Assignment

Respond to this your colleague's posting. In your responses, be sure to do the following:

• Address the content of each colleague's analysis and evaluation of the topic, as well as the integration of relevant resources.

• Address the question(s) posed by each colleague for further discussion.

• Analyze the relationship between each colleague's posting to other colleagues' postings or to other course materials and concepts, where appropriate and relevant.

• Include proper APA citations.

Colleague post:

Barrett's (2014) study focuses on the security of cloud computing and the digital forensic data that can be used to retrieve the data found on devices as a result of unauthorized access that might be related to criminal activity. My research will focus on the location of security mechanisms in relationship to the hardware on virtual host machines. Barrett's study focuses on the lack of security research regarding cloud computing. The same lack of research exists with my pursuit of virtualization layer security. Hair-Jones (2015) focuses on why or why not IT professionals in the educational industry adopt virtualization. This study does contribute to mine because it addresses the question on why or why not IT security professionals were adopted particular protocol.

The theoretical framework that Barrett (2014) pursues is contingency theory which addresses the response to situational variables in an effort toto attain organizational objectives. This is also applicable to my research because I am trying to define how the virtualization layer response to the different placements of the security mechanisms in regard to the host hardware. Hair-Jones' (2015) qualitative case study research utilize an interview process to ascertain why IT leaders in higher education made the jump to server virtualization. This is also applicable to my research study because this would be a possible research method for myself. I might consider interviews with a select number of key IT security professionals in hopes of defining best practices for hypervisor security.

Barrett's research questions are specific regarding when forensic processes can be used or modified. This would be similar to my research because I would be asking for the justification of the location of the security mechanisms within the virtual layer. I might ask a security professional why they chose to deploy their security mechanism within the virtual machine as opposed to within the guest operating system. Hair-Jones on the other hand asked more open-ended questions where there is more room for interpretation on why the IT professionals chose to migrate to a virtual server network. I think this line of questioning is less applicable to my study because I would be searching for a more precise answer.

My questions for the class are:

• When dealing with an IT subject that has a minimal amount of research on it, what would be good sources for future research considerations?

• What would be more effective, trying to select a few subject matter experts in the area of virtualization security in hopes of conducting a Delphi study myself? Or utilize a survey to blanket an area and hopefully engage a larger number of IT security professionals regarding their opinion on hypervisor security?