15 Challenges of Cloud Computing & Solutions

While cloud computing has transformed data access and management, cloud computing is not without challenges. The challenges of cloud computing are diverse, but often come down to fundamental aspects of the cloud.

Common challenges include security issues due to the increased attack surface from being hosted online, to multi-environment complexities like integrating multiple different cloud solutions or on-premises architecture with the cloud. In niche industries, expertise shortages often present a significant problem, where there’s simply not enough experts to go around.

The following factors highlight some of the most pressing challenges of cloud computing:

• Data security and privacy — Moving data to the cloud raises the potential for data leaks, data losses and security breaches.
• Complex hybrid and multi-cloud environments — Integrating solutions across multiple cloud platforms can be complex.
• Performance challenges — Maintaining consistent performance can get tricky in some situations. For one, sudden traffic surges can lead to downtime.
• Interoperability and flexibility — Each cloud service provider has proprietary software, which can make applications hard to operate on other platforms. Also, the level of customization is largely up to the provider, so there’s some inflexibility.
• High dependence on networks — Cloud systems rely heavily on network connectivity for data flow. Of course, this dependence comes with various risks, ranging from performance to security risks.
• Lack of knowledge and expertise — Cloud computing services are numerous, so every new tool might require training or the recruitment of an expert.
• Reliability and availability — Cloud systems must consistently perform and have zero or near-zero outages. However, with software bugs and hardware issues always lurking, achieving this reliability and availability isn’t easy.
• Password security — Some cloud systems require the creation of multiple accounts to use different services. Multiple accounts mean more passwords to manage. What’s more, cloud platforms — particularly SaaS and cloud storage providers — are top targets for hackers.
• Cost management — While relatively cost-effective, the cost of cloud computing typically varies with usage, which can be unpredictable. Proper cost management is therefore essential.
• Suboptimal resource usage — Having access to computing resources on-demand raises the chances of paying for underused resources.
• Control or governance — Cloud users relinquish significant control to cloud service providers. That means they must establish a thorough framework to maintain responsible standards.
• Compliance — It’s essential to ensure that the cloud provider’s policies adhere to regulatory guidelines.
• Migration — Making the shift from traditional systems to the cloud (or between different clouds) without breaking anything can be tricky.
• Private cloud creation — Creating a private cloud offers an extra layer of security and data privacy. However, this comes with some infrastructural complexity and requires a higher level of expertise.
• Segmented usage and adoption — Cloud service providers often struggle to create services that satisfy all potential use cases. Because of this, some companies may have to adopt services piece by piece.

1. Data Security and Privacy

Since cloud solutions are accessible from anywhere, keeping data both secure and private is one of the key challenges of cloud computing.

While cloud service providers secure the underlying infrastructure, customers remain largely responsible for data security and privacy in the cloud. Ordinarily, traditional privacy and security policies should suffice. However, customers have less control of data in the cloud, so their security approaches differ, resulting in a need for alternate data security and privacy policies.

Apart from that, cloud environments are a public target for malicious actors, so they experience regular attacks. Going by attack frequency only, cloud environments have an increased attack surface. Potential data breaches by insiders on the provider side further increase the attack surface.

Data regulations like the General Data Protection Regulation may also be a concern as they require adherence to stringent laws.

2. Complex Hybrid and Multi-Cloud Environments

Hybrid and Multi-Cloud environments allow users to take advantage of the strengths’ of multiple platforms, but they’re also much more complex to manage.

One of the main cloud computing challenges in multi-cloud environments is the lack of standardization among cloud providers. This makes app integration across cloud platforms somewhat difficult.

Ensuring appropriate configuration in each multi-cloud environment is another concern. The more complex the environment, the trickier the configuration management. Similarly, managing the billings, tools and so on for each platform could get too complicated.

3. Performance Challenges

While flexible and reliable, the cloud has its performance challenges, most commonly in the form of latency. Latency can come from a slow internet connection. It could also be due to physical distance from the cloud data servers. In either case, latency slows down data transfer and ruins the end user’s experience.

Changes in usage patterns can also affect cloud performance. For one, when accessing shared cloud resources, cloud users may experience reduced performance during peak usage periods. Similarly, applications can become inaccessible to end users during unexpected traffic surges. With reputable cloud platforms, this period of inaccessibility typically doesn’t last too long.

