Migrating to the cloud should seem like a no-brainer at this point, given the many ways the move can bring value to your business. Cloud computing has introduced a variety of benefits and advantages that help countless businesses maintain their competitive edge, from reduced costs to improved versatility and efficiency. Nevertheless, cloud computing faces a variety of challenges that continue to impact the development of cloud services and infrastructure, as well as the willingness of businesses to adopt and to utilize cloud computing for their own benefit.
Identifying the Biggest Challenges
Cloud computing is not perfect (yet). Like many other technologies, it continues to suffer from a variety of issues that have made significant impacts on adoption rates and development. Overcoming the biggest challenges to cloud computing involves properly identifying and recognizing those challenges. A concerted effort by businesses, customers and service providers is the key to not only addressing these issues, but also to ensure the future successes of the cloud computing industry.
Security and Privacy
Even outside of cloud computing, keeping data safe and secure is a foremost priority for businesses. Since many businesses are accustomed to having their most sensitive data tucked safely behind a corporate firewall, having that data residing within the cloud makes businesses understandably cautious.
Cloud providers must constantly reassure their clients of the numerous measures they take to prevent hacking and other malicious activities that could compromise their systems. Security applications, data loss software and encrypted file systems are among the many mitigating factors working toward preventing attacks on cloud infrastructures and keeping data safe.
Reliability and Availability
Although the vast majority of cloud providers continue to drastically improve their uptimes, service disruptions remain a common enough part of the cloud computing experience to dissuade some businesses away from the technology.
Many cloud providers have chosen to build upon their reliability and availability by creating multiple levels of redundancy within their systems. Cloud providers are also developing backup plans and disaster recovery setups as a way of mitigating cloud outages without compromising businesses or data.
Interoperability
Avoiding the prospect of being locked into a service is one of the many challenges businesses face when it comes to committing to a cloud infrastructure. Just as users value their freedom when it comes to service migration, many businesses value the same. Portability is a valued asset that allows businesses to migrate in and out of the cloud without any issues and businesses are keen on maintaining that asset. Lock-in periods and other impediments to client fluidity can stymie a business’s desire to work with a cloud provider.
Cloud providers must also have the ability to seamlessly integrate a client’s cloud computing needs with their on-premise IT operations. Many businesses cannot afford to have their operations within the cloud and their on-premise operations on two separate pages.
A Common Thread
Global management and strategy consulting firm Booz & Company recently performed research on the challenges facing cloud computing. From this research, Booz & Company identified a lack of standards as being the common thread for these issues. This lack of standards have come about due to the fragmented nature of cloud computing’s overall development over the years.
The future success of cloud computing relies on a continued effort to develop and introduce industry-wide standards that appropriately address technological, management and regulatory concerns. Cloud providers can do their part in building this groundwork by developing common definitions as well as clearly-defined guidelines and best practices.