Sticky policies for data control in the cloud

One of the main security concerns related to the cloud hosting and virtualization, is the lack of Trust in the infrastructure. This lack of trust is due to the absence of transparency concerning the data handling and storage conditions. There are no concrete technical guarantees that can convince a potential cloud customer that he is fully controlling his data. In this paper we propose a security service (called SPACE) in the cloud that provides all the tools to data owner to impose his privacy preferences during the virtualization phase. SPACE is based on the sticky policy technology and offers access and usage control functionalities to the data anywhere in the cloud. In addition to the main security features offered by SPACE, new visualization and control functionalities are proposed to make the user fully aware on the storage condition of his private information.