Why African Enterprises’ Cloud Journeys Require Holistic Cybersecurity Strategies

The future is cloud-first. According to Gartner, global cloud spend is forecast to reach $178B in 2022, and although Africa may lag behind the rest of the world’s cloud adoption with only 15 per cent cloud penetration, the continent’s public cloud market has doubled in the past three years. To remain competitive in a digitally transformed business environment, agile enterprises around the world have also adopted cloud technology to enable new ways of working for their distributed-, remote- and hybrid workforces.

And this new way of working isn’t going anywhere: 60 per cent of global knowledge workers are currently remote, and at least 18 percent will not return to the office. Africa has embraced this trend, too. According to a 2022 International Labour Organization report that covered more than 1,000 enterprises in 15 African countries, nearly 36 per cent of employees worked remotely during the pandemic. The report also reveals that while most future workplaces in Africa won’t be fully remote, they will be either in-person or hybrid.

Enterprise-wide cloud adoption is increasing as digital-first business leaders look to ensure flexibility through hybrid work, market agility, and business continuity throughout their daily operations. Paradoxically, however, when a rapid digital evolution is not approached strategically with end-to-end security in mind, it can leave enterprises more vulnerable to cybersecurity threats due to a wider set of risks spread across multiple surfaces and entry points. This is particularly important during a cloud migration, when the rush to move business-critical workflows from on-premise to the cloud can unintentionally (and easily) open backdoors to bad actors.

A robust, end-to-end cybersecurity strategy – every step of the way

Cybersecurity remains a significant concern for enterprises in Africa, as according to the Club of Information Security Experts in Africa (CESIA), in 2022, more than half of companies in Africa believe they are not prepared to handle a large-scale cyberattack. And Interpol’s Africa Cyberthreat Assessment report found that more than 90 per cent of businesses on the continent operate without the necessary cybersecurity protocols.

According to a recent IDC security survey commissioned by Microsoft, only 16% of organizations in Nigeria have implemented a full end-toend security strategy with shared responsibilities, risk tolerances, classified events, and recovery plans in case of an attack. Another 15% of surveyed organizations have implemented – but not formally tested or reviewed – a security strategy. Organizations in Nigeria still lag in terms of security solution implementations.

With the acceleration of digital transformation enabling cloud-first and hybrid work environments, it’s more important than ever to have a robust, end-to-end cybersecurity strategy in place – right from the beginning of the cloud journey, and every step of the way.