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Robert Hart sits with Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak to talk about the future of technology. Will your company be left behind?

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BIG DATA Keeping your companys data safe and accessible

DATA-SAFE ECOSYSTEMIntellectual property and

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ARE YOU PREPARED? The importance of cloud

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Canadas cloud caution: Losing out on economic benefi ts

To put it bluntly, Canada has been slow to embrace cloud computing. This has been largely due to secur-

ity concerns primarily around pri-vacy and data sovereignty. Are we losing competitive economic ad-vantage as a result?

Security and privacy considera-tions represent a global caution to cloud adoption. The Cloud Security Alliance (CSA) leads and contrib-utes internationally to commun-ities and governments, establishing security principles, best practices and frameworks that help secure the cloud ecosystem. The CSA Can-adian Chapter has been formed to address Canadas unique security and privacy considerations, leading to the realization of innovation and economic benefi ts.

EU in the cloudThe September 2012 European Com-mission Report on Unleashing the Potential of Cloud Computing in Eur-ope highlighted the signifi cant eco-

nomic business case for cloud com-puting. They anticipate an overall positive cumulative impact on GDP of 957 billion and 3.8 million jobs by 2020.

The EU also recognized that secur-ity and privacy considerations are a major concern, addressing these risks with the creation of activities such as European Union Agency for Informa-tion (ENISA) and Network Security, whose many guides help foster ap-propriate secured cloud usage.

Europe has initiated a funding program to stimulate adoption of cloud computing under the Euro-Cloud umbrella. The programs goal is to establish cloud computing as an economic advantage for the region.

United States in the cloudIn the United States, Cloud First was initiated in 2010 from the White House CIOs o ce to save money, im-prove agility, innovation, and time-to-market. A major consideration was the optimization of IT resources con-sumed by the U.S. government.

The policy has touted $5 billion in savings per year (7 percent of IT costs), not to mention signifi cantly lower energy consumption. Savings continue to rise, enabling more in-novation and trust in the cloud eco-system. The Federal Risk and Au-thorization Management Program (FedRAMP) was created as a means to expedite qualifi cation of cloud suppliers. Although it has had chal-lenges regarding the speed and com-plexity of obtaining accreditation, it is still considered the leading ex-ample of such a government pro-gram. The 25-point plan included

under Cloud First identifi ed several security considerations. The Nation-al Institute of Standards and Tech-nology (NIST) is addressing them by maturing cloud security practices, which are largely based on the CSA models, guides, and matrices.

Canada in the cloudOutside of Canada, cloud adoption has continued to accelerate; cost savings are now secondary to innov-ation, openness, and interoperabil-ity of the cloud.

In Canada, security is generally perceived as the largest inhibitor to cloud adoption. Other concerns re-late to the USA PATRIOT Act and data sovereignty considerations.

Canadian federal government and several of Canadas provinces adopt-ed strict policies prohibiting export of personally identifi able informa-tion (PII) outside of Canadian bor-ders. This refl ects Canadas relative-ly strong respect for citizen privacy.

Canada has tremendous oppor-tunities. The privacy instruments

developed in Canada by Ontarios In-formation and Privacy Commission-er Dr. Ann Cavoukian, and the O ce of the Privacy Commissioner of Can-ada, are extremely well respected and used extensively internationally.

Looking aheadThe Canadian ICT (Information Communication Technology) in-dustry is more risk adverse than its U.S. counterparts. As technol-ogy evolves, frameworks, tools, and solutions for security and privacy concerns become available many of which are developed and o ered right here in Canada. In reality, the cloud ecosystem now o ers secure, cost-e ective solutions that can directly and indirectly impact the Canadian economy.

In reality, the cloud ecosystem now o ers secure, cost-e ective solutions that can directly and indirectly impact the Canadian economy.

