Publications

This report surveys different approaches to securely storing and sharing data in the cloud based on traditional notions of security: confidentiality, integrity, and availability, with the main focus on confidentiality. An appendix discusses the related notion of how users can securely authenticate to cloud providers. We propose a metric for comparing secure storage approaches based on their residual vulnerabilities: attack surfaces against which an approach cannot protect. Our categorization therefore ranks approaches from the weakest (the most residual vulnerabilities) to the strongest (the fewest residual vulnerabilities). In addition to the security provided by each approach, we also consider their inherent costs and limitations. This report can therefore help an organization select a cloud data protection approach that satisfies their enterprise infrastructure, security specifications, and functionality requirements.