Running head: AN OVERVIEW OF CLOUD COMPUTING TECHNOLOGY 1 An Overview of Cloud Computing Technology: Benefits and Security, Social, Legal and Ethics Issues. Augusto Lopes da Silva George Mason University IT 103, Section 004 February 25, 2014. "By placing this statement on my webpage, I certify that I have read and understand the GMU Honor Code on http://oai.gmu.edu/the-mason-honor-code/. I am fully aware of the following sections of the Honor Code: Extent of the Honor Code, Responsibility of the Student and Penalty. In addition, I have received permission from the copyright holder for any copyrighted material that is displayed on my site. This includes quoting extensive amounts of text, any material copied directly from a web page and graphics/pictures that are copyrighted. This project or subject material has not been used in another class by me or any other student. Finally, I certify that this site is not for commercial purposes, which is a violation of the George Mason Responsible Use of Computing (RUC) Policy posted on http://copyright.gmu.edu/?page_id=301 web site."
CLOUD COMPUTING 2 Introduction Imagine a world where computer users can save documents in a safe environment and at the same time make the documents available for the users in any place in the world. It is just necessary to have a connection to the Internet and then all the information is ready to be consumed. A world where scholars can simulate their experience without caring about infrastructure. A world where companies can rent a huge processing power for a period of time without spending a lot of money buying infrastructure hardware such as servers, switches, routers, gateways, etc. This world is real, and the name of the technology behind this is cloud computing. Cloud computing is one of the greatest new development in the technology area that allows users to use services through the Internet. For this reason, it is possible to access the information stored in the cloud from any place in the world without caring about infrastructure such as e-mails, text and spreadsheet documents, and more. It is just necessary to have a simple internet connection, and all the data will be available. However, some concerns must be taken into consideration. All the user data is stored in data centers spread along the world. The user does not know where his/her information is stored and most times, does not know what kind of information about his/her activity is being recorded and who is managing it. This research paper will describe the Cloud computing. It will point out its many benefits, and its ethical, legal and social concerns. What is Cloud computing? According to Arutyunov (2012), the first time that cloud computing technology was commented was in the 1960s by John McCarthy. However, just a few years ago, in 2008, the
CLOUD COMPUTING 3 technology was introduced to the public (p. 173). Big companies like Google, Amazon, Microsoft, and others started to use their IT infrastructure to provide some services via the Internet. Hurwit, Bloor, Raufman and Halper (2009) define cloud as the next stage in evolution of the Internet. The cloud in cloud computing provides the means through which everything... can be delivered to you as a service wherever and whenever you need (Computing on the Cloud section, para. 1). In other words, it is a data processing technology where servers deal with the data and the users do not need to worry about the infrastructure needed to do it. Benefits The main objective of the capitalism financial system is profit. Companies are always trying to increase the profit and to minimize the losses. One of the best ways to maximize profit is outsourcing. Organizations hire third-party companies to do trivial services for them. Outsourcing is very common in IT areas because companies do not want to spend many resources on it. For this reason, cloud computing is one of the best approaches to save money and time. Saving time and money is the most direct advantage to use cloud computing. When a company starts to use these kind of services, it frees internal IT resources to focus on the core business of the company. Also, scalability is another key word when talking about cloud computing s benefits. It means that an application can grow in resources to adapt itself according with its demand. Moreover, cloud computing providers allow easily add more computing power with a low price (Hurwit et al., 2009, Supporting business agility section, para. 1).
