Cloud security: A real concern or just an excuse?

Grazed from ComputerWorld. Author: Steve Pate.

Is cloud security the chicken or the egg? Are CSOs playing the ‘it’s not secure’ card to avoid anything that, well, smells like work? Are IT pros rabidly defending their turf because they fear their jobs might also be outsourced, along with their data center? Surveys continually place concerns about data security as one of the top reasons preventing organizations from moving to the public cloud. Yet, Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) is the fastest growing segment of the public cloud, with CAGR above 40% through 2016, according to Gartner’s Forecast Overview: Public Cloud Services, Worldwide, 2011-2016, 4Q12 Update.

How do these seemingly inconsistent statistics come together? Rather than discussing the negative points at play, let’s think about what factors are at work. I’ve been talking to a lot of organizations lately — both enterprises as well as cloud service providers (CSPs) — about their cloud migration perspectives, and here’s what I’m seeing…

SMBs: These organizations are moving aggressively to the cloud. They have not yet made investments into building out large datacenters, or their IT staff. They are often growing quickly, and need to spin up their IT services in kind. Also, smaller organizations typically have less bureaucracy, and fewer people saying ‘Well, that’s not the way we’ve always done it.’ This makes IaaS an easy choice, and perhaps, even a godsend. Simply spin up servers when they are needed, and pay for services as you go (and grow)…

Read more from the source @ http://blogs.computerworld.com/cloud-security/22143/cloud-security-real-concern-or-just-excuse