7 SaaS Security Best Practices You Must Follow

‍Are you concerned that your SaaS security setup may not be strong enough to withstand security breaches? If so, it's time you follow SaaS security best practices – a series of measures that help protect your SaaS apps against potential breaches. But which practices are included in it? In this article, we'll discuss that in detail.

On January 12, 2024, Microsoft fell victim to a nation-state attack executed by Russian state-sponsored threat actor Midnight Blizzard (popularly known as NOBELIUM or APT29). The attackers compromised (with a password spray attack) one of Microsoft's legacy test OAuth applications to gain unauthorized access to Microsoft's corporate email accounts, including those of senior executives, the legal team, and the cybersecurity team. After that, they exfiltrated some sensitive emails and attached documents (i.e., transferring the emails and docs to an external location).

Note: Legacy OAuth applications use the OAuth 1.0 authorization framework (an earlier version of OAuth 2.0), which is known for its poor security features. This version allows users to access the app with basic or no credentials.

In fact, the attackers also created additional malicious OAuth applications, which gave them access to Microsoft's corporate environment and further hampered the safety of other crucial data.

This incident didn't just shake Microsoft; it unleashed havoc across the U.S. corporate market.  

However, Microsoft immediately activated its response process, investigated the attackers, minimized the attack's impact, and blocked the threat actors from accessing the system further.

You will be surprised to know this isn't the first time such a SaaS breach has occurred. Similar incidents were encountered by Hewlett Packard Enterprise and Solarwinds as well. Just imagine—if the giants aren't safe from such attacks, can you consider your organization safe? I guess not!

So, fix your SaaS security posture and strengthen it to withstand attackers who can breach your system, gain access to SaaS apps, and exploit your data. But how? To do so, you need to follow certain crucial SaaS security best practices. Which are these SaaS security best practices? Let's find out.

7 Essential SaaS Security Best Practices

Here are the top 7 SaaS security best practices you must follow to protect your SaaS apps and data from potential security breaches.

1: Evaluate Your Preferred SaaS Provider’s Profile Before Engaging

Think about it—today, most organizations, including yours, rely on SaaS applications offered by third-party providers to simplify and streamline daily operations/workflows (from basic to intricate tasks). Moreover, these apps often store critical data (like financial records and IPs) and integrate it with other systems and applications (forming an interconnected ecosystem). 

So, if cyberattackers target these apps, they will easily exploit your sensitive data and disrupt your operations instantly. 

To avoid being a victim of breaches, you must ensure that the SaaS providers you engage with offer apps with security configurations strong enough to withstand potential cyberattacks.

But how will you find that out? By performing SaaS security best practices like – conducting a thorough vendor risk assessment. 

• In such SaaS security best practices, you have to first examine your preferred vendor's overall profile (perform due diligence), as in, look into their past performance, whether their SaaS apps have ever been compromised, exploited, or attacked, check if there are any lawsuits against them, and review customer feedback to check their apps' reliability. 
• Such security best practices also assess whether both providers and their apps (products) comply with industry security standards and relevant regulations, what security features their apps have to prevent data breaches, and what protocols they follow for SaaS app data deletion.

By following such SaaS security best practices, you will get a clear picture of whether your preferred vendor and their SaaS products are secure and reliable enough to trust with your organization's data.

Think this way: If you don't opt for a SaaS app with weak security features or compliance issues, you are less likely to be caught off guard by a breach. 

Note: Make sure you conduct a service provider risk assessment during the request from the proposal stage (RFP) to detect security or compliance flaws in their app upfront. Also, after onboarding SaaS vendors, conduct this vendor assessment periodically to check whether their SaaS apps are still secure and reliable for your organization.

2: Create a Centralized SaaS Inventory To Gain Proper Visibility

Another one of the crucial SaaS security best practices is — creating a centralized SaaS inventory, i.e., a list or record of all SaaS apps being used within an organization. However, don’t just list the app name in your SaaS inventory; also include details like the app owner, who uses them, which data are stored in them, what compliances they meet, their risk and threat score, and other relevant information. How are such SaaS security best practices going to help?

Consolidating all this SaaS app data in one location makes it far easier for your team to thoroughly monitor, manage, and examine your SaaS stack.

For instance, with this centralized visibility, your team can easily detect which applications are no longer used actively, which have duplicate features, and which are risky. Further, with these insights, they can accordingly decide to eliminate redundant and duplicate apps and restrict access to risky or insecure apps that can serve as a gateway for cyber threats.

