Cloud computing is all the rage.

"It's become the phrase du jour," says Gartner senior analyst Ben Pring, echoing many of his peers. The problem is that (as with Web 2.0) everyone seems to have a different definition. As a metaphor for the Internet, "the cloud" is a familiar clich, but when combined with "computing," the meaning gets bigger and fuzzier. Some analysts and vendors define cloud computing narrowly as an updated version of utility computing: basically virtual servers available over the Internet. Others go very broad, arguing anything you consume outside the firewall is "in the cloud," including conventional outsourcing. Cloud computing comes into focus only when you think about what IT always needs: a way to increase capacity or add capabilities on the fly without investing in new infrastructure, training new personnel, or licensing new software. Cloud computing encompasses any subscription-based or pay-per-use service that, in real time over the Internet, extends IT's existing capabilities. Cloud computing is at an early stage, with a motley crew of providers large and small delivering a slew of cloud-based services, from full-blown applications to storage services to spam filtering. Yes, utility-style infrastructure providers are part of the mix, but so are SaaS (software as a service) providers such as Salesforce.com. Today, for the most part, IT must plug into cloudbased services individually, but cloud computing aggregators and integrators are already emerging. InfoWorld talked to dozens of vendors, analysts, and IT customers to tease out the various components of cloud computing. Based on those discussions, here's a rough breakdown of what cloud computing is all about: 1. SaaS This type of cloud computing delivers a single application through the browser to thousands of customers using a multitenant architecture. On the customer side, it means no upfront investment in servers or software licensing; on the provider side, with just one app to maintain, costs are low compared to conventional hosting. Salesforce.com is by far the best-known example among enterprise applications, but SaaS is also common for HR apps and has even worked its way up the food chain to ERP, with players such as Workday. And who could have predicted the sudden rise of SaaS "desktop" applications, such as Google Apps and Zoho Office? 2. Utility computing The idea is not new, but this form of cloud computing is getting new life from Amazon.com, Sun, IBM, and others who now offer storage and virtual servers that IT can access on demand. Early enterprise adopters mainly use utility computing for supplemental, non-mission-critical needs, but one day, they may replace parts of the datacenter. Other providers offer solutions that help IT create virtual datacenters from commodity servers, such as 3Tera's AppLogic and Cohesive Flexible Technologies' Elastic Server on Demand. Liquid Computing's LiquidQ offers similar capabilities, enabling IT to stitch together memory, I/O, storage, and computational capacity as a virtualized resource pool available over the network.

3. Web services in the cloud Closely related to SaaS, Web service providers offer APIs that enable developers to exploit functionality over the Internet, rather than delivering full-blown applications. They range from providers offering discrete business services -- such as Strike Iron and Xignite -- to the full range of APIs offered by Google Maps, ADP payroll processing, the U.S. Postal Service, Bloomberg, and even conventional credit card processing services. 4. Platform as a service Another SaaS variation, this form of cloud computing delivers development environments as a service. You build your own applications that run on the provider's infrastructure and are delivered to your users via the Internet from the provider's servers. Like Legos, these services are constrained by the vendor's design and capabilities, so you don't get complete freedom, but you do get predictability and pre-integration. Prime examples include Salesforce.com's Force.com, Coghead and the new Google App Engine. For extremely lightweight development, cloud-based mashup platforms abound, such as Yahoo Pipes or Dapper.net. 5. MSP (managed service providers) One of the oldest forms of cloud computing, a managed service is basically an application exposed to IT rather than to end-users, such as a virus scanning service for e-mail or an application monitoring service (which Mercury, among others, provides). Managed security services delivered by SecureWorks, IBM, and Verizon fall into this category, as do such cloudbased anti-spam services as Postini, recently acquired by Google. Other offerings include desktop management services, such as those offered by CenterBeam or Everdream. 6. Service commerce platforms A hybrid of SaaS and MSP, this cloud computing service offers a service hub that users interact with. They're most common in trading environments, such as expense management systems that allow users to order travel or secretarial services from a common platform that then coordinates the service delivery and pricing within the specifications set by the user. Think of it as an automated service bureau. Well-known examples include Rearden Commerce and Ariba. 7. Internet integration The integration of cloud-based services is in its early days. OpSource, which mainly concerns itself with serving SaaS providers, recently introduced the OpSource Services Bus, which employs in-the-cloud integration technology from a little startup called Boomi. SaaS provider Workday recently acquired another player in this space, CapeClear, an ESB (enterprise service bus) provider that was edging toward b-to-b integration. Way ahead of its time, Grand Central -which wanted to be a universal "bus in the cloud" to connect SaaS providers and provide integrated solutions to customers -- flamed out in 2005. Today, with such cloud-based interconnection seldom in evidence, cloud computing might be more accurately described as "sky computing," with many isolated clouds of services which IT customers must plug into individually. On the other hand, as virtualization and SOA permeate the enterprise, the idea of loosely coupled services running on an agile, scalable infrastructure should eventually make every enterprise a node in the cloud. It's a long-running trend with a far-

