It’s no secret that cloud security is a complex undertaking. Today’s threat actors have grown increasingly adept at launching sophisticated attacks at scale, increasing the pressure on security teams to sort through the barrage of incoming signals to quickly detect, digest, and respond to attacks. Modern digital estates can also sprawl across multiple cloud platforms and encompass numerous devices, networks, applications, and identities—making finding your most pressing vulnerabilities like searching for a needle in the proverbial haystack.

But what if you could bring together all your cloud security tools under a single unified platform? This platform would not only automatically detect, contextualize, and disrupt attacks but also consistently enforce cloud security posture management (CSPM) best practices across the full application lifecycle. By integrating various tools—from vulnerability scanning and compliance checking to real-time threat monitoring—you can achieve a more streamlined and efficient security operation.

Read on to learn how you can use a cloud-native application protection platform (CNAPP) to enhance security readiness and remain in control, from the earliest stages of development to deployment and runtime.

Why invest in CNAPP?

CNAPP offers several benefits over a “best-of-breed” approach, in which organizations rely on multiple standalone solutions to address different aspects of cloud security. While best-of-breed tools might excel individually, they often require complex integrations and constant management to ensure cohesive protection. In contrast, CNAPP simplifies this process by providing a unified platform that reduces the need for manual integration and maintenance, allowing security teams to focus more on strategic threat response rather than tool management.

Because CNAPP integrates multiple cloud security solutions under a unified platform, it can do everything from flagging back-end code and infrastructure for vulnerabilities to detecting and automatically disrupting attacks in runtime. For more complex threats that require human intervention, CNAPP empowers security admins with the necessary context to understand and remediate the attack or vulnerability.

A unified CNAPP also increases visibility and control because it can pull data and correlate insights from all stages of the cloud application lifecycle into a single pane of glass. It continuously scans your environment to ensure you’re up to date on current security best practices, industry and government regulations, necessary security patches, and more. This reduces the risk of misconfigurations due to human error and enhances your overall compliance posture, further driving security readiness and enabling teams to proactively remediate risks before threat actors can exploit them.

How does CNAPP protect against your most pressing threats?

So, how do CNAPP’s benefits stack up against a modern threat landscape?

Let’s start by looking at API security. Threat actors are increasingly targeting APIs due to their growing prominence in cloud-based environments, making securing APIs a key priority for many organizations. A CNAPP solution can help secure APIs by providing visibility and governance into the security risks that can arise in pre-production by integrating with various DevOps pipelines. It can also scan infrastructure for critical misconfigurations or risks that could lead to an attack. In the deployment phase, a CNAPP enforces key security policies and compliance requirements to ensure the application infrastructure meets your standards for encryptions, access controls, and secure configurations. Finally, in runtime, a CNAPP continuously monitors for threats and responds to incoming attacks and anomalous behavior to ensure you’re protected at the speed of attack.

Another major runtime security focus is data security—specifically, data security posture management (DSPM). While DSPM has existed as a concept for years, it was only recently coined by Gartner in its 2022 Hype Cycle for Data Security. DSPM is essential because it focuses on protecting the data, not just the infrastructure housing it. This is key as threat actors increasingly target data in their attacks. DSPM works to detect and prevent unauthorized access to sensitive data, blocking attackers from exfiltrating or manipulating critical data in the event of a breach. By integrating DSPM as part of CNAPP, companies can protect not only their cloud security posture but also the valuable data that lives within their digital estates.

Ultimately, CNAPP isn’t a product. It’s a cutting-edge approach to multicloud security that integrates various security functions into a single unified platform to deliver more holistic, contextualized, and efficient protection. By leveraging CNAPP within their digital estate, security leaders can improve their control and security readiness posture by enforcing CSPM consistently and automatically across the full cloud application lifecycle. Ready to learn how you can integrate a CNAPP into your cloud security strategy?

Explore Microsoft’s cloud security solutions to learn more.