How government can securely leverage cloud environments

Grazed from GCN.  Author: Dan Chenok.

In recent years, federal agencies have made significant strides incorporating cloud computing into their IT portfolios.  From the OMB “Cloud First” strategy, to GSA’s Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP), the government is following commercial best practices to leverage the cloud.

Cloud capabilities can be provided over the public Internet or through connections over private networks — and government does both. Some agencies establish private clouds due to perceived risks of making data available over public channels. At the same time, they are moving toward greater use of the open Internet, including public clouds.


In many cases, the choice for agencies is not public or private clouds, but rather a blend of the two approaches – often referred to as a hybrid cloud – where Internet-based applications provide information into a system that sits inside agency firewalls…

Read more from the source @ http://gcn.com/articles/2014/05/09/insight-hybrid-cloud-security.aspx