Is cloud computing the end of Internet utopia?

Cloud computing may be unavoidable but for all the IaaS, SaaS and (to a lesser extent) PaaS services out there, we're not quite there yet, at least at the corporate level. In fact, despite a growing adoption of out-hosted services there aren’t all that many corporations that have gotten rid of their data centres.

So what is then missing? A signature, really. The problem is that nobody wants to sign off what may be a death sentence for the business. So next question is, what is required to get that signature? I can only see one possibility: the one thing that nobody wants in the Internet right now... regulation. Once this is accepted, everything will come to place. The "cyber-world" will be ever more like our "physical" world. Even insurance companies may take their part and cover for data leakage, manipulation or unavailability. And the Internet will finally be a normal part of our lives.

But will people ever want regulation? It is certainly about time that our children get the protection that they deserve on the Internet, and that criminals start getting caught. No doubt that a hacker would think twice before defacing a web site or impersonating somebody else if he could get jailed for it. It's all about value at risk. Let’s face it, right now there is virtually no risk in attacking who or whatever a hacker wants, and that makes it really hard and often expensive for businesses and people to defend themselves.

In my opinion it is long overdue because only with security can people and institutions thrive.

The challenge is to create a secure environment while keeping privacy and freedom of expression. And as far as I can see that cannot be achieved only with so-called self-regulation.