Cloud Storage
Cloud storage services provide durable, scalable data persistence without owning physical media. They offer object, block, and file storage with varying performance, access patterns, and pricing tiers, accessible through APIs from anywhere with network connectivity.
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Intro
Cloud Storage
Cloud storage gives you storage capacity through a network service. The provider operates the underlying media, controllers, and much of the data-protection machinery. You choose a storage model, location, protection policy, access policy, and cost profile.
The useful question is not, “Which cloud storage is best?” Ask, “What access pattern, failure model, security boundary, and recovery target does this data need?” A database volume, a shared team directory, and a media archive need different answers.
Cloud storage inherits the core traits of cloud computing. You can provision it on demand, draw from shared provider capacity, expand without installing disks, and pay according to measured use. That convenience does not transfer ownership of your data decisions to the provider.
Start with the access model
Most cloud storage services expose one of three models: object, block, or file.
Object storage stores each item as an object with data, metadata, and an identifier. Applications normally use an HTTP-based API. Objects live in a flat logical namespace, although object names can contain slash characters that tools display like folders. Object storage fits media, logs, backups, static website assets, data lakes, and other large collections that do not need disk-style updates.
Block storage presents a volume to a compute system. The operating system treats that volume like a disk and places a file system or database layout on it. Block storage fits boot volumes, transactional databases, and applications that need low-latency random reads and writes.
File storage presents shared files and directories through a file protocol such as NFS or SMB. It fits applications and users that already depend on paths, directory traversal, file locking, and shared-file semantics.
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Sources
- https://csrc.nist.gov/pubs/sp/800/145/final
Supports
- Cloud computing as on-demand network access to shared configurable resources
- Resource pooling, rapid elasticity, and measured service
- Storage as a configurable cloud resource
- https://doi.org/10.6028/NIST.SP.800-209
Supports
- Object, block, and file storage service models
- Cloud storage as an abstraction over underlying storage technologies
- Authentication, authorization, data protection, isolation, encryption, backup, replication, and restoration assurance
- Storage threats, configuration risk, and security recommendations
- https://docs.aws.amazon.com/whitepapers/latest/web-application-hosting-best-practices/storage-and-backup-of-data-and-assets.html
Supports
- Object storage for static assets and media
- Block volumes as mountable persistent storage for databases and application data
- Snapshots as a protection mechanism for block volumes
- https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/storage/common/storage-introduction
Supports
- Managed object, file, disk, queue, and table storage services
- Encryption at rest, client-side encryption, redundancy, and data-transfer choices
- Managed cloud storage use cases and service boundaries
- https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/storage/common/storage-redundancy
Supports
- Local, zonal, and geographic redundancy choices
- Failure-scope, availability, durability, latency, and cost tradeoffs
- Synchronous primary-region writes and asynchronous geographic replication behavior
- Data integrity checks, secondary read access, and failover considerations
- https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/storage/blobs/data-protection-overview
Supports
- Versioning, soft deletion, backup, redundancy, replication, and restore as separate protection options
- Recovery from deletion, overwrite, corruption, and service outage
- Retention, immutability, and protected backup use cases
- https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/storage/common/storage-service-encryption
Supports
- Service-side encryption before data is persisted
- Transparent decryption when authorized data is retrieved
- Provider-managed and customer-managed key choices
- https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonS3/latest/userguide/Versioning.html
Supports
- Retaining, retrieving, and restoring multiple object variants
- Recovery from accidental deletion and overwrite
- Storage cost for full object versions and interaction with lifecycle rules
- https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonS3/latest/userguide/access-management.html
Supports
- Identity and resource policy controls for object storage
- Versioning, object immutability, encryption, and signed requests as distinct controls
- Server-side and client-side encryption boundaries
- https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonS3/latest/userguide/DataDurability.html
Supports
- Distinction between object durability and service availability targets
- Versioning, replication, and object lock as protection mechanisms
- Protection against infrastructure and availability-zone failures
- https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonS3/latest/userguide/intro-lifecycle-rules.html
Supports
- Storage-class transitions and expiration actions
- Different lifecycle behavior for current, noncurrent, and unversioned objects
- Need to account for version state in destructive automation
- https://cloud.google.com/storage/docs/storage-classes
Supports
- Storage class as object metadata affecting availability and pricing
- Retrieval fees, minimum storage durations, access patterns, and location choices
- Lifecycle-based class changes and automated class management
- https://cloud.google.com/storage/pricing
Supports
- Capacity, operation, retrieval, data-processing, and network-transfer price dimensions
- Minimum storage duration and early-deletion effects
- Location and storage-class effects on total cost
- https://cloud.google.com/storage/docs/lifecycle
Supports
- Lifecycle conditions and transition or deletion actions
- Current and noncurrent object-version behavior
- Retention, holds, and destructive-rule cautions
- https://cloud.google.com/storage/docs/consistency
Supports
- Strongly and eventually consistent operations
- Atomic behavior for individual object operations
- Cache effects, permission propagation, preconditions, and concurrency risks