Glossary
CASB
CASB is a security guard for cloud apps. It watches what employees do in Dropbox, Salesforce, and other cloud services, and can block risky actions like sharing files publicly.
What is CASB?
Cloud Access Security Broker - software that sits between users and cloud services to enforce security policies and provide visibility.
Why Should You Care?
Many data breaches now originate from compromised cloud credentials and overly permissive sharing settings, not traditional firewalls. Without CASB, security teams cannot see which employees are uploading sensitive files to personal cloud accounts or detect when a single compromised account exfiltrates data across dozens of SaaS applications. Incident responders lack visibility into cloud activity until damage is discovered post-breach, and compliance auditors have no logs to prove controls exist.
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Real-World Example
When an employee's credentials are stolen and used to access Salesforce or Google Drive, a CASB can detect anomalous behavior (new geography, bulk downloads, unusual access times) and block the session before data leaves the company. Without it, attackers can spend weeks copying customer records and files before anyone notices the account was compromised, since many cloud platforms generate minimal alerting by default.
How to Protect Against CASB
- 1.
Inventory all cloud services in use
- 2.
Evaluate CASB solutions
Related Terms
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