Development of Cloud Computing Technology - Thesis Example

Full Paper Development of Cloud Computing Every organization selects the best possible cloud computing deployment method as pertheir business requirements and compatibility factors. Below are the four deployment methods are available for selection: Private Cloud The private cloud is also referred as neologism. However, the concept of this term out dates cloud computing by 40 years. Private clouds are recommended for organization requiring advanced security and privacy measures. The private cloud is administered exclusively for only a single organization, in order to maintain strict level of security (Cloud deployment models). Community Cloud As compared to a private cloud, the community cloud is shared among many organizations having identical business requirements. Moreover, the required infrastructure is shared among all the organization that is connected to the cloud saving the cost and demonstrates one of the advantages of cloud computing (Cloud deployment models). Public Cloud Public computing is a traditional approach where the resources are accessible on the Internet. Third party providers, known as the cloud vendors, organize the hosting for these resources on the Internet. The services and resources on this cloud are accessible to the public and groups of various industries (Cloud deployment models). Hybrid Cloud A hybrid cloud comprises of a mixture of all types of clouds i.e. public, private and community. Most organizations deploy this type of cloud as it provides a range of options in the context of accessibility. By incorporating hybrid clouds, issues such as PCI compliance can be eliminated (Cloud deployment models). Cloud Computing Service Models Cloud computing consists of applications that are represented as a service on the web and the provision of hardware / software services provided by companies operating data centers. Likewise, the services provided over the Internet are referred as (Software as a Service) ‘SaaS’. There are few sellers who use the term (Infrastructure as a service) ‘IaaS’ and (Platform as a service) ‘PaaS’ in order to demonstrate their products and services. However, these terms are avoided and not accepted globally, due to variation (ARMBRUST, FOX et al. 2010). The Commerce Department’s National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have illustrated some helpful definitions that focus on three concepts (Ryan & Loeffler, 2010): Cloud infrastructure as a service ‘IaaS’ consists of provisioning elementary computing resources. Cloud software as a service ‘SaaS’ access software application that operates on a cloud infrastructure. Cloud platform as a service (PaaS) provides the accessibility to users for implementing and developing applications with programming language and tools supported by the providers. The core components of a cloud are consists of the data center hardware and software. When these resources are made available to the public, they are referred as public clouds and the service provided by the cloud is called as utility computing. Moreover, private clouds are only available to private organizations and are not accessible by public. Accordingly, cloud computing is the combination of ‘SaaS’ and utility computing (ARMBRUST et al., 2010). Cloud Computing Layers Cloud computing is associated with five layers that works as an architecture. These layers contribute functionality with each other to support the features of cloud computing services. The hardware layer has no fault tolerance concluding that if the hardware fails, there is no alternate except to replace it with the new one. The redundancy and fault tolerance is managed by the applications. However, the risk can be minimized by providing alternative power supplies to the hardware etc. The virtualization layer comprises of virtual machines (The five layers within cloud computing). However, these software applications uses a single hardware platform but are presented in many instances. The mainstream server is virtualized by this method, and the vendors can provide Infrastructure as a service (IaaS) to the customers. VMware, Citrix, Microsoft are the popular ones (The five layers within cloud computing). The IaaS acts as a layer for the cloud computing technology by illustrating a mechanism to administer the services of virtualization. Moreover, the API allows the users to construct templates, which can be deleted anytime. The administration of API facilitates the vendors to save cost (The five layers within cloud computing). Furthermore, IaaS facilitate storage services that are administered by an API. For instance, Amazon has implemented IaaS storage services for its customers. The next layer is the PaaS layer that facilitates the IaaS layer by eliminating the management of specific virtual machine instances (The five layers within cloud computing). PaaS also contributes in the deployment of an application in cloud computing. A programming interface is made available for the developer to develop API. One of the examples of PaaS is the Google application engine in which Google has demonstrated an API utilized for storage and database along with a platform. PaaS provides the platform for the developers to code a program and initialize it in the cloud. SaaS has its significance on organizations, which do not want to posses or maintain any application in their premises. Email services, customer relationship management (CRM) services are accessible online via the cloud. The storage and security is the responsibility of the vendor (The five layers within cloud computing). However, user credentials are required to log in the application on the Internet or a VPN connection. In this way, organizations save the application maintenance cost, cost of physical security measures, security measures etc (The five layers within cloud computing). Cloud Computing Security As cloud-computing usage is increasing with its connectivity to the public through an Internet, new opportunities are also originating for hackers, cyber terrorists, viruses and worms. These threats will increase and focus on cloud computing enabled services and applications for stealing classified data, denial of service attacks on data centers etc. ‘Google apps’ is the major player in the market for providing ‘SaaS’, it was attacked and hacked. The report from cyber forensics indicated that the attacks were originated from China (Bisong & Rahman, 2011). The security and privacy in cloud computing is associated with data storage and data protection. Moreover, monitoring the utilization of resources available on the cloud by the service providers is also included. In order to secure the data on the cloud, it can be stored internally in the organization’s premises. Moreover, the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) in the US and Data Protection directives along with the EU are only two compliances from many other compliance concerns related to data and application of cloud computing. Moreover, EU has backed up with a legislative data protection for the entire member across the globe. However, the US data protection differs from EU, as it varies in each state (PLI search results). Moreover, the service provides incorporates the highest level of security in the clouds by their inbound technical intelligence, but these measures are affected due to government regulations country by country. For instance, if a cloud computing service provides is located within a country, the service provider is bound to slipshod provisions on privacy that may lead the involvement of the government enforcement agencies to peek in the hosted data of a particular organization (Information security short takes: Cloud computing data protection world map ). References Cloud deployment models | BizCloud® network Retrieved 6/1/2011, 2011, from http://bizcloudnetwork.com/2010/defining-cloud-deployment-models/ Ryan, W. M., & Loeffler, C. M. (2010). Insights into cloud computing. Intellectual Property & Technology Law Journal, 22(11), 22-28. ARMBRUST, M., FOX, A., GRIFFITH, R., JOSEPH, A. D., KATZ, R., KONWINSKI, A., . . . ZAHARIA, M. (2010). A view of cloud computing. Communications of the ACM, 53(4), 50-58. PLI search results Retrieved 6/1/2011, 2011, from http://www.pli.edu/Content.aspx?dsNav=Ns:sort_date|101|1|,N:127-279 Bisong, A., & Rahman, S. M. (2011). An overview of the security concerns in enterprise cloud computing. International Journal of Network Security & its Applications, 3(1), 30-45. doi:10.5121/ijnsa.2011.3103 Information security short takes: Cloud computing data protection world map Retrieved 6/1/2011, 2011, from http://www.shortinfosec.net/2010/03/cloud-computing-data-protection-world.html The five layers within cloud computing | cloud computing journal Retrieved 6/3/2011, 2011, from http://cloudcomputing.sys-con.com/node/1200642 Read More