New Cloud Security Initiative
The Cloud Security Alliance (CSA), an organization that promotes best practices and security assurances in cloud computing, is now working with the MashSSL Alliance, an organization that encourages use of a next generation SSL standard for cloud computing.
The CSA is already working with a number of IT organizations to improve cloud security, and this new development represents, a new effort to lock down clouds and add new levels of visibility and control, while also pushing for standardization around cloud security.
A story I read about the development says that the CSA-MashSSL venture aims to “accelerate the adoption of secure cloud computing and alleviate end-user fears of security in the cloud.” If they can make that goal a reality, then it will be easier for solution providers to get clients on board with the cloud.
MashSSL enables Web apps to mutually authenticate and establish a secure channel without having to trust the user or the browser. A Layer 7 security protocol, MashSSL uses a so-called “friend in the middle” configuration to convert the SSL into a multi-party protocol that “inherits SSL’s security, efficiency and mature trust infrastructure,” says the story.
“As the CSA now moves into identifying the concrete building blocks for the new protocols that are emerging to build a secure cloud platform, we welcome their joining the MashSSL Alliance, as MashSSL certainly supplies one of the key missing ingredients,” said Siddharth Bajaj, Principal Innovation Group,VeriSign, who also serves as the Chair of the MashSSL Alliance and the W3C MashSSL XG, in a statement.
I’m all for any effort to make the cloud more secure, and I wish this new, innovative alliance good luck! It’s helpful, too, for users to remember that independent services like cloud platform monitoring with instant notification tools for when trouble is brewing, increases levels of safety and security.
