A New Invention Cloud Computing - Assignment Example

A New Invention –Cloud Computing Student’s Name: Institution: A New Invention –Cloud Computing Introduction In the last few decades there has been rapid development in the field of information communication and technology (ICT). One such technology is cloud computing which is a paradigm shift from the earlier technologies, for instance grid computing and distributed computing. According to Peng et al. (2009) cloud Computing is both an integration and evolution of virtualization, utility computing, Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS), Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS), and Software-as-a-Service (SaaS. To most of cloud service users, Cloud computing comes in handy as a Pay-per-Use-On-Demand mode with the capacity to enable users to appropriately access mutual IT resources via internet. Such IT resources are for instance service, application, storage, server and network among others and they are capable of being deployed in much quick and easier manner. At the same time they demand minimal organization of and communications with service provider. In comparison to other computing techniques, cloud computing enhances, to a greater scale, the availability of IT services. For instance cloud computing avails self-help services without the need of having manual interactions with most service providers. On the other hand, resources with a cloud enable users to dynamically lease virtual or physical resources without necessarily knowing the exact storage locations of such resources. Furthermore, it is possible to quickly and elastically deploy IT resources with a cloud service (Yu & Wen, 2010). In terms of service provision, cloud computing has three types services; SaaS, PaaS and IaaS. SaaS entails provision of services relating to applications being run in a cloud infrastructure. This can be accessed by a thin client interface for instance browser. PaaS deployment of applications created using development tools and language, such as Python and Java, which has been provided service providers on the cloud infrastructure. Finally, IaaS is a the services provisioned to cloud users which includes leasing the processing power, network, storage as well as other basic computing resources, with which users can organize and run any software including applications and operating systems. Considering the above cloud services, users are therefore not required to control and/or manage the cloud service, including server, storage, network, operating system as well as the functions of various applications. Subsequently, there are three kinds of cloud computing platforms; private cloud, public cloud and hybrid cloud. In private cloud, the cloud service is exclusively owned and leased by a single organization, and as well the same organization manages the cloud infrastructure. For public cloud, the cloud service is entirely owned by a Cloud Service Sales Organization which tries to sell the cloud services across the industrial divide and general public. In hybrid cloud infrastructure, there is integration of at least two kinds of clouds, public cloud and private cloud, in which case either of them is maintained independently although they share similar standards as well as both applications and/or data are transplant. In this regard, cloud computing has totally revolutionized the field the field of information communication and technology. As such, majority of countries have realized the enormous business potential offered by cloud computing and they are therefore investing and/or invested in cloud computing technologies. According to Peng et al. (2009), the US government is one such country that set aside capital for a pilot project in cloud computing. Similarly, the G-cloud is in the process of being rolled out. On the other hand, Singapore in collaboration with Intel and yahoo initiated a cloud project as a joint effort. Across the industrial divide, Amazons Ec2, Microsoft’s Azure, Google’s AppEngine and IBM’s Blue Cloud are some of the cloud computing platforms, which have been rolled out. Challenges in Cloud Computing Challenges of Cloud Standardization According to Ortiz (2011), the rapid growth of cloud services has caused and it is as well threatened by, lack of comprehensive cloud computing standards in order to gain traction. This problem may render it trickier to make use of cloud computing services. On the other hand, this may also restrict deployment of cloud services because of limiting interoperability on various cloud platforms as well as causing inconsistency in key areas for instance interoperability and security. A case is point in instance where a customer wants to switch from a private cloud to a public cloud. Due to lack of standardization, the customer may be limited from doing so as seamlessly as switching e-mail systems or browsers. On the other hand, failure to have standards continues to limit customers for knowing the fundamental capabilities they can get from a cloud computing service. Reason being interoperability between portability and offering of services from a particular provider to another is crucial to any customer who wants to maximize return on investment from a cloud service (Ortiz, 2011). Subsequently, another major concern is lack of security standards in cloud computing that would address aspects for instance data encryption and privacy. This limits wider adoption of cloud computing services. Reason being a lot of information stored with a cloud is sensitive and it is as well widely available over the