A cloud security solution maintains data integrity, confidentiality, and availability. It also manages authentication and authorization policies across hybrid deployments of public and private clouds. These solutions help organizations comply with industry regulations and internal policies and procedures.

Also read: Cloud Security Woes Give Rise to Integrated CNAP Platforms

How to Choose a Cloud Security Provider

A cloud security company can provide access to many resources that are critical to any business’s health. The best way to ensure you have a secure cloud environment is to enlist an organization that understands your industry and your needs as a client.

Cloud security vendors promise to protect your valuable data, but how do you know which one is best for your needs? Here are five factors to help determine if a cloud security provider can protect your cloud data.

Top-notch data protection

The first thing you need to look at when evaluating a cloud security provider is their data protection abilities. Ensure they have all your bases covered, including backups and offsite storage solutions in case of emergencies or natural disasters – or ransomware.

Ask about their contingency plans and make sure they’re up-to-date and well thought out. Are there any situations where customers would be without access to their information? What kind of customer support is available? These are some of the questions you should ask before choosing a cloud security provider.

Multi-cloud, misconfigurations and more

Cloud services and SaaS apps tend to be pretty good at protecting data; cloud security services are largely about protecting your data between your environment and the service. There are many options to consider, like workload protection, configuration monitoring, application and network security and performance monitoring, support for multi-cloud and hybrid environments, and more. Be sure to get the protection you need.

Resiliency

Another key factor to consider when choosing a cloud security provider is how much redundancy and resiliency they have built in. Do they use high availability software so your data isn’t lost in an emergency? Do servers failover so nothing is lost? What is their track record on uptime?

Consider pricing

When looking at different cloud security providers, consider their rates and contracts. Some may charge more for 24/7 phone support than others. Also, some companies may offer more affordable long-term contracts, while others may only provide month-to-month agreements. 

Look at their customer reviews

Before signing any agreement with a new company, take some time to read reviews from other customers who have used them in the past. You can better understand what to expect when working with them. 

Check for certifications and qualifications

Check if your potential cloud security provider has certifications and qualifications that confirm they’re up to the task of securing your data. It’s also important to note whether or not they are compliant with privacy regulations and standards like HIPAA or PCI-DSS. Many organizations require compliance as part of their contract terms.

Also read: Cloud Security Best Practices

Top 10 Cloud Security Solution Providers

The best cloud security solutions help keep your data safe from internal and external threats while making sharing information with customers and employees easier. As more businesses adopt cloud technology, choosing a provider that can meet all of your needs is essential. Here are some top cloud security solution providers to include in your research.

Check Point

The Check Point CloudGuard platform is a cloud-based service designed to help enterprises protect their data from advanced threats, detect zero-day attacks and stop them before they spread across a network. In addition, it offers full visibility into all traffic going in and out of an organization’s network.

Check Point’s networking, and security solutions offer integrated protection against traditional and emerging threats. CloudGuard makes sure that organizations’ data is protected while enabling secure migration to and from public cloud services.

The solution also helps secure hybrid clouds by providing visibility into all workloads across physical, virtual and cloud environments. This unique approach enables enterprises to control their network infrastructure, whether on-premises or in a public or private cloud environment.

With CloudGuard’s single unified console, IT administrators can centrally manage security policies across multiple cloud infrastructures without worrying about moving resources between them or maintaining multiple management consoles.

CloudPassage Halo

A key part of any cloud security strategy should be visibility into cloud apps and workloads running in virtual environments. CloudPassage’s Halo, a SaaS solution, constantly scans data storage repositories, detects unauthorized access attempts, and alerts security teams.

Halo also collects evidence needed to take action against threats so they can be stopped before they cause damage. The solution supports AWS, Azure, Google Cloud Platform (GCP), IBM Cloud, OpenStack and VMware.

Prisma Cloud – Palo Alto Networks

Palo Alto Networks’ Prisma Cloud is a cloud-native security platform built to deliver automated, continuous protection of cloud-native applications. The solution leverages machine learning and behavioral analysis to identify threats and provide deep visibility into user activity. Using an agentless approach, it supports AWS Lambda functions, serverless containers, and Kubernetes clusters with policy-based enforcement of security best practices.

Prisma Cloud can be used as a standalone product or as part of Palo Alto Networks’ Next-Generation Security Platform.

Symantec cloud workload protection

Symantec’s Cloud Workload Protection (CWP) offers strong protection against malware and other threats. CWP is available as a standalone product or can be purchased as part of Symantec’s suite of security products. The software is installed on each workload instance in your public cloud environment to protect them from cyberattacks.

It automates security for public cloud workloads, enabling business process improvement, reduced risk, and cost savings. Additionally, it protects your data and applications by continuously monitoring all activity within an instance. If suspicious activity is detected, CWP blocks access to compromised files and alerts you so that you can take action.

The platform also monitors network traffic between workloads and services, providing additional protection against external attacks. By leveraging automation technology, CWP works with your existing IT infrastructure to deliver consistent security across public clouds.

Threat Stack

Threat Stack’s cloud security platform provides all cloud workloads visibility, monitoring, and alerting capabilities. Threat Stack allows you to track the change in applications over time, map vulnerabilities and misconfigurations, monitor application performance and security controls, and automatically identify changes in your environment indicative of an attack.

The solution uses supervised learning technology to detect suspicious behavior on your cloud infrastructure. Once deployed, Threat Stack can help customers understand how their public clouds perform at a granular level through continuous analysis of data from log events and system metadata.

Qualys

Qualys’ cloud security platform offers various services, including vulnerability management, web application scanning, network security monitoring and log analysis. Qualys can also be integrated with other cloud-based applications to ensure that all applications in your infrastructure are secure.

The platform offers a unified environment that provides visibility into security and compliance issues for your entire organization—and it’s also easy to use. It monitors containers, endpoints, mobile devices and virtual machines, making it one of the best solutions for companies looking to build or update their security strategy.

Datadog

This cloud-monitoring tool offers analytics, monitoring, alerting and app integration, giving you complete control over your data infrastructure. Datadog provides dashboards with visualizations of data flow so that you can quickly spot security problems as they happen. Alerts can be sent via email or Slack when key performance indicators are breached.

App integrations offer more detail into traffic patterns to help you optimize data usage across your infrastructure. Datadog helps you identify potential threats to your network before they become a problem. With features like automatic log correlation, cross-platform support and multi-cloud capabilities, Datadog is an excellent choice for businesses looking to protect their data cost-effectively. It’s also a great option if you need visibility into multiple applications on multiple platforms.

Fortinet

Fortinet provides cloud engineers complete visibility into all cloud resources and a single platform to enforce policies across public, private and hybrid clouds. With a comprehensive set of security services that can be deployed across any environment, customers can protect their infrastructure from advanced threats.

Fortinet provides Cloud Security Hub, an integrated solution that protects workloads running in both physical and virtual environments. This solution helps organizations monitor, detect and respond to cyberattacks in real-time by integrating multiple layers of security technology, including firewall, antivirus, intrusion prevention system (IPS), next-generation firewall (NGFW) and unified threat management (UTM).

