Just last night, at the opening of the Broadband Properties conference in Dallas, I had a discussion about cloud computing with a gentleman who assured me in soothing tones that from a security perspective, there was "nothing to worry about" because IT folks would be very careful and make sure cloud-based data was secure from hackers.
So this morning I read via the InnerTubes that Sony's online Playstation database has been hacked. The hackers managed to swipe the personal information and credit card data of 77 million users, which is probably the entire Playstation user community.
I'm not really opposed to cloud computing; it's a great convenience and I already make use of several "cloud" services, but the industry hype about cloud computing is naive and dangerous to those who don't understand the risks. And as I've noted previously, mainly for the benefit of twenty-something "IT experts," cloud computing is nothing but a mainframe with a longer cord to the user. And many of the security problems that we will continue to see with poorly designed cloud applications and services will be the direct result of programmers who either did not pay attention in class or were poorly taught. Those who fail to understand history are doomed to repeat it.