Security still cited as main barrier to cloud adoption
Respondents to Computing's latest research indicate growing acceptance of cloud, though security fears remain
Cloud computing is seeing increasing adoption among UK-based firms, but many still cite security fears as the main reason for sticking with on-premise solutions.
In Computing's latest research into cloud and infrastructure trends among medium to large UK-based organisations, 43 per cent of respondents cited security as the main barrier to cloud adoption.
Fears stem from a loss of control of data and applications, as services move from internal data centres to those operated by third parties, which could be located anywhere in the world.
Following security fears was price, with 32 per cent of respondents suggesting that concerns over increased costs was their main reason for keeping their data out of the cloud.
Other barriers include flexibility, with 19 per cent of the vote, and staff re-training, with 12 per cent.
Despite these fears, most firms are intending to increase their use of cloud services in the future.
When asked about their current data centre strategy, 53 per cent of respondents said that they operate a heavily virtualised data centre, with 10 per cent saying that they mostly use externally hosted or cloud services.
However, when asked about their strategy over the next two years, this latter figure jumped to 31 per cent.
Firms in the financial sector have traditionally been the most wary of cloud services due to their heavy regulatory environment, however the Financial Conduct Authority recently gave the sector a green light to use cloud under certain conditions.