Cloud services are quickly being adopted by business because of the efficiency and flexibility they offer. Cloud services provide for a plethora of communication technologies and businesses who switch often report an increase in productivity for their team.
However, cloud computing services also come with some known risks which may need to be assessed by your team before you can feel comfortable adopting this technology. For example, data recovery, data integrity, privacy and regulatory compliance, auditing, and e-discovery are all topics you should be aware of and do some research on before choosing your cloud provider.
Customers often demand transparency and you should do your best to avoid vendors who refuse to give you details about the security measures they take to protect your data. You should always ask questions about risk processes, policy makers, technical mechanisms, operators, and coders.
The following are the cloud issues you should be aware of:
Use of Internal Cloud Is Said to Be Inherently Secure
Many companies today are moving away from using public cloud services, opting instead for private clouds. These private clouds are hidden by a firewall which many mistakenly believe inherently improves the level of security. This is untrue; however, companies need to understand that protecting the cloud by a firewall does not guarantee a safe solution.
Lack of Visibility Poses Safety Risks
Most cloud providers are invisible, and this could pose some safety risks to your business. Always be cautious when moving documents from your own network to the cloud, as cyberattacks are more common than many in the industry would like to admit. Always make informed and carefully deliberate decisions to mitigate your own risk and further protect the integrity and privacy of your valuable assets.
Unsecured Applications
Regular security applications have attracted scrutiny for a few years now. If it’s possible, the application can be rebuilt to provide a reliable deployment for cloud services; doing this will help the application components to be more resilient. It’s important to note that cloud providers will not help you during this process, however.
Long-Term Viability
Ideally, cloud providers will never be swallowed up by other companies, get acquired, or go broke. In the event of this unfortunate turn of events, however, you have to be sure that your data will remain safe during the entire process. You should ask your provider what measures they’ve put in place to return the stored data to the consumer in case their company goes under.
Sensitive Data Files Need a More Secure Storage
Service consumers should be careful about the storage of sensitive information using the cloud storage technology. One solution for peace of mind is to encrypt your data, but the question remains: how and where will you decode it? It’s advisable that encrypted data should never be stored together with the coding key.
Access to Files and Transfer Rates Depend on Internet Speed
To access the files from the provider’s data storage, you must have a stable and reliable internet connection. It’s important to note that wired internet can be affected by the vagaries of nature. Even though a consumer such as yourself can access these files via mobile devices, their uses are still limited.
Final Thought
Cloud technology is still a wise choice for providing storage service to individuals, small businesses, public organizations, and many institutions. However, make certain that you understand the inherent risks and security concerns involved in transferring your data to the cloud. Bring these issues up with any potential provider before trusting them with your data.