Cloud service provider: Focus on data dominance desalination SLA

Recently, experts from Microsoft, Amazon, Rackspace and Salesforce.com discussed the issue of service levels and data attribution at Gartner Catalyst Conference in San Diego.

How can you convince your customers that they are leading the data?

Cloud-computing vendors are now trying to get customers to trust their ownership of the data through end user agreements. However, in the provision of cloud computing services, the service provider must be to access the data itself. Stand on the user's point of view, the past has a full control of the data, now facing the service provider can contact the situation, no one will sleep without worry.

Peter Coffee, Salesforce.com's vice-president and head of platform research, believes that the traditional pattern of allowing an administrator to access all data will no longer exist. As Salesforce.com does, cloud computing needs a pattern that is not so clear-cut. "We're using a more granular approach where administrative rights include creating and deleting, but not necessarily reading power with data." Coffee said: "In a multi-tenant model, it makes sense." ”

John Engates, Rackspace's chief technology officer, believes that in a cloud computing environment, everyone's permissions should be limited to the minimum, and no one can be excepted. For the Rackspace data center, even engates himself must be accompanied to enter. "We started doing it many years ago," he said. The only way to get people in is if they need it, and no one has access to it except in this case. "Engates said.

In Rackspace, any information with a customer profile will be removed, so even people with physical access do not know where the data for a particular company is. "This is not limited to the cloud computing environment. "All physical servers and software are covered by this measure," Engates said.

"It is very useful to reduce risk from responsibilities, and those who are entitled to physical access cannot form the whole logic of the system." "Engates explained:" Whether through a process, policy or technical solution, you only need to implement it once in a cloud environment, rather than repeating it as often as you have done in the past. ”

In the big data age, customers are also worried about their data being used by others for analysis. Users of SaaS services are particularly concerned about this, according to Gartner's survey. In this case, Microsoft's Azure Manager, Bill Hilf, takes Office 365 as an example: Users of the product are concerned that their email content will be used for advertising purposes. Hilf said Microsoft had no interest in the information in Office 365 and would never touch the user's data. Moreover, he believes that this assurance can be implemented by technical means, such as the encryption of data during storage and transmission, or a plethora of third-party solutions.

At the same time, in addition to the above control means, customers also need to be in the service Level Agreement and License agreement to implement the corresponding provisions. "In some cases I tell the customer that you can still keep it inside the enterprise without moving the data," he said. There are various objective reasons, such as economic, geographic or political factors. In addition, there are various kinds of regulations, which have strict restrictions on the location of data resides. In short, communicate rationally with clients, such as when to use the techniques mentioned above and where the data should be placed. ”

Is the industry too focused on service level agreements now?

When it comes to cloud computing, it's hard to avoid the problem of service failure. Once the final control of the software or infrastructure is handed over to other people, any company that is most concerned will be the question of whether the service is available. However, cloud service providers believe that many things are more important to the customer's business than service failures. Hilf that in the context of a basic understanding of the content and level of the service, you should pay more attention to the content in the End User License Agreement (end-user Licensing Agreements,eula).

"We will not intervene in the case of IP conflicts because this is not part of our service level agreement – this is the content of the EULA or Sales contract." Hilf said: "I think the service level agreement is important because it sets the expectation of service time-8 hours or 80 hours a year?" But I think people are paying too much attention to service-level agreements. ”

Before becoming the vice president of Amazon's utility Computing (utility computing), Charlie Bell had been a multi-year user of AWS. At that time, Bell did not find any meaningful service-level agreements. For service providers and customers, the most important thing is to understand the scheme principle and the problem coping method.

"Service-level agreements are needed to prevent services from slacking off," he said. But it doesn't really make much of a lot of detail, and there's no real point in getting paid for that money, and you really should be concerned about the service itself. "Bell said.

Salesforce.com does not provide service-level agreements for all customers. Coffee's approach to incorporating service-level commitments into cloud service prices is likened to adding insurance costs to ticket prices. He thinks no one wants to pay for it: "The pricing of important service levels as cloud services leads to price increases, which in the end make customers feel less cost-effective." ”

For example, testing and development services do not necessarily require service-level agreements, and customers do not care too much about testing again. Furthermore, service-level agreements make service pricing mechanisms too complex.

"In contrast to service-level agreements, I think most people would prefer to be assured of service levels." I hope that the service providers and customers can reach a common understanding and cooperation in all aspects of their services – everyone wants to form a pleasant partnership, rather than sending a lawyer acrimony. "Coffee said.

(Responsible editor: Schpeppen)