How Secure Is the Cloud? IT Pros Speak Up

CIO - For CIOs and IT professionals, the potential of the cloud is clear: transforming IT from cost center to business engine. It promises the agility and scalability that tech dreams are made of. By leveraging the cloud, you can complete typical IT tasks in hours rather than weeks or months, allowing you to dedicate staff to innovation, not just maintaining systems and infrastructure.

But reduced costs and increased flexibility don't come without costs. Security is always a concern when sensitive data is involved, and that concern is heightened when it comes to cloud services that sit outside the corporate firewall. The numbers bear that out. U.S. companies are still feeling out their security footing when it comes to the cloud, but the trend is clear. Eighty-two percent of U.S. companies trust the cloud enough to use it in at least some deployments. However, 54 percent also list cloud security as a high priority (and another 32 percent cite it a middle priority).

To help you get a better sense of how your peers view cloud security, CIO.com collected survey data from multiple sources. Take a look at our infographic (or download the PDF) for more details on how U.S. companies are approaching the cloud.

Thor Olavsrud is a senior writer for CIO.com. Follow him @ThorOlavsrud. Dan Muse is executive editor of CIO.com. Follow him @DMuse.