Cloud Computing Confusion: New Statistics about IT and Security in the Cloud, Related Web Seminars

Earlier this week, we issued a press release that recaps some new statistics about IT attitudes toward cloud computing and SaaS solutions(especially with respect to email security). Working with Osterman Research, we polled more than 200 IT professionals about whether they felt that they understood "cloud computing" and their attitudes and perceptions about cloud-based services. The findingsgenerated some interesting commentary in other blogs. Sam Diaz over at ZDNet's "Between the Lines" blog reported the basic findings, including:

40 percent of IT professionals said they were confused by the term while more than half (52 percent) said no. Of the respondents, 33 percent said the believe cloud computing to be more hype than substance while 24 percent “weren’t sure.”

Mike Vizard at IT Business Edge's "IT Unmasked" blog commented that:

Sometimes it’s hard to distinguish between when somebody really doesn’t understand something and when they just don’t want to understand something. Such is the case with cloud computing, which from the perspective of the internal IT staff all too often threatens their status quo in terms of employment...

...When asked if they thought cloud computing was less secure than on-premise approaches, 43 percent said yes, 31 percent said not sure and 26 percent said no. And only 37 percent said their organizations would experience cost savings in the first year of a cloud-based security solution...

...when you add up all the cost of the infrastructure and expensive security professionals required to run e-mail security on premise, it’s pretty hard not to come up with savings in the first year. In fact, what these survey numbers tend to show as a whole is that a lot of IT people are still in various stages of denial about cloud computing.

Mike makes a good point. Indeed, IT professionals are concerned about the perception that using cloud-based services might lead to layoffs. Coincidentally, this is something that we asked about in our survey, but didn't report in the original press release. Asked if they agreed or disagreed with the following statement:

"If we implemented cloud-based services, many of our IT staff members would perceive that our company was preparing to lay them off."

We found that 47% said "Yes", 30% said "No" and 23% were "Not sure."

Mike goes on to note two interesting studies that I was not previously aware of: The Society for Information Management is working on determining how cloud computing is being used and also how software-as-a-service is being integrated with existing enterprise systems. Of these, he notes, "Taken together, the two studies will probably confirm the existence of a blended computing model where various IT services are delivered via the cloud, while others remain on premise." I would agree!

Upcoming Webinars Related to this Topic

There are two upcoming web seminars that relate to this topic. Both happen on the same day, at the same time... Next Wednesday, Nov. 18th at 2:00 PM ET. First, Proofpoint is holding a webinar about email security in the cloud. Learn more and register here:

Proofpoint Webinar: Cloud Computing Confusion - Is SaaS Email Security Right for You?

At that same time, our European datacenter partner TelecityGroup is hosting a webinar about the role data centers play in overseas expansion. Proofpoint's senior director of operations, Alexei Rodriguez, will be speaking about how Proofpoint goes about selecting datacenters and the operational issues that go into those selections and deployments. Learn more and register here:

Telecity Webinar: How The Planet and Proofpoint Accelerated Growth in Europe by Outsourcing Data Center Requirements to a European Specialist

Comments

[Saqib Ali]

A colleague of mine used to say "I am working myself out of a job". And he did exactly just that. You see he was a "automation in IT" evangelist, and one day his function was automated.

I take a more profitable and idealistic approach - I work myself out of a job function. Who wants to perform the same function his/her entire life anyways?