Configuring Salesforce Security- A Step-By-Step-Process

The work dynamics have changed extensively over the years. The technological world is constantly evolving with time and the needs of the growing workforce. Since the IT world is gaining momentum, data security is a big concern for every enterprise.

Introduction:

Although digitization has shrunk the world and made it easy to work remotely, we have never been more vulnerable. Risks involving data are an everyday issue, especially in today’s time when hackers are coming up with new ways to breach data privacy. 

Data breaches are even more common because cloud computing is on the rise. Salesforce is a cloud-based computing software. Cloud computing is a blessing for businesses as it provides services like- servers, storage, databases, analytics, etc. This cloud computing software provides services to enterprises and gets big chunks of data that need to be secured. So, Salesforce security is a matter of paramount importance.

As users, we and our work are dependent on these computing services.

But these services generate enormous amounts of data, and companies’ responsibility doubles up; to manage the company and take measures to keep the data secured. 

If you want to become a Salesforce Developer, you can use Salesforce Developer Training and join the course and improve your skills in this field.

What is data, and its importance for businesses?

Data is information relevant to businesses and their growth. It is digitally stored and processed on computers as text, visual images, audio or computer codes. 

Several cloud companies like Salesforce provides businesses with services such as data storage, networking and processing for their market and target audience. In simple words, data is the reason for the survival of any business enterprise. Data is the backbone whose security cannot be compromised. 

What is Data Security? Why does It need to be secured? 

It won’t be wrong to say that a company’s biggest asset is its data. A business relies on it. 

Data security is an ethical practice where an enterprise is responsible for safeguarding digital information from theft, corruption, and illegal access. 

Some enterprises have strict protocols and data protection regulations. Even if some companies do not have clear rules for data protection, they are still liable to keep the data safe because a modern business’s survival is on its customer’s data. 

A global report has shown that data breach cases have happened in 17 countries across 17 industries. 

The average cost of a data breach increased by 2.6% from USD 4.24 million in 2021 to USD 4.35 million in 2022. Data breaches are at an all-time high, and their average cost has climbed 12.7% from USD 3.86 million in the 2020 report. 15% of breaches happened because of cloud misconfiguration, 16% of breaches were results of phishing, and 19% were stolen/compromised credentials. 

And the list goes on. Data theft causes financial loss and emotional distress to the company, which also leads to the loss of customer trust.

The threats that often cause data breaching are: 

1. Data exposed accidentally: It can happen due to unintentional exposure or negligence on the business’s part in keeping the data safe.
2. A process called Phishing: In this, the user receives a message from a trusted source, and when they comply, they “unknowingly” expose their sensitive data to the attacker. It is a manipulative technique for gaining personal information. 
3. An insider: Often, an inside team member gets compromised or holds malice against the company. These people betray the trust of millions of users and leak their private data to cyber threats. 
4. Ransomware: This data stolen technique works like somebody is, and kidnappers are asking for ransom. In the digital world, it is a malware dysfunction and leads to total data loss, despite paying the ransom. 
5. Data loss in cloud networking: Cloud networks provide easy sharing, and due to their easy accessibility, the data gets lost because users are operating from unsecured networks. 

We need a properly secured network to protect data, in cloud computing and otherwise. Like in Salesforce security. 

What is Salesforce?  

Cloud-based software is a 360 approach to computing services. 

It is a complete CRM (Customer Relationship Management) software solution. It targets sales, customer service, data analytics, marketing, automation and app development.

Salesforce began as a Software as a Service (SaaS) company, but now it has become a Platform as a Service (PaaS) company. 

What is the use of Salesforce?

Salesforce is a complete CRM-based technology that targets the company’s existing and potential customers through healthy company-customer relationships and interaction.

Salesforce uses many cloud platforms to bring in various data and services that benefit the company’s customers. 

As we discussed, it is a 360 approach to understanding your customer’s needs by providing cloud services like unified data management and integrated systems. 

Why is Salesforce famous in the industry? 

The globalization of businesses has led to their expansion quickly. The growing market competition is not an easy challenge. It is crucial to boost one’s marketing and sales strategies to thrive in the industry and survive amongst tough competitors.

Customer satisfaction and relations are the top priority in scaling any business. And Salesforce is a complete CRM tool with cloud-based services. It takes care of your marketing campaigns, provides visual dashboards, and handles sales with its reporting features. 

Benefits of Salesforce

1. EASY TO USE: The Salesforce tool is easy to use; it features an interactive and intuitive which gives easy access so you can log in from anywhere, collaborate with colleagues and update customer data as required. 
2. A SaaS PIONEER: It is one of its kind SaaS CRM service which navigates competitive sales & marketing campaigns, cloud services, and networking and offers multiple software. 
3. EFFICIENT IN REPORTING: Salesforce masters in reporting; it saves time and money by providing the necessary tools so your business can thrive. Some features include real-time reporting, customizable reports and data analysis. 
4. IT IS FLEXIBLE IN OPERATING: It is just a matter of a few clicks, and you can easily customize your dashboards, manage business workflows and process sales reports. 
5. PROVIDES EASY INTEGRATION: Salesforce has a robust, fully documented and open API (Application Programming Interface), which makes integration with any other platform easy and hassle-free. 
6. AN AUTOMATED DATA COLLECTOR: The data collection in Salesforce Automation is automatic and needs no manual work. The customer service gets easy and error-free. 
7. IT IS A MULTI-DISCIPLINARY: Salesforce covers all the essential and integral partS of CRM. It takes sales & marketing matters in hand, collects automatic data, reports analysis, and keeps the consumer-company relationships healthy. 

