"Government regulations keeping pace with the market," "exit strategies," and "international data privacy" were found to be the top three areas where organizations have the lowest confidence in cloud computing.
The findings were based on the first global survey jointly conducted by non-profit organizationsISACA andCloud Security Alliance (CSA) on 252 participants in 48 countries, representing cloud users, providers, consultants and integrators from 15 industry segments.
In the "Cloud Market Maturity study," those who identified themselves as cloud users (85%) were asked to rank on a scale of zero to five a number of considerations in cloud computing, with zero being the least confident. The following shows the top 10 issues that cloud users have (ranked from least confident to most confident):
- Government regulations keeping pace with the market (1.80)
- Exit strategies (1.88)
- International data privacy (1.90)
- Legal issues (2.15)
- Contract lock-in (2.18)
- Data ownership and custodian responsibilities (2.18)
- Longevity of suppliers (2.20)
- Integration of cloud with internal systems (2.23)
- Credibility of suppliers (2.30)
- Testing and assurance (2.30)
"One of the most interesting findings is that governance issues recur repeatedly on the list of the top 10 concerns. Cloud users recognize the value of this [cloud computing] model, but are wrestling with such questions asdata ownership,legal issues,contract lock-in,international data privacy andgovernment regulations," said Michael Yung (pictured, left), past president of ISACA Hong Kong Chapter.
"Government regulations keeping pace with the market" refers todata jurisdiction requirements, Yung said. Some of the common issues include whether a company's data can be stored outside of Hong Kong, and whether their data will be viewed or obtained by other governments. Some enterprise cloud users are also concerned about the performance of utilities like power availability, in certain countries where their cloud service providers operate their facilities in.