Software-as-a-Service, an acronym for SaaS applications, has become increasingly popular among businesses looking to enhance efficiency, productivity, and scalability. These cloud-based services have exploded in popularity over the last few years, with the net consumption up 18% in 2023 and 130 apps used per business on average.

As cybersecurity threats evolve and grow, the risks associated with SaaS platforms become apparent. A SaaS industry survey discovered that 55% of organizations reported experiencing a cybersecurity incident in the past two years while 58% estimated that their SaaS security solutions only cover 50% or less of their applications and 7% of organizations have no monitoring at all. Cybercriminals continue to target SaaS environments by exploiting misconfigurations that can expose sensitive data and disrupt operations.

As organizations face heightened security issues, they must adopt security strategies and solutions to mitigate SaaS-specific risks and secure their cloud assets effectively.

Understanding Common SaaS Security Challenges

Organizations continue to embrace SaaS applications to support their business environment. However, this expansion brings unique security and access control issues and the risk of cyber attacks targeting SaaS platforms. Here’s an overview of the challenges while using SaaS applications:

Misconfigurations

Misconfigurations within SaaS applications introduce security risks that expose sensitive data to unauthorized users. 43% of surveyed organizations linked at least one security issue to SaaS misconfiguration. These misconfigurations, like improper access control, unsecured storage, and weak authentication, create entry points for hackers who can exploit them, leading to data loss or theft, operational disruptions, and compliance violations.

SaaS Sprawl

As the adoption of SaaS platforms by employees increases, it contributes to SaaS sprawl which is the excessive usage of SaaS applications without proper oversight and management. Each additional app might serve as an entry point for threat actors, which makes identity and access management challenging and can lead to exposure of sensitive data.

Shadow IT

Shadow IT is the unauthorized use of software and applications without the approval of the IT teams. Employees seeking quick solutions to their needs often use tools outside the IT teams’ approval. Approximately, 80% of employees admitted they use SaaS apps without any permission from the IT department. This leads to a decentralized and unregulated SaaS environment, which brings security concerns and compliance challenges. These apps are not designed with advanced security standards and lack compliance regulations, putting the company at risk of data breaches and regulatory issues.

Insecure APIs

Another issue is that SaaS platforms can easily integrate with other applications via APIs. Suppose these APIs are not adequately secured or have misconfigurations. In that case, attackers can exploit and use them as a gateway to infiltrate the SaaS environment and access sensitive information, leading to data exposure and compromise of multiple systems other than SaaS apps.

Phishing Attacks

Since anyone can access SaaS apps from any location, there is a high risk of unauthorized access.  As a result, cybercriminals utilize SaaS platforms to carry out hard-to-detect social engineering attacks. Cyber criminals may use phishing techniques to acquire user credentials or exploit weak passwords. Palo Alto Networks analyzed various URLs and discovered that the number of phishing URLs hosted on SaaS platforms increased by 1100% in 2022. Such events undermine data integrity and result in the modification or deletion of sensitive data from the software.

Insider Threats

Insider threats are among the significant security risks that SaaS platforms experience. These individuals can be business partners, contractors, or current or former employees who intentionally or unintentionally compromise security. Statistics reveal that 36% of employees retained access to the systems after leaving their jobs. Organizations don’t enforce least privilege access, allowing malicious insiders or former employees to access applications they don’t need to manipulate or steal stored data.

Integration Issues

Most organizations use multiple SaaS applications, each with their own security protocols and standards. Besides this, there are also on-premises applications and legacy systems which haven’t been upgraded for a long time. Integrating these disparate systems can be complex and lead to security gaps that attackers can exploit if not done correctly.

Advanced Security Solutions to Secure SaaS Applications

Maintaining SaaS security is vital because it enables safe access to data and services for anyone within the company. It also plays a crucial role in mitigating cyberattacks, protecting critical systems and data, and minimizing the potential of costly incidents and downtime. Below is an insight into various advanced SaaS security solutions that security teams must consider using to strengthen the overall security posture.

SaaS Security Posture Management

SaaS Security Posture Management (SSPM) is a great security tool that provides security teams more control and visibility over their SaaS apps. It focuses on identifying and mitigating vulnerabilities within various SaaS apps to secure the data and improve the overall cloud security posture. When monitoring SaaS applications, these solutions detect misconfigurations, dormant user accounts, and compliance risks before they turn into costly data breaches.

An effective SSPM solution provides comprehensive visibility into the organization’s SaaS environment by constantly monitoring SaaS apps and vulnerabilities within them. Later, they assign risk scores to detected misconfigurations, enabling the security teams to prioritize remediation. By focusing on high-risk issues, businesses can address the critical issues first and then move on to the less significant ones.

