Big Data, a technology that can’t be termed into a single definition as there are still many things that are left to be explored in the genre. Be it from hospital records to the ever-increasing government archives – this technology has always been available for companies, businesses and various types of institutions. And with the inception of cloud computing, things are now becoming affordable and easier to access the various packages by various smaller companies and individuals.
In recent times, when there’s an overwhelming amount of data across the web – be it websites or social media where both the brands and the consumers generate loads of information every day. Organizations and institutions are creating data daily that would be difficult to manage in the coming times. Here’s a run down of the condition in the last five years:
- 2.5 quintillion bytes (2.3 Trillion Gigabytes) of data that are created every day.
- 40 zettabytes (43 Trillion Gigabytes) of data that would be created by 2020.
- Most of the companies in the US have at least 100 Terabytes or 100,000 Gigabytes of stored data.
So, How exactly to manage and secure the essence of this data rather than just stacking it?
From what it appears there couldn’t have been a better combination than this – cloud computing and big data. They both provide solutions that is both scalable and accommodating for big data and business analytics. The advantages of this technology can be revolutionizing in today’s times, some of them are:
Agility:
The traditional infrastructure of storing and managing data is now proving to be slower and harder to manage. It can literally take weeks to just install and running a server. Cloud computing is here now, and it could also provide your company with all the resources you need. A cloud database can enable your company to have thousands of virtual servers and get them working seamlessly in only seconds.
Affordability:
Cloud computing can be a blessing in disguise for a company that wishes to update the technology under a budget. Companies could choose what is actually suitable for them as well as pay for it. The resources that are required to manage Big Data are available that is easy on the pocket. Before the cloud, companies used to invest the huge amount of money in setting up IT departments and then invest some more in updating and maintaining the hardware. Now the companies can host their Big Data on off-site servers or pay only for storage space and power they use every hour.
Data Processing:
The explosion of data leads to the issue of processing it. Social media can generate a load of unstructured, chaotic data like tweets, posts, photos, videos and blogs that can’t be processed under a single category. With Big Data Analytics platforms like Apache Hadoop, structured and unstructured data that can be processed. Cloud computing makes the whole process easier and accessible to small, medium and larger enterprises.
Feasibility:
Big Data Analysis requires new processing requirements for large data sets and the demand for processing this data can raise or fall at any time of the year and cloud environment is the perfect platform to fulfill this task. There is no need for additional infrastructure since cloud can provide most solutions in SaaS models.
Challenges for Big Data in the Cloud System:
Though the Big Data has provided managing several terabytes of data, it has also presented the issue of managing this data under a traditional framework. But, in order to analyze a large sum of data to bring out the most important bits – analyzing these volumes of data is complicated in nature.
Today, when lightning speed connectivity is everything, moving large sets of data and providing details for its access is also a problem. These large sets of data often carry various sensitive information like credit/debit card numbers, addresses, etc making it a huge concern for data security.
Security issues in the cloud is a major concern for businesses and cloud providers today. It seems like the attackers are relentless and keep inventing new ways to find entry points in a system. Other major issues include ransomware, that deeply affects a company’s reputation and resources, Denial of Service attacks, Phishing attacks, and Cloud Abuse. Over 40% of organizations across the world experienced ransomware last year that had a lot of client, customer and cloud providers’ data at stake when it comes to the risks involved in making an agreement on cloud solutions. Weak API’s and insecure interfaces can put all the data on the threat to hackers who can misuse this data for various malicious activities.
The various cloud models that are still in the deployment stage and basic DBMS is not only tailored for Cloud computing and Data Acts is also a serious issue that requires data closer to the user than the provider. In cases like these, Data Replication needs to be done error-free else it can mess with the analysis stage. It is also crucial to make the searching, sharing, storage, transfer, analysis, and visualization of those data as smoothly as possible. The only way to deal with such challenges is to implement next-generation technology that can predict various issues before causing any further damage. The fraud detection patterns, encryptions, and smart solutions are immensely important to combat attackers. At the same time, it is your responsibility to own your data and keep it protected at your end as you’re looking for business intelligence solutions that can ensure a steady ROI as well.