[unisog] Web Hosted Apps

[William Yang]

Darden, Patrick S. wrote:
> We are contemplating something like Google Docs campus wide.  Is anyone 
> using this as the officially recommended office suite?  Can it be hosted 
> locally?  What security concerns does it raise?  What are the privacy 
> and data continuity issues?

What are the privacy issues for having a third party that can have its 
behavior dictated to it by the government of any country on Earth--without 
notice to you--control all your documents?  Note that they will study the 
contents of your files and index them.

I'll readily say that Google Docs is cool and the price can't be beat... 
but I would be very concerned about the implications of using something 
like Google Docs on data that's protected by FERPA, HIPAA, or that falls in 
other regulated spaces.

How do you model--let alone mitigate--the risk of this, exactly?  You are 
*giving up control and custody* of your documents* with Google Docs.

	-Bill
-- 
William Yang
wyang at gcfn.net