Eight out of ten managers point out security as their main concern in cloud adoption

Telecommunications companies are the most committed to the cloud. 48% anticipate a significant increase in cloud use in 2019.

According to a Teradata study, eight out of ten managers point out security as their main concern in cloud adoption. However, executives predict that in 2019 more than half of critical data will be in the cloud, including IT data (56%), customer information (53%) and financial data (51%).

The study was carried out by RSI Corporation in January 2017 in nine countries: Spain, Germany, the United Kingdom, Russia, the United States, Australia, Japan and India. The results show that, although companies are interested in investing in cloud storage in the next two years, there are reluctance regarding information security and possible breaches.

For the professionals consulted in this study, security and lack of control are the biggest obstacles that delay cloud storage. 40% say that security in general is a risk, while 25% consider that cloud adoption will cause more problems. Furthermore, a quarter of those surveyed believe that control will be lost. For their part, 52% believe that executives' acceptance of the cloud is slowing their progress and 22% have problems hiring more employees to migrate to the cloud.

Cloud storage will increase considerably over the next two years. Despite the fact that 58% of the data of the organizations surveyed is in the cloud, three in ten companies worldwide predict a significant increase in 2019.

It should be noted that most legal data is maintained on physical servers. Only 27% of participating companies expect to migrate their legal data to the cloud in the next two years.

As for telecommunications companies, these are the most committed to the cloud. 48% anticipate a significant increase in cloud use in 2019. In addition, 48% of marketing and communications departments will have a relevant role in this.

59% of participants indicated that the healthcare sector will migrate customer data to the cloud in the next two years. While the public services sector will prioritize moving IT infrastructure (64%) and R&D (52%).

Marc Clark, director of cloud strategy and development at Teradata, states that "our message to all organizations is that the cloud is one of the most secure storage media available. Our study finds that there are some concerns, but the reality is that cloud storage is growing rapidly, it is very cost-effective, and there are ways to manage it securely."

“Cloud security processes should satisfy vendor controls to maintain security, privacy and regulatory compliance, as well as provide continuity and a contingency plan,” continues Marc Clark. “By identifying the barriers that hinder greater adoption and knowing where the most opportunities are created, we focus on ensuring that the cloud is a secure and cost-effective way to store company information,” he concludes.