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Top 10 Cloud Vulnerability in 2025
Cloud security

The Top 10 Cloud Vulnerabilities in 2025

With the year 2025 in full swing, cloud computing has been in fast progression. As businesses continue to shape their future business operations framework, it is evident that the benefits brought about by this era have cut across reduced costs, improved efficiency, and increased scalability. But this shift creates a collection of security challenges. With more and more sophisticated cyber threats being aimed at cloud environments, it is now critical for organizations to stay up to speed on the most recent vulnerabilities and trends. Qualysec Technologies is here to discuss the top 10 cloud vulnerabilities to expect for 2025 and interesting insights on how businesses can protect themselves from cloud vulnerabilities. Top 10 Cloud Vulnerabilities in 2025 At the time of this writing in 2025, the cloud computing environment is changing with rapid speed and many aspects of security. This is important for businesses that help to understand those vulnerabilities and keep their data safe. Down below are the top 10 cloud vulnerabilities that organizations need to prepare themselves for in 2025. 1. Ransomware-as-a-Service (RaaS) For the most part, ransomware has remained a mainstay threat, as cybercriminals target the cloud in more ways than ever. Attackers can encrypt cloud data more easily using RaaS models, and they invariably demand hefty ransoms for decryption. Instances of these attacks have also taken place in recent times and even mid sized companies have become victims and can lose millions. The best way to protect against RaaS is to ensure that your backups are robust and perform regular disaster recovery testing routines. 2. Zero-Day Exploits Cloud systems can be exposed by zero-day exploits, i.e. unknown vulnerabilities for months. To mitigate these threat weapons, continuous monitoring, rapid patch management, and zero-trust architecture are key. The recent worldwide zero day attack that affected thousands of cloud servers is a good reason for proactive measures. 3. API Vulnerabilities Cloud infrastructure lives by APIs and even the most innocuous of these things can go awry and lead to data breaches. Good secure API design and regular testing for vulnerabilities will protect you from such attacks. Among insecure APIs, it is frequent to find weak authentication, encryption, or validation, making them an obvious target for hackers. 4. Insider Threats Insider threats can be either intentional or unintentional and cloud network security that comes from insider threats can be significant. This can be done with strict access controls and watching each user’s activity. Generative AI may also be used to allow more complex phishing attacks, thus increasing the insider threat. 5. Supply Chain Attacks In supply chain attacks, the main goal is to reach at least one of the parties and utilize it to access an entire organization. These attacks can be prevented to some extent by conducting thorough security risk assessments of suppliers and implementing access controls. Supply chain vulnerabilities are becoming bigger news as cloud services become more popular. 6. DDoS Attacks Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks can ruin business operations by forcing cloud resources into paroxysms. To keep these services available, it is necessary to implement robust DDoS mitigation strategies. With more people relying on cloud services, DDoS attacks have a bigger impact. 7. Native Malware Cloud-native malware is malware that targets specific cloud environments. Adequate malware scanning and cloud security solutions must be regularly in place. Cloud environments are in an ever-evolving state and therefore new types of malware are emerging. 8. Data Breaches A vulnerability to a data breach can lead to financial and reputational loss. To avoid breaches, you can have the strongest security systems in place and conduct vulnerability analysis as much as possible. Common causes of data breaches are misconfigured storage buckets and weakened access controls. 9. Social Engineering Some of the social engineering tactics like phishing are still in use and can allow unauthorized access to cloud resources. In 2025, these attacks are likely to become more sophisticated as deep fake technology is bound to be used. They can be reduced by implementing multi-factor authentication and providing reasonable security awareness training. 10. Quantum Computing Threats Traditional encryption methods are at risk of being attacked by the very peak of quantum computing. In the long run, sensitive data can only be secure if encoded with quantum-resistant algorithms. It is not an immediate threat, but already a risk for long-term quantum security. Latest Penetration Testing Report Download Mitigation Strategies for Cloud Vulnerabilities To exert the mitigation for cloud security vulnerabilities, one has to take proactive approaches, technology advances, and strategic planning. Among the features that successful cloud environments share, robust security strategies play an essential role that needs to be implemented by organizations to protect themselves from emerging threats. To mitigate the top cloud vulnerabilities in 2025, here are some important basic strategies to address them – 1. Implementing Zero-Trust Architecture The Zero Trust model is based on ‘never trust, always verify’. The key here is continuous verification of users and devices, micro-segmentation, right down to every minute of every day, monitoring, and adaptive policies. Rather than trusting internal IP addresses or external DOTS that are commonly granted access, Zero Trust limits the number of attack surfaces, allowing only verified requests through. 2. Regular Vulnerability Scanning and Penetration Testing This allows the identification of potential weak points in the cloud infrastructure to be shown. Penetration testing is a test where ethical hackers simulate the real world of an actual attack scenario to discover the weakness before the actual attack. With these tests, you’ll have prioritized actionable insights that address the issues in your security posture that need to be performed continuously, or at least regularly, to stay ahead of the most agile threats. 3. Use Contextual Vulnerability Management However, one must contextually understand the impact of vulnerabilities and assess their potential impact on the business. This entails looking at the ways that you can intruder access vulnerable systems, the data that can be compromised in the process, and the likelihood of the breach having a positive impact. By correlating vulnerabilities with

What are The Top Cloud Computing Vulnerabilities & How to Address Them
Cloud security

Top Cloud Computing Vulnerabilities & How to Address Them?

