A study by Symantec and the Ponemon Institute, entitled Flying Blind in the Cloud: The State of Information Governance [PDF file], examines the procedures, policies and tools that U.S. companies currently have in place to ensure the security of data in the cloud -- and finds that only 27 percent of respondents had any procedures in place for approving cloud applications that use sensitive information.

"Despite widespread interest in adopting cloud computing technologies, many organizations are 'flying blind' with respect to making them secure, potentially putting their business operations, company data and customer information at risk," says Justin Somaini, chief information security officer at Symantec. "Today, organizations need stronger information governance for managing corporate information and enabling confidence in the cloud. The success of cloud computing hinges on the trust and confidence that can only occur when the information security teams have better visibility into the security posture and operations of cloud initiatives."

Click here [PDF file] to access the report.