DSPM, CSPM, and CIEM are more than just a mouthful of acronyms. They are some of today’s most sophisticated tools for managing data security in the cloud.
While they are all distinct entities and go about protecting data in different ways, the fact that they all seem to do very much the same thing can lead to a lot of confusion. This, in turn, can sell each of these unique solutions short – after all, they were all created in response to a specific problem. And the cloud is full of complex issues, warranting layered solutions in response.
Just like antivirus tools, firewalls, and email security platforms were pillars of on-premises security, the cloud needs a suite of defensive solutions that each fulfill part – yet not all – of its security requirements.
What is DSPM (Data Security Posture Management)?
Data Security Posture Management (DSPM) might best be defined by its differences. Right out of the gates, “DSPM should not be mistaken for cloud security posture management (CSPM), as the latter focuses on infrastructure-level vulnerabilities, while the former deals with data risks.” Nor is it CIEM (Cloud Infrastructure Entitlement Management), which deals primarily with managing identities and privileges in the cloud. But more on all of this later.
DSPM is a unique solution that was cited in the 2022 Gartner Hype Cycle for Data Security. Defined by Gartner as a solution that “provides visibility as to where sensitive data is, who has access to that data, how it has been used, and what the security posture of the data stored or application is,” it secures sensitive data in a unique way.
DSPM uses AI algorithms, machine learning, and Large Language Models (LLMs) to scan across multiple cloud environments (including hybrid and strictly on-prem), searching for structured and unstructured data. Using AI-driven capabilities, it can use context and keywords to see if an asset contains sensitive information, then use autonomous features to apply relevant security rules to the data once you have established those rules within your team.
The Bottom Line: DSPM protects data in the cloud (and in other environments) with a data-centric approach that searches out, assesses, and protects the data itself—not the places in which it is stored or the identities that secure access to that data.
What is CSPM?
Cloud security posture management is just that: a tool that ensures the security posture of your cloud architecture is impervious to attacks (at least as much as any tool can). It is specifically defined as “offerings that continuously manage IaaS [Infrastructure-as-a-Service] and PaaS [Platform-as-a-Service] security posture through prevention, detection and response to cloud infrastructure risks.” They also work across SaaS (Solution-as-a-Service) environments as well.
This boils down to properly setting up architectural configurations in the cloud, checking for vulnerabilities that could be exploited, and auditing current settings against compliance and industry frameworks to discover any indicators of risk—both proactively and reactively.
CSPM also encompasses notification and remediation, whether that be an alert sent to a SOC or autonomous playbook plays that can perform some fixes without human intervention. CSPM solutions automate the detection and mitigation of risk and compliance violations across cloud architectures.
The Bottom Line: CSPM makes sure that the “boxes” holding cloud data are secure, whereas DSPM hunts out hidden data assets in the cloud - even between those “boxes”- and makes sure the proper security controls have been assigned to them.
What is CIEM?
Lastly, Cloud Infrastructure Entitlement Management can be said to ensure that access to those cloud “boxes” is secure. As Gartner put it in its 2020 Hype Cycle for Identity and Access Management, CIEM tools are “specialized identity-centric SaaS solutions focused on managing cloud access risk via administration-time controls for the governance of entitlements in hybrid and multicloud IaaS.”
CIEM solutions enforce the principle of least privilege, monitoring and auditing cloud access in a central console, auditing and maintaining correct permissions and recommending cloud access policy optimizations through the use of AI.
The Bottom Line: CIEM solutions ensure that no unauthorized entity can get into the cloud architecture (CSPM), which protects the cloud data (DSPM).
DSPM, CSPM, and CIEM: Similarities and Differences
Put together, the cloud security triumvirate of DSPM, CSPM, and CIEM is a bit like Matryoshka dolls:
- DSPM | Cloud data is secured at the center (or tip-of-the-spear) by DSPM.
- CSPM | The architecture that holds and protects cloud data is secured in the middle by CSPM.
- CIEM | The initial access to that cloud architecture (that protects cloud data) is guarded by CIEM.
They each do separate yet comparably important things in the cloud security model. This is all on the customer’s side of the shared responsibility model, as cloud service providers (CSPs) provide many cloud security features out-of-the-box, but not all.
For those operating in the cloud (over 90%), and especially in multi-cloud environments (roughly 89%), this type of defense-in-depth approach is needed to combat the ways attackers seek to undermine cloud data at every phase of the data security lifecycle.
Editor’s Note: The opinions expressed in this guest author article are solely those of the contributor and do not necessarily reflect those of Tripwire.