out horizon. But among big metatrends, cloud computing is the hardest one to argue with in the long term.
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Cloud computing is a phrase used to describe a variety of computing concepts that involve a large number of computers connected through a real-time communication network such as the Internet.[1] In science, cloud computing is a synonym for distributed computing over a network, and means the ability to run a program or application on many connected computers at the same time. The phrase also more commonly refers to network-based services, which appear to be provided by real server hardware, and are in fact served up by virtual hardware, simulated by software running on one or more real machines. Such virtual servers do not physically exist and can therefore be moved around and scaled up (or down) on the fly without affecting the end user - arguably, rather likCloud computing relies on sharing of resources to achieve coherence and economies of scale, similar to a utility (like the electricity grid) over a network.[2] At the foundation of cloud computing is the broader concept of converged infrastructure and shared services. The cloud also focuses on maximizing the effectiveness of the shared resources. Cloud resources are usually not only shared by multiple users but are also dynamically reallocated per demand. This can work for allocating resources to users. For example, a cloud computer facility that serves European users during European business hours with a specific application (e.g., email) may reallocate the same resources to serve North American users during North America's business hours with a different application (e.g., a web server). This approach should maximize the use of computing powers thus reducing environmental damage as well since less power, air conditioning, rackspace, etc. is required for a variety of functions. The term "moving to cloud" also refers to an organization moving away from a traditional CAPEX model (buy the dedicated hardware and depreciate it over a period of time) to the OPEX model (use a shared cloud infrastructure and pay as one uses it). Proponents claim that cloud computing allows companies to avoid upfront infrastructure costs, and focus on projects that differentiate their businesses instead of infrastructure.[3] Proponents also claim that cloud computing allows enterprises to get their applications up and running faster, with improved manageability and less maintenance, and enables IT to more rapidly adjust resources to meet fluctuating and unpredictable business demand.

Service models
Cloud computing providers offer their services according to several fundamental models:[2][55] infrastructure as a service (IaaS), platform as a service (PaaS), and software as a service (SaaS) where IaaS is the most basic and each higher model abstracts from the details of the lower models. Other key components in anything as a service (XaaS) are described in a comprehensive taxonomy model published in 2009,[56] such as Strategy-as-a-Service, Collaboration-as-a-

Service, Business Process-as-a-Service, Database-as-a-Service, etc. In 2012, network as a service (NaaS) and communication as a service (CaaS) were officially included by ITU (International Telecommunication Union) as part of the basic cloud computing models, recognized service categories of a telecommunication-centric cloud ecosystem.[57]

Infrastructure as a service (IaaS)

See also: Category:Cloud infrastructure In the most basic cloud-service model, providers of IaaS offer computers physical or (more often) virtual machines and other resources. (A hypervisor, such as Hyper-V or Xen or KVM or VMware ESX/ESXi, runs the virtual machines as guests. Pools of hypervisors within the cloud operational support-system can support large numbers of virtual machines and the ability to scale services up and down according to customers' varying requirements.) IaaS clouds often offer additional resources such as a virtual-machine disk image library, raw (block) and filebased storage, firewalls, load balancers, IP addresses, virtual local area networks (VLANs), and software bundles.[58] IaaS-cloud providers supply these resources on-demand from their large pools installed in data centers. For wide-area connectivity, customers can use either the Internet or carrier clouds (dedicated virtual private networks). To deploy their applications, cloud users install operating-system images and their application software on the cloud infrastructure. In this model, the cloud user patches and maintains the operating systems and the application software. Cloud providers typically bill IaaS services on a utility computing basis[citation needed]: cost reflects the amount of resources allocated and consumed. Cloud communications and cloud telephony, rather than replacing local computing infrastructure, replace local telecommunications infrastructure with Voice over IP and other offsite Internet services.

