More and more companies have seen the increase value of virtualization. However, there are still some who are not yet convince! I will admit the startup costs of transitioning your datacenter from physical to virtual will incur a large cost and some inherent risk. But, the long term value will definitely outweigh these initial expenditures.
Virtualization has evolved over the past few years, where not only medium-to-large size companies can take advantage, but also small companies. There are virtual service providers who will host your entire environment from a remote location. So, the need to maintain hardware and software on your premises has gone away. Not only can you virtualize your infrastructure, but now there are service providers that can provide services to virtualize many of your business functions such as Operations and Human Resources. The possibilities seem to be endless…
With new services in technology brings new security vulnerabilities and just because you virtualize your environment it doesn’t mean you don’t have to worry about hackers breaking in to steal your data. Ultimately, no matter where your infrastructure resides and who owns the network and hardware; you as an organization still own the data. You as the owner of your employees and customer data must ensure your service providers are current on security updates, employ strong cryptography methods, and restrict access to your data to only those with a need a know.
Just remember this: Virtualization and hosting service providers endow many advantages to your company. However, you cannot lose sight of the ultimate asset, which is your data. If a breach was to occur your employees and customers are not going to blame the service providers; they will blame you and if the breach is significant and public it will hurt your business’ reputation and impact your revenues.
c~Sharpe Security Consulting
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