STEVEN WOODWARD, MEMBER & VP, POLICY & STANDARDS,

CSA CANADA

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Keeping cloud data in Canada is as simple as it sounds

Theres no question the ap-petite for cloud in the Can-adian market is strong and growing stronger, despite a bit of a slow start. In fact, a recent report from IT World Canada found that 54 per-cent of businesses surveyed planned to invest in cloud computing projects this year.

However, many Canadian organiza-tions are reluctant to move IT oper-ations to the cloud, despite its cost ef-fi ciency, scalability and agility de-spite their number one concern being the privacy and security of their data.

Even before cloud computing took o , Canadian businesses have tended to want their data to stay in Canada. First the USA PATRIOT Act, and then last years Snowden rev-elations have made Canadian fears over losing control over their data greater than ever. In fact, research from Peer 1 Hosting revealed that a full one-third of Canadian business-es planned to move data outside the U.S. this year.

But do Canadian businesses have to choose between two extremes using cloud services that comprom-ise on data privacy and security, or avoiding the cloud altogether? The short answer is no. In fact, secure Canadian-based clouds can keep data entirely within Canadian borders.

The three components of a secure Canadian cloudWhen thinking about where to store information while retain-ing data residency, some Can-adian businesses only think about the geographic location of servers where data is stored. Yet many busi-nesses with good reason arent satisfi ed to hear their data is stored in a Canadian data centre. They al-so want to be sure data doesnt pass through any networks in any coun-try, including the U.S., where it might be subject to unwarranted surveillance or seizure.

A Canadian cloud that offers true data residency cant rely just on data centres sitting inside Can-adian borders it must be con-nected by networks that are en-tirely within Canada. Further-more, the disaster recovery zones where data is relocated in the event of a server outage must also be located in Canada.

The three requirements for a se-cure Canadian cloud are therefore pretty simple: physical storage of data in Canada, networks inside Canadian borders, and disaster re-covery points local to Canada.

Canadians want choiceData privacy and residency arent always deal-breakers for every Can-adian business, but its import-ant that Canadian customers have choice when it comes to the cloud. Canadians shouldnt have to miss out on the clouds benefi ts simply because some providers cant guar-antee that data will remain with-in Canada. Fortunately, the rapidly growing Canadian cloud market is creating alternatives that keep data local, safe and secure.

BEN YOUNG

editorial@mediaplanet.com

How you can keep yourcompanys data safe and accessible

Digital data is critical to business. Just im-agine what would happen if you lost access to customer records or emails.

Organizations are also gathering more data now than ever before. This big data is a rich source of competi-tive advantage, but many still deal with more fundamental concerns: dealing with growth a ordably, as-suring constant access, and driving up productivity.

Exponential growthTraditionally, businesses relied on structured databases that grew at predictable rates. Now, organiza-tions see spikes in unstructured data like audio, video, and photographs.

Ninety percent of the data stored worldwide is less than two years old, explains Corey Dyer, Vice President Storage Sales at HP Can-ada. Yet, despite this exponential increase, organizations are still using physical storage devices that were designed 15 or 20 years ago. These old designs are simply un-able to keep up.

Businesses are likely to be be-hind the times if they dont take a hard look at the systems that theyre using to store, serve, and protect their information, says Dyer. Thats why its important

for companies to understand what theyre doing with their data, and how its stored.

Technologies like thin storage, de-duplication, and other storage e -ciency features are critical to bridge the gap between capacity and cost.

Keep your data protectedNot modernizing storage or using the right protection technologies could put a business in serious fi -nancial danger. Storage is the one aspect of the corporate data centre that is persistent, says Dyer. All the other pieces move from point A to point B. So without the right storage, human error or a major event could have a drastic impact on the busi-nesses survival.

Research indicates that, in most enterprises, one minute of down-time could cost as much as $5,600. Despite this risk, most companies are using traditional dual-control-ler storage with limited resiliency and havent done a major refresh of their backup infrastructure in over fi ve years. They are likely to face

major issues when they do a recov-ery and get back up and running, says Dyer.