Platform as a service (PaaS)

Main article: Platform as a service See also: Category:Cloud platforms In the PaaS models, cloud providers deliver a '''computing platform''', typically including operating system, programming language execution environment, database, and web server. Application developers can develop and run their software solutions on a cloud platform without the cost and complexity of buying and managing the underlying hardware and software layers. With some PaaS offers like Windows Azure, the underlying computer and storage resources scale automatically to match application demand so that the cloud user does not have to allocate resources manually. The latter has also been proposed by an architecture aiming to facilitate realtime in cloud environments.[59]

Software as a service (SaaS)

Main article: Software as a service In the business model using software as a service (SaaS), users are provided access to application software and databases. Cloud providers manage the infrastructure and platforms that run the applications. SaaS is sometimes referred to as "on-demand software" and is usually priced on a pay-per-use basis. SaaS providers generally price applications using a subscription fee. In the SaaS model, cloud providers install and operate application software in the cloud and cloud users access the software from cloud clients. Cloud users do not manage the cloud infrastructure and platform where the application runs. This eliminates the need to install and run the application on the cloud user's own computers, which simplifies maintenance and support. Cloud applications are different from other applications in their scalabilitywhich can be achieved by cloning tasks onto multiple virtual machines at run-time to meet changing work demand.[60] Load balancers distribute the work over the set of virtual machines. This process is transparent to the cloud user, who sees only a single access point. To accommodate a large number of cloud users, cloud applications can be multitenant, that is, any machine serves more than one cloud user organization. It is common to refer to special types of cloud-based application software with a similar naming convention: desktop as a service, business process as a service, test environment as a service, communication as a service. The pricing model for SaaS applications is typically a monthly or yearly flat fee per user,[61] so price is scalable and adjustable if users are added or removed at any point.[62] Proponents claim SaaS allows a business the potential to reduce IT operational costs by outsourcing hardware and software maintenance and support to the cloud provider. This enables the business to reallocate IT operations costs away from hardware/software spending and personnel expenses, towards meeting other goals. In addition, with applications hosted centrally, updates can be released without the need for users to install new software. One drawback of SaaS is that the users' data are stored on the cloud provider's server. As a result, there could be

unauthorized access to the data. For this reason, users are increasingly adopting intelligent thirdparty key management systems to help secure their data.

Network as a service (NaaS)

Main article: Network as a service A category of cloud services where the capability provided to the cloud service user is to use network/transport connectivity services and/or inter-cloud network connectivity services.[63] NaaS involves the optimization of resource allocations by considering network and computing resources as a unified whole.[64] Traditional NaaS services include flexible and extended VPN, and bandwidth on demand.[63] NaaS concept materialization also includes the provision of a virtual network service by the owners of the network infrastructure to a third party (VNP VNO).[65][66]

Deployment models
Private cloud
Private cloud is cloud infrastructure operated solely for a single organization, whether managed internally or by a third-party and hosted internally or externally.[2] Undertaking a private cloud project requires a significant level and degree of engagement to virtualize the business environment, and requires the organization to reevaluate decisions about existing resources. When done right, it can improve business, but every step in the project raises security issues that must be addressed to prevent serious vulnerabilities.[74] Self-run data centers are generally capital intensive. They have a significant physical footprint, requiring allocations of space, hardware, and environmental controls. These assets have to be refreshed periodically, resulting in additional capital expenditures. They have attracted criticism because users "still have to buy, build, and manage them" and thus do not benefit from less hands-on management,[75] essentially "[lacking] the economic model that makes cloud computing such an intriguing concept".[76][77]

Public cloud
A cloud is called a "public cloud" when the services are rendered over a network that is open for public use. Technically there may be little or no difference between public and private cloud architecture, however, security consideration may be substantially different for services (applications, storage, and other resources) that are made available by a service provider for a public audience and when communication is effected over a non-trusted network. Generally, public cloud service providers like Amazon AWS, Microsoft and Google own and operate the infrastructure and offer access only via Internet (direct connectivity is not offered).[32] It has been suggested that Public cloud be merged into this article. (Discuss) Proposed
since February 2013.

