You might have often heard the term “Cloud Computing” since it is increasingly in use these days. What exactly is cloud computing? What are its advantages and what are its disadvantages or the risks involved? Cloud computing basically means that your document / data files and the software applications are stored directly on the Internet instead of your own computer and that you access them from the Internet as and when you require. Here “cloud” basically stands for “Internet”. Don’t be alarmed by this since there is a good chance that you might already be using cloud computing, albeit unknowingly.
So, using cloud computing to the fullest extent means that you’ve a skeleton computer with a minimalist operating system and a browser. No other software applications are installed on your computer. You connect to the Internet using your browser. Whatever software applications you require are already installed on the servers on the Internet that offer you cloud computing. You want to create a Word document? Okay, access a word processing software such as Google Docs or Zoho or Adobe Buzzword directly from the Internet. No need to install it on your laptop. Want to create a spreadsheet or a presentation? Go to online Google Docs again. Same thing applies to other software such as an accounting software or a stock trading software. Likewise, whatever documents are created or edited by you using such online software are stored directly on the Internet, such as on Google Docs. Your personal computer need not store your documents or data files. So, cloud computing, if used in its fullest sense, means all your programs and data files being directly on the Internet. You access them directly from the Internet either free or by paying a small fee, depending upon your cloud computing service providers.
Isn’t that scary? You’re losing all your control on your data files? Your personal documents are not with you, not in your safe custody? Well, wait for a while. I’ll answer them shortly. But, aren’t you using cloud computing already? What happens when you access your Gmail account, or your Yahoo! Mail or Hotmail account? Don’t you access these email accounts through your browser by going online to the Internet? Where is the email software stored for say, Gmail? Isn’t it on the Google servers? Where are your emails stored? Aren’t they again on the Google servers? So? The email software as well as your email (i.e., equivalent of your “data files” or “documents”) is already on the Internet. Isn’t it cloud computing then that you’re already using? Are you not worried about the safety of your emails that may contain sensitive data, or the massive file attachments sent / received as attachments to these emails? Why is other cloud computing so scary then?
Okay. What about your Flickr account? All your personal photos may be stored online with Flickr, somewhere on the Internet? What about YouTube? You might have stored your personal videos with YouTube. Your text documents may already be with Google Docs. And, the like. All this is nothing but cloud computing. That’s why I said that you might already be using cloud computing. The only difference is that today cloud computing takes care of only a part of your total computing experience and it is yet to take control of all your computing needs. So, the difference is in scale of use or the level of use. Otherwise, the fact remains that you’re already using cloud computing at least to some extent.
What are the advantages of cloud computing?
Well, you won’t have to pay for Microsoft Office license. No need to pay for a Photoshop software. No need to install such software on your personal computer. No need to keep worrying about finding and installing updates to these and many other software. What about viruses or malware or spyware? Well, when your data files are not stored on your computer, and when you don’t have many programs installed on your computer and have just a minimalist operating system with a browser, etc., the chances of getting infected with viruses and malware and worms, etc., will recede and you can have nice sleep without worrying too much about your computer getting crashed due to a virus attack and so on. So, less worries for software installations and may be less (?) expenses for buying software and their updates that keep pouring in at regular intervals.
With your documents and software directly accessible from Internet, you can access them from any place and from any computer. No need to transfer files from home to office. No need to install same software in two or more computers. No worries that if you send a presentation to your friend, he may not have Microsoft PowerPoint software installed on his computer. What you require is any minimalist computer with a browser and Internet connection, and of course your user name and password.
So, you can easily share your documents with any person when they are stored on the web. You can easily co-author those document with anybody else on the Internet. Or simply allow others to just view your documents. And, all this is possible with just a single copy of the document stored on the Internet. No need to send multiple copies to your co-authors or friends by email or by CD, etc. Your online documents are thus always available online, accessible on 24×7 basis by any person you authorize to view them or edit them.
Since you may not have the need to install software on your computer, the distinction between whether you’re using Microsoft Windows or Mac OS X or Linux will become redundant. Isn’t Firefox already running on all these operating systems? So, what you should know is which browser you’re running. If a browser can be run on your computer, you can access your documents and the software applications through cloud computing. Moreover, you don’t have to worry on which operating system your documents are stored or the software is running on a cloud computing platform as long as you’re able to access them through your browser.
What are the disadvantages or risks involved in cloud computing?