Technologies like multi-control-ler scale-out design, replication and federation, as well as snap-shots and disk-based backup, are all modern innovations that cus-tomers should be integrating into their datacenter plans.

Turbo-charge application performanceMany companies that use virtual machines fail to realize that storage performance is the most important link to maximize ROI from server virtualization.

One of the biggest innovations in data storage is the utilization of fl ash technology, says Dyer. People now expect the speed of access that they get from their smartphone or tablet in their business applications, and fl ash technology allows that to happen. At the same time, the right fl ash storage can allow companies to reduce power consumption and store data more e ciently, which

keeps costs down and frees up re-sources for critical projects.

All-flash storage has reached something of an infl ection point. Everybody wants more speed but nobody wants to compromise on re-liability or scale, and organizations are not willing to pay a premium. Second generation all-fl ash arrays from mainstream storage vendors are stepping up to the plate.

Businesses now have the op-tion to purchase high performance storage with robust tier-1 features and guaranteed resiliency, and it now costs the same as the spin-ning hard disk you were purchas-ing, says Dyer.

JOE ROSENGARTEN

editorial@mediaplanet.com

Corey DyerVP STORAGE SALES,HP CANADA

Businesses are likely to be behind the times if they dont take a hard look at the systems that theyre using to store, serve,

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INSPIRATION

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F. Scott Fitzgerald once remarked, both in a short essay titled My Lost City, and then again in the finest hour of HBOs The Wire, that there are no second acts in American lives. But, are there second acts in Canadian lives?

Since the inception of the Can-adian Cloud Council in 2011, I have to admit, we have taken a rather cyn-ical approach to our countrys place as a innovator on the global stage and rightfully so. This is a coun-try that still does not have a national cloud policy in place nor a telecom-munications sector willing to em-brace open source technologies, or

at least sell them to Canadian con-sumers. And, far too many lacklus-ter CIO nerds just not willing to put their jobs on the line to drive for-ward any type of material change.

Canadian legislationWe do, however, have a digital strat-egy that is decidedly anti-digital (the Canadian Anti-Spam Legisla-tion is absurd), governments hell-bent on building the biggest private clouds on Planet Earth, and a slew of incredibly fast growing start-up companies who build their business with United States giants like Goo-gle and Amazon because they dont have access to Canadian resident, on demand, API driven public cloud. So, many Canadian companies are

innovating. Just not in Canada.Of course, this was all incredibly

good news for the big boys in the IT Cartel, but really bad news for the Canadian economy. Until recently. When things started changing.

Shopify and Hootsuite, two of the largest software companies in Can-ada, were recently valuated at a $1 billion a pop. Salesforce announced their plans to establish Canadian data center operations and offer Canadians (and others I imagine) non U.S.-resident data safe cloud services. At last glance, at least three companies have gone to market with Canadian-hosted, open source public cloud infrastructure. And, well I hate to brag, a truly world class technology conference called Inter-

zone was announced by yours truly. One, where many tech titans like Steve Wozniak, the CEOs of Citrix and NetApp, and CTOs of Twitter and GoDaddy will speak in Canada publically for the very fi rst time.

Canadas world-class ecosystem for dataWhy is all this happening despite our governments best e orts to the con-trary? Because we have world-class data center ecosystem here. A ridicu-lously vibrant start-up software eco-system with M&A opportunities at every turn. An oil and gas industry that is one of the biggest micro-econ-omies in the world. And some of the smartest and innovative minds on the planet. And, well, who the hell

would not want to build their com-pany in Vancouver or Toronto two of the greatest cities on the planet?

So, Canadians, lets prove Fitzgerald wrong and Jay-Z right. Moral victor-ies is for minor league cultures, he once said. Minor league? Marc Benio- , whos already acquired two major Canadian software companies doesnt think so. Neither does the co-found-er of Apple who you can read about below. We are done with the moral tongue-wagging, endless post-punk cynicism and claims of dumbfounded moral victories. We have arrived on the global stage the major leagues, baby. And, you only live twice.

