{"id":63086,"date":"2013-11-14T13:31:34","date_gmt":"2013-11-14T18:31:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rbach.net\/blog\/index.php\/"},"modified":"2022-08-25T12:48:06","modified_gmt":"2022-08-25T16:48:06","slug":"cloud-exit-plan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rbach.net\/index.php\/cloud-exit-plan\/","title":{"rendered":"Cloud Exit Plan"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Cloud<\/a>Another cloud services<\/strong> provider seems to have closed up shop. NetworkWorld<\/em><\/a> reports<\/a> that MegaCloud.com<\/a>, a consumer cloud storage<\/a> provider has been inaccessible.<\/strong> Users started complaining on social media that they have not had access to their data since at least October 30th. (rb-<\/strong> there is likely lots of enterprise data as well. FierceMobileIT<\/a> reports<\/a> that 72 percent of workers are using free file-sharing services without authorization.<\/em>)<\/p>\n

\"Cloud<\/a>MegaCloud<\/strong> had offered customers up to 8GB of free cloud storage, with another 8GB of free backup storage. That 16GB of free cloud storage was one of the largest giveaways of cloud storage from a consumer cloud provider. MegaCloud offered a desktop client, as well as mobile apps for\u00a0Apple<\/a> (AAPL<\/a>) iOS<\/a>, Google<\/a> (GOOG<\/a>) Android<\/a>, and Microsoft<\/a> (MSFT<\/a>) Windows phones<\/a>.<\/p>\n

At the end of September, San Jos\u00e9, CA-based\u00a0<\/strong>Nirvanix<\/a><\/strong> cloud provider gave their mostly business customers 2-weeks notice<\/strong> to get their files back before they went dark, taking all the data with them. There are reports that Nirvanix hosted around 40 petabytes of data<\/strong>. Getting their data out in time must have challenged Nirvanix customers.<\/p>\n

\"Moving<\/a>Charles Babcock<\/a> at InformationWeek<\/a><\/em> explained in an intriguing article<\/a> that data movements in the cloud are dependent on the speed with which the service provider can write data to an external source and the amount of bandwidth made available to do so. He cited tests<\/a> by Nirvanix competitor, Nasuni<\/a>, which found that moving 12 TB of data<\/strong> from one\u00a0Amazon<\/a>\u00a0(AMZN<\/a>) S3<\/a> bucket to another took four hours. Moving the same amount from Amazon S3 to\u00a0Microsoft Azure<\/a> took 40 hours, and from S3 to Rackspace<\/a> (RAX<\/a>), just<\/strong> under one week<\/strong>. Moving data from Rackspace into Amazon took only five hours.<\/p>\n

In a Data Center Knowledge<\/em><\/a> article<\/a>, Gartner<\/a> (IT<\/a>) analyst Kyle Hilgendorf<\/a> reinforces my point that cloud meltdowns should prompt cloud users to get serious about contingency planning<\/strong>. Gartner’s Hilgendorf wrote in a blog post<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\"Exit<\/a>\u201cCloud exits are not nearly as sexy as cloud deployments \u2013 they are an afterthought …\u00a0 It\u2019s analogous to disaster recovery and other mundane IT risk mitigation responsibilities<\/strong>. These functions rarely receive the attention they deserve in IT, except for immediately following major events like Hurricane Sandy or 9\/11.”<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cIf you are a customer of any other cloud service (that is basically all of us) \u2013 take some time and build a cloud exit strategy\/plan<\/strong> for every service you depend upon,\u201d he added. \u201cCloud providers will continue to go out of business. It may not be a frequent occurrence, but it will happen. \u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Nicos Vekiarides<\/a>, co-founder and CEO of Natick, MA-based cloud storage provider TwinStrata<\/a> told<\/a> NetWorkWorld<\/em> that in the long-term, the economic draw of the cloud<\/strong> should overcome the fear and hesitancy of many businesses considering cloud storage solutions He predicts that the shut-downs will drive businesses toward larger, better-known cloud storage brands instead of to smaller, newer providers. He says:<\/p>\n

\"Afraid<\/a>The storage needs of businesses haven’t gone away. Organizations’ data storage requirements still are growing at 40 percent to 60 percent a year<\/strong> … What will change is how CIOs shop for and deploy cloud services, in that everyone still wants choice, but they’ll be much more wary. There’s always the need for choice among a number of vendors, and CIOs will want the best of breed. That might mean they will gravitate toward more established vendors.”
\n<\/em><\/p>\n

rb-<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

These events may put a few firms off the cloud, but not all. These events should point out the need for due diligence<\/strong> when planning what to do with their data.<\/em><\/p>\n

Barb Darrow<\/a> at GigaOM<\/a> said<\/a> it most \"Data<\/a>poetically, “cloud storage offerings have multiplied like rabbits over the past year, and the notion that you could entrust business data to a company that appears to be\u00a0well-funded\u00a0only to see it shutting its doors could be more paranoia-inducing than the NSA spooks.”<\/em><\/p>\n

IMHO, continuity plans need to account for data in the cloud. Cloud providers can offer better availability and redundancy, but still pose risks. But do they guarantee your data?\u00a0 Continuity plans need to protect complete business services, including parts that may rely on a cloud piece.\u00a0 Some of the questions I would ask:<\/em><\/p>\n