Sony encounters hacker attacks exposing commercial cloud computing security risks

Shen Yi April 17, 2011 to date, Sony's home gaming platform PlayStation's online platform Playstationnetwork (abbreviated as PSN) has at least 3 hacking attacks. Hacking into platform systems is believed to have stolen 77 million of users ' personal information, including PSN registration IDs, email accounts, login passwords, and even information related to credit card accounts. Sony's PSN platform is a typical platform for using the cloud computing concept, and almost the same period of April 22, Amazon's cloud computing center in North Virginia State downtime, resulting in services Quora, news services Reddit,　　HootSuite and Location tracking service Foursquare Some websites have been affected. A hacker attack, a failure so far not clear why the event, directly to the once-beautiful cloud computing concept cast a big cloud.　　How to ensure the information security of the commercial cloud computing and avoid the enterprise to collect and abuse the personal information of the customers by the advantage of information technology is becoming the two important propositions to test the future development of cloud computing. Security, security, or security to ensure that the data stored in the Cloud computing center is secure, ensuring the normal operation of the computing Centre, constitutes a necessary condition for maintaining the concept of cloud computing. Putting a lot of data in a "cloud server", which allows very little money to put a business plan into practice very quickly, is a classic description of cloud computing by Brad Jefferson, chief executive of Animoto, a new york-based company. Bernard Gordon, chief executive of Hyperstratus, a consultancy that devotes to advanced information technology research, says "cloud computing can help companies shift capital to operating costs rather than to expensive data centers".　　But behind these advantages, how to ensure the storage of a large number of valuable information in the cloud server information security, but consciously or unconsciously by people ignored. In fact, as the Sony PSN platform has proved, even for industry giants such as Sony, it is still a huge expense to really strengthen the information security of cloud servers.　　So that there is news that Sony PSN was easily captured by hackers, is the company to save costs, not using professional firewall software. The downtime at Amazon's cloud computing hub is another way to prove the daunting challenge of cloud data security: the hardware and software currently relied on by the cloud computing center do not seem to be foolproof enough to ensure the reliability and stability of its operations. More oddly, North Virginia State's cloud computing center is just one of Amazon's many cloud computing hubs, and theoretically the cloud-centric system should be able to automatically take over the work it does when a single center fails.　　But when downtime really happens, the design doesn't seem to work. The scale of data and services that is truly moving to cloud computing is still relatively limited, and the future, if trueIt is predicted that, when cloud computing becomes a mainstream application, how to avoid such downtime, the data stored in the cloud server in a nearly foolproof protection, I am afraid will be all interested in continuing to use and promote cloud computing companies must take seriously. Privacy, privacy, and privacy The second problem is cloud computing and the privacy of customers. The Sony PSN platform attack led to a large number of customer information leaked, but also after the Google and Apple mobile phone positioning door, the third show the information giant of the vast collection of customer information. There is no doubt that this information for information industry companies, means great business opportunities, but in essence, this business opportunity is to commercialize personal privacy, and because of the asymmetry of information technology knowledge and ability between customers and vendors, the customer lacks the effective ability to resist this massive collection of personal information.　　In the existing software operating mode, most of the time, the customer is faced with no choice: not Press the consent button, "Allow" vendors to collect your privacy information, customers often can not fully enjoy the product or service. It is for this fear that the Democratic Senator John Kerry, who has participated in the presidential election, and Republican Senator John McCain, have recently tried to launch an updated version of the 1998 Children's Online Privacy Protection Act, a draft of what is currently known as the "2011 on-line tracking" bill, The plan is to limit the company's online collection of information, allowing users to stop information technology companies from gathering information about their online activities and personal privacy information at the right time. This can be seen as a rebound and a constraint on the excessive collection of private information by information companies in the United States, although the restrictions are limited. At the same time, it is also a reminder that in the information age, the hope of protecting personal privacy can not be pinned on the self-discipline of commercial companies or the development of information technology, but it is necessary to construct a good system environment through legislation and other non technical means to protect personal privacy.　　After all, it is at least as important to ensure that privacy continues to be private, rather than inadvertently becoming a source of business profits, than to enjoy a convenient and enjoyable information product. Legislation, legislation, the imminent cloud computing, as well as other types of more advanced and powerful information technology applications, will inevitably gradually into people's lives, this is the trend of information technology development, how to enjoy these technologies at the same time, to avoid personal privacy damage, will be the future society must face the key problem,　　Therefore, it is very important to construct a good system environment by means of legislation. (Ph. D., School of International Relations and Public Affairs, Fudan University)