CLOUD COMPUTING 4 Security and privacy Privacy and security are two important aspects that must be taken into consideration when talking about cloud computing. Bilton (2009) wrote quoting Talbot in reference to cloud computing security risks: cloud computing actually poses several separate but related security risks. Not only could stored data be stolen by hackers or lost to breakdowns, but a cloud provider might mishandle data or be forced to give it up in response to a subpoena (para. 3). After users upload their information to the cloud via simple services (e.g. online backup, social networks, e-commerce), the information is distributed to different datacenters, but this depends on how the cloud provider s infrastructure is configured. Big datacenters are always targets of hacker attacks. If there is some problem in the network configuration, a hacker could enter in and have access to all the information stored there. Moreover, datacenter s employees can also see the files when managing them. For instance, an employee could have access to a list of a user s financial information and try to make profit of it selling the information to third-parties. Legal issues Using cloud computing, some legal issues could also be raised. According to Agarwal (2010), the physical location of the data, the responsibility for the data and intellectual property rights must be taken into consideration before buying cloud computing services. If the data is stored in a different country from where the customer lives, they could be under different laws and the local government could apply regulations that the user does not know which would make him/her incompliance with the law. Moreover, the responsibility for data must be clear for the users. Cloud computing providers must offer insurance for the data stored into their infrastructure once they are vulnerable to disasters. Finally yet importantly, the customer needs
CLOUD COMPUTING 5 to be aware if the location where the data is stored has weak laws about property rights or if the providers partners, usually third party companies, have access to or use the data. Ethical issues Nowadays IT professionals are making some decisions related to cloud computing that could have important results in the future. These professionals have been making decisions about how to manage and store the data. However, they must analyze ethical concepts when making such decisions. Miller (2010) points out an idea to apply ethical methods of utilitarianism to the cloud computing technology, which would consider it everyone's utility. In other words, IT professionals must be able to develop new policies, standards and designs considering everyone who will utilize cloud computing. Protecting everyone s interests disregarding aspects like if the customer is an ordinary citizen, a big company or the government (p. 7). Social issues Cloud computing has many benefits, but it is has a cost. For instance, if more computing resources such as storage, network bandwidth, etc. are needed, they must be purchased. However, sometimes, depending on the resources added by the user, the cost could be very high making it unaffordable. Miller (2010) had said before that one of the kind of people who will be disadvantaged with cloud computing would be those who cannot pay for use the service (p. 9). When using some service on the cloud computing, for instance, a small company could not have the same resources/tools available that he biggest player in the same business has. This might make the small company be not able to compete with the biggest one. Also, individual users or
CLOUD COMPUTING 6 small companies might not have the same attention to solve issues related to the service from the cloud computer provider that the biggest ones have. Conclusion In short, cloud computing has many benefits, but it also has different issues that could be raised. When stored in big datacenter around the world, the data could become a target for hacker attacks or be misused by cloud computer providers employees. Moreover, stored in different locations, the data could be under other laws that their owners are not familiar. In addition, professionals involved with cloud computing must ensure that cloud computing does not become a service where just a few users can use it. No different from any new technology in a capitalist world, cloud computing was first commercialized and then its pros and cons were taken into consideration.
CLOUD COMPUTING 7 References Agarwal, A. (2010, July 27). The legal issues around cloud computing. Retrieved February 10, 2014 from http://www.labnol.org/internet/cloud-computing-legal-issues/14120/. Agarwal writes columns about technology in several media publications what makes him a good source regarding new technology. His posting describing the legal issues related to cloud computing points out three topics that must be taken into consideration before purchasing or signing up a cloud service. This makes the posting a perfect source for writing about the legal issues involving cloud computing. Arutyunov, V.V. (2012). Cloud computing: Its history of development, modern state, and future considerations. Scientific and Technical Information Processing. 39(3). 173-178. doi: 10.3103/S0147688212030082 In this article, the author describes the history and future consideration about cloud computing. Also, some advantages and disadvantages are listed. The article is a good source for understanding the history of cloud computing and its consequences to the future, once was written by a doctor of Technical Science who is a professor at the Russian State University for the Humanities in Russia, a prestigious university in Russia. Bilton, N. (2009, December 24). Is our data too vulnerable in the cloud? The New York Times. Retrieved February 12, 2014 from http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/12/24/is-our-datatoo-vulnerable-in-the-cloud/. Bilton wrote an article in a technology section in the newspaper New York Times reviewing the latest David Talbot. He uses Talbot s work trying to warn the public about the
CLOUD COMPUTING 8 security aspects in the cloud. Bilton s comments are very solid and supported by Talbot s arguments that where published in the MIT Technology Review, a bimonthly magazine issued by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Hurwitz, J., Bloor, R., Kaufman, M. & Halper F. (2009). Cloud computing for dummies. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley Pub. The authors wrote in this book key concepts related to cloud computing including its benefits, how it works, how to implement it in a company and much more. The source provides a better understand about cloud computing because it tries to avoid or explain many technical keywords that are related to the topic. This book is one publication of the For Dummies series and was written by four strategy consultants in cloud computing and other IT topics. Miller, K. W. (2010). Ethical Analysis in the Cloud. IT Professional, 12(6), 7-9. doi:10.1109/mitp.2010.146 Miller, who is a professor of the College of Education at the University of Missouri and has computer ethics as of his research s topics, explains that it is not difficult to apply ethical analysis to IT decisions. He points out three ideas showing how ethics could be applied to situations involving cloud computing by IT professionals. These ideas were written in form of an article published in a prestigious journal, the IT Professional that is a bimonthly publication of the IEEE Computer Society for the IT professionals.