Another source of cloud performance challenges is flawed architecture. Poor choice of services — such as improper virtual machine sizing or configuration — could cause your software to underperform.

4. Interoperability and Flexibility

Cloud solutions should ideally be as interoperable and flexible as possible, meaning they can function independent of their specific platform or vendor.

However, cloud service providers build some of their services on proprietary software. Because of this, integrating apps using these services across multiple platforms sometimes isn’t straightforward. This can ultimately lead to vendor lock-in, where the user is so dependent on a particular cloud provider that they can’t leave.

5. High Dependence on Networks

High dependence on networks is one of the biggest challenges of cloud computing, and it’s one that is hard to avoid, since networking is one of the core components of cloud computing.

Data transfer to and from the cloud is done over a network, which is typically the internet. With limited bandwidth or slow internet, the data transfer time will skyrocket and performance will drop. Even worse, without internet access, it’s almost impossible to use the cloud. Data transfer over the internet also adds an extra layer of exposure, raising the risk of data breaches.

6. Lack of Knowledge and Expertise

A lack of knowledge or expertise in cloud computing is a common problem for organizations moving from an on-premises solution to the cloud.

Businesses will face hurdles when switching to the cloud if their team isn’t comfortable with cloud technology solutions. If the business lacks professionals with cloud training, they will certainly face operational challenges. For instance, getting a tech team that isn’t cloud-savvy to implement an effective cloud security policy would be a big ask.

Apart from that, teams that don’t have sufficient cloud expertise are more likely to use resources inefficiently. Of course, this will lead to unnecessary costs. Furthermore, a team or individual with insufficient cloud expertise won’t be able to keep up with the most recent cloud trends and developments, stagnating the business and stripping it of its competitive edge.

7. Reliability and Availability

Reliability and availability, meaning how rarely a computing solution becomes unavailable for whatever reason, are commonly cited as upsides of cloud computing.

However, while it would be ideal to have completely reliable and available systems, actually achieving this is nearly impossible, and reliability or availability challenges are often inevitable in any system.

Cloud providers still sweat over the availability of their infrastructure. In many cases, reliability and availability issues stem from external factors like security breaches and unstable internet connectivity. However, there could also be software bugs, physical infrastructure failure or misconfiguration of the cloud resources.

8. Password Security

With everything accessible over the internet, keeping passwords secure is one of the most important parts of cloud security as a whole.

Cloud users sometimes have to create several accounts to use multiple services. This creates a situation where they must remember many different passwords, which can be difficult. Some people try to avoid this by reusing passwords, but this presents a potential security vulnerability.

Users who have one password for a cloud account are also somewhat vulnerable. For them, password exposure would mean that attackers can gain access to all their data and applications in the cloud.

While the issue may seem minor, not many users follow best password practices. This creates even more vulnerabilities.

9. Cost Management

Managing costs for cloud computing can be tricky, especially in the early stages, when usage can be unpredictable. As a result, you may overprovision or underprovision the cloud resources. You’ll lose money if you overprovision, but you may face performance issues if you underprovision.

In cloud computing, customers cede some architectural visibility to the provider. However, this reduced visibility also means that customers won’t readily get an overview of all the resources they use. Ultimately, they’ll accrue hidden or unrecognized charges.

Some services have complex pricing models, which make budgeting difficult. Situations like these are even worse when they involve multi-cloud services.

10. Suboptimal Resource Usage

Because cloud computing offers easy access to computing resources, it can be easy to waste these resources or use them inefficiently, with users provisioning resources they don’t need on a whim. Consequently, they’ll have underutilized resources, wasting energy and raking in unnecessary costs.

Overused resources are also potential cloud challenges. When resources are provisioned to the max or the scaling configuration is skewed, resources will be spread too thin and performance will plunge. Besides performance drops, overused resources can be prone to security attacks. For example, a virtual machine overloaded with privileges becomes a hotbed for attackers.

11. Control or Governance

In the cloud, you relinquish some control and governance to the provider. As a result, you can’t enforce configurations to your desired degree. In other words, you may just have to accept some of the provider’s default configurations.

12. Compliance

Staying compliant with various regulations and laws while operating in the cloud comes with many hurdles. For one, the portability of cloud data allows it to travel across various locations very fast. With each region having different data regulations, it gets hard to keep up.

