What is a CASB DLP?

CASB DLP refers to the Data Loss Prevention (DLP) capabilities of a Cloud Access Security Broker (CASB). 

A CASB solution helps organizations enforce security policies in the cloud. Sitting between end users and cloud services, CASBs monitor traffic and user activity and enforce security policies to authenticate users, block threats, control cloud app usage, prevent risky filesharing, control shadow IT and safeguard data. CASB software may be installed on-premises, in the cloud or offered as a service by CASB providers.

DLP software provides the tools and processes to prevent sensitive data from being lost, leaked, misused or accessed by unauthorized individuals. DLP software helps security teams to identify confidential and critical information and monitor how it is used, stored, accessed, retained and destroyed. DLP technology also enforces security policies to prevent sensitive information from being publicly exposed, inadvertently leaked or stolen by malicious individuals.

Choosing a CASB software that provides integrated DLP capabilities can help enforce data loss prevention policies for data residing in the cloud or used by cloud applications.
 

To secure cloud applications and cloud data, CASBs combine a variety of technologies and serve as a firewall, a filter and a proxy between end users and cloud services. Security teams rely on CASBs to perform three types of functions: discovering cloud applications and users, evaluating risk associated with each, and enforcing a wide range of security policies around data security, threat protection, regulatory compliance, authentication, data loss prevention and cloud usage. 

To accomplish these tasks, CASBs incorporate various tools. Gateways sitting between users and cloud resources provide real-time insights and help enforce policies for cloud traffic. Log data collected from firewalls and secure web gateways offers insight into cloud usage and helps enforce policies. Endpoint agents monitor activity and enforce policy on managed end-user devices. Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) monitor activity and analyze content.

CASBs enable security teams to:

• Gain greater visibility. Auto-discovery features of a CASB can automatically identify all cloud applications within an organization’s IT environment as well as the users interacting with them. This helps security teams to identify and manage shadow IT and to better understand and control cloud usage.
• Mitigate threats. Real-time monitoring enables CASBs to identify and block cyberattacks, malware, insider threats and unauthorized access.
• Enhance data security. CASBs can block sensitive data from leaving the organization, prevent unauthorized access to data in the cloud and enforce encryption for certain data types.
• Improve regulatory compliance. By automatically enforcing policies and providing greater visibility, CASBs help ensure compliance with HIPAA, PCI DSS, GDPR and other regulatory frameworks.

DLP technology employs various technologies to monitor data flowing through an IT environment, detect potential leaks or misuse and block user actions to safeguard data. DLP solutions use firewalls, monitoring technology, endpoint protection, antivirus solutions and automated tools to continuously monitor data streams and flag or block suspicious activity.

DLP solutions perform several tasks to help protect sensitive and critical data.

• Identifying data. DLP solutions identify and categorize data based on its criticality to the business and by the severity of damage that would result if the data was leaked or lost.
• Establishing policies. DLP technology helps security teams to establish policies that govern how sensitive or regulated data should be used, accessed, stored and retained, along with who should have access to each type of data.
• Monitoring continuously. DLP services monitor and track the use and movement of data throughout the organization to detect any unauthorized attempts to access it, change it, duplicate it or move it outside the organization. 
• Alerting and blocking. When a potential policy violation occurs, DLP technology can block a user’s action, automatically enforce encryption, alert security teams or remediate the violation in other ways.

Choosing a CASB with DLP capabilities provides several advantages.

• Better coverage. Since most standard DLP solutions do not provide optimal coverage in the cloud, choosing a provider that offers robust CASB DLP capabilities can help organizations achieve comprehensive DLP coverage.
• Stronger DLP protection. Migrating data to the cloud inevitably involves a certain loss of control and visibility. CASB DLP solutions help to enhance data protection and security.
• Unified DLP policies. A superior CASB should be able to leverage existing DLP policies, workflows and business logic for cloud services and applications. This enables IT teams to set DLP policies once and have them implemented for both cloud and on-premises infrastructure.
• Deeper insight. Integrating DLP with CASB’s provides administrators of DLP solutions with greater insight into user behavior and how data is used and accessed in the cloud.

As a leading user and data security company, Forcepoint offers a CASB solution with DLP capabilities that extends best-in-class data security and data loss prevention to all cloud applications. 

As part of Forcepoint ONE – an all-in-one, cloud-native security platform – Forcepoint CASB provides full visibility and control over data in any application for safe, high-performance use everywhere.

Forcepoint ONE CASB enables security teams to continuously secure data across the web with 190+ pre-defined data security policies and customized controls that streamline compliance through an integration with Forcepoint DLP. 

Forcepoint ONE CASB delivers industry-leading performance regardless of where and how employees and contractors connect to the Internet. Forcepoint’s built-in CASB DLP features prevent the need to adopt point products to stop data breaches. When sensitive data is detected, Forcepoint ONE CASB DLP capabilities can block it in transit with agentless DLP, encrypt or mask it, redact it or watermark and track it.

Forcepoint CASB also provides:

• Office 365 cloud app security. Forcepoint augments the native CASB in Office 365 to provide a unified and comprehensive solution for protecting all cloud applications in addition to Office 365.
• Protection for unmanaged devices. Forcepoint implements Zero Trust access that safeguards access to business apps from BYOD and unmanaged devices.
• Malware detection in business files. Forcepoint CASB detects and blocks malware in data in motion between users and SaaS apps, relying on malware engines from Bitdefender and CrowdStrike. 
• Shadow IT controls. Forcepoint CASB uncovers shadow IT by detecting and listing unmanaged SaaS apps in use and allowing administrators to build policies for company devices that can block access or direct users to approved apps.