An Advisory Paper released today by The Real Story Group determined that enterprise customers may find cloud-based file sharing surprisingly immature, especially when dealing with data security and ownership. This report comes as enterprises move toward cloud services, yet frequently do not realize how their information is being stored, transferred, or duplicated.

Real Story Group Principal Alan Pelz-Sharpe summed up the challenge for enterprise customers: “The onus of responsibility for your data is on you — not the cloud-service provider.”

Cloud-based file-sharing services have obtained some traction — even among larger organizations — because of ease of provisioning and mobile access, as well as for exchanging files with external parties. At least five major providers now target enterprise customers for hosted file sharing: Box, Dropbox, Huddle, Oxygen, and ShareFile. However, enterprises licensing these services should be on the alert for a variety of potentially unpleasant surprises, including immature service level agreements, and a lack of lifecycle management services.

Real Story Group Analyst Apoorv Durga added, “Customers should also investigate loose data encryption regimes and fuzzy data ownership policies.”

The Advisory Paper, “Are cloud-based file-sharing services too immature for the enterprise?” is available for purchase for $475 from www.realstorygroup.com.