It is fully scalable to meet growing demands as a business grows. It also includes automated deployment capabilities for faster provisioning without affecting performance or causing downtime.

Cisco

Cisco is one of the most well-known providers of cloud security. Their solutions protect your data, applications, and systems across all cloud environments. Cisco offers a wide range of cloud security solutions, including Cisco Umbrella for secure cloud access, Cisco Cloudlock for protection of SaaS applications, Cloud Email Security for blocking and remediating email threats, Stealthwatch Cloud for monitoring IaaS instances, and AppDynamics for application performance monitoring.

Enterprises can choose these solutions or combine them into their custom solution. Cisco’s core focus is protecting its customers’ networks from cyberattacks regardless of where they are hosted–the company offers support for public, private, and hybrid clouds.

CrowdStrike

CrowdStrike offers cloud security platforms that help organizations identify, investigate and respond to cyber attacks within their network. The platform lets users monitor network traffic, detect malware and intrusions across endpoints, and quickly investigate attacks.

It also provides real-time intelligence for better incident response and threat prevention. In addition, it offers endpoint protection capabilities for laptops, desktops and mobile devices, as well as data loss prevention (DLP) for cloud environments. CrowdStrike features a machine learning engine, enabling its products to adapt to new threats and automatically reduce false positives.

Research Your Options Carefully

This list of top cloud security providers isn’t exhaustive, but it will give you a good idea of the features you need to protect your environment.

Once you’ve chosen a cloud security provider, test their services by conducting regular audits and tests. Not only will this help protect your organization against outside threats, but it can also ensure that your current service is performing correctly. Although most providers offer free trials or demo accounts, it may be worth investing in additional testing to ensure your data will be safe.

Read next: Top Cybersecurity Companies & Service Providers

The post Best Cloud Security Solutions appeared first on IT Business Edge.

However, data migration is a complicated and often expensive process. You will need the right approach to migrating data without error, including well thought-out strategies and appropriate tools.

Also read: Best Cloud Migration Vendors & Services

What is Data Migration?

Data migration refers to the process of transferring data from one storage system to another. It begins with data selection and preparation, during which extraction and transformation takes place. Following this step, permanent data is moved from the old storage system and loaded onto an appropriate data store. Then, the data migration ends with decommissioning the old storage system.

Data migration typically falls into one of two categories:

• Cloud Migration: Data or applications are migrated from a physical storage system to the cloud or between two cloud environments.
• Data Center Migration: Data is migrated from one on-premises data center to another for upgrading or relocation.

After decide where you’re going to migrate, next you need to determine what you need to migrate:

• Storage Migration: Data is moved from one physical storage solution to another.
• Database Migration: Structured, or database managed, data is moved using a database management system.
• Application Migration: Data is migrated from one computing environment to another to support a change in application software.
• Business Process Migration: Business applications and data related to business processes and metrics are migrated.

Why Do You Need Data Migration?

Organizations opt to upgrade their storage systems and consequentially migrate data for several reasons that ultimately help them gain a competitive advantage. Database migration helps companies overcome storage limitations and can facilitate better data management features and processing speed. On the other hand, storage migration is chiefly focused on upgrading to support new technology.

Other scenarios where you might find the need for data migration include:

• You want to upgrade to a new infrastructure to make up for size constraints.
• You want to optimize the overhead costs of running a data center.
• You need to merge new data following an acquisition.
• You need to relocate your data center.
• You want to implement a disaster recovery solution.
• You want to move an application to the cloud, for reasons ranging from ease of maintenance and access to cost

Strategies and Precursors to Data Migration

Strategizing in advance will help you save on costs and prevent downtime to ensure business continuity. It is essential to consider your limitations and understand the overall scope of your data migration project. There are two key factors that you need to consider before launching a data migration project, namely the size and time.

• Data Size: Most datasets are too big to be simply uploaded to the cloud and will need to be shipped on physical devices. This is primarily because of speed and cost constraints. You can send data below 10TB through standard drives, while larger data in the petabyte range will need specialized devices meant for data migration.
• Time Constraints: Bandwidth, network speed and limitations, and dataset size are key considerations when calculating how much time a data migration will take. If data needs to be shipped on physical devices, that time should also be taken into account.

After considering data size and time constraints, you can formulate your project budget and timeline. You also need to decide on the tools and framework for database migration. This will give you an overview of the entire process of data migration.

In addition, you will also need to decide on the migration approach, i.e., to pick between the big-bang approach and doing it in one go or the trickle approach–where you migrate in phases with both systems operating side-by-side.

Also read: 5 Cloud Migration Strategies

Key Steps to Data Migration

Data migration is one of the most critical projects your company will undertake, requiring careful efforts at every step. The reason behind the complexity is that you do not want to compromise data quality, as data-driven businesses will suffer errors in core operations otherwise.

After planning, there are roughly five more stages to data migration:

1. Data preparation involves some key actions targeted at making the data suitable for the migration. Beginning with auditing, an automated process is run to analyze data quality and inform you about inconsistencies, duplicate entries, or poor health. Next, you back up files and establish access levels.
2. Data mapping involves matching the data field between the source and the new destination.
3. Execution is where data is extracted, processed, and loaded to the destination.
4. Testing is ideally a continuous process in data migration, especially when you are migrating data in phases. Once the entire migration process is complete, you need to run another iteration of automated testing, fix the issues, and proceed to go live.
5. Auditing the data again once it is live is necessary to ensure successful completion. You should also run timely audits and monitor the system’s health.

Tools of Migration

There are numerous tools that can assist you through the migration process. And many cloud providers offer their own set of tools. Other tools, including several free and open-source applications such as Data Loader by Salesforce, are also available. Like the migration types, the migration tools can be self-scripted, on-premises, and cloud-based. Other major tools include Amazon’s AWS Data Pipeline, IBM Informix, and Microsoft Azure CosmosDB.

Also read: Successful Cloud Migration with Automated Discovery Tools

Challenges in Data Migration

Data migration is inherently complex, and there are likely going to be several challenges when carrying out this project in your organization.

• Failing to include concerned parties might disrupt your business activities and the data migration process in general. Keep them updated on a weekly basis about the progress.
• Lack of data governance or clarity about who has access to the data in the source system can create confusion and hamper data quality. A clearly defined data governance framework is essential to overcome this challenge.
• A generic and unproven migration method might do more harm than good. Always look for a reliable testimonial-backed service provider, and pick an experienced team.
• Insufficient skills and inadequate tools can both lead to unexpected delays and cost you valuable time. Give it due to research and ensure that the team assigned with data migration is sufficiently trained and has all the necessary tools.
• Planning is indispensable. It might not be sufficient by itself to guarantee successful migration, but it is necessary.

Ready to Migrate Your Data?

