7 Considerations When Using Cloud Services
For organizations moving to the cloud or enhancing their existing cloud posture, it’s crucial to stay on top of new features and commonly overlooked configurations. Some of these are simple settings that need to be configured, while others require more effort to implement robust controls and monitor their impact effectively.
Below are 7 key considerations that every organization should review when using cloud services.
Quotas
Quotas play a critical role in managing resource usage across cloud environments. They help prevent runaway costs and can signal unusual activity—such as a rogue deployment triggering excessive API calls. As cloud usage grows and more organizational resources are deployed, quota settings should be regularly reviewed and adjusted.
It’s a best practice to enable only the cloud services and APIs that are necessary. Once enabled, establish monitoring to understand baseline usage patterns and proactively request quota increases based on routine analysis. Waiting until limits are reached can cause service interruptions, negatively impacting application performance and user experience.
Zonal Redundancy
While many cloud services are designed to be highly available and redundant, certain critical services require explicit configuration for zonal redundancy. For example, services like Azure Cosmos DB or Application Gateway may be misconfigured, leaving them vulnerable to disruptions during zonal failures or planned maintenance.
To minimize risk, it’s essential to review the configuration of these services and ensure they are deployed across multiple availability zones where supported. Leverage tools such as Azure Advisor, AWS Resilience Hub, or Google Cloud’s Recommendation Hub to routinely assess resiliency configurations and implement recommended best practices. Doing so helps reduce the likelihood of service disruptions caused by zonal outages.
Private Endpoints
Private endpoints help minimize exposure to the public internet by enabling services to communicate over the cloud provider’s internal network. This not only enhances security but also optimizes network performance and reduces data egress costs.
When using services like Amazon S3 or Container Registry, ensure that private VPC endpoints are properly configured to route traffic internally via AWS PrivateLink. This reduces outbound internet traffic and strengthens your overall cloud security posture.
Latency
Application and service latency can significantly affect performance and degrade the user experience. Since each application has unique usage patterns, it’s important to profile both application behavior and network requirements regularly.
To reduce latency, consider implementing private endpoints for internal traffic, leveraging Content Delivery Networks (CDNs) for faster content distribution, and optimizing VPN throughput—especially in hybrid environments that integrate with on-premises resources. Taking a proactive approach to latency management ensures more reliable and responsive applications.
Scaling and Elasticity
One of the key advantages of cloud-hosted services is the ability to scale resources easily, especially through autoscaling. This is particularly valuable during unexpected spikes in traffic or service demand.
However, it’s equally important to manage how resources scale back down. While autoscaling helps maintain performance under load, ensure that scaling policies include safe thresholds and cooldown periods to avoid degrading the user experience. Regularly review usage patterns and adjust scaling parameters to balance cost efficiency with performance.
Public IP Exposure
Security should always be a top priority when operating in the cloud. Unlike traditional on-premises environments, you may have reduced visibility and control over certain layers of the infrastructure. Additionally, many cloud services are not secure by default and require deliberate configuration to meet organizational security standards.
Be especially cautious when assigning public IPs to services. Exposing critical components, such as Kubernetes control planes or databases, to the public internet increases the risk of attack. Even with IP allow-listing, public endpoints can be a significant vulnerability. Where possible, use private IPs, leverage internal networking, and apply the principle of least privilege to limit exposure and reduce risk.
Private DNS Zones
Using private DNS zones is an effective way to reduce the exposure of internal IP addresses and services to the public internet. Registering DNS records in public zones can create unnecessary risk, especially for non-production environments as these systems may not be fully hardened or monitored.
Exposing DNS entries publicly also introduces other risks, such as domain takeovers or dangling DNS records, where decommissioned services still resolve to outdated or vulnerable endpoints. To mitigate these threats, use private DNS zones for internal services and follow strict controls over what is published to public DNS.