internet thereby rendering its security to be a key concern. On the other hand, failure to have standardization of cloud computing makes it difficult for potential buyers to evaluate and compare cloud offerings. Currently, various organizations such as IEEE, open forum, distribution management task force and OASIS have come up with working groups to institute regulatory standards within cloud computing. In order to attain true interoperability, it calls for translation of particular service and application functionality from one cloud service to another. This cannot happen without proper standardization according to Michael, the president of RightScale (Ortiz, 2011). For instance, currently there are no standard methods that can one use to seamlessly translate security policies and requirements across all cloud offerings. Precisely, one major standardization issue in cloud computing entails virtualization and it plays a key role in almost every cloud computing approach. Flexibility of virtualization enables cloud providers to improve workloads amongst their hardware resources. As such users are capable of connecting to storage locations without necessarily knowing the server addresses and names as is the case in traditional networks. In virtualization technology, the host server’s dispensation and other resources are managed by hypervisors to enable it run on several virtual machines (VMs) by making use different platforms and operating systems. It is worth noting that every cloud platform has a unique kind of hypervisor. In this regard, cloud systems that utilize different hypervisors cannot interoperate effectively because they do not make use of the same data formats. On the other cloud platforms may also not interoperate because their virtual machines does not interact in a standard way with different storage and network architectures, network connections, APIs as well as other elements. The translation of virtual machines is in that it enables in preserving the network policy, security policy and identity in all cloud infrastructures. In this regard, lack of standardization means that for one to be able to move a workload from one cloud platform to another, it would require creating a new virtual machine on the second platform and then reinstalling the application. This requires considerable effort and time. By having several on-going standardization efforts, from both standard bodies and vendors, the situation becomes more complex. Reason being it would be difficult for both the users and the vendors to determine what is not going to emerge in the future. On the other hand, in some areas of cloud computing, multiple-standardization is on-going whereas in others, there are none. Subsequently, most of the on-going standardization efforts lack customer input and they thus do not ascertain full requirements of the users. It is in this respect that Ortiz (2011) in his research work urges that it will take quite a long time before cloud-computing standards are instituted. As vendors continue to standardize their own implementations, ineffective specifications will still be experienced. Therefore, cloud computing standardization will be achieved only when the industry will not tolerate lack of interoperability any longer (Ortiz, 2011). Security Challenges in Cloud Computing However, cloud computing infrastructure has continued to face a lot of challenges right from when it was invented and in the foreseeable future such challenges will continue considering the rapid technological developments. According to Crusadzr (n.d.), cloud computing has a myriad of security issues and they are particularly privacy, data loss and data theft. Other problems include data integrity, infected application, data location, security on users, and vender levels. In the same regard Ortiz (2011) notes that cloud computing is currently facing standardization issues for instance virtualization. In concurrence to the same concerns on problems facing cloud computing, Yu and Wen (2010) argues data security which is mainly about data availability, integrity and confidentiality, is a large security challenge. On the other hand, Dorey and Leite (2011) in their research work categorizes security concerns in cloud computing into three areas that requires significant improvement, identity and access management, data security, trust and assurance. The main reason that has contributed to these security issues in cloud is that instead of also considering the security aspect of cloud, much of the focus has been on cloud as a service. These challenges are discussed below. According to Dorey and Leite (2011), security framework that can be deployed in cloud computing is still a challenge. In this regard, Yu and Wen (2010) categorized data security threats in a cloud environment into external and internal threats. Internal threats in cloud computing emanates mainly from users and providers of cloud services. In respect to cloud providers have total control over cloud resources especially data stored within the cloud. Therefore, for them to maintain proper system performance, cloud providers regularly perform backups or move some of the user’s data without prior knowledge of the data owner. On the other hand, providers of cloud service are in a position to modify corresponding information in user profile and as well as access unencrypted memory information especially when data is in active use. In a cloud computing environment in where there are multiple users, and sharing of the cloud service, the users are logically isolated and their data may