Key Considerations for Selecting DSPM for Cloud Environments

Choosing the right DSPM (data security posture management) platform matters a lot to your business—whether your data is stored in the cloud, on premise, or in a hybrid environment. This post is going to focus on what to look for and how to choose a DSPM platform for cloud—where it’s easy for sensitive data to slip through the cracks across databases and online tools.

What Is Data Security Posture Management?

DSPM is a cybersecurity process and technology that focuses on protecting sensitive data across environments—in this instance, the cloud. The process of DSPM includes the continuous discovery, classification, and monitoring of sensitive data to assess and improve the data’s security posture.

DSPM solutions like BigID use advanced technology, like automation, to pinpoint vulnerabilities and enforce security policies. It also performs regular audits and scans to safeguard businesses against data breaches and hidden security threats like shadow data.

The right DSPM solution makes sure businesses are aware of their regulatory compliance requirements and can respond quickly to threats.

In layman’s terms, a DSPM solution gives your organization a better view into where your data lives, who has access to it, and how it is being used. It will ultimately show you the security posture of the data stores or applications that consume the data.

So, when you’re essentially asking yourself, “What should I look for in a DSPM tool for cloud?” you really need to consider this:

• Does the DSPM platform provide your data management team with clear and continuous visibility into where your sensitive data lives and how it might be exposed?
• Will it help minimize data permission and security mistakes?
• Will deliver insights into how your data is configured, accessed, or shared in real time?

Not to Be Confused with CSPM

Some read “DSPM for cloud environments” and think that we’re talking about cloud security posture management, or CSPM. But there’s a very important distinction. DSPM covers data discovery, management, and security across cloud (and other) data environments. CSPM is more specifically concerned with securing the network and the cloud environment itself.

Read more on DSPM vs CSPM.

Why Do Cloud Environments Need DSPM Tools?

Stats show that 79% of organizations use multiple cloud providers. If that’s like your organization, your attack surface is not only significantly increased, but it’s a lot more difficult to stay on top of data security. This is especially true when you consider that each cloud platform has different tools, configurations, and policies.

Maintaining a strong data security posture is more complex when you have multiple cloud environments. This increases the risk of misconfigurations, which are some of the main vulnerabilities exploited by attackers.

A data-centric approach to cloud data security can be helpful. Instead of securing the applications or infrastructure where the data lives, DSPM fills these security gaps by focusing on protecting the data itself. This is vital for companies operating in multi-cloud environments.

But how to choose a DSPM solution for cloud security? Here are the essential features to look for from DSPM vendors:

Essential Features to Look for in a DSPM Solution

Whether you’re at the start of your search or considering switching out from an existing DSPM provider, here are some key considerations for selecting DSPM in cloud environments:

Advanced Data Discovery and Classification Capabilities

Neglected cloud data repositories, improperly managed cloud databases, and shadow IT likely contain data you don’t know about. Therein lies the risk that’s ripe for exploitation by bad actors. To avoid this, your DSPM solution should have advanced or auto-discovery features that cover every data repository.

To speed up adoption, consider a DSPM solution with agentless deployment capabilities, which enables fast, broad, low‑impact discovery and continuous monitoring of cloud data stores without installing software on every resource.

Spotlight on BigID: The solution uses agentless, AI-augmented data discovery and classification to automatically find dark data, shadow data, and unknown data across all your cloud data stores. BigID’s tool helps you uncover high-risk data—both structured and unstructured. This AI-augmented capability simplifies the process of inventorying, classifying, and protecting sensitive data.

Automated Data Sensitivity and Regulation Classification

Data classification by sensitivity and regulation is an important DSPM feature to look for. It allows you to accurately and swiftly identify what data is considered sensitive and personal (and therefore covered by regulations). By classifying data according to its sensitivity and regulatory requirements—like GDPR, HIPAA, or PCI DSS—a DSPM solution can help your business prioritize and optimize your security resources.

Spotlight on BigID: Users of BigID’s DSPM solution experience comprehensive and automated data discovery, classification, and risk management across all environments. You’ll receive a customizable NLP classification that gives accurate results for all data.

Remediation and Incident Response Functionalities

You don’t just want your system to flag data security risks; you want it to systematically do something about these issues as they arise. When searching for a new platform, look for a tool that can automatically take remedial measures, such as restricting access, revoking permissions, etc.

Spotlight on BigID: The BigID DSPM solution provides a systematic remediation solution for alerts according to the various risk parameters, like sensitivity, access, activity, and policy. From a centralized location, its alerts automatically trigger tickets through Jira or ServiceNow and delegate remediation to the right data owner.

Thanks to advanced technology like AI, your team can make more informed decisions to strengthen your security management across the cloud.

Integration with Existing Security Tools

Work smarter, not harder, they say. So with that in mind, one of our biggest tips for picking the right DSPM in cloud environments is to find a solution that slides easily into your tech stack and broader exposure management strategy. With CSPM, SOAR (security orchestration, automation, and response), and (security information and event management) integrations, all your bases—across data, cloud infrastructures, identities, and applications—are covered.

Spotlight on BigID: The DSPM platform is designed to integrate with your company’s existing data security tools and apps. Thanks to its built-in, out-of-the-box integrations (SOAR, SIEM, and CSPM, to name just a few technologies), you can anticipate a frictionless, more effective, and automated data security strategy.

