Grazed from Sys Con Media. Author: Gilad Parann-Nissany.

The cloud computing industry is currently experiencing tremendous growth. Studies predict that by 2014, 60% of server workload will be virtualized and the total size of the industry will be $150 billion (up from $48 billion in 2008). Alongside this growth, cloud computing has also seen an increase in criminal activities in the cloud.

Cloud computing faces many of the same threats as the physical workplace. Attackers use tactics such like social engineering or working from the inside. They take advantage of employees’ use of social media and downloading of applications on company computers to send attacks over the web. They continue to take advantage of email with increasingly sophisticated viruses that bypass anti-virus tools. Hackers focus on targeting specific organizations with valuable data – attacking in a planned and professional way. All of these threats affect the cloud, the data center, and personal devices…

Grazed from Webopedia. Author: Vangie Beal.

If you’re looking for a solid cloud storage provider, here’s 5 to try. Cloud storage basically means "the storage of data online in the cloud," wherein a company’s data is stored in and accessible from multiple distributed and connected resources that comprise a cloud.
Today businesses of all shapes and sizes use cloud storage, not only because of lower costs (you don’t need to purchase, manage and maintain expensive hardware) but cloud storage can provide the benefits of greater accessibility and reliability; rapid deployment; strong protection for data backup, archival and disaster recovery purposes.

5 Cloud Storage Service Providers to Try

If you’re looking for a solid cloud storage provider, here’s 5 to try:..

Grazed from ArsTechnica. Author: Sean Gallagher.

Apparently even the government can have too much cloud capacity. The Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) has announced that it is putting the brakes on a $450 million commercial cloud-computing contract because of a lack of demand from within the Department of Defense.

In a notice posted by the DISA to the Federal Business Opportunities website, the agency’s contracting officer Scott Stewart wrote, "Initial indications are the demand will not require a contract with the ceiling estimated in [the] draft solicitation. We are currently revising our acquisition strategy."…

Grazed from InfoWorld. Author:

Microsoft definitely doesn’t want developers to eschew its cloud, that’s for sure. Redmond’s latest additions to its arsenal of cloud-based resources are aimed squarely at developers, and while a new version of Visual Studio (2013) is part of that mix, there’s an entirely new offering: Visual Studio Online. Formerly branded as Team Foundation Service, Visual Studio Online is a Windows Azure-hosted development environment designed to work as an online complement to Visual Studio’s desktop tools.

Most of the features offered through Visual Studio Online ought to be familiar territory, both for Microsoft and non-Microsoft developers. The hosted source control system, for instance, works with Microsoft’s Team Foundation Version Control system, but will operate transparently with Git as well — a nice tip of the hat to those who already have projects managed with Git and don’t feel like scrapping it in favor of a Microsoft solution. Likewise, Visual Studio is the preferred software client for working with projects hosted in Visual Studio Online, but Eclipse and Xcode are supported too…

Grazed from EON. Author: PR Announcement.

Faronics, a global leader in simplifying, securing and managing multi-user computer environments, announced today the release of Deep Freeze Cloud – a cloud-managed version of its instant system restore solution. “Cloud computing is revolutionizing every sector of business including IT management. As cloud-based technologies grow in popularity and more and more organizations make the switch to the cloud, developing Deep Freeze Cloud is a natural next step for Faronics”

With Reboot to Restore functionality, Deep Freeze protects original workstation configurations by restoring the computer settings to their original, pristine condition with a simple reboot. By creating a “Frozen” snapshot of a workstation’s desired configuration and settings, Deep Freeze eliminates the need for IT administrators to perform manual rebuilds, re-image or troubleshoot computers every time something goes awry…

Grazed from ZDNet. Author: Dan Kusnetzky.

Adrian Lonel, Mirantis CEO and President, stopped by to chat about how organizations are adopting cloud computing and how, in his vision, OpenStack is positioned to win over the others. Although it is impossible for me to really do justice to our rapidly moving conversation, I’ll try to summarize what was touched upon.