By performing such SaaS security best practices, you are not just closing security gaps (by restricting user form access to insecure) but also decluttering your SaaS stack.

3: Adopt a Zero Trust Security Model

A zero-trust security model (ZTSM) is a security framework that follows the principle of 'never trust, always verify.' Such SaaS security best practices ensure that no identity (external or internal user) is automatically trusted and allowed to access any organization's SaaS app. How does a zero-trust security model do that?

Such SaaS security best practices (i.e., ZTSM) implement different strong authentication methods, such as multi-factor authentication (MFA) and two-factor authentication (2FA), to always verify the user's identity (whether they are genuinely who they claim to be) before granting them access to the organization's SaaS apps. 

That's not all; after authenticating users, such SaaS security best practices takes a step further and authorizes users (in simple words, determining what actions users are permitted to perform and which resources they can access). For authorization, the zero trust security model enforces access control security policies like – role-based access control (RBAC) and the principle of least privilege (PoLP). RBAC helps ensure that users can only access specific applications relevant to their role. Meanwhile, PoLP ensures that users are given the bare minimum or least amount of access privileges so that they cannot modify or delete data stored in SaaS apps.

By implementing these measures, the zero-trust security model creates a layer of security for your SaaS apps. It ensures that only verified and authorized users can access your SaaS apps, which further helps minimize the risk of cyberattacks and unauthorized access attempts.

4: Utilize Virtual Private Network To Restrict Unauthorized Access To Apps

The next SaaS security best practice is utilizing a virtual private network (VPN). A VPN helps enforce strict access/security controls that allow you to limit or restrict IP addresses or devices that can access or connect to your organization’s SaaS apps. Think of such SaaS security best practices as a guard that only permits trusted users to enter your SaaS ecosystem.

Suppose you only want your internal IT and security department employees to access the organization’s security apps like — Okta, Duo Security, INB QRader, and a few others. So, to make sure no external user can access these apps, you can set up a virtual private network to restrict access (set up which IP addresses and devices can access the applications). Once configured, such SaaS security best practices (i.e.,VPN) will only allow IT and security department employees connecting from a trusted IP address or device to access these apps – and no one else. For example, even if a hacker tries to break into your network, they won’t be able to access these apps because they won’t have the IP address required for entry (to access the apps).

In short, implementing such SaaS security best practices can easily prevent hackers or unauthorized users from accessing your critical applications.

5: Continuously Review Which Users Hold Access To SaaS Apps

Sometimes, IT teams accidentally or mistakenly give users access to SaaS apps that are irrelevant to their role. Now, you may say, ' It's just a minor mistake,' but this seemingly small mistake can become a major security threat. For example, if a hacker compromises such a user's account, they will gain direct access to the applications to which the IT team has mistakenly granted access. Once hackers infiltrate, they can instantly exploit your critical data and other resources.

To prevent such situations, you must follow one of the most crucial SaaS security best practices: continuously reviewing which users hold access to SaaS apps.

By regularly reviewing users' permissions, you can easily detect users who hold access to applications irrelevant to their role and users who intentionally access apps they are not authorized to. Further, with the help of these insights, you can immediately take preventive measures like revoking users' access and restricting unauthorized users' access rights. Ultimately, this will help safeguard your SaaS apps from misuse and reduce the likelihood of breaches.

6: Create An Incident Response Plan

Sometimes, despite your best efforts, security breaches can still slip through. That's why it's very important to always stay prepared—and for that, you need to have a solid plan in place well in advance (which you can pull out of your sleeves when breaches occur). This brings us to another one of the crucial SaaS security best practices: creating a contingency or incident response plan. 

In this plan, you have to clearly mention the following things:

• Designated Team: Assign a dedicated team of experts who will be responsible for handling breaches and stopping them from further impacting other sensitive data, apps, and systems.
• Procedure For Protecting Data Stored In SaaS Apps: Outline what actions to take to protect data stored in cloud-based applications, such as creating a backup, restricting all access, transferring the data to another safe drive or application, or creating a copy.
• Temporary Applications: List the applications that can temporarily replace the affected cloud apps in case of a breach. This will ensure that your operations are not disrupted entirely.
• Post-Incident Review: Conduct a thorough post-security incident review to identify why the breach occurred, what weakness your system had that allowed the attackers to enter, how long it took your team to respond, and which security measures needed to be strengthened. Also, make sure to generate a detailed report of the security incident so that, in case similar attacks occur soon, your team can quickly review the report and take preventive actions.

