ICT Services Data Warehousing and Data Mining Over Cloud

Question: Discuss about theICT Servicesfor Data Warehousing and Data Mining Over Cloud. Answer: Introduction XYZ organization is an organization that is a software company that provides software services and solutions to its clients in the field of banking and healthcare. The organization deals with huge quantity of data on a per day basis and therefore has now decided to move the entire database to the cloud. The various operations related with the data will also be performed virtually over the private cloud of the organization. There are a number of details associated with this step and the same are covered in the report. SWOT Analysis SWOT Template Organization:XYZ Date: 30/09/2016 Description ofcurrent/newICT service: The new service that has been launched and implemented by the organization is in the terms of cloud database. The organization has moved all of its data over the private cloud that will be managed by its internal database team. The internal and external activities and the data operations associated internally and externally will now be handled over the cloud only. STRENGTHS Scalability is the biggest strength that will be possible for the organization in terms of its data solutions. Cloud database would allow the database and data storage to be scaled up or scaled down as per the requirements and the scenario irrespective of the major changes. Database administration will also become easy and simple to perform with the involvement of the cloud database. Disaster recovery and data backup will also become simpler with the aid of cloud database due to the automatic backup solutions along with the easy ways to recover the data in case of a disaster. The organization will also benefit in terms of the operational, maintenance and infrastructural costs that will be reduced to a great extent. Maintenance and support activities associated with the database and associated operations will also become easy. WEAKNESSES The migration of database to the cloud will bring a lot many changes for the internal staff in terms of processing and operations. These changes may be difficult to manage during the initial period and may also result in a number of concerns related with employee resistance and reduced productivity. Training costs will be involved as it would be necessary to train the employees on the new changes implemented in the system There may be unavailability of the skills required to administer and perform operations on the cloud database which may require external hiring to be performed. There may also be security concerns that may come up which will require special focus from the security team (Hashizume, Rosado, Fernndez-Medina, Fernandez, 2013). Downtime may also increase due to frequent attacks and threats in case of weak security architecture. OPPORTUNITIES The organization will be able to serve better to its clients as the database operations will become faster in terms of processing and execution There will also be overall cost savings and benefits with this step and planned cost benefit analysis Once the employees will be able to acquire the required skills and adapt the pace required for the operations, there will be improvements in terms of efficiencies and productivity The organization will also be able to attain a competitive edge over the others in the market Management and administration activities will also improve leading to organized execution of database services and operations THREATS Data breaches may be common with the involvement of cloud database and cloud storage which may impact the data properties such as confidentiality, availability and integrity of the data (Jansen, 2016). Malware threats and attacks and the likelihood of the same may also increase leading to adverse impact on the data and information There may be increased instances of data loss and information leakage as well Network threats and attacks such as man in the middle, intruder attacks and likewise may also increase with the involvement of cloud database (Pearson Benameur, 2016). Denial of service and distributed denial of service attacks will also increase with the cloud database (Kshetri, 2016) Summary and Recommendations: Short Term (Now) The employee training plan will be created and the trainings will be scheduled and executed along with the hiring of additional resources, if required after the assessment of the current skills set. Basic security and physical security mechanisms will be implemented and monitored. Mid Term (next 12 months) Employee feedback will be taken on the change implemented along with the implementation of the advanced security mechanisms such as cryptography, encryption, and identity and access management. Long Term (next 3 to 5 years) Assessment of the requirements will be done time and again to understand the changes in the requirements along with the market analysis as well. A detailed plan will be developed for the management and reinforcement of the changes along with the maintenance and support activities that would be necessary. Security infrastructure will also be developed and improved as per the amount of data and the data properties that the organization will deal with (Ryan, 2016). Cloud Database and Associated Database Operations The decision that has been taken by the organization in terms of the migration of database services and operations over cloud will result in a lot many benefits for the organization and it would be necessary to look after a few operations in terms of the change management and the security issues and concerns that may come up. The reason behind the change and the newly implemented service was the