked with securing the underlying infrastructure, including physical hardware, virtualization layers, and platform services, users are responsible for securing data, applications, access credentials, and configurations. Misunderstanding or neglecting these responsibilities can result in security gaps, misconfigurations, and increased exposure to cyberattacks. To address these challenges, the study analyzes a range of mitigation strategies, including advanced encryption techniques for data at rest and in transit, identity and access management (IAM) solutions, multi-factor authentication, continuous monitoring, intrusion detection and prevention systems, and compliance with international security standards such as ISO/IEC 27001, NIST frameworks, and GDPR.
Published by: vikaspatanker
