Business LawData Security & Privacy

Federal Government ‘Up in the Air’ Over Cloud Computing

Vivek Kundra’s tenure as the Nation’s first Chief Information Officer will likely be remembered for designating much of the federal government’s IT architecture towards cloud-based services.  The former CIO’s vision has recently come under scrutiny by the two most prominent agencies within the U.S. government – the Pentagon and State Department.  While the main selling point for cloud-based technology is cost and scalability, both Pentagon and State Department officials still express deep concerns over the fallibility of its security.  According to The New York Times, “[a]ttacks from abroad this spring and summer on government systems and contractors have heightened concerns over security in defense and intelligence systems.”

“With the increasing frequency and sophistication of cyber attacks on defense systems, we are concerned with any new approaches that can introduce new risks[.]” Ms. Terri Takai, Pentagon Chief Information Officer

In addition to questions about security, critics of cloud computing are skeptical about its reliability.  This past April, Amazon Web Services had an outage that caused more than 30,000 service tickets to be issued to customers.  Until service providers like Amazon, Google, and Lockheed Martin can assure the general public at-large that the security, dependability, and reliability of cloud-based services is a stable choice for its technological needs, the migration into the “Clouds” will be slow for most government agencies who deal with a large volume of sensitive data (i.e. Social Security Department, State Department, Pentagon, etc.).

 

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