While data migration might not sound too daunting in theory, it is a complex process with many variables that must be figured out beforehand. Therefore, you’ll need a specialized team to execute and monitor the data migration process and treat it like a major project.

You can also take advantage of several premium and open-source applications to help you with your data migration. Like the migration types, migration tools can be self-scripted, on-premises, and cloud-based, giving you plenty of flexibility to proceed with your data migration in a way that’s best for your company.

Although it is a major undertaking, you can proceed without hesitation once you have given it due thought.

Read next: Top 7 Data Management Trends to Watch in 2022

The post Strategies for Successful Data Migration appeared first on IT Business Edge.

The Risks of Cloud and Third-Party Apps

While cloud and third-party applications make it easier for businesses to operate, they introduce their own set of security risks. Organizations have less control over third-party apps than they would if they built them in-house. And because of this, more people and applications have access—not just employees.

Third-party applications open a backdoor into the business network that organizations don’t always secure on their own. In the SolarWinds breach, for example, attackers were able to gain access to the Orion monitoring platform, which gave them valuable cybersecurity information on thousands of organizations and access to their networks. Unfortunately, SolarWinds didn’t discover the breach for nine months, meaning the attackers gained nine months of knowledge and access. While AI may not have prevented the initial breach, it likely could have identified the intrusion much faster.

In addition to third-party risks, more applications in the cloud means more places for attackers to hide or breach to gain access to the network. Because the threat surface is distributed across the cloud, there are also more potential attackers posing as customers, partners and even employees.

Learn How to Prevent Third-Party Vulnerabilities.

Why is AI an Effective Security Measure?

With the larger attack surface, businesses should include AI as a baseline technology in their security measures. Human error causes approximately 88 percent of all security breaches.  AI solves that by automating repetitive tasks and monitoring more traffic at one time than humans can. It also never gets tired or makes an error, ensuring that remediation tactics are consistent every time. 

Another significant benefit of using AI for cybersecurity is behavioral analysis. Most cybersecurity AI monitoring tools can track normal behaviors of customers, employees, or partners, enabling AI to quickly identify anything out of the norm as different users use their cloud applications.

For example, if an employee in Chicago is only ever logged in from 9 AM to 5 PM during the week, and typically uses an application by visiting pages A, B, and C in that order, but suddenly the credentials are used to access sensitive information at 2 AM on a Saturday from Tokyo making initial requests to page C, AI can block the request and flag it for IT to investigate or challenge.

AI can also train itself through intent-based algorithms that watch and learn normal patterns of behavior and uses that to flag questionable or bad behavior.  However, with this model, the security is only as good as the data scientists who created the algorithms, since the AI will do exactly what it was programmed to do as it learns – not more or less. If organizations work with knowledgeable and experienced data scientists who understand algorithm biases and how unintended consequences can cause problems, AI is one of the best security measures they can have in place.

CloudSecOps is a Battle of Algorithms

The unfortunate reality is that bad actors already employ AI to power their attacks in the form of bots. If that’s the case, businesses can’t afford not to include AI in their cybersecurity processes to keep up. Cloud security operations (CloudSecOps) is a battle between good AI and bad AI. Good AI needs automation and strong policy enforcement to be effective, which means businesses need to work with expert data scientists to build strong policies into the algorithms.

Additionally, human cybersecurity experts can’t shut down bad bots as fast as attackers create them, meaning businesses need AI incorporated into their CloudSecOps to stand a fighting chance. AI also has the ability to infinitely scale while protecting applications by differentiating between good bots, like those used by search engines to index a website, and bad bots that cause harm. 

To protect against today’s threats, the best security strategies use a proactive approach. Human security analysts can only be reactive, responding to security threats after they occur. Yet, AI allows for a proactive approach by providing real-time monitoring of the attack surface and prompting action to advance security measures. Cybersecurity experts can best use their skills to build logic to remediate threats by working with data scientists to improve AI algorithms.

Security Has to Be a Priority with CloudOps

Cybersecurity can’t be an afterthought when it comes to CloudOps. It has to be built in from the beginning, using AI to automate and enforce security policies. It’s important to remember that current capabilities are always changing. Even if an organization addressed security during its first cloud migration, it may not be keeping up with emerging threats or taking advantage of current AI technologies.

Businesses that already have CloudOps or are considering a cloud migration need to revisit current AI capabilities to see how they can help improve their security landscape and put them on a more proactive footing. And if they don’t already have experienced data scientists on staff, they should consider hiring or partnering with companies that can provide their services to determine how to best build their next CloudSecOps organization.

Ready to improve your CloudSecOps? Check out our guide to Cloud Security Best Practices.

Mike O’Malley is the SVP of strategy at SenecaGlobal, a leading software development as-a-service company specializing in digital transformation. He has been in product development for 20+ years leading development, product management, marketing, and M&A in the tech space.

Throughout his career, Mike has combined deep engineering knowledge with business acumen to help companies figure out what creates success in the market for a product or solution. Then he builds and coaches teams to make it happen again and again. Mike holds a Bachelor of Science and a Master of Science degree in electrical engineering and a Master of Business Administration from the University of Illinois.

The post Leveraging AI to Secure CloudOps as Threat Surfaces Grow appeared first on IT Business Edge.

But as the cloud becomes more pervasive, it may be tougher to keep up the growth.

“More and more of those workloads will live in the cloud, but that will take time, and inevitably, some of them will probably never move over,” said AWS CEO Adam Selipsky at last year’s VMworld conference.

The reality of increasingly demanding regulations, especially in financial services in healthcare, is proving to be an obstacle for cloud growth.

According to Gartner, about 65% of the world’s population will have their data covered by privacy regulations. This is up from 10% in 2020. In light of this, it should be no surprise that enterprises still see on-premises environments as a good option.

“The last great barrier to migrating IT to the cloud is addressing the understandable fears of the chief information security officer (CISO) regarding data security,” said Ayal Yogev, CEO and co-founder of Anjuna Security. “There’s good reason to be concerned; workloads and data executed and stored in the public cloud expose data to too many people—good and bad.”

Yet, there are emerging innovations in security to make it more palatable to migrate sensitive workloads to the cloud. One of them is confidential computing, which provides security at the chip level. It has been showing lots of traction during the past few years.

Also read: 5 Emerging Cloud Computing Trends for 2022

What is Confidential Computing?

Simply put, data has three states. It can be at rest, in use, or in transit.

It’s true that data can be encrypted while it is in the first two states, yet there are still vulnerabilities when it is in use or being processed. The reason is that before the application can be executed, the data is temporarily unencrypted, allowing just enough time for an intrusion.

To secure this data, there needs to be another layer of protection, which is embedded in the central processing unit (CPU). This is called a trusted execution environment (TEE), or enclave, which uses embedded encryption keys. The result is that the data remains protected while in memory.

“Memory and other resources will be protected by cryptographic keys that prevent unauthorized access to the data,” said Ben Richardson, senior software engineer at SecureW2. “Encrypting data in memory means it can’t be read by software that isn’t authorized to do so … even if the unauthorized software is running on the same physical server as the data.”