Trends in developing Cloud-based applications

There are a number of groups seeking to define the stack of software everyone will use to develop cloud-based workloads. Amazon Web Services and its frenemy Eucalyptus Systems hope that the stack of software defined by Amazon will win. Microsoft hopes that Microsoft’s Windows Azure will become the standard. Two different open source communities, Apache CloudStack and the OpenStack believe that their approach to building cloud-based applications will win. Lonel believes that OpenStack is likely to win because of the following reasons:…

Grazed from PR NewsWire. Author: PR Announcement.

Virtustream, Inc., the leading enterprise class cloud software and Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) provider, today announced they have fully integrated Intel® Trusted Execution Technology (Intel® TXT) into both the xStream 2.2 cloud management software and Virtustream’s IaaS cloud. These enterprise class cloud solutions provide companies with highly secure and compliant cloud computing, whether in private, public or hybrid clouds. Intel TXT provides strong hardware authentication and enables a range of advanced high security features including malware/virus prevention, BIOS authentication, hypervisor authentication, geotagging and geofencing.

“Virtustream’s partnership with Intel has been built on our common belief that enterprise class clouds must closely integrate software and hardware to give our clients the most advanced security features and compliance capabilities which reduce risk and costs,” said Kevin Reid, CEO and CTO of Virtustream. “By integrating Intel TXT, Virtustream’s xStream moves several steps ahead of any other hybrid cloud solution. The combination of application-level SLAs and security compliance gives our customers a tremendous advantage and new options for how they can deploy business-critical applications in the cloud.” …

Grazed from Computing.co.uk. Author: John Leonard.

Shadow IT – the bypassing of the IT department by employees who set up their own systems – is the inevitable consequence of the ease of use and quick deployment enabled by the cloud. Given the choice between waiting for days or weeks for the IT department to configure the CRM system to suit their needs, or ordering something over the web with a credit card (or even for free) that can be used immediately and turned off again afterwards, it is obvious which will win. And the consequences be damned.

But the consequences of shadow IT can be serious. As with other trends driven by consumerisation, such as bring your own device (BYOD), shadow IT leaves the IT department between a rock and a hard place: it does not want to be seen as a progress-denying jobs-worth, but neither can it afford to preside over the sort of free-for-all that is the logical conclusion of the boom in self-service IT, an outcome that could have seriously negative repercussions for the company – and the IT leader’s job…

Grazed from CloudTech. Author: Editorial Staff.

PaaS is a multi-faceted phenomenon that has been evolving very rapidly in the past five years, and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future. Enterprises should get ready to anticipate and take advantage of new PaaS developments. To do so, they should ask vendors some hard questions about strategy plans and product roadmaps. For more information, see the Ovum report PaaS: Two More Years of Confusion Ahead.

PaaS has quickly evolved in the past few years

Today’s PaaS is quite different from that of yesterday, and this can cause confusion. Its rapid evolution has so far partly reflected the evolution of the overall cloud computing market. PaaS has, for example, evolved from a focus on public clouds to private and hybrid clouds, from green-field to legacy applications, and from being packaged with its own infrastructure services to supporting third-party (mostly IaaS) services…

Grazed from WSJ. Author: Don Clark.

Many businesses no longer buy servers–they just turn to Amazon’s cloud computing service to run their operations. Some now may apply the same tactic to personal computers. The Seattle-based company’s Web services unit on Wednesday announced what it calls Amazon WorkSpaces, which amounts to deploying virtual Windows PCs on Amazon servers. Such a service opens up several different possibilities.

In theory, for example, a user could access Windows-based applications from many kinds of devices, including Apple Macs or iPads, Android or Amazon Kindle Fire tablets, Google Chromebooks or conventional laptops. Assuming a decent Internet connection, they also should be able to get pretty much the same experience in using those applications when they are on the move as when they are in the office…