RH Internal IT departments are widely seen as being more maintainers than innovators. Should IT departments emphasize innovation over maintenance and makemaintenance the business of service providers?

Steve Wozniak This is a tough question for me. Innovation and maintenance are both important. It is important to fi nd a good balance. Disruption is the word of the day for those who dont adapt to new trends. A healthy company will have de-velopment and adaptation and in-novation as key elements to a long term (fi ve year) planning cycle, but the key sources of revenues and prof-its should be protected in the mean-time. Innovation should be intro-duced in stages to avoid the New Coke problem. Great care should be exercised in introducing new ways of doing business. Imagine a product that gets totally replaced with a new one. The creators of the new prod-ucts (or methodology) want to be im-portant. The higher up in the com-pany they are, they want credit for the change. But I say that you should keep existing profi t sources running and supported to the max and o er new products to your employees as options that will gradually become the standard. Of course you can fi nd many examples where total instan-taneous switchovers work and are e cient. Just show caution.

AM Will human beings still be at the top of the evolutionary food chain in 2050?

SW I felt my entire life that computer technology could do amazing things with speed, compared to humans, but that they would never equal the human mind. Imagine a chess prob-lem. A computer cant solve the prob-lem by trying every solution. It needs some clever thinking to devise a solution. I never felt that computers would be able to program themselves in this sense. I disdained the idea of the [technological] Singularity where computers could process as much information as the human brain by [2050]. But then I changed my mind. When things progress along expo-nential curves, you never see much change until you hit the knee of the curve. I saw many examples in real life where computers were working as smartly as humans do. Maybe the human brain is not so much intui-tion as it is access to huge amounts of data, and thats what you have on the internet. You used to ask a smart per-son a di cult question, but now you ask someone whose name starts with Go and its not God. We didnt cre-ate the internet as a brain replace-ment, but to a large extent thats how it turned out, by accident.

As I started saying that it was go-ing to happen, I realized that there were dire outcomes for the human species once computers were 10 times as smart. Companies without

slow humans, only these sentient computers, would outperform com-panies with slow humans. Even art would fl ourish. Wed be left as the family dog. We build this equipment to do things for us and it may wind up taking care of us. There wouldnt be a battle. We just cant turn it o .

Because of this negative thinking, I rethought what I was saying. I am now unconvinced that computers will be sentient (conscious) in 20-50 years. The advances that make this possible largely depend on Moores Law and I believe that Moores Law is at or near its endpoint. We store 1s and 0s with a little as 8 electrons now. You cant go much further.

As to the evolutionary food chain we have already started to see the impact. We have kiosks in many places, along with things like phone support trees. These are all examples of human workers being replaced by machines. You can draw your own conclusions as to what the future will bring.

PC Customers are notori-ously bad at describing what they would like before theyve seen it. How should companies read the tea leaves of customer behaviour to envision genuinely innova-tive products and services?

SW Written into this question is an answer that the companies should be, or include, some custom-ers of the products and services. A heavy user is in the market to begin with and can accurately feel what products or services or, more like-ly, changes are good. It is helpful to make such a personal assessment with working models of the fi nal product. Without that you really are reading tea leaves. Your head and your spreadsheets can fi nd benefi ts but they arent the important ones that guide emotional decisions as to what is good and what is bad and how much value to assign.

The problem is that there is usual-ly no single typical customer. This is totally the case if the product or ser-

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ROBERT HART

CEO, CANADIAN CLOUD COUNCILeditorial@mediaplanet.com

Robert HartCEO, CANADIAN CLOUD COUNCIL & INTERZONECTO, AURO

Adam Messinger CTO, TWITTER INC.

