Cloud Storage:
What are the
alternatives?
Last year’s hacking of celebrity selfies
put data privacy issues firmly into the
spotlight and raised important issues
about how individuals and organisations
store and protect their most sensitive
information. Above all, it served as a
reminder that data is hot property and
every organisation has a responsibility
to ensure that the information it holds
is secure and protected.
There is no doubt that the cloud offers
distinct advantages to businesses of all
sizes and should be embraced for the
benefits it brings, such as reduced cost
and the flexibility of remote working.
However, the cloud shouldn’t be the sole
method a business uses to store and back-
Mobile
2015 will be the year of enterprise mobile
applications. The IBM/Apple partnership and
HP’s push into the mobility market illustrate
just how large this market could be. So far,
apps created for enterprise use have been a
mobile skin on existing desktop solutions. In
2015, enterprises will develop new, native
applications that take full advantage of the
mobile device form factor and mobile features
to create streamlined business processes.
Cloud
Following all the security breaches that have
occurred recently, 2015 will see the beginnings
of a downward spiral in public cloud hype,
as enterprises realise they may need a
combination of public and private cloud
solutions.We’ve seen this happen already with
GE. Despite claims by some groups that the
company will go ‘all in’ on the public cloud,
security teams have stated that compliance
or infrastructure issues mean certain data will
remain ‘private’ and reside behind the firewall.
Wearable Tech
Wearables will find their first footing in the
enterprise and businesses need to prepare for
this shift from a data security standpoint. Look
at Google Glass, its most compelling use case
is in industries where hands-free computing
is a matter of life and death – surgeons and
field workers who fix machinery.Wearable
technology applications in the enterprise
will grow exponentially once wearables are
introduced.
Security
A 100% secured environment is not
attainable, so there will be increased demand
for vendors to build security directly into
applications. Every app needs to be self-aware
and self-protecting, so emerging companies
will no longer be able to push security below
user experience on the priorities list. In the
future, security will have to be an integral part
of the app.
Lee Holsgrove explains how tape storage
can work in conjunction with cloud storage
to help keep your business data safe
up information, mainly because physical
back-up reduces the risk of losing data
completely.
Data stored in the cloud can and
does get lost and/or corrupted. A survey
conducted in 2013 by internet security
company Symantec found that 43%
of businesses have lost data in the
cloud, which they have had to recover
from backups*. Yet, most cloud service
providers accept no responsibility for data
losses in their service level agreements.
Providers of public cloud storage
services quite often subcontract
elsewhere, giving customers very little
control over, or access to, their sensitive
information. It may even be difficult for
the provider itself to identify and retrieve
your data from the plethora of other
clients’ information.
Businesses will also need to check that
their data is being stored in compliance
with the laws of their country, and not
just those of the country where the cloud
server is hosted. Many cloud servers are
based in the U.S. and operate under U.S.
law. UK-based organisations must comply
with the EU Data Protection Directive,
which outlines standards of protection
throughout the EU.
Tiered storage
Instead of relying solely on the cloud, we
strongly advise organisations to adopt a
tiered approach to data. It is crucial that
your most important data should have
a different strategy to less important
information. For business critical
information, we advocate using tape
storage, as well as the cloud. Data stored
on tape boasts a 99.99% reliability level,
as well as robust security. If you use an
outsourced supplier, computerised zone
access, perimeter fencing and high-
security vaults make it near impossible
Data Security
magazine
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for your data to be lost or corrupted.
Tape storage also provides encryption,
so that should your data fall into the
wrong hands (extremely unlikely in the
first place), a third party would not be
able to make sense of it, rendering it
useless to them and to anyone else they
pass it on to.
Thanks to recent innovations like LTFS
(Linear Tape File System), tape storage
is no longer an expensive, cumbersome
option. Launched in 2010 by IBM, LTFS
was developed specifically to address
tape archive requirements and to
improve data access times. Being an
open standard format, it also addresses
the concern that archived data will not
be readable in the future without the use
of specialised software.
With cloud security breaches continuing
to hit the headlines, I urge anyone using
cloud storage to perform their due
diligence and, crucially, to investigate tape
storage options for the most sensitive data
you cannot afford to lose.
Lee Holsgrove is Strategic Data
Protection Development Manager at
Wincanton Records Management.
WRM has over 20 years’ experience in
the provision of off-site data protection
services, along with secure document
storage for live and archive documents,
data protection, secure records
destruction and electronic document
management. It holds ISO9001
accreditation for quality management
systems and ISO27001 for security
management systems.
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2015 Predictions
Yorgen Edholm, CEO of Accellion, a provider of secure mobile file sharing and
collaboration solutions, shares his predictions for 2015
