Work has gone to the cloud. As more and more businesses embrace remote and hybrid work, the cloud has become a go-to tool for work, hosting critical applications that employees need for their daily work. However, that also makes it a target for attackers and other bad actors, hence the need for cloud patch management.
Cloud patch management helps companies ensure their cloud environments have the latest security features and updates to protect their applications and connected devices. So let’s explore cloud-based patch management, why it matters, and how Splashtop helps companies ensure their cloud environments remain secure.
What is Cloud Patching?
Cloud patching is the process of updating the hosted software you use to keep it protected against known vulnerabilities. Whenever a new security patch comes out, cloud patch management ensures it rolls out across devices quickly.
Cloud patch management typically involves creating an inventory of software running on company resources, finding patches and updates to fix vulnerabilities, and pushing out the updates. This can be done manually or automatically, although the manual process can be time-consuming and prone to human error.
Why Cloud Patch Management is Important
As organizations rely more on cloud infrastructure for critical business applications, it’s becoming increasingly important to ensure their apps and security are up-to-date. This is especially true for remote/hybrid work environments and organizations with a bring-your-own-device (BYOD) policy, as they need to manage a wide array of endpoints across locations.
Unpatched systems are typically vulnerable to attacks from hackers, malware, and other cyber threats, so it’s important to install security patches before any bad actors can exploit those vulnerabilities. A proactive approach to cybersecurity is essential, as it helps prevent breaches and data leaks before they can occur.
Failing to protect your cloud infrastructure and devices can result in significant damage, data loss, and loss of reputation. Additionally, companies failing to meet their security compliance requirements can face heavy fines.
Types Of Cloud Environments & Their Patching Responsibilities
While we often talk about cloud environments as if they're identical, there are several different cloud service models. Each one requires a different approach to patching, as they provide various levels of control.
The different types of cloud environments include:
Public Cloud
Cloud environments where services are provided over the internet by third parties, including Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud. Public clouds share the responsibility for patches, as the provider patches the platform and infrastructure, but customers must manage their own virtual machines and applications.
Private Cloud
In private cloud environments, the users own and manage their entire cloud services and infrastructure. As such, while they have more control, they’re also completely responsible for patches and updates across their cloud ecosystem.
Hybrid Cloud
Hybrid cloud environments combine public and private clouds, typically allowing data and applications to move between the two to provide more flexibility and cost-effectiveness. Here, the provider and customer also share responsibility for updates and patches, though the specifics will vary across environments.
How Can Cloud Patch Management Improve Security, Compliance, and Performance?
This brings us to cloud patch management, which helps organizations update all their cloud services and applications with ease. Cloud-based patch management is vital for security, IT compliance, and overall performance by keeping systems and endpoints secure, and the automation and scalability of the cloud can streamline the patching process and reduce operational overhead.
Key benefits of cloud patch management include:
Enhanced security thanks to timely updates, ensuring you always have the latest security patches
Reduced risk from cyber threats, due to the swiftness with which you can close security vulnerabilities
Improved compliance with regulatory standards, as you’ll be able to keep up with the latest security updates and standards
Optimized performance, thanks to immediate access to the latest updates and improvements
What Challenges Do Organizations Face in Cloud Patch Management?
Some challenges can make cloud patch management more difficult. Fortunately, these can be addressed and mitigated with proper preparation. Common cloud patch management obstacles include:
Compatibility Issues and System Crashes
When a hosted application is updated faster than the devices accessing it, there’s always the chance they won’t be compatible — this can lead to frequent crashes or an application just failing to load. It can help to deploy patches in a staging environment first to check for compatibility issues or crashes before rolling out the deployment across your cloud infrastructure.
Lack of Awareness About the Importance of Patching
Employees must know why patch updates are important, especially if the patching process isn’t automated. If employees keep pushing off updates, they’ll continue to leave their systems vulnerable and risk attacks or data breaches.
Losses or Downtime Due to Failed Patches
On rare occasions, a patch update can go wrong. When that happens, the consequences can range anywhere from a mild inconvenience as you have to update the patches again to unplanned downtime or damages. The best way to prepare for this is to have secure, cloud-based backups, which you should already have as part of your security strategy.
Evolving Cloud Environments and Strategy Adaptation
The cloud is not a static technology; cloud technology is constantly advancing, and cloud environments are shifting with the latest developments. As such, patch management strategies need to evolve too. It’s important to regularly review your strategy to make sure you’re fully utilizing the latest tools and processes at your disposal to run efficient updates and stay aligned with your business needs.
Lack of In-House Expertise
Patch management is not always as easy as pressing an “update” button. It also involves identifying vulnerabilities, providing ongoing management, and deploying patches over large network environments. However, proper automation tools and security service providers specializing in cloud patch management can address this difficulty.
4 Best Practices for Optimizing Cloud Patch Management
If you want to optimize your cloud patch management fully, there are some best practices you can follow. Keeping these tips in mind will help ensure a smooth and efficient patch management process:
1. Embrace Automation
Cloud patch management doesn’t have to be a manual, time-consuming process. Automation tools make it easy to roll out patches across endpoints and environments as soon as they’re available, ensuring immediate updates while saving time.
2. Scan and Update Regularly
It’s important to regularly check your cloud services to monitor for vulnerabilities and ensure your security is up-to-date. This helps reduce the risk of missing a patch or leaving a vulnerability, so attackers have fewer weaknesses to exploit.
3. Endpoint Visibility
In remote and hybrid environments, BYOD workspaces, and anywhere that relies on the Internet of Things (IoT), managing and overseeing multiple endpoints is essential. You need a solution that lets you monitor and manage all of your endpoints from a single place, so you can gain a holistic view of your endpoint environment and easily push updates across each one.
4. Patch Across Apps
Think about all the different applications your teams use – each should remain just as secure as your network and endpoints. Third-party applications need patching too, as they’re a common point of ingress for many cyberattacks. It’s vital to keep all your applications up-to-date and secure. Otherwise, any of them could create a vulnerability that attackers could exploit.
Seamless Cloud Patching with Splashtop AEM
Cloud patch management can be a challenge if you manage multiple endpoints. Fortunately, there are ways to make it fast, efficient, and painless, like with Splashtop AEM (Autonomous Endpoint Management).
Splashtop AEM makes it easy to automate tasks, streamline IT operations, and secure endpoints from a single console. With it, you can automate updates for operating systems and third-party software across all your devices, customize policies across endpoints, and quickly spot and resolve problems in real time, all from anywhere.
This makes Splashtop AEM a powerful tool for cloud patch management that works by providing automated endpoint patching, security updates, and monitoring for all devices.
With Splashtop AEM, you can:
Address zero-day vulnerabilities and other security issues as soon as they emerge across all your endpoints.
Monitor and manage all your endpoints from a single dashboard to monitor security health and compliance.
Automate IT tasks across distributed environments.
Customize and enforce security policies.
Automatically roll out updates and patches.
Receive real-time alerts and send out fixes via smart actions.
View your endpoint health, patch statuses, and more from a centralized dashboard.
Schedule and execute tasks across multiple endpoints.
Centralize endpoint protection with real-time threat detection and response.
Ready to experience Splashtop for yourself? You can get started today with a free trial:
