A Refined RBAC Model for Cloud Computing

Cloud computing is a fast growing field which is arguably a new computing paradigm. In cloud computing, computing resources are provided as services over the Internet and users can access resources on based on their payments. This paper discusses cloud computing and its related security risks, with a focus on access control. As a traditional access control mechanism, role-based access control (RBAC) model can be used to implement several important security principles such as least privilege, separation of duties, and data abstraction. This paper shows an on-going effort by refining entities in RBAC used for cloud computing, and further discusses their security implications. We argue that RBAC is well suited to many situations in cloud computing where users or applications can be clearly separated according to their job functions.