Germany is Ready for Cloud Computing? Well, if the BSA says so…

According to the Business Software Alliance’s (BSA) “Global Cloud Computing Scorecard”, Germany is ready for the cloud computing age, ranking at a spectacular No. 3, ahead of such cloud computing powerhouses as the United States, Italy and Poland! If you’re interested in the methodology (a word that my spell check has never heard of) uses by the BSA, go here. Either way, the result is interesting. Because, and I know I’m repeating myself, if you ask data protection practitioners in Germany, “ready” is certainly not the term that comes to mind when dealing with the cloud. Continue reading

Fraunhofer Study on the (Lack of) Data Security of Cloud Storage Services

Popular cloud storage sercives often lack data security. This is the result of a detailed study published by MP3 inventor Fraunhofer Institute. Fraunhofer has scrutinized  Dropbox, Cloudme, Crashplan, Mozy, Teamdrive, Ubuntu One and Wuala. Continue reading

The “Sopot Memorandum”: Recommendations on Cloud Computing

The International Working Group on Data Protection in Telecommunications, a working group of the International Conference of Data Protection and Privacy Commissioners (no entry in the Wikipedia. Should that make us think?), established and still run by the head of the data protection authority of the federal state of Berlin, has published a working paper with recommendations regarding the use of cloud computing services by companies and public authorities. They’ve called it the “Sopot Memorandum“. Conference pros never fail to pick one of the nicer and more interesting spots to meet, do they?

Starting from the usual analysis (cloud computing is risky with respect to privacy, data protection “and other legal issues”, you know the deal), the Working Group, essentially, recommends: Continue reading