The top challenges to compliance in virtualization

Chris Farrow of Fortisphere, in a recent News.com article outlined some challenges for achieving IT compliance in the field of virtualization. For example, the discovery and inventory of virtual machines can be tricky, given that virtual machine resources cannot be tagged physically. Also, what is the company's policy pertaining to rogue virtual machines? Closely related to this would be the importance of maintaining a chain of custody in which an audit trail of approved changes is documented. Farrow also discusses the importance of segregating low-risk virtual machines from high-risk or mission-critical ones, and the need to track software licenses for violations. Because virtualization is relatively new, he advocates that companies ensure they retain the appropriate expertise in their technical personnel. 

For more on the challenges to IT compliance in virtualization:
- check out this ZDNet article