In some cases, organizations using the cloud must meet data residency regulations. For instance, the rules may require them to only use cloud service providers with data centers in specific locations.

Within an organization, different teams can have different perspectives on compliance in the cloud. This can create confusion, hindering overall compliance. Furthermore, tracking compliance across each platform can be difficult when running multi-cloud services, particularly with these changing regulations.

13. Migration

Cloud migration — the process of migrating data or workflows between architectures — requires extensive planning and a well-defined strategy to increase the chances of success. The planning and strategizing becomes even more daunting for complex systems that aren’t readily adaptable to the cloud.

Migration to the cloud comes with downtime and service disruption. Proper planning could minimize the downtime, but there will always be some disruption.

14. Private Cloud Creation

Private clouds are cloud solutions dedicate to a single entity or organization. While it’s beneficial for security and privacy, creating a private cloud comes with extra costs. It also introduces an extra layer of complexity into cloud architecture, requiring a higher level of expertise.

15. Segmented Usage and Adoption

When setting up cloud infrastructure, different teams may opt for varying services across different cloud providers. If this segmented adoption isn’t well managed, they’ll end up with some inconsistencies.

Apart from that, integrating services from various cloud providers can be difficult due to the incompatible differences in the underlying structure of said services.

What Are the Challenges of Cloud Computing in Healthcare?

The cloud computing challenges in healthcare include data sensitivity, vendor lock-in, high dependence on connectivity, and migration concerns.

• Data sensitivity: Protecting sensitive data is a legal requirement for healthcare institutions as health data often contains personally identifiable information. Thus, data privacy and security for cloud computing in healthcare is often more thorough. Healthcare compliance regulations are also more detailed, giving cloud service providers more hurdles to scale.
• Vendor lock-in: When using a specific cloud provider, it’s easy to get “locked in” to their service, meaning it becomes impossible to migrate away from it in the future. Considering their data privacy and security needs along with their compliance concerns, healthcare providers may have limited options when choosing a cloud provider. As such, they may become locked-in when they finally find a platform that satisfies their requirements.
• High dependence on connectivity: Cloud solutions require a high level of connectivity to function. The critical nature of healthcare data means that they must always be available in real time. However, with the cloud’s high dependence on connectivity, network outages are a constant threat.
• Migration concerns: Migrating workflows and data from a legacy system to the cloud can be fraught with danger. Most healthcare providers rely on legacy systems, which aren’t readily compatible with modern cloud systems. This introduces some difficulties when migrating to the cloud.

What Are the Challenges of Cloud Computing in Education?

Cost considerations, integration concerns, data privacy and security, and lack of expertise are some of the primary challenges of cloud computing in education.

• Cost considerations: Managing expenses is key for most education institutions. Of course, cloud computing will save schools money in the long term. However, the up-front costs of migration can be an issue for institutions with tight budgets.
• Integration concerns: Integrating on-premises systems with the cloud can present challenges. Some educational institutions have legacy infrastructure, which cannot readily integrate with the cloud. Cloud integration may therefore require more effort than it would with modern systems.
• Data privacy and security: Data privacy and security remain a concern in any sector that uses cloud computing. Educational institutions hold sensitive student data, and migrating such data to the cloud increases the attack surface. Strict security and privacy protocols that align with applicable regulations must be enforced to protect the data.
• Lack of expertise: A lack of expertise and training on cloud technologies is a common problem in cloud computing, and in education depends on the teachers’ ability to use the cloud solutions. Therefore, cloud migration in education typically requires training the educators, which introduces extra costs.

What Are the Challenges of Cloud Computing in the Banking Industry?

Security is the number one challenge of cloud computing in the banking industry. Besides that, there are also compliance concerns, integration challenges, and control and governance issues. These challenges are described below:

• Security: Banks handle sensitive financial data, so they are prime targets for cyberattacks. Since transitioning to cloud computing potentially increases the attack surface, stricter policies are often required to prevent data breaches and financial losses.
• Compliance concerns: The banking sector is heavily regulated for obvious reasons. When switching to cloud computing, banks must carefully assess cloud service providers and choose those that meet all their compliance requirements.
• Integration challenges: Banks often have complex infrastructure with legacy technology. As such, their systems may not readily integrate with modern cloud infrastructure. This would pose a problem and cause some delays during cloud migration.
• Control and governance: Traditionally, banks have full control over their computing infrastructure. However, they cede some control when they switch to the cloud, demanding a need for thorough cloud governance policies.