Compliance Reporting and Audit Trail Capabilities

When asking yourself, “How do I choose a DSPM solution for cloud security?” you should consider DSPMs that can provide the ability to continuously demonstrate compliance with applicable data regulations. In addition to safeguarding people’s data privacy, this also helps avoid costly fines and reputational damage, as well as simplify security threat detection. In general, these features help you take a proactive role in compliance.

Spotlight on BigID: From the get-go, BigID provides full compliance auditing capabilities to protect your organization’s sensitive structured and unstructured data to ensure regulatory compliance.

Support for Multiple Cloud Providers (AWS, Azure, GCP)

More likely than not, your sensitive data exists in multiple cloud environments like AWS, GCP, Azure, and other SaaS platforms. The right DSPM solution should span across these multiple cloud providers, so that your security team has consistent and constant visibility and control across the board. This multi-provider support reduces data risks by preventing security blind spots and holes in risk management.

Spotlight on BigID: Leverage advanced machine learning to discover and map all assets across any cloud store. Enjoy enhanced visibility and context across your organization’s entire data estate, which equips teams with powerful tools to protect sensitive data everywhere it lives.

Try BigID’s DSPM Platform for Comprehensive Cloud Data Protection

Want to improve your data security posture? BigID’s leading DSPM platform is designed for hybrid enterprises with modern data security in mind. This AI-powered platform helps you automatically uncover dark data, identify and manage risk, and customize risk remediation at scale.

FAQs

What Are the Different Types of Data, and Does a DSPM Protect Them All?

A DSPM worth its weight will discover, classify, manage, and protect all sensitive data. Sensitive data is usually considered any personally identifiable information (PII), financial information, or protected health information (PHI), and needs stricter levels of protection to prevent authorized access. Data is also often categorized as structured and unstructured. Structured data is organized in preset formats, such as financial data. Unstructured data has no such formatting (i.e., emails, multimedia).

When looking for a DSPM platform, you may come across the terms shadow data and dark data. The former is data that exists outside of formally managed and governed IT systems. The latter is data that organizations collect and store but don’t actively use or analyze for anything related to decision-making or business intelligence. Both types of data fall under the purview of effective DSPM.

How Can I Implement DSPM in My Cloud Infrastructure?

Security teams looking to effectively implement DSPM across their cloud infrastructure should follow these steps:

1. Start With Data Discovery and Inventory. Map all data assets across cloud platforms, including structured, unstructured, known, unknown, shadow, and dark data. Agentless, AI-augmented tools like BigID help automate this discovery with minimal impact to your operations.
2. Classify the Data. Base data classification on the level of sensitivity and the necessary regulatory requirements to help prioritize protection measures.
3. Continuously Monitor. Facilitate the continuous monitoring of data usage and access permissions. Set up flagging of misconfigurations and excessive privileges to stay on top of risks.
4. Integrate with Existing Security Tools. Work with your existing security tech stack (IAM, SOAR, SIEM, and CSPM) to create a unified risk posture picture.
5. Maintain Ongoing Visibility and Regulatory Adherence. Automate remediation workflows, enforce security policies, and generate compliance reports and audit trails. Continually review and update the DSPM framework to adapt to whatever cloud environment changes and emerging risks come your way.

How Can a DSPM Protect My Organization’s Sensitive Data?

An effective data security posture management solution identifies and maps all your enterprise data across cloud, on-prem, and hybrid environments. Then it classifies the data according to sensitivity/risk and monitors how it is being used and by whom. It also makes an assessment of your organization’s security policies to determine how data is being protected.

With all this information, the DSPM then modifies and automates security policies to flag suspicious activities and prevent incidents from happening, thereby reducing potential security gaps (compliance violations, data vulnerabilities, etc). The end result is proactive data security and privacy enforcement.

What Are the Best Practices for Maintaining a Strong Data Security Posture?

To maintain a strong data security posture, best practices include…

• Gaining complete visibility across all cloud and on-premises data assets to know exactly where your sensitive data lives.
• Implementing continuous monitoring to detect risks, misconfigurations, or unauthorized access in real time.
• Automating compliance audits and enforcement so that security policies align with regulatory standards like GDPR, HIPAA, and PCI DSS.
• Prioritizing remediation of high-risk vulnerabilities, such as exposed storage buckets or excessive permissions.
• Integrating DSPM with broader security tools like IAM, SIEM, and SOAR to create a unified view of risk and orchestrate responses efficiently.
• Establishing clear governance policies and role-based access control (RBAC) to limit data access to only what is necessary.
• Conducting regular reviews, audits, and staff training to ensure ongoing compliance and adapt to evolving threats and cloud environment changes.

Author

Lonnie Ross

Digital Experience Marketing Lead

Lonnie is the Digital Experience Marketing Lead at BigID, bringing over a decade of SEO and digital marketing expertise across B2C and B2B businesses in SaaS and eCommerce. Having worked both in tech and on the agency side, Lonnie combines a strong foundation in search strategy, UX, and content development with a passion for the evolving landscape of data protection. From aligning content with search intent to sharpening brand voice, Lonnie ensures that organizations not only stand out in a competitive SaaS market but also build trust through thought leadership on critical issues like compliance, data risk, and responsible innovation.