Saturday, June 11, 2011

Comparing Local to Cloud Security

The first thing that prospective cloud users ask about a new cloud application is "What about security?".  It's a good question, and one that should always be asked when looking at a new public cloud based service vs. internally hosted “private cloud solutions”.  One of the things that I highlight for my clients is that when looking at the security implications of using a public cloud computing service, they should use a fair comparison.  They should compare the security of the public cloud to their alternative, usually an application deployed on their "private cloud" or locally hosted solution, on their own hardware located within their walls.  

This is the first in a series of articles that I will be writing to help answer how we can evaluate cloud security for our business and make good choices.  I want to peel away that first layer when evaluating security.  What you might find is that getting into minute detail on cloud vendor’s security scheme isn’t needed if you can’t afford to do the most basic things for your own locally hosted business system.   I’ll revisit some of the things I mentioned in the security section of my risks article.