SOA provides cloud security example, analyst says

Security is one of the most often discussed about cloud-related issues. According to one security expert, service oriented architecture provides the industry with a strong example of how to make cloud computing more secure.

John Pescatore, vice president of Gartner, spoke a recent summit, where he outlined how cloud computing security will likely draw from methods adopted by XML gateways, XML firewalls and SOA governance.

According to Pescatore, many of the concerns related to cloud security today are similar to those one held about SOA. "When we first rolled out SOA, the security people were aghast," he said. However, according to Pescatore, the community came to accept SOA security methods.

"People will extend the idea of SOA governance boxes out to the cloud," Pescatore said.

Pescatore called tokenization a security measure that is likely to become the best cloud computing security practice. Tokenization allows information to be stored locally.

While cloud computing security remains a concern, some experts believe it is overblown. In a recent article, James Urquhart, a field technologist with more than 20 years of experience, argued that public clouds are just as safe as private clouds.