Many organizations and enterprises consider the cloud to be a boon mainly because of its easily apparent business benefits. With the constantly increasing dependency on the cloud, cloud providers continue to offer more advanced, sophisticated, and customized cloud services that will ease the work of the IT teams. In addition to the technical aspects, these providers are cognizant of affordability considerations of customers, whether they be large organizations, small companies, or start-ups. To help ease the potential financial stress, they have introduced a pay-as-you-go payment model.
While there are many advantages of using cloud services there are still numerous organizations that hesitate to adopt or migrate to the cloud because they are worried about data security and privacy. The contributing factor behind this second-guessing of a move to the cloud is the increased number of threats. According to the “A Walk in the Clouds” Analytic Report of Cloud Computing by InformationWeek, 81% of business owners say security is one of their top concerns. Cloud has proven to be a safe environment to protect data assets.
Cloud Security Challenges and How to Avoid Them
Notwithstanding the benefits of cloud migrations, the major reasons that keep many organizations away from the cloud are the following:
Data Security – Many organizations are wary when it comes to cloud computing mainly because they must entrust their company and customer data to a third-party cloud service provider. This makes them nervous. Often, they think that maintaining the data in their physical hardware is a safer option when compared to delegating to a third party. Fortunately, this is not the case.
In the right hands data is considerably safer and more secure in the cloud environment. To withstand security threats and breaches such as DoS attacks virtually all cloud service providers constantly upgrade their security strategies and solutions; data security is of paramount importance for the welfare of any business.
Accessibility – Cloud computing allows IT teams to make use of their company and customer data 24/7 from anywhere if they have an internet connection; they need not be close to a local server to access these data files. However, this also means that a hacker or an unauthorized person only needs an internet connection to potentially break into the system. Hence, even though accessibility is one of the major features that many organizations highlight as a reason to migrate to the cloud, some organizations are skeptical about the safety of their data.
Cloud misconfiguration is often the means by which hackers can breach and access a company’s data assets. Poor passwords are yet another reason that paves the way for security breaches. Fortunately, in contrast to what many business leaders believe, there are in fact multiple levels of security provided by cloud service providers that ensure the safety and privacy of the data assets. The combination of a reliable cloud service provider and a responsible IT team is what every organization needs to safeguard their valuable data.
Big Budget – Many organizations and enterprises refrain from adopting a cloud platform and stick with their on-premises data centres because of a misapprehension that cloud computing is an expensive investment. One reason behind this notion could be that organizations migrated to the cloud without estimating their business needs properly. Each organization is different, and the cloud may not fully leverage their data and protocols to the extent they were when using legacy applications and systems. Cybertalk reports that 60% of infrastructure and operations (I&O) leaders are likely to experience budget-related issues on account of public cloud cost overruns. This is because organizations and enterprises fail to plan for the expenses involved in cloud computing.
Cloud solutions cater to the most important business needs such as protecting valuable data from the hands of hackers, helping organizations save huge sums of money for hardware devices, and recovering data in case of a disaster or accident. As mentioned earlier, the pay-as-you-go payment model has made cloud computing feasible for a host of small and mid-sized businesses; they do not have to pay for anything they do not use.
Control and Visibility – Another major concern for many organizations and enterprises is the trepidation of losing control of their data. Business leaders and IT teams feel that moving or sharing their data assets to an offshore data centre with a third-party cloud service provider could mean a loss of control over the data. Further, they worry that the cloud service provider may misuse or misplace their data.
This is a genuine concern for any business leader or decision-maker. Where is my data, and how is it being used or safeguarded? To ameliorate such concerns an organization should discuss and clarify with the provider the location of their data, the level of security they provide, the restrictions placed on access, and the process of employee authorization. Through this means organizations can rest assured that the data is in safe hands. Cloud service providers have gone a step further by introducing a shared responsibility model which allows their customers to choose the strategies necessary to achieve visibility, control, and to monitor the activities in the cloud.
These are honest concerns for any organization that wants to ensure the safety and privacy of customer and company data. To be clear though, the safety of the data systems once migrated to the cloud lies in the hands of both the cloud service providers and the organizations’ IT teams. Cloud computing alone is not sufficient to safeguard the data; employees must be equally responsible and trustworthy. Lack of proper awareness for data security among the employees can easily provide access to hackers.
Choose PreludeSys as Your Cloud Partner for a Safe Cloud Enablement Journey
PreludeSys offers advanced cloud services to customers by leveraging the best of Microsoft Azure. Our state-of-the-art cloud service delivers exceptional operational efficiencies while mitigating risks. Our clients experience a shorter time-to-market, improved competitiveness, and better ROI.
If you are an organization that is still hesitant about adopting the cloud our cloud experts at PreludeSys would love to speak with you. They can elaborate on our cloud services to help you determine if your business is in need of cloud adoption and which potential cloud enablement services will help you boost your business.
Find out more about our Cloud Enablement Services here.
