Cloud Data Security
Discover, classify, and secure sensitive data across cloud services and SaaS apps. Reduce exposure, govern access, and stop risky data movement with cloud data security that understands people, data, and risk.
OVERVIEW
Sensitive data constantly moves across cloud services, SaaS apps, collaboration platforms, and AI tools. To protect that data, security teams need to know what data is sensitive, where it resides, who can access it, and how it's being used.
Effective cloud data security combines visibility and access controls to help organisations discover, protect, and govern sensitive data across their cloud environments.
Discover sensitive data
Find regulated, confidential, and business-critical data across cloud, SaaS, and hybrid environments.
Understand data exposure
Identify oversharing, excessive permissions, risky access, shadow data, and SaaS misconfigurations.
Apply adaptive controls
Enforce DLP policies, govern access, remove risky sharing, and respond based on user, data, and threat context.
CLOUD DATA LIFECYCLE
Effective cloud data security is a continuous process, not a single control. Proofpoint helps security teams discover sensitive data, understand exposure, and remediate risk across cloud services, SaaS apps, and AI tools.
1. Discover
Find sensitive data across SaaS, cloud apps, collaboration platforms, and hybrid environments.
2. Classify
Identify regulated data and business-critical content with Smart Identifiers, templates, and AI-powered data classification.
3. Analyse access
See who can access sensitive data, how it is shared, and where excessive permissions create exposure.
4. Understand behaviour
Correlate file activity, user behaviour, insider risk signals, and compromised account indicators to identify risky data movement.
6. Remediate
Remove risky shares, reduce permissions, revoke OAuth access, and suspend active sessions before data loss occurs.
5. Enforce controls
Apply DLP policies to detect and contain risky data movement and govern access to sensitive data across SaaS apps.
AI DATA EXPOSURE
AI tools and agents you adopt inherit access to the data in your cloud and SaaS environments. If you lack visibility into that access, everyday AI use can quickly put sensitive data at risk.
Proofpoint Data Security Posture Management (DSPM) discovers and classifies sensitive data, then maps the users, apps, and AI agents that can access it. When it identifies exposure, DSPM closes the loop by governing access, remediating risk, and triggering DLP enforcement.
Sensitive Data Discovery
Find and classify sensitive data at scale, including business-specific content that traditional rules miss.
Data Access Governance
Map access to sensitive data across users, apps, and AI agents, and automatically remove risky permissions.
AI Data Exposure Visibility
Visualise the path from copilots, GenAI tools, and AI agents to the sensitive data they can reach.
Closed-Loop Remediation
Automatically turn findings into DLP policies and access remediation actions, with no manual translation.
SaaS and AI App Posture
Discover shadow apps and detect SaaS misconfigurations before they expose sensitive data.
CLOUD AND AI DLP
Data moves through AI and cloud apps in ways that are difficult to track. Without consistent visibility and controls, risky sharing can quickly lead to data loss, noncompliance, or AI-driven exposure.
Proofpoint Cloud DLP monitors sensitive data across SaaS apps and AI tools, correlating content with user behaviour and risk signals to automatically contain exposure before it escalates.
Cloud and AI App Coverage
Monitor sensitive data across SaaS and sanctioned and unsanctioned AI tools with a single policy engine.
Behavioural Risk Detection
Correlate sensitive data with user behaviour and risk signals to identify accidental sharing, malicious exfiltration, and compromised accounts.
Oversharing Detection and Remediation
Identify files exposed through public links or excessive sharing, including organisation-specific content that traditional rules overlook.
Automated Response
Automatically quarantine files, revoke shared links, and suspend active sessions to contain exposure.
CAPABILITY GUIDE
Cloud data security requires more than one control. Proofpoint connects discovery, classification, posture management, DLP, SaaS governance and insider-risk context across a unified data security program.
| Your challenge | Capability | How Proofpoint helps |
|---|---|---|
| You don't know where sensitive data lives or who and what can access it | DSPM and Data Access Governance | Discover and classify sensitive data, identify AI-accessible data and excessive permissions, and prioritise and remediate exposure through integrated access governance. |
| Sensitive data is being shared or moved across cloud and AI tools in risky ways | Cloud DLP | Detect risky sharing, uploads, downloads, and data movement across SaaS platforms, cloud apps, and AI tools. Apply policies to reduce exposure and prevent sensitive data loss. |
| SaaS apps, 3rd-party tools, and AI services create configuration and access risk | SaaS and Identity Posture Management | Discover shadow apps, detect SaaS misconfigurations, and identify risky OAuth access before they lead to the exposure of sensitive data. |
| A user may be careless, malicious, compromised, or preparing to leave | Insider Threat Management | Correlate cloud file activity with user behaviour, threat context, and motive indicators to identify users who pose elevated risk to sensitive data. |
| Employees are sharing sensitive data with AI tools | Data Security for AI | Monitor prompts, uploads, and responses across sanctioned AI tools, control and redact sensitive data sent to shadow AI apps, and capture activity for auditing and regulatory compliance. |
| You need consistent protection across cloud, AI, email, web, and endpoints | Unified DLP | Apply shared classifiers and consistent DLP policies across cloud apps, AI tools, email, web, and endpoints from a single management console. |
CUSTOMER STORIES
The California Department of Motor Vehicles serves millions of Californians every day and protects their sensitive data with Proofpoint.
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See how Proofpoint helps you discover sensitive data, reduce cloud data exposure, and apply adaptive protection across your cloud environment.
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Cloud data security protects sensitive data across cloud services, SaaS applications, AI tools, collaboration platforms, and cloud storage. It combines data discovery, data classification, identity and access management, and data loss prevention (DLP) to help organisations secure data wherever it is stored, shared, or moved. As organisations rely more on cloud services, data security for the cloud has become essential for protecting sensitive information while supporting compliance requirements.
Proofpoint helps organisations discover and classify sensitive data, govern access, monitor risky activity, and apply adaptive DLP policies across SaaS applications and AI tools. By connecting Data Security Posture Management (DSPM), Cloud DLP, and data access governance, Proofpoint helps reduce cloud data exposure before it leads to data loss or a data breach.
AI tools inherit the same permissions people already have across cloud services and SaaS applications. Proofpoint DSPM discovers and classifies sensitive data, then maps the users, applications, and AI agents that can access it, helping security teams identify AI-accessible data, reduce excessive permissions, and secure data before it is exposed.
Cloud DLP protects sensitive data while it is being shared or moved across cloud services, SaaS applications, and AI tools. DSPM discovers where sensitive data resides, who can access it, and where exposure creates risk. Together, they help organisations discover sensitive data, understand exposure, and apply consistent protection across cloud environments.
Yes. Cloud access security broker (CASB) capabilities help organisations discover shadow IT, govern SaaS usage, monitor cloud activity, and control third-party application access. As cloud environments have evolved, CASB has become one part of a broader cloud data security strategy that also includes DSPM, Cloud DLP, data access governance, and SaaS security posture management.
Cloud data security helps organisations identify regulated and sensitive customer data, monitor how it is used, and apply consistent security measures across cloud services and cloud storage. By improving data classification, governance, and data loss prevention, organisations can better support regulatory compliance requirements while reducing the risk of data exposure. A strong strategy for data protection in the cloud helps organisations apply consistent controls wherever sensitive data resides or moves.
