UK companies reluctant to embrace public clouds

The UK is lagging behind much of Europe when it comes to seeing the real benefits of cloud services, new research has claimed.

Despite businesses on the continent fully embracing the cloud, companies in the UK appear more reluctant to make the move, meaning they are potentially missing out on some major advantages, according to a report from Barracuda.

In a Europe-wide survey, the UK was found to be the least trusting of public cloud solutions, with just over half (52 percent) saying that they trusted the platform more than they did five years ago. This was versus an EMEA average of 58 percent, and far behind cloud frontrunners Austria, where 83 percent of businesses had seen an increase in their trust in public cloud.

This distrust means that UK businesses were found to be embracing cloud less than our continental cousins, with just 29 percent of UK infrastructure is in cloud, versus an EMEA average of 35 percent.

This is despite the variety of benefits that cloud services can offer a business, not least in terms of security protection.

Worryingly, Barracuda’s research found that there was also a lack of understanding among senior IT figures as to who owned the responsibility for security on public cloud platforms.

Across Europe, the survey discovered that only 61 percent of those surveyed claimed to fully understand their responsibilities in this area.

Despite most cloud providers stipulating on a shared responsibility model when signing an agreement with a business, almost two thirds (64 percent) of respondents across the EMEA region believed it was the solely the responsibility of the cloud provider to secure data in the cloud, while 61 percent said the same about applications and 60 percent about operating systems.

Such attitudes would normally suggest that companies have their own security systems in place to stay safe online, however the survey found that the UK was also the least likely country to have added additional security solutions, with only 43 percent saying they had any extra protection.

"We have to do more to educate customers, we have to do more to make sure our products are deeply integrated into the fabric of how they want to roll those capabilities out," Barracuda SVP of Security Hatem Naguib told ITProPortal, noting that "rational business minds" would win out soon.

"When it benefits the citizens, and it can help from a business perspective, people will see (public cloud) as a benefit -- I don't think anyone is motivated to create additional friction just for the sake of doing it."

Published under license from ITProPortal.com, a Future plc Publication. All rights reserved.

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