In 2016, Intel launched the first confidential computing system with its SGX platform. Since then, many other large vendors have adopted the technology, including IBM, Amazon, Advanced Micro Devices, Alibaba, Google, and Nvidia.

Also read: The ABCs of Smart Cloud Migration

Why Confidential Computing is Important

While working with third-party cloud providers can result in lower costs, there is the issue of trust and knowing whether the company is doing enough with security.

But with confidential computing, there is a zero-trust security. That is, the cloud provider does not have access to the data because there is no time when it lacks encryption. This certainly provides for confidence in moving workloads to the cloud.

“Confidential computing is ushering in a new era to enable analytics of sensitive data without violating privacy and confidentiality requirements,” said Baffle CEO Ameesh Divatia. “It will address a significant roadblock for enterprises wishing to migrate to the cloud because it prevents cloud administrators from being able to view their customers’ data.”

A report from Gartner predicts that by 2025 about 65% of large organizations will use one or more privacy-enhancing computations approaches. The report highlights that confidential computing will be one of the most important.

The Challenges and Future of Confidential Computing

Even though confidential computing has much promise, there are still some lingering issues.  For example, it can require substantial processing compute to enable it.

“Cloud providers are creating a dedicated infrastructure that supports confidential computing, but this approach creates a hardware dependency that may restrict customers’ ability to run across disparate cloud providers or pursue a multicloud strategy,” said Divatia.  “Existing application and database environments will need to be redesigned to work with confidential computing; although, there is scope for innovation to minimize the operational burden.”

Another problem is that it can be complicated to set up and manage. The fact is you need a team with deep technological skills.

Yet, startups are already beginning to address this issue. And given the importance of cloud migration, there will likely be more investment in confidential computing. It definitely helps that there has already been adoption from large chip manufacturers.

“With the rise of data consolidation in the cloud and the accompanying need for secure data sharing, organizations will need to protect their sensitive data in the cloud with new computation models that incorporate privacy-preserving analytics and innovative architectural models,” said Divatia.

Read next: Cloud Security Best Practices for 2022

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5G and Edge Computing

5G and edge computing are technologies that can capitalize on a symbiotic relationship to empower a new generation of smart devices and applications. Through its increased performance, 5G can enhance edge computing applications by reducing latency, bettering application response times, and improving the ability of enterprises to collect and process data.

The number of edge devices increases every day, with their capabilities continuously evolving. Internet of Things (IoT) devices are also becoming more sophisticated, as they can collect more types of data. The data generated by these devices fuels the need for actionable insights to help enterprises stay atop of trends, forecast new products and services, and create a competitive advantage.

Human beings generate more than 2.5 exabytes of data daily. Imagine remotely sending approximately 1.7 megabytes per second for each person on earth to be processed centrally.

This would result in strained network resources, which yields performance degradation due to latency, roundtrip delays, and poor use of bandwidth. This data deluge, the struggles of moving it, and the inefficiencies of remote data processing reinforce the need for 5G and edge computing to be leveraged together.

Additionally, more responsibility is being placed on edge devices as the COVID-19 pandemic brought about a shift to traditional workforce patterns. And with the ever-increasing quality of edge computing use cases and the data requirements these implementations have, a shorter control loop is necessary to satisfy the need for near real-time responsiveness.

As such, 5G is a network infrastructure that can support and enable the increasing complexity and specialization of edge computing.

Also read: Best Enterprise 5G Network Providers 2022

Benefits of the Relationship Between 5G and Edge Computing

Ultra-low latency use cases

Combining 5G and edge computing is critical in attaining ultra-low latency in various edge devices and use cases.

Considering the increasing need for high reliability and ultra-low latency communications for use cases in smart factories, healthcare, intelligent transportation, smart grids, and entertainment and media among others, pairing 5G and edge computing enables such ultra-low latency applications to reach their full effectiveness.

Near real-time performance

Leveraging the combination of 5G and edge computing helps enterprises collect and process massive volumes of real-time data to optimize various operational systems and improve productivity and customer experiences. Enterprises can process and analyze data in the environments that yield the most value.

Carrying out processing and analysis close to where data was created brings enterprises close to near real-time performance for mission-critical applications.

Improved bandwidth usage

The relationship between 5G and edge computing impacts the success of 5G network technology. Edge computing helps ensure 5G is feasible when dealing with millions of devices connected to a 5G network.

In the absence of edge computing, all these devices would be transmitting data directly to the cloud. This would, in turn, push the bandwidth requirement for transmission to the cloud to an overwhelming level and counter the effectiveness of a 5G network.

Advancement of emerging technologies

High-speed connectivity coupled with data processing at the edge is critical for the advancement of technologies, such as artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML), augmented reality (AR), and virtual reality (VR). The advancement of these technologies is important, as they have the potential to revolutionize entire industries and enable boundless innovation as entirely new applications are made feasible.

Specifically, by moving compute closer to data, 5G and edge computing improve the ability to innovate, as this opens up the ability to infuse AI and machine learning into edge solutions, which opens up new possibilities for use cases and business models. It also opens up the possibilities for IoT solutions.

The pairing of 5G and edge computing and their impact on AI, ML, and IoT makes smart cities more feasible and provides a foundation to innovate further as compute and network challenges are minimized.

Another example of an area where limited deployment has the potential to be erased by 5G and edge computing is telemedicine. Industrial automation also stands to benefit from much more effective and creative solutions. Manufacturing could finally realize a truly intelligent and integrated supply chain to improve efficiency.

Also read: 5G and AI: Ushering in New Tech Innovation

Potential Drawbacks

• Greater attack surface: As 5G edge use cases become more ubiquitous, the attack surface becomes larger. This is seen as worthwhile to threat actors, as the likelihood of a successful attack is increased.
• Complexity: Enterprises may be drawn to the use cases of the technologies but fail to grasp the regulatory requirements; financial implications; and potential technical issues, such as massive scale, rate of change, and variability.
• Modular Ecosystem: The connectivity ecosystem proves to be challenging to navigate due to its increasingly modular nature. As such, there are many solutions to consider with different costs and varying levels of performance and control.

Enterprise Use Cases

Augmented reality and virtual reality

Enterprise consumers can enjoy more immersive real-time collaboration, as employees in different locations can collaborate on and manipulate the same virtual objects. Smart glasses can also help revolutionize maintenance, repairs, and operations as well as relay instructions to employees using AR to help them correctly carry out tasks.

AR and VR headsets can be used to train new employees. They can learn how to carry out various roles and tasks with minimal errors. 5G edge enables AR and VR in sales and marketing, allowing prospective clients to enjoy immersive virtual previews of products and services. For example, users can enjoy virtual tours of real-world properties or locations as well as virtually try out fashion and cosmetic products.

