Cloud Computing security - Trends and research directions

Abstract

Cloud Computing is increasingly becoming popular as many enterprise applications and data are moving into cloud platforms. However, a major barrier for cloud adoption is real and perceived lack of security. In this paper, we take a holistic view of cloud computing security - spanning across the possible issues and vulnerabilities connected with virtualization infrastructure; software platform; identity management and access control; data integrity; confidentiality and privacy; physical and process security aspects; and legal compliance in cloud. We present our findings from the points of view of a cloud service provider, cloud consumer, and third-party authorities such as Govt. We also discuss important research directions in cloud security in areas such as Trusted Computing, Information Centric Security and Privacy Preserving Models. Finally, we sketch a set of steps that can be used, at a high level, to assess security preparedness for a business application to be migrated to cloud. © 2011 IEEE.