What is Salesforce Data Security?

Salesforce primarily provides a complete CRM service, and alongside, it ensures an in-depth and versatile data security network which secures data at many levels. 

It is a complete framework of salesforce security tools to access data based on business necessities. 

There are three fundamental structures in Salesforce Security: 

1. Objects
2. Fields
3. Records

The Salesforce Security Model Framework.

This model aims to protect the data on various levels, from the company’s perspective to personal data security. 

The Salesforce security model targets four security areas, ensuring a complete security framework for users and enterprises. 

The four layers of the security framework are: 

1. ON THE LEVEL OF ORGANIZATION: At this level, salesforce security determines who can access the Salesforce org. It restricts the use of IPs that customers use and limit the permission to log in and access permission first. 
2. ON THE LEVEL OF OBJECT: It works on the object level by implementing permission for the domain or creating multiple accounts on the profile.
3. ON THE FIELD LEVEL: This deals with the field’s value by limiting the power to see, modify or edit any field value. Authorization and profiles help to manage field-level security. 
4. ON THE RECORD LEVEL: This is how directly a customer has access to records. Manual sharing, role hierarchy, and organization redirects are ways to have record-level security. 

How does Salesforce Security is configured? 

The process of achieving complete data security is complex. As important as it is, Salesforce security can handle all virtual data and access scenarios. Sounds intimidating but crucial. 

Below we will find out how to practically configure Salesforce Security. 

The Concepts of Salesforce Security:

1. OBJECT: The order type has an account, order, etc. and includes user-defined, custom objects. An object compares to a table structure in the database.
2. RECORD: This is a substantial record in the database. It compares to a table row in the database.
3. FIELD: This compares to a column in the database; It is an individual field. 
4. RECORD TYPE: This includes: 

• (Page layouts) how do users see the object
• (visibility) how only specific users can have access to the record types
• shows how the process of business works/flows

1. PAGE LAYOUT: this covers how an object presents to the user, the availability of fields, action buttons etc. For instance, the marketing team will see different details of the account than the managing team.
2. PROFILE: This shows how consumers access their objects and data because a user is assigned only one profile.
3. PERMISSION SET: these are supplementary profiles, and one user can have multiple permission sets.
4. PERMISSION SET GROUP: a collection of permission sets is called a permission set group. The users have these in bulk.
5. ROLE: In this approach, we define the user’s role within the company hierarchy because each user has just one position. It also mentions which user can access records.
6. RULE SHARING: This shows that users can share records based on their assigned roles in the company. 
7. LIGHTNING EXPERIENCE: This is different from the old classic interface. It is a new interface which enables mobile client support.
8. LIGHTNING PAGE: this is an extension of page layouts for the lightning user interface and is highly customizable. 
9. LIGHTNING APP: it has a home page with several menu items. The app is available to multiple profiles and a designated home page. 
10. LIGHTNING APP HOME PAGE: a home page is specific to the app. This home page is customizable with components like dashboards, lists etc. 

The Configuration steps of Salesforce Security: 

STEP 1. PROFILE

The profile is the first step to security configuration. 

1. Initially, the Salesforce profile is for sales, so you leave your sales profile the way it is and isolate it.
2. The rules to create additional profiles:

• to create profiles based on department/team
• to share those profiles to minimize in number
• to make a single profile for (Finance) and a single for (Sales), meaning to generalize 

1. The object access of every profile is reviewed to keep them simple and configured using permission sets/permission set groups.

STEP 2. PERMISSION SETS AND GROUPS

The approach to configuring permission sets.

1. Identify those profiles that raised suspicions during the configuration process, that is, the “delete” operations or items. These are exceptions, and create separate permission sets for them.
2. When there are a lot of permission sets, use the permission set groups to combine them based on departments. 

STEP 3. ROLES & SHARING GROUPS 

1. Every organization has a reporting structure, so this part involves the configuration of those roles.
2. It looks into which user or profile has access to ‘share’, and it is better to start with restrictions and then release gradually.

STEP 4. PAGE LAYOUTS & LIGHTING RECORD PAGES

Mostly we first have objects that are per record layout type. Then, later we can add profile-specific layouts if needed. Same for lighting record pages.

STEP 5. LIGHTING APPS AND HOME PAGES

Every profile has only one default app, so it is better to define which profile is for which app and the home page. 

STEP 6. GROUPS

For the data like reports, lists and dashboards, groups are crucial for visibility and sharing. 

STEP 7. QUEUES

In this, the tasks are assigned to departmental queues before they hand out to the individual. They are for group object assignments, and their configurations are familiar to group configurations. 

Final Word

Salesforce security works, especially for businesses that want to scale their sales and marketing and establish consumer-company relationships and interactions. For a 360 CRM solution tool, Salesforce Security should be every company’s priority. 

When it comes to its configuration, it is a complex process. A lot of detailed technical know-how is needed if you want to use it beyond the CRM tool. 

Author Bio

Bala SubbaRao is a digital marketer and writer at MindMajix, a leading global online training provider. He has expertise in various IT and cutting-edge technologies, including Business Intelligence, Salesforce, Cybersecurity, Software Testing, Data Analytics, Project Management, and ERP tools. With a passion for writing and a deep understanding of the tech industry, He is dedicated to delivering insightful and informative content for his readers.