I don't know about you guys but I see cloud computing as the biggest security folly in the history of computers.
There's no way in hell you can permanently secure a public network which is what cloud computing would be working on. Anything you send "to the cloud" can be intercepted. Encryption as good as it is under some schemes isn't a be all end all defense.
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...Why not? Properly implemented SSH is unbreakable, barring rubber-hose attacks.
edited 7th Jul '11 6:31:58 AM by Yej
Da Rules excuse all the inaccuracy in the world. Listen to them, not me.
Quantum brute force cracking, it slices through private key encryption like butter.
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And watch me use a few more bits on my keys. O(1,000,000n) is still polynomial time. Besides, if we're allowed to use technologies that don't exist yet, Quantum key exchange
. Game over. 
Decemberist
Most home users have absolutely no clue about encryption. Not a good thing, I tell you.
The sin of silence when they should protest makes cowards of men.
I still haven't figured out the difference between "cloud computing" and "renting a VPS", unless it's supposed to be "use webapps for everything!".
While I like the simplicity of a web interface (and they are much easier to program in my experience), the data still has to live somewhere. And I would much prefer it to be under my control. The canonical copy at least; online backups or repositories are very convenient, and increase overall safety.
But if Microsoft was hit by a meteor today, even the most terribly written Visual Basic app would still function. If Google up and dematerialized, maybe you could find mangled versions of your more recent docs in the browser cache.
Do you highlight everything looking for secret messages?
^^^ Quantum computers are already in the hands of large entities like governments and corporations, while doing quantum cryptography yourself would require one of these, and (my understanding of this last part may be a bit off) would also require a quantum network to transmit data encrypted in such a fashion. In other words, cracking has been made mathematically trivial for anyone with deep pockets.
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No, it hasn't; The best quantum computer publicly known can process 4 qbits. I doubt governments have orders-of-magnitude improvements we don't know about. (Also, the hardware required for quantum transmission is just ordinary fibre optics.)
Regardless, even quantum computers can't crack 1024-bit encryption in less than days.
edited 7th Jul '11 9:21:32 AM by Yej
Da Rules excuse all the inaccuracy in the world. Listen to them, not me.
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Most home users have no idea about good security practices in general. Easiest way to get somebody's password? Ask them.
Second easiest way? Send them a file and ask them to run it, and say yes to all the prompts.
Security awareness is non-existent for most people.
Also, there's no inherent reason why a system would be completely dead without internet access, you would have to develop a very dumb terminal, and when phones are capable of running systems more advanced than most people need to do things, it's not exactly a desirable thing. Admittedly, you won't be fully capable, but how many people would be hamstrung without internet access no matter how powerful their system is?
I have a lot of concerns about privacy. I don't know about others, but I want the data on my computer to be all mine, and don't want to be dependent on the server. What if something happens to my internet connection? Then I'm unable to do some most basic things on the computer. No, thank you, I'm perfectly fine with my "dated" technology.
The sin of silence when they should protest makes cowards of men.