Manufacturing

Edge computing and 5G combine to improve oil and gas, food and beverage, and consumer goods manufacturing. Edge computing can be implemented at distribution and remote pumping sites. These sites can be connected to a main autonomous system using 5G. Infrastructure can also be upgraded to ensure these sites can handle 5G data requirements.

Another edge computing and 5G deployment involves monitoring environmental controls of food and beverage items in transit to maintain the quality of perishable products. Centralized production analytics can be replaced with distributed edge systems in consumer goods manufacturing. These edge systems can use a private network to connect to supply partners.

Moving Forward with 5G and Edge Computing

Enterprises can start by understanding the value and implications of 5G and edge computing from a technological as well as business perspective. They can then identify challenges or opportunities that 5G and edge computing can help them overcome or capitalize on.

At this point, developing a 5G and edge computing strategy will help ensure the intended use cases are aligned not only with the enterprise but also with the technologies. This also helps the enterprises to effectively implement use cases and make sure the technology is naturally evolving with the implementation.

Read next: Edge AI: The Future of Artificial Intelligence and Edge Computing

The post Understanding the Relationship Between 5G and Edge Computing appeared first on IT Business Edge.

As cloud technology evolves, it’s important to bring the customer along the cloud journey to ensure seamless adoption. There can’t be a mismatch between the goals of the business, company culture, crucial pain points, and IT department. So, how can you continue helping your customers innovate while staying true to your cloud journey?

Provide a Clear Understanding of Cloud Migration Benefits

Many businesses and leaders are jumping to adopt the cloud, with 30% of all IT budgets dedicated to cloud computing. As you, your organization and clients dive into the cloud journey, it’s important to consider the reasons that inspire most businesses to choose to migrate.

These are what will outline the end goal (or goals) for moving toward the cloud in the first place. Having the right alignment can ensure a clearer destination in your cloud journey and a better understanding of how to get there.

For most, cloud migration is driven by the need to cut technological costs, but that is only a part of the story. Be sure to highlight the additional benefits cloud migration can help ease aside from finances to your customers. For example, customer retention and onboarding can be eased through cloud technology, it can eliminate redundant technology at scale and increase efficiency, and more.

Have a dynamic discussion with your customers that asks the right questions, so you can determine which other benefits would align with your customers’ goals and how you can help them innovate as cloud technology evolves.

Conversations like these ensure that clients understand the bigger picture and understand how the cloud journey will benefit their business, not just your organization.

Also read: 5 Emerging Cloud Computing Trends for 2022

Be Realistic About Cloud Migration and Its Pitfalls

A major part of the cloud journey involves being realistic about your capabilities. As companies start on their cloud journey, they aren’t always honest with themselves, which can lead to slower results than previously anticipated and ultimately lead to friction with customers.

Think about the maturity of your company, and be honest about what you can and can’t do. This is crucial for determining whether your customers’ goals are feasible with where you want your cloud journey to take you.

There are so many paths to cloud adoption that the sheer number of options can be overwhelming, especially when analyzing what a perfect cloud implementation could look like. It is important to be realistic about how much change your organization can withstand at once and to try and keep your program simple, since it’s tempting to try to incorporate every cloud service and modernization tool all at once.

Instead, you should plan for these improvements incrementally over time and with the benefit of hindsight. By phasing in change and modernization over time, you have the ability to learn what is the right cloud program to generate the most value for your business, the market and your customers.

This reflection can better prepare you for some of the most common challenges cloud professionals face when moving to the cloud, including time and money, capability gaps, and building alignment. Thinking about the challenges can also ensure that your journey not only works well with customers but also with your people, organization, compliance, and more.

This conversation also ensures that customers feel like you are communicating thoroughly as you both go along this journey. Opening up about challenges allows for transparency and can educate customers on the ins and outs of the cloud and have them thinking through the constraints they may have in their own cloud migration.

Also read: Cloud Security Best Practices for 2022

Frameworks Can Help You Prep Ahead

For your migration to stay on track and meet the needs of both you and your customers, there needs to be a framework that highlights the guiding principles for how the system should be in place. Make sure to account for things like clearly defined thresholds in line with the customer’s cost model, clear expectations for compliance, and more.

Most importantly, a framework also needs to account for revision cycles. Remember, many customers won’t understand the technical aspects of cloud migration. Part of having them along for your journey stems from anticipating their needs.

You can and should educate them as much as possible, but at the end of the day, they will be more focused on the outcome. This means that if revisions take time or don’t go well, they can derail the entire migration process, costing time and money.

A framework also goes hand-in-hand with understanding your limitations and anticipating obstacles. Through a framework you can continue to communicate with customers throughout your cloud journey in an informed way, sharing where you are in the process and how this progress can impact their business needs.

Migrating to the cloud is an important step in any business. By engaging with your customers from day one, you will gain a better understanding of the destination, acknowledge the challenges, and establish a framework. In turn, you will not only innovate but will also account for your customers’ goals every step of the way.

Read next: The ABCs of Smart Cloud Migration

The post Why Cloud Integration Starts With Your Customers appeared first on IT Business Edge.

However, the emergence of cloud applications has changed that by enabling users to access corporate applications, documents, and services remotely. According to an IDG survey, 92% of organizations’ IT environment are at least partially stationed on the cloud today. However, cloud services come with the challenge and risk of data security in the cloud, which has called for new security tools and practices. 

For enterprises considering public cloud, security has been a major concern. As organizations move from offline to cloud networks and more sensitive data is put at risk, security must be at the forefront.

Typically, cloud service providers are responsible for the physical security of data centers and ensuring their systems are secure from cyberattacks. However, keeping data or running applications on an infrastructure not directly managed by the organization is seemingly insecure.

For organizations willing to safeguard their cloud environments, the following best practices can help ensure that critical data and applications don’t fall into the wrong hands.

Also read: The ABCs of Smart Cloud Migration

Best Practices for Cloud Security

Picking the right cloud service provider

With more external IT teams and an abundance of options, it becomes necessary to pick a cloud service provider weighted towards your set of needs. Selecting the right cloud service provider begins with conforming to their security certificates and compliances. Then, evaluate your organization’s precise security goals and compare the security measures offered by various service providers along with the mechanisms they use to protect applications and data. 

Ask detailed questions that go with your use case, industry, and regulatory requirements, and express other definitive concerns. The service provider’s architectural platform should be coherent with compliance standards that apply to your industry and organization. Another essential consideration is inquiring about the level and mode of support services. 

Understanding the shared responsibility model

In private data centers, the organization is responsible for handling all data security concerns. However, in the public cloud, providers share some of this burden. Clearly defining which security operations are handled by either party can lead to a successful security implementation in cloud environments. 

The shared responsibility security model varies according to each service provider and differs while using infrastructure as a service (IaaS) or platform as a service (PaaS). A clear-cut shared responsibility model ensures there is no gap in the security coverage of a system. Otherwise, obscurities in your shared responsibilities may leave certain areas of the cloud system unguarded and exposed to external threats.

