K12 Education Cloud Security Solutions: Cybersafety & Cybersecurity
In an increasingly digital world, K12 school districts have adopted cloud security tools to keep students safe and their information secure. Google has “taken over the classroom” with their affordable suite of education tools, including Google for Education and Chromebooks. While this trend is great for integrating education and technology, it has also raised some challenges for IT and campus safety teams.
Cybersafety Cloud Security
K12 cloud security solutions can help staff protect students from potential psychological and physical harm. After transitioning to the cloud, school officials have been surprised to find how much personal information students share in Google apps. Important student safety issues such as cyberbullying, thoughts of suicide, threats of violence, and explicit content can all be exposed in a matter of minutes using available machine learning technology in cloud security solutions.
Cybersecurity Cloud Security
Cybersecurity is a big topic that K12 school districts need to take seriously, as student information is increasingly a target for cybercriminals. Any school using Google for Education or Office 365 for Education must have a cloud security solution in place to protect personally identifiable information and must be in compliance with FERPA, COPPA, and other regulations. Cybersecurity keeps students, faculty, and staff safe from identity theft and financial loss. Further, regulations regarding the storage and protection of personally identifiable information mandate that these protections are put into place. Unfortunately, many IT managers in K12 education think that their firewall and/or gateways are enough to keep data stored in the cloud secure. This could not be further from the truth.
[FREE] Cyber Safety & Security for K-12 Schools Webinar On-Demand. Learn from Google for Education & Bremerton School District >>
K12 Education Cloud Security Solutions: Is There A Difference?
The difference in the types of K12 education cloud security solutions comes down to the specific vendor you’re evaluating (or have already). Some vendors specialize in cybersafety, such as Bark, Gaggle, and GoGuardian. Others specialize in cybersecurity, such as Cisco, Palo Alto, and McAfee.
For K12 schools looking to break the silos, or create redundancy and diversity in their security and safety systems, a solution like ManagedMethods may be your best bet. With student saftey and security in mind, ManagedMethods is built in close partnership with K12 education system admins to provide a platform that is lightning fast, efficient, and super easy to use.
K12 Education Cloud Security Solutions Features
- Data Loss Prevention: Government regulations require K12 school districts to protect student data from malicious and accidental loss. Schools that operate in cloud applications, such as Google for Education and/or Office 365, without a cloud security solution are not in compliance with these regulations. A good K12 cloud security solution gives system admins the ability to automate data loss prevention using rules and policies.
- Malware & Threat Protection: Malware and phishing threats can attack a cloud environment through email links and attachments, as well as files, folders, and unsanctioned cloud applications. A cloud security solution helps IT and system admins quickly see risks where they exist in the system and delete or quarantine them before they can lead to bigger issues. They should also be able to customize automated threat protection rules to mitigate threats no matter when they arise.
- User Monitoring: Traditional network security tools cannot monitor user behavior within the cloud environment. This means that K12 education system admins need cloud security tools to see and control account behavior such as suspicious logins, suspicious sharing and downloads of files containing sensitive information and more.
- Content Scanning: Schools need all the help they can get keeping students safe in today’s world. With a K12 education cloud security solution in place, staff can gain visibility into the content that is being stored and shared in G Suite and/or Office 365. This means emails, files, and images students use for cyberbullying, threats of suicide or violence, blackmail, and more can be caught by cloud security content scanners and flagged as inappropriate. The system can unshare, quarantine, or delete these types of files and automatically notify the proper administrator to take action.
- No Gateways, Agents, or Proxies: Students quickly find ways around device-based content filtering technology. With a cloud security solution in place, safety and security follows students anywhere they’re saving, sharing and sending as well as anywhere they have logged in with their Google for Education account.
- Low Cost: In most cases ManagedMethods comes in at a much lower price than others in the K12 education space. We are growing our K12 customer list like crazy; just ask around and you’re likely to find someone in your network who is either evaluating our cloud security solution or is already a customer (or you can read our case studies here).
