Summary

This chapter introduced some of the security and compliance benefits of cloud computing. I focused my discussion on the world’s most popular CSPs’ basic capabilities, that is, of Amazon Web Services, Google, and Microsoft.

The physical infrastructure model that hyperscale CSPs have roughly coalesced around is based on the concept of Regions and Availability Zones. This concept is that an Availability Zone is a cluster of datacenters and a Region is a cluster of Availability Zones. There are meaningful differences in the size and scope of CSPs’ infrastructures and how they leverage components of this model. Although the terms IaaS, PaaS, and SaaS are still in widespread use today, they are slowly becoming obsolete. Newer services that solve specific problems can blur the lines between IaaS, PaaS, and SaaS service models, making them less important.

CSPs are different from traditional Managed Service Providers (MSPs) in some key ways. It is important...