Implementing identity and access management

In an increasingly heterogeneous technology environment, identity and access management (IAM) is crucial to safeguarding critical enterprise systems, assets, and information from unauthorized access. Identity and access management provides effective security for cloud environments by performing different security functions such as authentication, authorization, and provisioning of storage and verification. 

This authentication system helps manage access rights by verifying if the right person with the right privileges is accessing information stored on the cloud applications. Verification mechanisms may include physical or digital methods, such as public key infrastructure. In addition, setting access levels will further help control how much data a person can change or see even after gaining access.

Encrypting data

One of the key benefits of using cloud-based applications is that storing and transferring data becomes easy. However, organizations need to ensure that they do not simply upload the data on the cloud and forget about it. An additional step is to safeguard data uploaded on the cloud, known as encryption. 

Encryption makes the data concealed to unauthorized users by translating it into another form or code. Organizations should not only encrypt their data on the public cloud but also ensure encryption during transit when data is more vulnerable. These encryption services can be aided by cloud service providers or third-party vendors.

It is ideal to find encryption options that fit in with the existing workflow so that there is no need to take any additional precautions to ensure compliance.

Also read: ​​Best Managed Security Service Providers (MSSPs) 2022

Protecting user endpoints 

Cloud services give rise to a larger need for endpoint security. Users are bound to access cloud services through website browsers and personal devices. Therefore, businesses must deploy an endpoint security solution to secure end-user devices. They can protect data from vulnerabilities by initiating effective client-side security and enforcing users to update their browsers regularly. 

It is best to adopt a tool that includes internet security measures such as access verification tools, firewalls, antivirus, and mobile device security. In addition, automation tools also serve as a systematic solution in endpoint security concerns. 

Upskilling all employees

For a secure cloud computing experience, educating users should be the prime goal to enhance protection. The way users interact with the cloud applications will either expose the environment to cyberattacks or protect it.

Therefore, organizations must train all employees with cybersecurity fundamentals to identify anomalies and respond accordingly. This high level of awareness within teams can prevent attackers from obtaining access credentials to sensitive data and cloud computing tools. 

While standard practices such as generating strong passwords or recognizing phishing emails must be included in their training, users must also be aware of the risks associated with shadow IT. Consider high-level training and certification for more advanced users and administrators involved directly in implementing cloud security.

Also read: Cybersecurity Awareness for Employees: Best Practices

Maintaining logs and monitoring

With logging capabilities in the cloud infrastructure, organizations can help identify unauthorized activities. A logging and monitoring system will allow the security teams to quickly identify which individuals are making changes to the cloud environment, getting to the root of an issue faster. 

When an intruder gains access to the system and meddles with any settings or data, the logs will expose who is responsible and what kind of change has been made so that it can be acted upon quickly. In case of an unusual event, make sure alerts are set to occur the moment it begins. 

Keep Your Cloud Environments Secure

With the advancement of the cloud and faster connectivity, businesses of all sizes can seamlessly access tools, data, and services. The benefits of cloud-based workspaces outweigh those of traditional data centers, bringing a fresh set of challenges. However, that should not refrain organizations from using public cloud services. Businesses can minimize the risk and enjoy greater benefits by following best practices and implementing the right tools and strategies. 

The cloud environment has great potential, yet it may seem unfamiliar at first. However, you will gradually adapt to this environment as you move forward. In this process, one crucial aspect is to look for weak security points and strengthen them consistently. Misconfigured cloud infrastructures can lead to several invisible vulnerabilities that significantly increase an organization’s attack surface.

Enterprises and cloud service providers need to work with transparency and show interest in building and continually reconfiguring a safe cloud computing framework.

Read next: Top Cybersecurity Companies & Service Providers 2022

The post Cloud Security Best Practices for 2022 appeared first on IT Business Edge.

Each of these repatriations of applications from cloud back to on-prem infrastructure represents wasted time and resources. Why are some organizations able to generate value from the cloud and others not? How can you ensure that your migration will go smoothly and you will realize the business gains you expect from the cloud? In an area where the pace of innovation is matched only by the speed at which new jargon is created, it can be difficult to know where to start. After all, what exactly makes a cloud migration ‘smart’? 

Though the answer isn’t quite as simple as ABC, it’s a good place to start.  

A is for Automation 

IT decision makers planning a cloud migration often think they have two options:  

1. Move quickly: saving time and money in the short-term, but sacrificing precision and not taking advantage of the strategic benefits cloud can provide. 
2. Undertake a painstaking planning and development process: guaranteeing better outcomes, but requiring significant time and resources.  

But, there’s a third route available that offers the best of both worlds with the help of automation and AI. AI-based cloud migration applications can map thousands of customer data points and correlate them to an optimum migration pattern in minutes. What’s more, AI uses historical data to inform its conclusions, so it gets smarter with each migration, and lacks the same inherent biases as human teams, so can help to maintain objectivity and consistency in decision making.  

Pre-migration, automation can help you discover ‘unknown unknowns’, including: 

• Understanding app dependencies 
• Assessing technical feasibility 
• Weighing up on-premises vs. cloud costs 

Post-migration, automation can help by monitoring your cloud estate in real-time and providing intelligent modernization recommendations. Having completed a cloud migration, too many organizations adopt a ‘set it and forget it’ mentality. This leads to resource mismanagement and over-provisioning—ultimately resulting in poor performance, unnecessary spend, and security vulnerabilities. 

Also read: Successful Cloud Migration with Automated Discovery Tools

B is for Business Empowerment 

Let’s zoom out a bit. It’s now well understood that a cloud migration isn’t purely a technical project, but a business enablement initiative. In a recent survey of US businesses undertaking a large-scale cloud migration, 80% of respondents cited improving business agility and 71% cited reducing time to market as their key motivators. 

A smart migration should start by identifying the strategic benefits cloud can bring to your business. Perhaps your organization wants to start experimenting with machine learning capabilities like image recognition or voice analysis? All three of the major cloud providers have created general-purpose services to support this, which don’t require in-depth data science skills.  

Or maybe you want to build data-driven decision making into each stage of your value chain? The cloud offers greater data visibility, enabling you to more quickly make the right decisions.  

Once you’ve decided what you want to achieve, true cloud transformation depends on putting a comprehensive migration plan in place—one that takes your goals into account. This should include: 

• A migration strategy for each application. 
• A definition of the amount of change you’ll make to each application as it’s migrated. 
• How rapidly you can move applications through the migration process. 

Failure to do this can slow down your migration, cause you to miss dependencies, and lead to outages. Automation can help here, too—enabling you to effortlessly fly through painstaking mapping work that would otherwise take weeks.  

Also read: Creating a Cloud Migration Checklist

C is for Communication  

A successful cloud migration depends on effective communication and mutually understood goals. A clear migration communication strategy will ensure your entire organization is aligned and provide the right information to the right people:  

• C-suite: If they’re not directly involved, senior leaders need succinct information around costs, benefits, and expectations as well as a clear picture of what a successful migration would look like. 
• Management: While requiring less strategic information than the C-Suite, managers need to understand the details about how this change will affect their departments and the services they provide. 
• End users: A cloud migration is a significant cultural change. End users need to know when changes are taking place, how they will be affected, and who to turn to with any questions or issues.  

