Data Governance and Security of Cloud Data Warehouse

There is a vast amount of data being generated by organizations today, enabling them to leverage next-gen business intelligence to predict future trends and plan growth strategies accordingly. The backbone of this system is the data warehouse, which is the central data repository at the heart of your structured analytics system that facilitates timely and informed decision-making for spurring growth. The importance of the data warehouse can be gauged from its projected growth at a CAGR of 11.17% from USD 6.3 billion in 2019 to USD 11.95 billion by 2025 according to a Mordor Intelligence report.

Security Concerns of Data Warehouse on Cloud

The agile and scalable data warehouse can be created within minutes, with real-time data to provide significant insights regarding new product development, detecting frauds, improving customer loyalty or optimal pricing. By taking it to the cloud, you can accelerate and simplify data warehouse development. While data management and integration are two critical aspects of cloud data warehousing, data governance and security are the two other aspects that need as much attention.

Your data warehouse is a wealth of organizational information right from financial to those related to customers and employees, credit card details and organizational trade secrets. This makes it vulnerable to cyberattacks from malicious outsiders and insiders. While cloud service providers may have security provisions, research shows that it is not completely safe and it is important for you to have data governance and security to protect your sensitive data on cloud as well.

Cloud data warehouse is vulnerable to four types of attacks:

• DDoS or Distributed Denial of Service where the servers are overwhelmed and unable to service genuine user request
• Data breaches due to unauthorized access
• Data loss due to deletion by accident, with malicious intent, or due to physical destruction of the infrastructure
• Visitors accessing your services through insecure points
• Timely alerts in case of potential threats

Data Governance for Greater Security

Insecure data not only poses a threat to data but also has the potential to tarnish your reputation, for customers to lose trust, compromises the safety of your employees and your business as well as a drop in revenues.

According to a Ponemon survey of more than 3,000 people in 507 companies, the data breach lifecycle in 2019 was longer at 279 days than that of 266 days in 2018. The malicious attacks lifecycle was longer by 12.5% at 314 days. While a lifecycle of more than 200 days cost companies $4.56 million, those shorter than that cost $3.34 million for a breach. The most common and costly causes of the breaches were malicious attacks at a per capita cost of $166.

This makes data governance and data security critical to protect data as well as ensure its integrity, availability and usability. Regulatory compliance is another reason why you need data governance for your cloud data warehouse. While protecting stakeholder interests, it also enables you to standardize your processes and procedures, improves your efficacy at a lower cost and enhances the quality of workflows and decision making.

Meeting Your Data Governance Needs

Indium Software, with expertise in Big Data technologies, understands that the key requirements of a good data governance are the clear definition of:

• Processes
• Roles
• Policies
• Standards
• Metrics

This enables establishing access rights, responsibilities and accountability to protect sensitive data and prevent it from falling into the wrong hands. It also ensures that the data is available consistently across the business with common terminology but is flexible enough to let individual business units retain it as per their needs. Most importantly, Indium ensures that all functions have access to a single version of truth that can provide them with deeper insights to develop strategies for their operations while aligning it with the organizational goals.

Indium’s endeavors to implement data governance includes ensuring greater data accuracy and completeness along with better data integration by creating a clear data map for data related to all key entities.

Indium also ensures that your data governance implementation complies with the guidelines provided by regulatory bodies such as the US HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act) and the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) as well as industry requirements such as PCI DSS (Payment Card Industry Data Security Standards).

While having the policies that will govern the security and usage of your enterprise data is important, there is no silver bullet to protect your data. It will depend on your organizational needs and should be configured accordingly using the appropriate tools. It should be an integral part and an extension of your overall IT governance strategy for a smooth and seamless implementation.

Indium’s aim for implementing data governance, in short, is to establish a code of conduct and best practices for improved data management meeting legal, security, and compliance needs best suited to your organization and ensuring growth.

About Indium

Indium, a more-than-two-decades-old software company, has wide and deep experience in end-to-end delivery of Big Data solutions as well as in other cutting edge technologies such as AI, Blockchain, data analytics, application development and in the traditional platforms.

Our teams have cross-domain experience as well as expertise in the technology offerings. We offer high level services including consulting, implementation, on-going maintenance & managed services. To implement data governance and security in your cloud data warehouse, contact us now.