Oracle cloud computing forum. Input wanted.

[kgun]

I am going to participate on an Oracle cloud computing forum february 18 2010.

If some of you are interested in this topic, I want your feedback to questions / topics that I can pose in the round table conference that I am invited to participate in after the lectures. I can give a short summary here of the discussion and interesting subjects that may interest some of you. No feedback to this thread indicate little interest for this subject.

A place to start: http://www.webproworld.com/discussio...tml#post393401

[wige]

Being somewhat security minded, my questions would involve the security aspects - how is the flow of data within the cloud secured, how is compliance with regulations such as HIPAA and PCI verified, and how much visibility would the owner of data have into the replication of their data - where in the cloud the data has been replicated and the security/compliance situation of those nodes.

[kgun]

... how is the flow of data within the cloud secured, how is compliance with regulations such as HIPAA and PCI verified, ...?

My bolding.

These concepts are new to me. The closest I come is: Compliance Solutions for Oracle - SOX, PCI, HIPAA — Integrigy Corporation .

Can you explain in greater detail?

[wige]

PCI-DSS deals with the security of financial and credit card information, while HIPAA is a federal regulation in the United States regarding the minimum security requirements for the protection of medical records. Both of these standards set out a minimum set of requirements that servers containing protected information must meet. Since data in the cloud can exist on any member server, and be backed up, what measures are in place to verify that the data is stored, replicated, backed up, and, when necessary, disposed of in accordance with these regulations? What kind of auditing is available so that in the event of a compromise or audit the location, status and access records of every instance of the protected data can be accounted for?

Also, medical and financial data has to be transferred at a specific minimum level of encryption, even as it moves from one area in the cloud to another. Some clouds have been shown not to encrypt this traffic at all. How is this being addressed within the Oracle cloud?

The cited document only refers to a product which monitors traditional Oracle databases for compliance. Cloud computing adds a new dimension to securing sensitive data since the data can exist in multiple places, and can be moved as demands on the data changes.

[kgun]

The short answer is that you should encrypt sensitive data that is stored in the cloud. So the responsibility is on yourself. Encrypt sensitive data or don't store them in the cloud.

There was relatively much on Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2) . Amazon is one of the companies that is in front of using the technology.

One example: You need paralell computing power to test something that can not be easily done without buying (a) new computer(s). You can buy (a) virtual server(s) from Amazon to solve the problem and destroy the server(s) once the project is finished. Amazon is becoming one of the biggest online super stores that also sell (hosting) servicese (free computing power).

One of the most interesting lectures were held by German Dr. Stefan Ried Stefan Ried (StefanRied) on Twitter

Bio:

Forrester Analyst for Middleware, SaaS, Cloud and ERP platforms. Forrester Research

Google (suggest) KW's related to the seminar:

Oracle cloud

Amazon cloud

private cloud

public cloud

virtual cloud

hybrid cloud

IaaS

PaaS

Saas

Where

I = Infrastructure

P = Platform

S = Software

aaS = as a Service.

Two key elements in cloud computing (services):

1. Reduce costs (if it is not paid, it is not cloud computing according to Dr. Ried).
2. Make the technology available fast.

An example of a project where the Amazon ec2 service is used. One per cent of our galaxy shall be photograped by taking one picture / millisecond.

On a single machine the project will take 30 years to finish. Using the Amazon cloud computing service the time will be considerably reduced. Paralell processing is the Kw.