Peter Coffee VP, STRATEGIC RESEARCH, SALESFORCE

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vice is entirely new. Market research is usually done in a way that tries to assess the value to others. The goal is to create products that others would want. That is not nearly as accurate as creating products that you your-self want. Internal groups can cre-ate working models and can dem-onstrate what the benefi ts are, but they often want recognition for do-ing something worthwhile. For ex-ample, engineers might be able to show an example where a change improves the response time of part of a solution by a factor of 10:1. The developers tend to overlook the total picture. This improvement may only apply to 1/100 of the total delay, and therefore be nearly meaningless.

What is needed is a very object-ive group internal to the company whose job is to fi nd the best solution for the users and to overcome any biases. It may sound unusual and contradictory, but one way is to have

the researcher[s] who have little ex-perience with the exact solution methodologies but who fi t the role of typical users. When you are used to the existing solutions you de-velop a framework of knowing how certain things are done and it acts as blinders to new di erent ways that really are improvements in the eyes of unattached customers.

Sorry if this answer sounds vague. Every example for every company is unique and should be treated as its own. The best answer should be found and not a general formula ap-plied to all new products. The key is in fi nding employees and execu-tives and managers with the per-sonality to think this way. High in-tegrity is a key.

Steve Wozniak, co-founder of Apple, answers questions from some of the biggest names in the cloud about the industrys direction.

PAST, PRESENT, AND FUTUREApple Computer co-founder and philanthropist Steve Wozniak pauses while speaking at the Bay Area Discovery Museums Discovery Forum February 1, 2010 in San Francisco, California. PHOTO: JUSTIN SULLIVAN/GETTY IMAGES

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WOZ WITH AN APPLE 1 BOARDSteve Wozniak, known as Woz, is an electronics engineer and computer programmer who co-founded Apple Computer with Steve Jobs and Ronald Wayne. PHOTO: WOZ.ORG

Disruption is the word of the day for those who dont adapt to new trends.

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INSIGHT

D.F. MCCOURT

editorial@mediaplanet.com

Its in the cloud

W as anyone really surprised when Edward Snowden revealed last year that the United States National Security Agency collects massive amounts of customer data from cloud service pro-viders and sells it to the highest bid-der? I mean, isnt this what they do for a living? For those of you not fam-iliar with their business model, I sug-gest watching Matt Damon explain why he shouldnt work for the NSA in his very fi rst fi lm Good Will Hunting. He should have won the Oscar.

At any rate, perception is reality, and it must be harder and harder for U.S.-based public cloud companies to convince Canadian customers that the economics of U.S. cloud suppos-edly outweigh the need to be cautious with their customer data. Heck, the biggest Software as a Service (SaaS) and Platform as a Service (PaaS) com-pany in the world, Salesforce, recent-ly announced their plans to establish Canadian data center operations. So, maybe we arent as small of a market as we think we are. Or, maybe, just maybe, they are on to something big-ger than just selling Canadian resi-dent cloud services to Canadians.

Intellectual property in Canada Businesses (rightfully so) view their data as intellectual property. So how many Canadian CIOs are going to sign o on the potential fi re sale of their companys core asset? Hey, we were already a risk-adverse bunch before Snowden bought a one-way ticket to

Russia and every Canadian CEO start-ed asking questions about cloud com-puting and where their companys data is hosted. Ironically, the cloud conversation fi nally started at the top level of every Canadian company, even if it was for all the wrong reasons.

And really, why should the Can-adian CEO be the person most in-vested in the whole cloud comput-ing discussion? Well, for starters, the cloud dramatically improves and accelerates the way companies de-velop, monetize and commercialize innovation, engage with their cus-tomers, and di erentiate against their competition. Tech startups with a fantastic idea can strive to become the next Mark Zuckberg ac-quisition overnight and access the necessary infrastructure to sup-port that growth with a click of the mouse. Although, that scale comes with a tradeo , and it hasnt been good for the Canadian enterprise.

