How the Cloud Is – and Isn’t – Changing IT

Amy Larsen DeCarlo

Summary Bullets:

• The cloud strikes fear in the hearts of IT professionals that see the model’s potential to render them obsolete.
• Yet, according to a recent Current Analysis survey on enterprise cloud adoption, many enterprises in the process of migrating to the cloud are finding that while on-demand solutions may alter the role of IT, there is still a need for internal professionals to manage technology.

Corporate IT staffers’ concerns about the threat to their job security posed by providers of external sourcing solutions are hardly new.  In both complex and more tactical engagements through the years, IT managers have often been leery of third-party providers.  At a minimum, IT staffers worry about outsiders disrupting processes and adding unnecessary complexity; at worst, they see third-party providers as presenting their employers with a cheaper alternative to their own IT expertise.

The (Potential) Upside of Cloud Insecurity

Amy Larsen DeCarlo

Summary Bullets:

• Half of all organizations surveyed in Trend Micro’s 2012 study said “apprehension over security” is a major inhibitor in their adoption of cloud technologies.
• This reticence may actually prove to be a good thing as enterprises examine their own security strategies, and press their providers to offer up proof points around protecting data privacy and integrity in the cloud.

As is the case with the deployment of any transformational technology or IT delivery model, the enterprise migration to the cloud is pushing IT organizations to reexamine their own security postures and policies, and question the practices their providers employ to protect their data.  Even as more organizations move workloads into the cloud, many are still reticent about making the leap of faith into an on-demand environment, and perhaps for good reason.  A recently released survey of IT professionals sponsored by security vendor Trend Micro found that 41 percent of companies in the U.S. that had deployed workloads in the cloud experienced some kind of lapse or security breach.