eDiscovery in the Cloud - Watch Out!

It is clear from many surveys and indeed from my previous posts on cloud computing that data security, accessibility and location are key concerns for companies considering cloud computing solutions. However there is yet another area of concern around data in the cloud that requires consideration and discussing with cloud vendors before embarking on a cloud computing project. This area of concern, which isn' t much talked about in cloud computing circles, relates to eDiscovery.
As with any on premises application, courts and other authorities can issue eDiscovery orders at short notice and with tight delivery timelines (in some jurisdictions this can be as little as 24 hours). The question organisations must ask themselves is will their cloud vendor be able to support them in responding to such an eDiscovery request within the required timeframes. Remember responding to such a request will often require trawling through large volumes of data. This is difficult enough when all the resources are in your control. However, in the cloud scenario where infrastructure is shared between customers this becomes more complicated - for example how will the data be searched without impacting your operational performance for you and that of other customers and will the vendor have the resources and tools at hand to do discovery at all?

None of these issues are insurmountable but it does highlight again the absolute need to think through all impacts of the cloud computing model in advance of embarking on the journey and to ensure you have a comprehensive SLA in place with your vendor.