In a recent column for StateTech, Alan R. Shark, longtime executive director of the Public Technology Institute, observes that many local governments are “reconsidering cloud strategies to improve reliability.” The cost of building on-premises IT infrastructure has fallen in recent years, he adds, and so he anticipates a growth in hybrid cloud configurations among cities and counties.
Recently, CDW released a proprietary cloud research report titled “What’s Next in the Cloud?” in which we see many organizations in various verticals embracing hybrid cloud. Many find strategic advantages to keeping some workloads on-premises and others in a public cloud. “Business objectives should be the primary factor for IT leaders in determining where to place workloads within a hybrid environment,” notes the CDW research report.
Local governments often find that a hybrid cloud approach best suits their IT environments and business priorities, partly for security reasons. After all, they hold a lot of private citizen information and other sensitive data.
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Many Moving from Cloud Express Security Concerns
The CDW cloud research report finds that roughly 84% of survey respondents in all industries have moved some workloads to the cloud and then back to on-premises infrastructure. This reflects Alan Shark’s own observations. And for those moving back on-premises, 68% expressed security concerns, making it the top reason for shifting away from cloud.
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CDW recently worked with the Kansas Turnpike Authority, a state government agency, to establish cashless tolling with the Red Hat OpenShift platform to maintain data on-premises. Meanwhile, the Calcasieu Parish Sheriff’s Office in Louisiana maintains a hybrid cloud environment to keep sensitive law enforcement intelligence close while transmitting body camera footage and other data through cloud solutions.
Local governments often find that a hybrid cloud approach best suits their IT environments and business priorities, partly for security reasons.”
In both of these cases, state and local governments are capitalizing on capabilities that only hybrid cloud can provide by using cloud infrastructure to support operations in the field and then holding data close to home. It is a configuration that states and localities have long found satisfies their security concerns. As Shark says, we can expect to see more agencies housing data in-house to address security issues as they continue to grow their hybrid cloud environments.
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