Connected devices give rise to personal cloud, Gartner says

The increasing popularity of connected devices, like tablet computers and smartphones, is having a direct effect on the adoption rate of personal cloud services, a March 2012 report from Gartner states. Both trends will continue alongside each other, the research firm's analysts say.

"[A] big change has occurred during the past couple of years, with the growing adoption of mobile and portable devices that have limited internal storage and rely heavily on cloud services," Gartner managing vice president Andrew Johnson says.

At a conference in Singapore, Johnson acknowledged that the idea of personal cloud services isn't new. However, the increased adoption rate of mobile devices has given rise to new services within these cloud platforms, including the ability to store, synchronize, stream and share content across numerous platforms.

That, Johnson says, has given consumers the flexibility they both need and desire.

The Cloud Security Alliance (CSA) has taken aim at the rise of mobile cloud computing by addressing the issue at the recent RSA Conference in San Francisco. At the gathering, CSA officials launched a new program to help organizations combine the two innovative technologies, CSO magazine reports.