Google-China Standoff Raises Dust for Cloud Security

by Curt Hall

Google's recent revelation that some of it services, including its hosted (cloud-based) Gmail service (and possibly other offerings), had been breached by hackers operating from inside of China, once again, has people questioning the viability of the cloud model for enterprise applications. The logic goes something like this: If the IT wizards at Google can't secure cloud systems, who really can? But is this fair? And from our point of view, what does it mean for cloud-based BI and analytics? Let's consider.