increased amount of data that the organization had to deal with on a per day basis. It was becoming impossible to keep an account of all the data that was involved with a single data repository and the internal database that was present in the organization. Also, the information that the organization deals with is associated with the banking and healthcare domain and both of these domains comprise of private and confidential data. It was necessary to come up with a solution that could allow the easy data storage along with easier operations that could be performed on the data (Takabi, 2016). Data Warehousing and Data Mining Over Cloud There are a number of warehousing and data mining operations that are executed by the organization to analyze the data and come up with meaningful information. There are logical data warehouses that are possible with the involvement of the cloud database that allow data to be kept and viewed logically to understand the various properties of the data. The monitoring along with the maintenance of the data would also become easy in this case. Data mining operations will also be performed with ease with the usage of cloud data storage and database. Countermeasures to Data Security There are a number of components that are involved with the cloud and the same gives rise to a number of security issues. There are many advanced security mechanisms that are now possible and can be implemented in order to keep a check on the security concerns that are possible and have also been raised in the Threats section of the SWOT analysis that has been conducted above. Steps to Security The essential effort to establish safety and components that must be received well so that there are no simple accesses provided to the aggressors at the initial step of security. These measures incorporate utilization of hostile to infection and other against malware programming alongside the establishment of firewall at each system way out and passage point. Propelled security systems as far as character and get to administration should likewise be guaranteed, for example, interruption discovery, interruption aversion, multi layer confirmation and numerous others. Organizing checking and arrange filters should likewise be utilized to keep any of the systems administration assaults and dangers. Cryptography and encryption are the measures that must be utilized to keep up the security of the information and data regardless of the possibility that the assailant succeeds in gaining the data and information (Sen, 2016). Physical security is one of the measures that are regularly disregarded by the associations and firms that must never be overlooked to ensure the servers and physical access focuses. There must likewise be nonstop review and action logs that must be kept up to identify the exercises of the assets and workers that are connected with the association to put a mind the insider dangers that are very normal in the present situation (Sun, Zhang, Xiong, Zhu, 2014). Conclusion The decision that has been taken by the organization is in sync with the latest demands of the technology. There will be a number of advantages for the organization in terms of the faster processing of operations, easier database administration, cost savings and also simpler maintenance and support activities. There may also be concerns and weaknesses that may come up in terms of the change management, training of the employees and the skill sets that will be required. The newly implemented services will also bring along a number of security threats in terms of data breaches, data loss, information leakage, malware threats and many others. These threats can be dealt with the establishment of stronger security mechanisms along with the countermeasures such as enhanced physical security, basic security and advanced security. Successful implementation of the cloud database will also add many values and bring along a number of opportunities in terms of competitive edge in the market, imp roved customer satisfaction and many others. References Hashizume, K., Rosado, D., Fernndez-Medina, E., Fernandez, E. (2013). An analysis of security issues for cloud computing. J Internet Serv Appl, 4(1), 5. https://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1869-0238-4-5 Jansen, W. (2016). Cloud Hooks: Security and Privacy Issues in Cloud Computing. Retrieved 30 September 2016, from https://www.computer.org/csdl/proceedings/hicss/2011/4282/00/10-03-01.pdf Kshetri, N. (2016). Privacy and security issues in cloud computing: The role of institutions and institutional evolution. Sciencedirect.com. Retrieved 30 September 2016, from https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0308596112000717 Pearson, S. Benameur, A. (2016). Privacy, Security and Trust Issues Arising from Cloud Computing. Retrieved 30 September 2016, from https://barbie.uta.edu/~hdfeng/CloudComputing/cc/cc05.pdf Ryan, M. (2016). Cloud Computing Privacy Concerns on Our Doorstep. Cacm.acm.org. Retrieved 30 September 2016, from https://cacm.acm.org/magazines/2011/1/103200-cloud-computing-privacy-concerns-on-our-doorstep/fulltext Sen, J. (2016). Security and Privacy Issues in Cloud Computing. Retrieved 30 September 2016, from https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1303/1303.4814.pdf Sun, Y., Zhang, J., Xiong, Y., Zhu, G. (2014). Data Security and Privacy in Cloud Computing. International Journal Of Distributed Sensor Networks, 2014, 1-9. https://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2014/190903 Takabi, H. (2016). Security and Privacy Challenges in Cloud Computing Environments. Retrieved 30 September 2016, from https://csis.pace.edu/~marchese/SE765/Paper/security2.pdf