be stored in the same hardware. In such an environment, adversaries are highly potential distinguish themselves as legitimate cloud users and thereby propagate attacks from within the cloud service (Yu & Wem, 2010). As earlier mentioned such attacks are for instance data theft and identify theft (Crusadzr, n.d.). Besides, in a multi-VM platform, hackers in a VM may detect data of their user in another VM by manipulating weak points in that kind of cloud platform. In the second category, external threats are those that emanates from outside the cloud service. Adversaries stays in client so as to steal the login details of the user i.e. password and username, and then masquerade as legal users. On the other hand, the intruder may eavesdrop on the data transmission process and execute man-in-the-middle attacks. This as well includes stealing information within the network, altering the data, and also creating other invalid data. On the other hand, such external threats are also capable of exploiting weaknesses within the cloud system in order to intrude the cloud environment which directly compromises user’s data security by causing threats. The aforementioned attacks are illustrated and explained in reference to the data life cycle model Figure 1. Data Life Cycle Model In the created stage, an adversary is capable of tampering with data and changing the data access rights. This results in significant loss of user rights. In the second stage, which involves storage of data, authorized data access and tampering from cloud service providers with malice as well as network intruders is highly possible. Other attacks under the same are for instance leakage of information during backup process as well as risk of backup medium to age. In the third stage, it becomes difficult to maintain data consistency and integrity because it is shared within other users. During data archiving, there is a big security risk in instances where data is archived in online locations. In that it can as well be accessed illegally. Finally, during the destruction stage, although data is totally destroyed, adversaries and/or malicious providers may restore the data in order to sabotage its owner in future. Future Security Requirements in Cloud Computing Although, the above challenges concerning cloud computing have been discussed, there are still solutions especially in regard to security framework. It is expectation of both the cloud computing service users and service providers that security of cloud computing will be enhanced in the near future. In that case, it is important for designing and implementation of data solutions through detailing all the cloud requirements. In respect to the aforementioned security threats (internal and external) data life cycle stages, the most important pre-requisites for data security include but not limited to: Data Encryption Storage –encrypting data/information contained in cloud would come in handy to reducing any leakage. For large amounts of data, symmetric encryption would be most appropriate whereas for small amount of data, asymmetric encryption is more suitable; Protection and prove of data integrity –this ensures that data within the cloud service is correct before any storage or backup is done. The prove of data integrity is usually done by the cloud provider; protection of data availability –the storage of data within cloud is normally done on different devices and as such it is necessary to ensure that availability of data within the cloud is of high quality; access control –this requires strict regulation in that it can stop adversaries form intruding into cloud service; data backup and recovery –performing frequent backups and recovery of data reduces data security risk to a great deal; encrypted data transmission –channels and or data mode is necessary to ensure control of man-in-the middle attacks. Other security measures are for instance authentication, security tag, key management, user rights management prove of data destruction, and remote platform attestation among others (Yu & Wen, 2010). Conclusion As discussed in the above review, the invention of cloud computing is a major revolution in the field of Information Communication and Technology. It is offered in three major platforms, PaaS, IaaS and SaaS and done of its main benefit is that users are able to access various IT resources without necessarily incurring the cost of buying hardware and software. However, lack of proper standardization across in cloud computing hinders interoperability of various IT resources and services offered within the cloud. It is therefore until such a time when the IT industry will come up with mutually acceptable standards that these problems will be solved. Such problem as discussed above is for instance virtualization. On the other hand, cloud security is a major concern and it inhibits the rapid adoption of cloud computing as a service across the industry. This includes both internal and external threats which are propagated within and from outside the cloud. As such, there is need to have a robust security cloud security infrastructure that integrates both internal and external architectures. Although, it is still a challenge security can still be achieved in cloud computing if proper investment in cloud security especially in the areas of identity management, data-centric security and assurance is done. There is the need for all stakeholders especially end-user companies to redesign the security architecture of cloud computing in order to ensure its embracement across all industries. Read More