Security, privacy a must for good cloud adoption: IappANZ

Understanding and maintaining a balance between privacy and security is critical for CIOs if their cloud computing strategies are to succeed, says an IT security manager.

Privacy professionals organisation iappANZ president Kevin Shaw spoke to CIO about the constant challenge of cloud security and how it is a “moving target”.

“You get measures into place and of course you’ve got new aspects of security opening up. The developments in technology are also another challenge, and I think getting the balance between security and privacy right is the other challenge,” Shaw told CIO.

Shaw has been in the security industry for 15 years and is currently the information security manager at Foxtel. While he couldn’t comment specifically on his role at the pay TV provider, he said cloud provides a great opportunity for businesses if managed well.

“I would say that for any organisation looking at the cloud you have to make sure you’re looking at privacy in that environment and you understand what your principles are and enforce those.”

“You need to have a very clear understanding of how you’re going to map those cloud based services into that security setting,” Shaw said.

Now number two on Gartner’s last annual CIO survey of key technology investments, cloud computing is on the rise, but Shaw said while the cloud market is expanding and a variety of clouds are being developed, the issue of privacy is not often addressed by both consumers and businesses.

“A lot of people are moving their personal information and their data up to these cloud based services and I wonder if there’s an adequate understanding of the security behind this.”

Shaw said the iapp conference is aimed at helping CIOs understand compliance around cloud security and give an insight into some of the issues.

“When CIOs are looking at privacy there are definitely a couple of things they need to look at. What we’re doing at the conference in November is looking at the compliance perspectives on cloud computing. But you’ve got to look at a couple of things. How am I managing my privacy compliance when I’m moving my services onto the cloud? Am I still compliant with a number of jurisdictions? How do I start reporting on my compliance on both?.”

Shaw also said customer data protection and maintaining a services contract perspective were important issues that the iapp conference will look at from a variety of angles.

“The aim is to look at issues around privacy and cloud computing from a government perspective, from an advocate perspective, from a business perspective both from the view of the provider and the consumer, from a privacy professionals perspective, and lastly from a technology perspective.”

Click here to find out more about the annual iappANZ Australasian Privacy Conference being held in Sydney in November.