Mr. Niall McDonagh:

I will address a number of points. The fear of change is probably one of the reasons for the slower movement in the public sector. There is a risk for the private sector, but there is also an incentive, particularly for chief information officers, CIOs. There is a risk for the public sector in adopting cloud computing but there is not necessarily an incentive to take that risk. People will not necessarily see improvements in their budgets or increases in their pay packets.

The policy mandated approach in the US is interesting. In a way, it provides a cover or support for CIOs to take action. It is possible to dip one's toes in the cloud waters. One could buy a subscription for one of our services, for example, Windows Azure, for €10,000 or €20,000, and start building pilot applications. A large, overnight and risky transformation is not necessary.

Regarding fear of change and questions of security and privacy, "cloud" does not necessarily mean "public cloud". It need not involve giving one's data to an external provider. For example, an Irish Government service could have all of the characteristics of cloud. Indeed, this is exactly the Government's strategy. While it is primarily intended for central government, it also envisages a private cloud strategy and, therefore, removes many of the risks.

Another key security and privacy point is that of data classification. Of the Departments' data, one needs to know what is and is not sensitive. Therefore, one can tailor a cloud service. Typically, the public cloud service is large scale and, for this reason, allows one to make greater cost savings. However, there are also greater privacy concerns. If one classifies data, the less sensitive data can be moved onto the public cloud and the more sensitive data can be kept in a private cloud. This is in line with what the Government has envisaged.