Business prefer to keep 'mission critical data' away from SaaS

Category: Data management

24 August, 2012

Many businesses are avoiding software as a service (SaaS) to help reduce the risk of mission-critical data loss, according to Gartner.

Cloud technology is more likely to be used for sensitive data than high-risk information, which many organisations are reluctant to store at outsourced data centres.

Thirty six per cent of organisations surveyed have a policy against putting mission-critical data onto the cloud, with avoidance being the most common practice.

One of the biggest barriers to greater SaaS adoption could be a fear of divesting control of data retrieval protocols.

Gartner research vice president Jay Heiser explained: "While fault tolerance is a feature of many such offerings, we consider it premature to assume that mission-critical data is safer in a cloud than in a traditional data centre in which buyers usually make very specific choices about how data will be backed up."

He added that there appears to be an expectation that packaged service offerings are more preferable to SaaS.

Information is critical to the successful running of most businesses. When it comes to the secure deletion of end-of-life data, Kroll Ontrack has CESG accredited software and hardware you can rely on.

Posted by Paulie Phillips