Community cloud
Community cloud shares infrastructure between several organizations from a specific community with common concerns (security, compliance, jurisdiction, etc.), whether managed internally or by a third-party and hosted internally or externally. The costs are spread over fewer users than a public cloud (but more than a private cloud), so only some of the cost savings potential of cloud computing are realized.[2]

Hybrid cloud
Hybrid cloud is a composition of two or more clouds (private, community or public) that remain unique entities but are bound together, offering the benefits of multiple deployment models.[2] Gartner, Inc.defines a hybrid cloud service as a cloud computing service that is composed of some combination of private, public and community cloud services, from different service providers.[78] A hybrid cloud service crosses isolation and provider boundaries so that it cant be simply put in one category of private, public, or community cloud service. It allows one to extend either the capacity or the capability of a cloud service, by aggregation, integration or customization with another cloud service. Varied use cases for hybrid cloud composition exist. For example, an organization may store sensitive client data in house on a private cloud application, but interconnect that application to a billing application provided on a public cloud as a software service. This example of hybrid cloud extends the capabilities of the enterprise to deliver a specific business service through the addition of externally available public cloud services. Another example of hybrid cloud is one where IT organizations use public cloud computing resources to meet temporary capacity needs that can not be met by the private cloud.[79] This capability enables hybrid clouds to employ cloud bursting for scaling across clouds.[2] Cloud bursting is an application deployment model in which an application runs in a private cloud or data center and "bursts" to a public cloud when the demand for computing capacity increases. A primary advantage of cloud bursting and a hybrid cloud model is that an organization only pays for extra compute resources when they are needed.[80] Cloud bursting enables data centers to create an in-house IT infrastructure that supports average workloads, and use cloud resources from public or private clouds, during spikes in processing demands.[81] By utilizing "hybrid cloud" architecture, companies and individuals are able to obtain degrees of fault tolerance combined with locally immediate usability without dependency on internet connectivity. Hybrid cloud architecture requires both on-premises resources and off-site (remote) server-based cloud infrastructure.

Distributed cloud

Cloud computing can also be provided by a distributed set of machines that are running at different locations, while still connected to a single network or hub service. Examples of this include distributed computing platforms such as BOINC and Folding@Home. [[[[ Cloud computing is broken down into three segments: "application" "storage" and "connectivity." Each segment serves a different purpose and offers different products for businesses and individuals around the world. In June 2011, a study conducted by V1 found that 91% of senior IT professionals actually don't know what cloud computing is and two-thirds of senior finance professionals are clear by the concept,[1] highlighting the young nature of the technology. In Sept 2011, an Aberdeen Group study found that disciplined companies achieved on average an 68% increase in their IT expense because cloud computing and only a 10% reduction in data center power costs.[2] Oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

Cloud Security Controls

Cloud security architecture is effective only if the correct defensive implementations are in place. An efficient cloud security architecture should recognize the issues that will arise with security management. [5] The security management addresses these issues with security controls. These controls are put in place to safeguard any weaknesses in the system and reduce the effect of an attack. While there are many types of controls behind a cloud security architecture, they can usually be found in one of the following categories:[6]

Deterrent Controls
These controls are set in place to prevent any purposeful attack on a cloud system. Much like a warning sign on a fence or a property, these controls do not reduce the actual vulnerability of a system.

Preventative Controls
These controls upgrade the strength of the system by managing the vulnerabilities. The preventative control will safeguard vulnerabilities of the system. If an attack were to occur, the preventative controls are in place to cover the attack and reduce the damage and violation to the system's security.

Corrective Controls
Corrective controls are used to reduce the effect of an attack. Unlike the preventative controls, the corrective controls take action as an attack is occurring.