The biggest disadvantage perhaps is the “feeling of insecurity” since you may be worried that your documents are not in your control, that your personal or sensitive information is not stored on your own computer but somewhere else under somebody else’s control. So, you may have the privacy concerns. While such concerns may be genuine, I again come back to the email. Aren’t you already trusting cloud computing with your sensitive email contents? Isn’t your whole communication these days through email or messenger, etc.? Do you use postal department letters (in paper form) nowadays? How often? May be when you’ve to communicate with your grandpa who does not understand much about computer or who does not want to learn it or who is more comfortable with physical letters. But, the fact remains that more than 90% of your (written) communication may already be through email or some other online communication channel (in my case, it may be almost 100%). And, not many people save local copies of the emails. But, irrespective of whether or not you save local copies of your email, you would perhaps be leaving a copy of the email at the server as well. So, basically it is a question of “getting used to it”. Once it becomes a habit, it is a routine and one starts trusting.
In any case, you can always encrypt your files when you store them online. This may give you that sense of security of your personal data.
What will happen to my data? Can some hacker steal it from those online servers? Well, that risk is always there. But, the risk may be more or less the same when you store on your own computer. Some spyware, hacker, keylogger software, can always steal your data even your own computer. Your room-mate, your colleagues, your friends could also steal your data from your computer. Or, you may simply forget your laptop somewhere or somebody may steal the laptop itself. So, the risk is everywhere. In fact, a cloud computing service provider, if run on fully professional basis, would perhaps have more systemic approach to security of their customers’ data, with better resources being at their command.
What if the servers of the cloud computing crash? What if the cloud computing service provider company becomes bankrupt and closes down? Well, all these possibilities are always there. Perhaps, some other company may take over a bankrupt company, so your data may still be available. You may keep your duplicate data with some other company. Or, you may keep a duplicate copy of your data files on your own computer as well – but what happens to the concept of cloud computing then – you may ask. May be, as a backup of the “cloud computing data”! Do we not keep backup of our data from the traditional system of our own computer, on the Internet as a duplicate copy? So, keeping backup of cloud computing data on our own computer may be just the reverse process or its counterpart!
Moreover, the fact remains that our own computer hard disk may also crash. We always run the same risk. Cloud computing companies may perhaps take more care of the data files, in a professional manner, may be by keeping sufficient provisions for backups.
What about the expenses to be incurred on the cloud computing? While there are free services such as Google Docs offering you cloud computing today, you also have (or may have in future) paid services. One doesn’t know at this stage as to what would be the expenses and whether such expenses would be more than the traditional computing through your own computer. But then, you’ll save on your software cost and storage cost. In any case, one has to wait and see what developments take place in the arena of cloud computing in the near (or distant?) future.
Another downside is that you’ll have to be online whenever you want to access your files; but do you’ve Internet connection everywhere? Hopefully, the world may be well-connected through wireless Internet by that time, so Internet would possibly be omnipresent and possibly free (or almost free).
What if my files are stored in a server in a particular country where a totalitarian regime may suddenly decide in future to take full control of all data in those servers in their country!!! How do I know “where” in the cloud, or in “which” cloud my files are saved? Or “where is the cloud” in which my files are saved? Which country? Are they safe? Well, there is no satisfactory answer to all these questions as yet. Cloud computing does imply that the political boundaries may perhaps cease to exist in so far as your data is concerned. One only hopes that in order to cut expenses, the cloud computing companies would not expose your data to such political risks. Luckily there are countries which have stable and democratic Governments with sound legal systems and with less expenses to maintain huge server farms. So, one hopes that such companies would apply their mind when deciding where to put their servers.
Conclusion:
As of today, cloud computing is a developing concept. We already have many uses for cloud computing but still most of our computing consists of traditional computing through our own personal computer or laptop. We do install software and do save our data files on our own computer. But, things are changing over time. More and more computing is shifting to Internet. So, cloud computing is gaining in importance. Will we ever shift to total cloud computing to the total exclusion of traditional computing? Well, it is difficult to predict at this stage. One has to see how things develop in a comparative way. If at all, the world has to move fully to cloud computing at some point in future, I think it may not be near future. It may take several years yet, if at all that happens. So, meanwhile, we can “safely” have control over our own data while putting a backup thereof on the Internet, till the things become just the opposite, i.e., when we keep backup of our cloud computing files on our own hard disk or flash memory chips or some like “thing”.
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