Balancing leasing and insurance costs to achieve total risk coverage in cloud storage multi-homing

Abstract

Cloud storage multi-homing (a.k.a. as multicloud) represents a possible solution to achieve enhanced availability of one’s own data and build an extremely reliable cloud environment out of relatively unreliable single cloud platforms. However, subscribing with multiple cloud providers comes at a cost. The cost of multiple subscriptions must be compared against the damage resulting from the possible temporary unavailability of the data stored on the cloud. A complementary approach is to protect against the economic damage resulting from data unavailability by subscribing an insurance policy. In this paper we investigate the complementary use of cloud multi-homing and insurance to obtain a total risk coverage against data unavailability. We provide a total cost function, which incorporates the cost of cloud subscriptions and the insurance premium, and investigate the possibility of trade-offs to achieve a total risk coverage at minimum cost.