Detective Controls

Detective controls are used to detect any attacks that may be occurring to the system. In the event of an attack, the detective control will signal the preventative or corrective controls to address the issue. [7]

Security and privacy

Identity management Every enterprise will have its own identity management system to control access to information and computing resources. Cloud providers either integrate the customers identity management system into their own infrastructure, using federation or SSO technology, or provide an identity management solution of their own. Physical and personnel security Providers ensure that physical machines are adequately secure and that access to these machines as well as all relevant customer data is not only restricted but that access is documented. Availability Cloud providers assure customers that they will have regular and predictable access to their data and applications. Application security Cloud providers ensure that applications available as a service via the cloud are secure by implementing testing and acceptance procedures for outsourced or packaged application code. It also requires application security measures be in place in the production environment. Privacy Finally, providers ensure that all critical data (credit card numbers, for example) are masked and that only authorized users have access to data in its entirety. Moreover, digital identities and credentials must be protected as should any data that the provider collects or produces about customer activity in the cloud.

Compliances
Numerous regulations pertain to the storage and use of data, including Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS), the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, among others. Many of these regulations require regular reporting and audit trails. Cloud providers must enable their customers to comply appropriately with these regulations

TOP THREATS

Abuse and Nefarious Use of Cloud Computing Some providers even offer free limited trial periods. By abusing the relative anonymity behind these registration and usage models, spammers, malicious code authors, and other criminals have been able to conduct their activities with relative impunity. Insecure Application Programming Interfaces The security and availability of general cloud services is dependent upon the security of these basic APIs. From authentication and access control to encryption and activity monitoring, these interfaces must be designed to protect against both accidental and malicious attempts to circumvent policy Malicious Insiders . For example, a provider may not reveal how it grants employees access to physical and virtual assets, how it monitors these employees, or how it analyzes and reports on policy compliance. Shared Technology Vulnerabilities Often, the underlying components that make up this infrastructure ( e.g., CPU caches, GPUs, etc.) were not designed to offer strong isolation properties for a multi-tenant architecture. To address this gap, a virtualization hypervisor mediates access between guest operating systems and the physical compute resources Data Loss/Leakage There are many ways to compromise data. Deletion or alteration of records without a backup of the original content is an obvious example. Unlinking a record from a larger context may render it unrecoverable, as can storage on unreliable media. Loss of an encoding key may result in effective destruction. Finally, unauthorized parties must be prevented from gaining access to sensitive data Account, Service & Traffic Hijacking Account or service hijacking is not new. Attack methods such as phishing, fraud, and exploitation of software vulnerabilities still achieve results. Credentials and passwords are often reused, which amplifies the impact of such attacks.

Major players

No. 10: SoftLayer is the key to success for two big players.
IBM and EMC are reportedly both courting cloud-computing company SoftLayer Technologies in an acquisition expected to exceed $2 billion.

No. 9. Joyent offers a powerful, low cost alternative for big data centers.
Joyent competes with VMware, OpenStack and Citrix, too, with its own cloud operating system.

No. 8: Citrix Systems is taking on VMware with some success.

Citrix makes software for clouds, competing with two main rivals, VMware and a consortium of vendors who built an open source, free cloud operating system known as OpenStack.

No. 7: IBM: All in for OpenStack.

IBM has been a key player in a cloud tech called OpenStack for a long time. But in March, IBM upped the stakes in a big, big way.

No. 6: Rackspace is leading a massive coalition for free cloud software.

Rackspace runs an IaaS cloud and made a name for itself by championing OpenStack.

No. 5: Google was born in the cloud.

Google made big waves in cloud computing last year by launching its own IaaS service, the Compute Engine.

No 4: Salesforce.com has proved that enterprises really do want the cloud

The name Salesforce.com is almost synonymous with cloud computing. Salesforce.com proved that the world wants to buy software-as-a-service.

No. 3: Microsoft is staking out its own turf.

Microsoft has a big enterprise cloud, too, Azure.

No. 2: VMware going deeper into all things cloud

Until this year VMware didn't offer cloud services itself. It offered software called vCloud for

building clouds.

No. 1: Amazon, of course.

There's no question who the most important cloud player is: Amazon. Amazon basically invented the IaaS market.