Download Legal issues in cloud computing

Legal issues in cloud computing
Teemu Mäntylä
11.11.2009
Reliability & liability
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Users expect clouds to be reliable
What guarantees are there?
Who is responsible for damages?
How do you prove the cloud provider is at
fault?
Reliability & liability (2)
• Damages may come from multiple causes:
– Service outage
– Data/code/result corruption
– Data/code/result compromisation
• Telecommunications law relies on market to
drop bad operators, doing the same with
clouds is too risky
Security & privacy
• Data, code and results must all be protected
• Cloud provider needs to monitor
• Threats range from pushy advertisers to
corporate spies
• Difference between simple monitoring and
malicious data mining can be a fine line
Security & privacy (2)
• By European laws, personal data may not
normally be sent outside the EU, but a cloud
provider might subcontract another cloud
• Foreign government agencies might gain
access, even without needing to show cause
• Care must be taken not to break data
protection laws or user contracts
Access & usage
• Can a licensed program be used in a cloud?
• License terms vary between countries, with
no regard to clouds
• Who is responsible for illegal activity
within the cloud?
• Expecting cloud providers to monitor for
illegal activity big technical problem
Current situation
• National laws, international clouds
• Legislation lags behind technology
• Current laws and cloud providers place all
responsibility on the client
• Clients need to be alert and insist on terms
that protect their interests
• Better clouds might surface if left to market
Example cases
• Legal issues very much alike between
outsourcing services and cloud computing
• Death by Delete
• Monopolizing service provider
?