As companies keep increasing their usage of cloud services, the risks of cloud computing vulnerabilities also increase. Cloud computing services have become a go-to solution for data storage, business operations, and team collaborations. And why not? They are cost-effective, flexible, and boost productivity. However, it is not always smooth sailing. They too have their fair share of security risks.  A study by IBM shows that cloud data breaches cost companies $4.8 million on average to recover. This comes when 65% of organizations are defaulting to cloud-based services. So, if your business uses cloud computing services or even offers cloud services, you must be aware of the lingering threats. This blog lists the top vulnerabilities in cloud computing, what is their impact, and best practices to address them. Remember, proactive prevention is always better than required remediation. Definition of Cloud Computing Cloud computing refers to services that are provided over the internet (in this case, “the cloud”) such as servers, storage, networking, analytics, software, and intelligence. It is a cost-effective way where typically pay for the service you want to use. Most companies use cloud computing for data storage and business operations. Instead of storing files on a device or hard drive, you can save them on the cloud, which you can access from anywhere, as long as you have access to the Internet. Based on the deployment model, the cloud can be classified as a public, private, and hybrid cloud. Cloud computing is broadly divided into 3 types:   Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) Cloud computing has revolutionized business operations and eliminated storage issues. It will continue to expand to make the services more convenient. However, business owners should stay updated with the evolving vulnerabilities of cloud computation so that they do not face any cyberattacks. What are Cloud Computing Vulnerabilities? Cloud computing vulnerabilities are security gaps or weaknesses in a cloud computing environment that hackers/attackers can exploit to gain unauthorized access, steal sensitive data, and interrupt services.   These vulnerabilities can be present anywhere in the cloud environment, including applications, infrastructure, data storage, and communication pathways. These vulnerabilities could be due to bugs in the software, outdated security patches, insecure access controls, lack of encryption, etc. Identifying and promptly addressing these vulnerabilities is key to a secure cloud environment.   The Impact of Cloud Vulnerabilities on Businesses The impacts of cloud vulnerabilities include unauthorized access, data breaches, and cyberattacks. Additionally, these vulnerabilities endanger system integrity, privacy, and the overall security posture of the cloud environment. Here is a brief description of their impact: Data Loss: Sensitive information, such as customer data and financial records can be stolen or lost due to unfixed cloud vulnerabilities. Financial Loss: It can be expensive to recover from data breaches. Additional costs include legal fees, fines, compensation to affected customers, and investments in new security measures. Additionally, sales might go down due to a loss of customer trust. Compliance Issues: If cloud vulnerabilities are exploited, then it can lead to violation of data protection laws such as GDPR or HIPAA. This may result in legal penalties and fines. Reputation Damage: If there’s a security breach due to vulnerabilities, the news can spread quickly, resulting in broken customer trust and reputational damage. Rebuilding the trust can be a long and challenging process. Loss of Intellectual Property: Critical business information such as product designs and trade secrets can be stolen by exploiting cloud vulnerabilities. Operational Disruptions: Security incidents can interrupt business operations in the cloud. As a result, it can decrease productivity, delay projects, and affect the overall efficiency of the business. Additionally, it can lead to revenue loss.  List of Top 10 Cloud Computing Vulnerabilities Cloud computing is going to integrate AI in most of its services in the coming years. This means new and unique cloud computing vulnerabilities are going to emerge in the future. Companies face a wide range of risks with the cloud. However, the majority of breaches occur from these 10 vulnerabilities:   1. Misconfigurations As per the National Security Agency (NSA), cloud misconfiguration is probably the most common vulnerability faced by organizations. Cloud misconfigurations refer to incorrect security settings in cloud applications and systems that expose them to various security risks. Misconfigurations can happen in many cloud components, including storage, networking, and access management. These misconfigurations can reveal sensitive data, lead to unauthorized access, increase the attack surface, and pose many other risks.   Common cloud misconfigurations include: Open Ports: Open ports allow web traffic into the environment without any restrictions. As a result, it may lead to exploitation by hackers. Insecure Storage: If you don’t have proper data security measures such as publicly accessible buckets or containers, it can impact data integrity. Disabled Logging and Monitoring: If the logging and monitoring systems are disabled, it can create security gaps and delay in incident detection. Excessive Accessibility: Without inadequate access controls, cloud data can be exposed to unauthorized users and hackers. Improper Secret Management: Usually, secrets include digital credentials like encryption keys, API keys, passwords, etc. Without proper configuration, these crucial elements can be compromised. 2. Insecure APIs In December 2021, a security breach in Twitter API exposed the personal data of 5.4 million users. In addition, a section of this data was sold on the dark web and the rest was released for free. Cloud computing relies heavily on application programming interfaces (APIs) for better functioning of the services. However, third-party APIs often lack proper security measures during their design, configuration, and implementation. These weaknesses can lead to injection attacks (SQL injection and XSS), data exposure, and privilege escalation. There are many API security issues, such as: Weak authorization and authentication controls Outdated API versions Missing endpoint security Improper error handling 3. Lack of visibility In cloud computing, lack of visibility means that the organization struggles to monitor and track activities within the cloud environment. This includes: Not knowing which users are accessing data Which data is being acceded Where the data is stored or moved Without

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Pabitra Kumar Sahoo

Pabitra Kumar Sahoo

COO & Cybersecurity Expert

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Pabitra Kumar Sahoo

Pabitra Kumar Sahoo

COO & Cybersecurity Expert