To Cloud Or Not To Cloud ?

If you ask the above question to the various cloud services providers, I am sure their answers are “Definite yes”.

If you ask the same question to end users, their answers may end up like “I really don’t care.”. And for the question again to business owners, their answers will probably are “May-be’s” because seriously no one really reveals all the cloud benefits, implementation pros and cons to them.

To IT professionals, however, we will probably provide a vague answer – “It depends.”. The long form of the answer is – “It depends on the maturity of the cloud market, technology and whether the solution available today can match your budget, quality requirements, and expected service level. More importantly, whether cloud technology and solutions can help your company to improve competitive advantage.”

That’s exactly what Cloud Security Alliance (CSA) and Information Systems Audit and Control Association (ISACA) did in a recent survey to answer part of the question – what is the maturity of the cloud technology and market, now ? A collaborative project by CSA and ISACA , the Cloud Market Maturity study provides business and IT leaders with insight into the maturity of cloud computing.

The Truth about Cloud Security

The study also reveals that cloud users in 50 countries were least confident about the following issues (ranked from least confident to most confident):

1. Government regulations keeping pace with the market (1.80)
2. Exit strategies (1.88)
3. International data privacy (1.90)
4. Legal issues (2.15)
5. Contract lock in (2.18)
6. Data ownership and custodian responsibilities (2.18)
7. Longevity of suppliers (2.20)
8. Integration of cloud with internal systems (2.23)
9. Credibility of suppliers (2.30)
10. Testing and assurance (2.30)

None of these findings are really a surprise, I suppose, however it is important to conduct such project because it helps us to understand how the cloud market will change over time, and how it advances from infancy to full maturity.

Do check out the press release and the full report to understand more about the findings, or you can check out the following infographics – the whole report in one picture.