What Are the Two Most Common Cloud Adoption Challenges?

The two most common cloud adoption challenges are security and cost management. Switching to cloud computing exposes data and apps to more interfaces, raising the risk of breaches and leaks. Organizations therefore have more work to do in the way of security.

While cloud computing pricing might be economical, cost management can be an issue. Organizations lose some visibility when they use cloud infrastructure, making it harder to keep track of and manage all the resources in use.

What Are the Disadvantages of Cloud Computing?

The disadvantages of cloud computing include increased cyberattack surface, limited control, cost management and network dependence. Cloud data interacts with more interfaces, so a breach is more likely.

Also, cloud users have limited control over resources, and may struggle to monitor and manage costs. Finally, cloud computing depends on network connectivity, which comes with downtime risks.

What Are the Security Risks of Cloud Computing?

The security risks of cloud computing include insider threats, account hijacking, data breaches, DoS attacks, insecure APIs and limited visibility. 

In traditional systems, insider threats came from the organization only. However, in cloud computing, insider threats exist in both the cloud service provider and the organization. These insiders can exploit flaws in the system, even with robust security measures in place. You can mitigate this with least-privilege access management.

In many instances, if cyberattackers compromise the credentials of a cloud account, they gain access to virtually all resources and sensitive data. With least-privilege access, multi-factor authentication, strong password policies and cybersecurity awareness, you can avoid this.

Because data on the cloud interacts with more interfaces, more APIs, more humans and so on, there’s an increased chance of a data breach, whether intentional or not. Thorough encryption policies and least-privilege access make this less likely.

APIs drive most of the movement in cloud computing. Thus, if they’re insecure, hackers can have a field day when they exploit vulnerabilities. Organizations can avoid this by understanding the security posture of APIs before using them.

Furthermore, cloud computing’s dependence on network connectivity exposes applications to DoS attacks. DoS attacks make applications inaccessible to real users. However, cloud providers typically have firewalls and other measures in place to prevent them.

Cloud computing abstracts some processes from the users, limiting their visibility. As such, organizations just have to trust that their cloud providers are following through with standards. Choosing reputable cloud service providers is essential here.

What Are the Benefits of Cloud Computing?

The benefits of cloud computing include cost-effectiveness, on-demand service access, scalability and elasticity, enhanced collaboration and reduced infrastructural burden. 

Cloud computing is cost-effective because it takes away the up-front costs of setting up on-premises infrastructure. In addition, the pricing model typically focuses on usage, meaning you only pay for what you use. This makes it more cost-effective than traditional infrastructure.

On-demand service access means that cloud computing offers computing resources on-demand. There’s no lead time; the resources are available when you need them. Since resources are available on-demand, the cloud is elastic, meaning you can readily scale up or down.

Cloud computing also makes it possible for teams to collaborate from any location with network access. Distance and location are no longer barriers to teamwork. Organizations don’t have to worry about maintaining physical infrastructure; they just need experts to handle their applications and data in the cloud.

Final Thoughts

Most cloud computing challenges point back to security concerns. However, this doesn’t mean that cloud computing is inherently insecure. It’s just that data and applications interact with more interfaces, increasing their attack surface. Cost management is also a big challenge as it’s easy to lose sight of resources when infrastructure gets complex.

In your daily usage of cloud computing, what challenges are most frequent? How do you overcome these challenges? What future improvements are you most excited for in the cloud computing industry? Leave a comment about your experience with cloud computing in general. Thanks for reading.

FAQ: Cloud Computing Challenges

• What Are the Challenges in Cloud Computing?

  The common challenges in cloud computing include security, compliance, cost management, lack of expertise and reliability.

• What Are the Top 5 Cloud Computing Security Challenges?

  Five of the top cloud computing security challenges are data loss, misconfiguration, unauthorized access, vulnerable interfaces and insider threats.

• What Are the Main Disadvantages of Cloud Computing?

  The main downsides of cloud computing are limited control and visibility, vendor lock-in and high dependence on networks.

• What Are the Risks of Cloud Computing?

  Cloud computing comes with security and privacy risks as it inadvertently increases the attack surface. There’s also the risk of downtime and unexpected costs.