Another benefit of using SSPM solutions is they can easily integrate with Identity and Access Management (IAM) systems and enforce secure access control policies across the SaaS applications. By managing permissions and user access levels, SSPM reduces the risk of unauthorized access and exposure of sensitive data. In addition, it enforces Data Loss Prevention (DLP) policies, which ensure proper data handling as per the organizations’ security policies and address accidental data leaks and malicious data breaches.

Moreover, by running automated security checks, SSPM ensures that SaaS configurations and user permissions align with regulatory requirements like GDPR, HIPAA, and PCI DSS and avoid penalties. However, SSPM products do come with some limitations. For instance, some SSPM solutions won’t support a discrete set of applications and help discover all the SaaS apps used in a company.

Make sure to choose an effective SSPM solution that seamlessly integrates with all the SaaS apps used within the organization network. Also, prepare an inventory of all the SaaS apps used by the company and ensure the SSPM solution identifies all of them.

Cloud Access Secure Broker

Cloud Access Security Broker (CASBs) is a cloud-specific security solution that businesses use to ensure secure access to SaaS applications. It acts as a gatekeeper among the users and SaaS providers to prevent users from accessing unauthorized applications and enhance security.

The main purpose of using this solution is that it offers comprehensive visibility into SaaS usage. It identifies and records all the SaaS services, including unsanctioned shadow IT apps, and gives insights into who uses them and for what purpose. All this information helps security teams to have a better understanding of the SaaS environment and strengthen security posture.

A CASB solution employs advanced threat protection by leveraging behavioral analytics, machine learning, and user and entity behavior analytics (UEBA) capabilities to detect malware, ransomware, and phishing attempts within the SaaS environment. These systems also analyze various behavioral patterns, detect anomalies that might result in a security incident, and enable proactive remediation to prevent them.

Implementing and managing CASB can be complex and time-consuming. Also, these solutions do come with other challenges; it’s crucial to evaluate your organization’s needs and requirements and understand the limitations of this technology.

Zero Trust Architecture

Zero trust is a modern approach that helps organizations protect their sensitive SaaS data by limiting user access and reducing the risk of unauthorized access and data breaches. With this approach no device, system, or person is trusted by default and requires verification as part of every interaction.

Unlike the traditional perimeter security model, which assumes that everything inside the network is trustworthy, ZTA solutions continuously monitor and access each user’s identity and device status before granting access. In other words, it authenticates and authorizes each user present on the network for every resource they want to access.

Another advantage of using zero-trust solutions within the SaaS applications is that they enforce the least privilege policy and ensure users have minimum access to apps and data. Doing so restricts entry points for attackers and any opportunity they’d get to exploit misconfiguration or any vulnerable device.

Besides this, Zero-trust architecture employs micro-segmentation, dividing the cloud network into smaller and isolated segments and limiting the lateral movement of threats. Even if an attacker gains unauthorized access to one app by some means, they won’t move to other applications. This reduces the attack surface and the risk of potential data breaches.

Zero trust is a great approach for enhancing security of SaaS apps, but comes with significant challenges. Cultural shifts, legacy systems and compatibility, and budget constraints are hurdles in implementing these solutions. However, organizations can easily overcome these issues by immense planning and a thorough understanding of the network.

Best Practices for Ongoing SaaS Security

Protecting SaaS platforms is vital for modern organizations to secure their application data from malicious attackers while allowing users access simultaneously. Besides relying on innovative solutions, they should practice various security measures to ensure data protection like:

• Monitor shared accounts used by multiple users to ensure that only authorized users can access sensitive data or make changes within the application.
• Regularly review the user account list and deactivate dormant accounts belonging to any former employee or not used for a specific time. Such accounts are highly vulnerable to hacking if left active without proper oversight.
• Review the security policies and measures of the SaaS vendors. This includes incident response procedures, compliance status, and data protection capabilities.
• Prepare a well-defined incident response plan which outlines immediate actions for post-breach and defines the responsibilities of each party involved.
• Perform regular security audits of the software usage across the organization. This helps identify unapproved applications and ensure compliance with established policies.
• Regularly update and patch the SaaS applications to address known vulnerabilities and ensure their proper configuration. Doing so prevents unauthorized access and data leaks.
• Enable multi-factor authentication (MFA) to add an extra layer of security to user accounts. If by any means hackers break into the password, MFA ensures that only approved users have access to specific applications.
• Run a comprehensive awareness and training program for employees about the risks associated with SaaS software. Also, educate them about the best practices and steps to mitigate the risks.

Final Thoughts

Protecting data within the SaaS environment requires a comprehensive approach. By integrating SSPM, CASB, and ZTNA solutions, security teams can gain better visibility and control across their environment and mitigate the challenges posed by SaaS platforms. In addition, by embracing the best security measures and focusing on the awareness and education of employees, businesses can ensure a more comprehensive and proactive defense against SaaS risks.