Cast your mind back five years, and organizations would typically start their cloud transformation project by building a landing zone. They’d then do a lighthouse application migration, start application assessments and continue in this vein. Only much further down the road would IT decision-makers think about a cloud education program.  

Nowadays, forward-thinking organizations are turning this timeline on their head—focusing on education and communication before starting the build process. Let’s take the example of one financial services organization recently supported by Cloudreach. The organization began its cloud transformation initiative with a cloud fluency program for 50 to 60 product leaders and C-Suite executives. Through a mixture of formal education and informal brainstorming sessions, it was able to uncover some unexpected strategic benefits of cloud—and engage decision-makers from all verticals. 

Of course, these are just three factors to consider when starting your smart cloud transformation—and they all depend on having the right team of experts in place to execute the project. Given the complex considerations involved in most cloud migrations, we could probably cover the whole alphabet and beyond!

Read next: Best Cloud Migration Vendors & Services 

The post The ABCs of Smart Cloud Migration appeared first on IT Business Edge.

Top Cloud Provider Comparison

• Amazon Web Services: Best for availability
• Microsoft Azure: Best for ease of use
• Google Cloud Platform: Best for analytics
• Alibaba Cloud: Best for pricing flexibility

Amazon Web Services: Best for availability

Amazon Web Services (AWS) has led the cloud IaaS market for many years, and it’s easy to understand why. AWS offers more services and features than any other cloud service provider, and it offers higher availability than most of its competitors. In fact, the AWS infrastructure has 81 Availability Zones in 25 regions around the world and guarantees a 99.99% uptime. 

AWS also offers a lot in the way of cybersecurity. It supports 90 security standards and compliance certifications and offers encryption for any service that interacts with customer data. AWS is a one-stop shop for virtually any cloud service, so it’s a clear choice for organizations needing versatility and advanced solutions.

Pros

• Limitless server capacity
• Flexible scalability
• Broad toolset
• Straightforward user interface

Cons

• Complicated pricing structure
• Difficult to manage costs effectively

Pricing

Though AWS is the leader of the cloud services market, its pricing structure is anything but straightforward. Though it does offer a pricing calculator, it can be hard to estimate exactly how much the services will cost because of how many different variables there are. However, AWS is one of the most affordable cloud solutions available. Plus, the Free Tier includes more than 100 products that can be expanded and scaled as needed. 

Read more: AWS Extends Scope of Cloud Storage Services

Microsoft Azure: Best for ease of use

Microsoft has long been a leader in the on-premises software market, so it makes sense that they were able to gain momentum quickly when they pivoted to cloud services with Azure. Plus, Azure was designed to work in tandem with other Microsoft products like Windows Server and Microsoft Office. This is a huge benefit for enterprises that are already using Microsoft tools. 

The breadth of solutions Azure offers isn’t as wide as AWS, and the products it does offer usually come with a bigger price tag than its competitors. However, Azure is one of the easiest cloud solutions to set up and manage. It supports Linux systems and container architectures, which is a unique value for open source environments.

Pros

• Integrates with other Microsoft products
• Supports Linux and container architectures
• User friendly
• Good for hybrid cloud environments

Cons

• More expensive than AWS
• Poorer performance than competitors

Pricing

Microsoft Azure’s pricing is also somewhat convoluted. The pay-as-you-go structure is based on a number of situational variables, so it’s difficult to understand how much the services will cost before committing. Azure offers a small number of services on a forever free basis, plus its most popular services on a 12-month free trial. On average, however, Azure costs more to deploy than AWS.

Read more: Azure Stack vs. Azure Cloud: Private vs. Public Cloud

Google Cloud Platform: Best for analytics

Google Cloud Platform (GCP) is the third most popular cloud service provider behind AWS and Azure. Though its track record with enterprise customers is relatively short, it does have a unique advantage over its competitors when it comes to analytics, automation, and networking. GCP’s artificial intelligence and machine learning tools are some of the most advanced of any in the cloud computing space.

Many customers choose to use GCP as a supplementary cloud service in a multi-cloud environment. Its live migration feature is useful for these customers because it enables VM migration in real time without any downtime. Additionally, Google’s Kubernetes framework is the foundation for most container environments, so GCP is an ideal solution for containerized app development. GCP might not be the biggest cloud provider on the market, but it’s growing rapidly and driving innovation on many fronts.

Pros

• Live migration
• Unparalleled data analytics
• Accessible customer support
• Good for multi-cloud environments

Cons

• More expensive than AWS
• Lower availability

Pricing

Google Cloud may be more expensive than AWS, but its pricing structure is more transparent. It offers a pricing calculator to understand exactly what costs to expect based on a number of variables using the pay-as-you-go pricing model. Google offers deep discounts and flexible contracts to draw customers from other cloud providers. There are also special tools and support channels to optimize costs.

Alibaba Cloud: Best for pricing flexibility

Alibaba Cloud is the top cloud service provider in China, so it’s a likely choice for enterprises with a large presence in the APAC region. However, Alibaba has rapidly expanded its reach to become a major competitor around the globe. It has a more flexible pricing structure than most providers, plus new customers can take advantage of Alibaba’s free trial to test drive the most expensive products before committing.

The interface is not very intuitive for users who don’t have strong technical expertise, but there is decent multilingual support and an energetic community of users who are willing to collaborate to solve a problem. Though their presence in Western markets is relatively small, Alibaba Cloud is perhaps one of the most affordable, fastest growing, and most internationally-friendly cloud providers on the market.

Pros

• Impressive free trial offering
• Strong presence in APAC
• Flexible pricing options
• Multilingual support

Cons

• Requires technical expertise
• Limited geographical availability outside APAC

Pricing

Alibaba Cloud’s services are priced using the pay-as-you-go model or subscription billing for a lower monthly rate. There are no upfront fees, so there’s very little cost to get started, and many services are available for free. Alibaba also offers a referral program that provides discounts to customers who invite colleagues or partners to join Alibaba Cloud. 

Read more: Alibaba Cloud vs. AWS

How to Choose the Right Cloud Provider

It can be difficult to determine which top cloud provider is the right fit for your organization. First, understand your top business priorities and read customer reviews from those with similar needs. Then, consider signing up for a free trial or exploring some of the tools each provider offers for free to get a sense of how the services work. 

If none of the top cloud providers on this list meet your needs exactly, review our complete list of Top Cloud Providers & Companies to explore other options.

The post AWS vs Azure vs Google vs Alibaba: Compare Top Cloud Providers appeared first on IT Business Edge.

