Data Protection for the Hybrid Cloud

Grazed from The Virtualization Practice. Author: Edward Haletky.

In many cases, when we mention Data Protection for the Hybrid Cloud, we are usually talking about backing up to the cloud. The cloud becomes a repository of our backup images and in some cases those backup images can be launched within clouds that use the same technology. Being able to send data to the cloud is becoming table stakes for infrastructure as a service (IaaS) data protection. However, once we move outside the realm of IaaS to Platform or Software as a Service (PaaS or SaaS), data protection is hit or miss.

Data Protection is a piece of the larger hybrid cloud security story as we discussed in Securing the Hybrid Cloud and as seen in Figure 1. In many cases Data Protection is used to transition virtual machines and data to the cloud, and in some cases back again. For this to work, the data protection tool must use an identity to contact the cloud, authenticate and authorize itself, then speak the appropriate API to move the data to the cloud. In most cases, the API used, is the one provided by the data protection tool. Yet the identity is the identity of the user with rights to access the data center as well as the cloud and is most likely an administrative user in both. That identity is controlled by just the use of user name, password, and perhaps a secondary password (or authentication key)…

However, there is also a need to get your data back out of each cloud into which it is placed. This is the ‘There and Back Again’ requirement for data protection. For IaaS and Storage Clouds, the traditional ways to move data into and out of those cloud solutions works as expected. For IaaS, the traditional way is to set up a data protection server within the cloud and move the data out to another location, perhaps your data center or even another cloud. However, for SaaS and PaaS data protection is lacking, specifically there are three ways to get data from a PaaS or SaaS cloud solution:…

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