There are massive amounts of sensitive information managed and stored online in the cloud or on connected servers. Encryption uses cybersecurity to defend against brute-force and cyber-attacks, including malware and ransomware. Data encryption works by securing transmitted digital data on the cloud and computer systems. There are two kinds of digital data, transmitted data or in-flight data and stored digital data or data at rest.
Modern encryption algorithms have replaced the outdated Data Encryption Standard to protect data. These algorithms guard information and fuel security initiatives including integrity, authentication, and non-repudiation. The algorithms first authenticate a message to verify the origin. Next. they check the integrity to verify that contents have remained unchanged. Finally, the non-repudiation initiative stops sends from denying legitimate activity.
There are several different encryption methods, each developed with different security and security needs in mind. The two main types of data encryption are asymmetric encryption and symmetric encryption.
Asymmetric encryption, also known as Public-Key Cryptography, encrypts and decrypts the data using two separate cryptographic asymmetric keys. These two keys are known as a “public key” and a “private key”.
Common asymmetric encryption methods:
- RSA: RSA, named after computer scientists Ron Rivest, Adi Shamir, and Leonard Adleman, is a popular algorithm used to encrypt data with a public key and decrypt with a private key for secure data transmission.
- Public key infrastructure (PKI): PKI is a way of governing encryption keys through the issuance and management of digital certificates.
Symmetric encryption is a type of encryption where only one secret symmetric key is used to encrypt the plaintext and decrypt the ciphertext.
Common symmetric encryption methods:
- Data Encryption Standards (DES): DES is a low-level encryption block cipher algorithm that converts plain text in blocks of 64 bits and converts them to ciphertext using keys of 48 bits.
- Triple DES: Triple DES runs DES encryption three different times by encrypting, decrypting, and then encrypting data again.
- Advanced Encryption Standard (AES): AES is often referred to as the gold standard for data encryption and is used worldwide as the U.S. government standard.
- Twofish: Twofish is considered one of the fastest encryption algorithms and is free to use.
With more and more organizations moving to hybrid and multicloud environments, concerns are growing about public cloud security and protecting data across complex environments. Enterprise-wide data encryption and encryption key management can help protect data on-premises and in the cloud.
Cloud service providers (CSPs) may be responsible for the security of the cloud, but customers are responsible for security in the cloud, especially the security of any data. An organization’s sensitive data must be protected, while allowing authorized users to perform their job functions. This protection should not only encrypt data, but also provide robust encryption key management, access control and audit logging capabilities.
Robust data encryption and key management solutions should offer:
- A centralized management console for data encryption and encryption key policies and configurations
- Encryption at the file, database and application levels for on-premise and cloud data
- Role and group-based access controls and audit logging to help address compliance
- Automated key lifecycle processes for on-premise and cloud encryption keys
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