Virtualization Pitfalls

Virtual machines and hypervisors deliver flexible, elastic computing capabilities that allow organizations to stand up new environments in a matter of minutes, while gaining more operating function from each individual physical system. As with cloud computing solutions, virtualization constantly redraws the traditional boundaries that we're accustomed to with our physical systems.

For example, a company might physically house its web-services-based customer portal right beside the operating environment, the applications, and the data for its highly sensitive financial database. These two data sources may be separated only by a virtual operating system boundary. If the customer portal is compromised, it's not much of a leap for the attacker to gain access to the financial data residing on the same machine.Many of the same concerns and due diligence that apply to cloud solutions also apply to virtualization. However, in the case of virtualization, the ownership and related actions remain completely in the hands of your organization.