Traditionally, any business in Canada who wants to control their data and have access to an enter-prise cloud has to build it from the ground up. It is complex, expen-sive, time consuming, and challen-ging to operate and maintain, said Matthew McKinney, Chief Strategy O cer at Auro. More importantly, because of the apparent non-exist-ence of true enterprise public clouds in Canada, many Canadian enter-prises have been forced to choose traditional infrastructure to en-sure protection of their data, while competitors South of the border eat our lunch with immediate access to highly scalable, on-demand, and elastic cloud services.

Back to Edward SnowdenSo, then, Edward Snowden may have shed light on a program that has been accused of possibly killing the U.S. Internet Industry (it wont),

but I suggest we leverage Edwards clean conscience as an opportunity to fi nally start building a viable Can-adian cloud ecosystem. One that can compete with the Amazons of the world, not just because it is built across Canadian data centers, but one that can compete globally on its own uniqueness and merit.

There is an incredible software ecosystem brewing in Canada, and wouldnt it be fantastic for the Can-adian economy if companies like Hootsuite, OpenText and Shopi-fy actually built their businesses using Canadian cloud infrastruc-ture? Or, if more big U.S. Internet companies followed Salesforce in-to Canada to o er Canadian hosted data safe zones to their custom-ers? This is not something that will fragment the global internet, but rather diversify its core network operations outside of the United States, and make it harder for pesky

three-letter acronym agencies to gain access to customer data. This would be a good thing for everyone, not just Canadians.

Salesforce is on to something here says Chris Moore, former CIO at the City of Edmonton. Canada is one of the most stable countries and economies in the world, known for our peace keeping international-ly it is the best place in the world for the worlds data, not just Can-adian data. If anyone in the world is concerned about the USA PATRIOT Act, then consider moving your data from the U.S. to Canada.

So, Ryan Holmes or Tony Clem-ent, if youre listening, give me a shout. Canadian innovators and in-vestors have been busy over the last year and there are fi nally enterprise class Canadian resident public cloud services available to Canadian busi-nesses. What we need is a big Can-adian software company or govern-mental agency to actually use them and shout their story from their rooftops of our countrys incredibly awesome data centers. There is a jet leaving Moscow at this very mo-ment. Edward Snowden is falling asleep in the back. Lets not get stuck on the tarmac.

THE NEXT JET TO LEAVE MOSCOW

ROBERT HART

editorial@mediaplanet.com

Its in the cloudIts in the cloudIts in the cloudThe three faces of cloud computing

Cloud computing and stor-age have become so wide-ly adopted and are so poorly understood that, in certain executive boardrooms across the country, the phrase its in the cloud has become a sort of joking shorthand for I dont know. This is a shame, because its a simple concept that is transforming the way companies do business.

Most people are familiar with the idea of cloud storage. Remote ser-vices like Dropbox let you save fi les from one computer and recover them later from another. Cloud computing works under a similar principal, only instead of data being stored remotely, computer programs are executed re-motely. This is not an old idea. As Les-

lie K. Lambert of GuruCul Solutions, a security company with a large pres-ence in the cloud computing space, puts it: cloud computing has been with us for many many years. Its on-ly the name that is new.

Beyond stratus and cumulusClouds come in three basic fl avours: private, public, and hybrid. A private cloud is basically a large datacenter with hundreds of computers chug-ging away on customized code to meet the specifi c needs of one com-pany. When a salesperson requests a quote on their cellphone, that quote is generated by the cloud. When the CEO types half a memo on his o ce computer and then fi nishes it on his tablet at home, its the cloud that bridges that gap. In a sense, says Lambert, a private cloud is a very

close extension of your company intranet. The primary advantages are security and control.

