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Fri, Nov 6, 10:30 - 10:55, Ballroom B Paper (refereed)

Recommended Citation: Tout, S, W Sverdlik, and G Lawver. Cloud Computing and its Security in Higher Education. In The Proceedings of the Information Systems Education Conference 2009, v 26 (Washington DC): §2314. ISSN: 1542-7382.

Cloud Computing and its Security in Higher Education

Refereed

5 pages

Samir Tout    [a1] [a2]
School of Technology Studies, Information Assurance
Eastern Michigan University    [u1] [u2]
Ypsilanti, Michigan, USA    [c1] [c2]

William Sverdlik    [a1] [a2]
Department of Computer Science
Eastern Michigan University    [u1] [u2]
Ypsilanti, Michigan, USA    [c1] [c2]

Gerald (Skip) Lawver    [a1] [a2]
School of Technology Studies, Information Assurance
Eastern Michigan University    [u1] [u2]
Ypsilanti, Michigan, USA    [c1] [c2]

Interest in cloud computing has witnessed a significant surge in the past few years. The basic tenet of this concept entails the reduction of in-house data centers and the delegation of a portion or all of the Information Technology infrastructure capability to a third party. This holds the promise of driving down cost while fostering innovation and promoting agility. Three typical kinds of cloud services are: Processing Clouds that provide scalable and mostly affordable computing resources that run enterprise programs, Storage Clouds that offer an alternative to local file systems, and Application Clouds that allow a thin client to interact with services that are completely hosted on an external infrastructure. Institutions of higher education, such as universities and colleges, are the core of innovation through their advanced research and development. Unfortunately, some of the limitations that confront such institutions are not the lack of ideas but rather repeated budget cuts, limited on-campus computing resources, lack of a unified storage media, and application silos that are scattered around campus computers. Subsequently, universities may benefit greatly by harnessing the power of cloud computing, including cost cutting as well as all the above types of cloud services. However, before full adoption, universities must consider key issues, which include, among others, migration tradeoffs and security. This paper explores the application of cloud computing in higher education and touches upon some of its aspired benefits as well as its expected limitations.

Keywords: Cloud Computing, Higher Education, Security, Software as a Service (SaaS), Computing Resources

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