Cloud data deletion: Cryptographic challenges and requirements

Abstract

The rapid development of cloud services reports a noticeably quick increase in users and things utilizing the cloud platform. The support of data storage at a very low cost, which the cloud platform provides, can reduce the storage limitation in local devices. An obvious worry, however, is raised by the data owners about the possibility of losing direct control of their outsourced data. This fear and concern have alarmed a real problem about the data confidentiality and assurance of data deletion within the utilized cloud platform. Users need to get some level of guarantee about their deleted data being away from getting recovered by unauthorized users or cloud servers. Issues about assured deletion have gained lots of attention; this paper presents a study and analysis of this topic aiming to reduce the gap by reviewing many closely relevant published literatures about assured data deletion in clouds. The advantages and limitations of most existing schemes are analyzed and discussed, together with various challenges facing the issue of assured deletion. Moreover, the paper identifies some supporting proposals for future research, which will dig further into this area. The basic set of challenges and requirements for approaching best practices to gain and possibly developing new techniques for assured deletion are presented in this paper.