Public cloud services, on the other hand, are provided by large general-ized organizations, usually over the public internet. They are more cost-e ective than private clouds, but less customizable and less secure. They do, however, provide one power-ful operational advantage. Pub-lic clouds help companies size up and size down very quickly in synch with their need, says Lambert. Say a business needs a certain amount of computing power for most of the year, but then needs double or triple that during occasional burst periods, such as a Christmastime rush. With a public cloud service they are never paying for more computer power than they use.

The best of both worldsThe hybrid cloud model is simply a combination of private and pub-lic clouds. Increasingly companies are turning to hybrid clouds in or-der to realize the separate advan-tages of each model. For example, a company might use a private sub-cloud to store and process sensitive client information, but simultan-eously use a dynamic public sub-cloud to scale processing power up and down as needed.

The technology may be advanced, but the concept behind it essen-tially the outsourcing or insourcing of computation is a simple one that anyone in todays connected society can benefi t from understanding. Leslie K. Lambert

CHIEF SECURITY & STRATEGY OFFICER,GURUCUL SOLUTIONS, LLC

FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVEPictured is Sheremetyevo airport in Moscow, Russia. It was here that Snowden was confined to while applying for asylum-status in various nations around the world.

NEWS

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When disaster strikes, data recovery is essen-tial to a business surviv-al. Whether it is a one-person oper-ation or a multinational behemoth, every company lives and dies by the ability to access backup data quick-ly and e ectively. With businesses increasingly opting to adopt cloud computing solutions, new alterna-tives in data recovery are taking centre stage.

For some businesses, the process of data backup for recovery is as sim-ple as saving important data to an external hard drive. For larger com-panies, data recovery can be more in-volved, requiring o -site locations, complex disaster recovery plans (DRP) and signifi cant outlays.

Affordable alternativesThe unfortunate reality is that DRPs are a huge expense for many com-panies; the cost of renting space, equipment, technicians, and other overheads is substantial, making the provision of data backup overly burdensome for some. Consequent-

ly, many businesses do not have ad-equate data recovery plans in place. According to Eran Farajun, Execu-tive Vice President of Asigra, a To-ronto-based company specializing in cloud backup and recovery, the advent of Data Recovery as a Service (DRaaS) through cloud computing o ers an a ordable, dependable al-ternative for many companies.

With cloud backup youre pay-ing at a marginal rate, says Farajun. Sure, theres a data centre with computers, sta , and infrastructure but youre only paying for the ser-vices that you need. There is a huge economic benefi t there.

Multiple benefitsThe benefi ts of cloud backup arent just economic DRaaS contracts of-fer easily customized, scalable solu-tions that can grow in lockstep with a companys needs. Cloud backup strategies also provide faster recov-ery times than traditional methods such as magnetic tape recovery. The time to value for the right workload is much shorter in the cloud. When

you need to recover data, and youre using old processes, your team and customers cant wait weeks for data to be recovered. The pace of business is measured today not in weeks and months, but in minutes and hours.

And it is that unrelenting pace that makes early adoption of new, more e cient technologies all the more important. In the next three to fi ve years the majority of business data will be moved to the cloud. Its a strategic fi rst-mover advantage that enables you to focus and spend less time on back o ce processes. The businesses that do that will have a huge head start, says Eran.

Note of cautionHowever, while early adopters will have an advantage, there is a note of caution. While Cloud Application Pro-viders o er space to house immense amounts of corporate data, they do not necessarily o er secure backup and recovery solutions that meet the specifi c service level requirements for each enterprise. Unfortunate-ly there is a misperception out there

that moving corporate data to the cloud shifts responsibility onto those companies, but thats not the case, says Eran. If youre moving your data you still need to make sure that its safe. If youre working with a cloud backup provider make sure that they can also backup and protect the data in cloud-based applications like Goo-gle apps, O ce 365 and other applica-tions that an enterprise might use.

There is a growing interest within organizations to ex-plore what cloud services have to offer as there can be considerable economic advantages to doing so.

