According to a recent survey by Pew Research Center's Internet Project, 69% of all Internet users in U.S. have either stored data online or used a web-based software application. "These users are making use of 'cloud computing,' an emerging architecture by which data and applications reside in cyberspace, allowing users to access them through any web-connected device." At the same time, most of these users are still unfamiliar with the term "cloud computing." more»
The spam attacks which occurred this weekend and claimed to have come from Microsoft, are reported to have used Amazon's Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) servers. Brian Krebs of Washington Post's Security Fix has investigated this issue -- from the report: "...to spammers and scammers accustomed to paying for all kinds of Web services with stolen credit cards, Amazon's service is another place to host their junk, said Suresh Ramasubramanian, head of anti-spam operations at Outblaze, a Hong Kong-based outfit that has listed all of Amazon's EC2 Internet space on its spam blacklists..." Also reported: "Anti-spam group Spamhaus also has flagged a large swath of Amazon's EC2 Internet address space on its "policy blocklist," which subscribers use to block e-mail from dynamic Internet addresses..." more»
During a recent Google forum on the policy implications of hosted applications and services, experts anticipate great challenges facing policy makers in the next few years as cloud computing is becoming increasingly popular. Issues include: "Who owns the data that consumers store on the network? Should law enforcement agencies have easier access to personal information in the cloud than data on a personal computer? Do government procurement regulations need to change to allow agencies to embrace cloud computing?" more»
More than 40 years ago, the FCC was worried about telephone companies using their power over communications to control the then-nascent (and competitive) data processing marketplace. The Bell System at that point was already banned from providing services that weren't common carriage communications services (or "incidental to" those communications services)... In a 1999 article in the Texas Law Review, Steve Bickerstaff pointed out that Computer 1 meant that no one could provide a "computer utility" service... Today, we'd call the "computer utility" something different -- we'd use the term "cloud computing." more»
Almost a year ago I wrote about Google Chrome: Cloud Operating Environment and [re]wrote the Google Chrome Wikipedia article, discussing the ways in which Google was changing the game through new and innovative features... Similar features were quickly adopted by competitors including Opera (which Chrome quickly overtook at ~2%) and Firefox (which still has an order of magnitude more users at ~20-25%). more»
Like the term Web 2.0, "cloud computing" is quickly becoming a meme without borders. And like the old one, the new phrase with the fuzzy definition has someone making a claim on its trademark, as Dell filed for a trademark on the term last year. The trademark application was recently noted by cloud computing consultant Sam Johnston, posting on a Google Groups cloud computing forum. Dell has also snatched up the Web sites cloudcomputing.com, cloud-computing.com, and cloud-computing.net as well as cloudcomputers.com. Cloudcomputing.com re-routes visitors to Dell's Cloud Computing Solutions Web site. more»
The recent launch of Google Wave generated a lot of attention, and for good reason. It's recently crossed my path in a few different settings, and while the news is still fresh, there is a lot here for service providers to be thinking about. At a high level, Wave is Google's entry into the real time collaboration space, and being Web-based, is poised to disrupt the status quo, not just for vendors, but service providers as well. more»
Software giant Microsoft is fighting rival Google for a place in the clouds. The company thinks that more and more software services will take over or replace the tasks currently being handled by Microsoft applications on business and home PCs. In the past two weeks alone, Microsoft has unveiled several key products it thinks will accelerate the process of transition to cloud computing, or software services delivered over the internet. more»
A number of large technology companies, including Google, Microsoft and Yahoo!, have announced that they have signed up to a voluntary code of conduct on how they do business in countries that curtail freedom of expression like China and Singapore... It's not surprising to see this sort of self-regulation being proposed as otherwise political initiatives like the Global Online Freedom Act, passed in one US Senate committee but currently floating in legislative limbo, could actually make it into law. more»
The penny dropped when I started looking at cloud computing as a service rather than a new technology. In that respect it is more like Google search and a DotCom development than a set of software and hardware tools. That was what I needed to get a better strategic grip on this new concept. As with all services, business strategies are key here, rather than technologies. As soon as it is seen as a technology customer issues often come in second, which then leads to a technology looking for a market... more»
Google's application-hosting service, "Google App Engine," suffered an outage on Tuesday, highlighting one of the downsides of the new cloud computing services, reports Nancy Gohring of IDG News Service. Between 9 a.m. and 11:30 a.m. PST and again later in the day, a significant percentage of users trying to access the service were unable to do so, according to a post on the Google App Engine forum. "This outage was the result of a bug in our datastore servers and was triggered by a particular class of queries," wrote a member of the App Engine Team who called himself "Pete." more»
The Cloud Manifesto, a collaborative document prepared jointly by Amazon, Google, IBM and others has apparently upset Microsoft. In a blog post entitled "Moving Toward an Open Process on Cloud Computing Interoperability" and penned by the senior director of developer platform management for Microsoft, Steven Martin, Mr. Martin stated his position that the Cloud Manifesto and the process of creating it was biased to benefit its authors, and unfair to their competitors – such as Microsoft... more»
Gartner says the confusion that surrounds the term "cloud computing" signifies its potential to change the IT market. Gartner defines cloud computing as scalable, IT-related capabilities provided as a service on the internet. "When organizations cross the threshold between the internet as a communications channel and the deliberate delivery of service over the internet, then we truly start to head for an economy based on consumption of everything from storage to computation to video to finance deduction management," said Daryl Plummer, a Gartner analyst. more»
If anyone has the right to be excited about cloud computing, it's John Chambers. But on Wednesday Cisco Systems' Chairman and CEO conceded that the computing industry's move to sell pay-as-you-go computing cycles available as a service on the Internet was also "a security nightmare." Speaking during a keynote address at the annual security confab, Chambers said that cloud computing was inevitable, but that it would shake up the way that networks are secured... more»
In this multipart series I will be presenting some of the leading industry-standard best practices for enterprise network security using Cisco technologies.... "Wisdom consists in being able to distinguish among dangers and make a choice of the least harmful." That quote is quite possibly the most accurate depiction possible of the never-ending struggle between network security and corporate budget. Providing a mechanism to defend the enterprise network from every conceivable threat is impossible in terms of both technology and funding. more»