Also read: Top Cloud Providers & Companies 2022

Azure Stack

Azure Stack is an Azure extension that offers cloud computing agility and innovation to your on-premises environment by allowing enterprises to bring cloud computing services into their own data centers. Azure Stack, when deployed on-premises, may deliver Azure consistent services whether connected to the internet (and Azure) or in disconnected environments with no internet access.  

Benefits of Azure Stack

• Business agility: It helps enterprises keep pace with fast-moving markets, streamlines app development, and allows organizations to achieve new levels of operational efficiency by simplifying access to Azure’s built-in capabilities from anywhere on-premises or in the cloud.
• Cost savings: It helps in reducing operational costs. Using Microsoft Azure Stack, enterprises can implement specific services (e.g., IaaS) based on their business needs resulting in cost savings.  
• Multi-cloud integration: It allows rapid migration between environments using existing tools like System Center App Controller, which enables migration of Azure resources like virtual machines, storage accounts, and service bus namespaces between private clouds running on Windows Server and other clouds. 
• Compliance & security: It provides enterprise-grade security at all layers of infrastructure by preventing unauthorized access to sensitive data, helping meet strict compliance requirements.
• Acceleration services: It offers accelerated time-to-value by moving applications faster through automated, simplified management.  

Key Differentiators

Autonomous cloud 

With Azure Stack, you have everything under your control, so you know exactly what’s happening with your data, including where it is stored and where it is moving. You can even run hybrid scenarios to ensure business continuity.  

Edge and disconnected solutions

By processing data locally in Azure Stack and then aggregating it on Azure for further analytics, with the same app logic across both, you may reduce latency and connectivity requirements. With disconnected internet connectivity, you can deploy Azure Stack without connecting to Azure. 

Cloud apps that meet varied regulations 

With Azure Stack, you can build and deploy applications in the cloud, and you can also deploy them on-premises to meet regulatory or policy needs. 

Cloud app model on-premises 

Update and extend existing applications or create new ones using Azure services, containers, serverless, and microservice architectures. Accelerate the modernization of mission-critical core applications by using consistent DevOps methods across Azure in the cloud and Azure Stack on-premises architectures and tools.

Ability to use consistent tools, experiences and app models

A consistent management experience across Azure Stack allows you to use an application or tool that supports an RBAC (role-based access control) model. Experience familiarity when managing your hybrid environment, while still enjoying the security and scale benefits of on-premises infrastructure. 

Pricing

Azure Stack offers pay-as-you-use pricing. The prices below are estimates only and are not intended as actual price quotes. Actual pricing may vary depending on your requirements. You can use the Azure Stack calculator to get an estimate.

Also read: Private Cloud vs Public Cloud

Azure Cloud

Microsoft Azure is a cloud computing platform and infrastructure created by Microsoft for building, deploying, and managing applications and services through a global network of Microsoft-managed datacenters. It provides both PaaS (platform as a service) and IaaS (infrastructure as a service) via its offerings. With respect to IaaS, Azure offers virtual machines, storage, networks, analytics, application services, security software, API access, etc. PaaS comprises .NET cloud services, integration services, App Services, etc. in which developers can build and run web apps on Microsoft-managed servers.

Benefits of Azure Cloud

• Comprehensive functionality on demand: Microsoft Azure is a comprehensive multi-platform enterprise cloud with offerings including IaaS, PaaS, and software as a service (SaaS).
• Scale on demand: Customer workloads can be scaled up or down in seconds with no downtime or performance degradation.
• Completely integrated cloud platform: Microsoft engineers services built on top of Azure, so developers do not have to spend time building common components like database storage, virtual machines, and load balancing solutions. 
• Hybrid computing scenarios become easier: Developers can easily provision a single application across multiple locations without having to worry about maintaining data consistency between them. 
• Rapid scaling: The system automatically scales out to provide additional resources as customer demand grows (and back down again as usage dips). 

Key Differentiators

Data resiliency

Azure is built with resiliency in mind, you can replicate your data to geographically distinct data centers and even create data center-to-data center replication. In addition, if one region is inaccessible because of a natural disaster or some other incident, Azure will automatically redirect requests to another region. It also provides secure backup for user content, including applications and application settings, via consistent snapshots. If anything does happen to go wrong, multi-tenancy in Windows Azure lets you work directly with other users’ data without compromising security or confidentiality through encryption techniques at rest and in motion.

Data security

To ensure that you are keeping your clients’ data secure, Microsoft has made it easy to manage who can access what. They have implemented two ways of managing permissions: RBAC and feature-based access control (FBAC). RBAC enables you to create roles, granting certain permissions, while FBAC allows you to restrict or give access to specific features in a cloud service. In addition, they offer encryption at rest and in transit, which provides protection for clients’ sensitive information. You can also take advantage of data loss prevention for these same needs by preventing or restricting external entities from copying, sharing, printing, downloading, editing files without approval from designated business users only. 

BCDR integration

Business Continuity/Disaster Recovery (BCDR) Integration enables Azure Storage replication to on-premises storage. Azure Site Recovery has been designed to work with Azure Backup, Azure site recovery helps you replicate server workloads from on-premises virtual machines to Azure. Data replication is done in real-time, helping ensure the data protection of your replicated servers at all times. 

Capacity management 

With a wide range of instance types, you can find an Azure virtual machine with the right balance of resources for your workload. By using autoscaling, you’ll only pay for what you use, so if traffic to your website spikes and your VM needs more power, it’s ready when you need it. There’s no need to worry about where to host or how many instances are enough.

Single-pane operations

Microsoft Operation Management Suite enables you to use a single pane of glass to monitor, manage, and operate your cloud-based applications. Rather than managing each application individually, you can effectively handle an entire array of systems all at once through comprehensive views and reports, centralized management capabilities, and prebuilt automation services.  

Pricing

Azure Cloud has a pay-as-you-go pricing model. The costs shown below are simply estimates and are not intended to be exact pricing quotes. Actual cost may vary based on your needs. To get an actual estimate, use the Azure Cloud total cost of ownership calculator. 

Azure support plans

Azure Stack vs. Azure Cloud

Here is how Azure Stack and Azure Cloud’s feature sets compare: 

Choosing Between Azure Cloud and Azure Stack

If you’re an enterprise-level user or an IT manager, one of your main concerns will likely be cost savings while maximizing uptime. Both services have their place in a business, both off-premises with Azure Cloud and on-premises with Azure Stack. It all depends entirely on your requirements from your IT infrastructure.

If it’s great flexibility and high performance, then Azure Cloud will probably be your go-to platform. If it’s tight security and control—plus reliable uptime—then hosting cloud applications on Azure Stack could be better for you. 

Whatever option you choose should be appropriate for what an organization needs. Ultimately, it’s all about striking a balance between cost and capability—ensuring you get something flexible enough to meet changing demands over time, while still meeting current business needs too. Hybrid clouds are also recommended since it allows enterprises to get the best of both worlds.

Read next: Creating a Cloud Migration Checklist

The post Azure Stack vs. Azure Cloud: Private vs. Public Cloud appeared first on IT Business Edge.