In Canada, both public sector and private sector organizations must comply with Canadian privacy laws. The federal and provincial laws enforce some factors for or-ganizations using cloud services especially if the services are hosted in another jurisdiction. Depending on the cloud service provider used, the laws of foreign jurisdictions may also be applicable.

Who is responsible?Canadian privacy law mandates that an organization collecting person-al information is responsible for it. For example, The Personal Informa-tion Protection and Electronic Docu-ments Act (PIPEDA) principle 4.1.3 stipulates that an organization may engage third party vendors to pro-cess data on its behalf, but the organ-ization will remain responsible for such personal information.

With some exceptions, generally an organization can use foreign cloud vendors. In PIPEDA case #313, the federal Privacy Commissioner ad-dressed a case in which CIBC sought to outsource processing of its Visa

cards using a U.S. supplier. The Com-missioner found that PIPEDA does not prohibit use of foreign vendors, but Canadian organizations must have adequate provisions in place to ensure a similar level of protection.

While much focus has been placed on the USA PATRIOT Act, most coun-tries, including Canada, have laws that can require a cloud vendor to disclose customer data in the case of a governmental investigation.

Comparable legal riskIn the Visa case, the Commissioner noted that personal information held by a foreign third party vendor will be subject to the laws of that country and

no contractual provision can over-ride those laws. The Commissioner found that there is a comparable legal risk that the personal information of Canadians held by an organization and its vendor (whether Canadian or United States) can be obtained by government agencies lawfully in the applicable country. Where an organ-ization plans to use a foreign vendor, the Commissioner found that the or-ganization must notify its customers that the information may be available to government agencies under a law-ful order made in that country.

A CLOUD ON THE HORIZON: DISASTER RECOVERY AND CLOUD BACKUP STRATEGIES

How privacy laws in Canada a ect the cloud

When somethings missing, everythings wrong.

When it comes to recovering your data, theres no such thing as a minor detail.Good thing theres Asigra. Our award-winning recovery solution lets you recover now from anywhere. Every byte. Any device. All the time. How can we make such a promise? Because weve been leading the recovery revolution for more than 25 yearswith more than a million installations worldwide.

Find out more today at recoveryiseverything.com. Before you make the wrong step.

2014 Asigra Inc. Asigra, the Asigra logo, Asigra Cloud Backup, Recovery is Everything, Recovery License Model and Recovery Tracker are registered trademarks of Asigra Inc. All other brand and product names are trademarks of their respective owners.

Eran FarajunEXECUTIVE VP, ASIGRA

PATRICK BISSETT

editorial@mediaplanet.com

MARTIN P.J. KRATZ,

BENNETT JONES LLP

editorial@mediaplanet.com

Distributed computing (includ-ing cloud, big data or other multi-device use) can have a net posi-tive impact on a business. How-ever, as with any other invest-ment of time, talent or cash, or-ganizations must approach cloud functions with care to achieve their goals and avoid harm along the way.

There are fi ve basic steps busi-nesses can take to protect their in-formation in the cloud and ensure data remains private:

Know Thy Data (Assets) Know Thy Team (People) Know Thy Systems (Process) Know Thy Stu (Technology) Know Thy Consequences

Before an organization jumps headfi rst into the cloud, it is mis-sion critical to understand what steps to take and what types of con-sequences a business may incur when faced with a privacy breach.

FAST FACTS

The five commandments of the cloud

Michelle Finneran DennedyVP & CHIEF PRIVACY OFFICER, MCAFEE; AUTHOR, THE PRIVACY ENGINEERS MANIFESTO

FOR MICHELLES IN-DEPTH VIEW ON EACH PLEASE STEP VISIT CLOUDCOMPUTINGINFO.CA

MICHELLE FINNERAN DENNEDY

editorial@mediaplanet.com

FOR MORE ON DATA SOVEREIGNTY FROM MARTIN KRATZ GO TO CLOUDCOMPUTINGINFO.CA