7: Opt For An Effective SaaS Management Platform & Identity Access Management Platform

Although the above SaaS security best practices can be performed manually, it's not the smartest route. Manual methods (like using spreadsheets to list down apps in use or checking each user's access details by switching between multiple screens to review them) are often time-consuming, susceptible to error, and lack the agility (not fast enough) needed to address uncertain security threats. Even if you have a security team of experts and ample time, manual methods still can't match the speed needed to respond to breaches (which strike without prior warning). This is why you need to consider opting for automated solutions like SaaS management platforms (SMP) and identity access management solutions.

Now, see – investing in an SMP and IAM solution separately (which means using two different tools) can be quite costly, so instead, you can opt for an all-in-one solution like Zluri. It basically offers dedicated solutions like SaaS management, access management, and access review – each serves a distinct role in managing and maintaining SaaS security. By opting for Zluri, you can enjoy the benefits of both the world (SMP and IAM) at a reasonable rate. Also, you will no longer have to go through the headache of switching between platforms while managing SaaS security. But how can Zluri's solutions help perform SaaS security best practices? Here's how.

• Zluri’s SaaS Management Helps Gain Visibility Into SaaS Stack 

Zluri’s SMP utilizes 9 unique discovery methods and automatically discovers all the SaaS apps in use within your organization (including shadow IT). Then, it displays all the apps in a centralized dashboard in a categorical manner (category name—managed, unmanaged, needs review, and restricted) along with details such as app owners, users accessing the apps, app risk and threat scores, and other relevant details. 

With the help of this centralized visibility into the SaaS stack, IT teams can efficiently manage and monitor SaaS apps. For example, with these valuable app insights, they can easily assess the app usage trend and detect which apps are used actively and which are not. Also, by viewing the risk & threat score, your team can understand which app can pose some serious potential risks. Further, with the help of this understanding, they can easily decide which apps to keep, which ones to remove, and which ones should be restricted from being used.

Note: Zluri’s SMP updates its dashboard whenever a new SaaS app is added and existing ones are removed.

In fact, by restricting and eliminating risky and unnecessary apps, you can prevent scenarios — in which hackers exploit such apps (risky and unused apps) to infiltrate systems — from occurring.

Also Read: How SaaS Management Platforms Help in Eliminating Security Risks

• Zluri’s Access Management Help Manage Access To SaaS Apps

Zluri’s access management further makes it more easier to manage SaaS security by ensuring only authorized users gain access to your applications within the organization. 

It does that by allowing your IT teams to set up automated workflows that run based on a defined set of access rules or control policies (which need to be defined by you or your IT team). Once configured and triggered, it automatically grants users access to specific apps in accordance with the criteria you or your team have defined. 

In short, it helps ensure you have complete control over who can interact with your critical applications, thereby simplifying the maintenance of SaaS security.

• Zluri’s Access Review Helps Conduct Thorough Audit 

One bonus point is that Zluri also offers an access review solution that automatically reviews your user access (you or your team have to fill in relevant details to trigger these actions). If any misalignment is detected, such as users having access to unauthorized apps or excessive access privileges that can hamper SaaS app security, Zluri runs auto-remediation actions (revoking or modifying user access). 

All these actions protect your SaaS app and store data from misuse and potential security breaches.

Also Read: 7-Step SaaS Security Posture Management Checklist

Follow SaaS Security Best Practices To Prevent Breaches

In conclusion, by following SaaS security best practices, you create a powerful defense system—like a chain of interconnected guards—that addresses various security concerns or needs simultaneously.

For instance, by conducting vendor profile assessments, implementing ZTSM, using VPN, leveraging Zluri, and following other SaaS security best practices, you are protecting your SaaS apps from potential attacks and safeguarding your critical data stored in SaaS apps from being compromised.

That’s not it—it goes beyond data security. These SaaS security best practices further help prevent the far-reaching effects of breaches/ attacks, such as operational disruption, loss of stakeholder, partner, or client trust, and financial fallout.

In short, if you aim to strengthen your SaaS security posture and make it resilient to evolving threats – following SaaS security best practices is an absolute necessity! There is no other way around.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

1. What Is SaaS Security Posture?

SaaS security posture refers to the overall readiness of an organization's security system to mitigate security threats that can compromise SaaS app security. In simple words, it shows how effective your security setup is at responding to and preventing security breaches.

2. Can SaaS Security Best Practices Help Meet Compliance Requirements?

Yes, SaaS security best practices do help meet regulatory requirements. For example, by implementing these practices, you can ensure that the data stored in SaaS apps are secure. This further helps meet data security requirements for regulatory compliance like GDPR and HIPAA.  

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