Given the differences in market maturity, cultural acceptance and local IT infrastructures, considerable regional differences exist in the deployment rates of cloud-based security systems. They all play a part in the level of spending dedicated to this delivery model — when compared with on-premises business technology deployments.

Moreover, privacy remains an inhibitor in the deployment of all forms of cloud-based services by the late adopter market segment. In particular, it’s a big issue in those regions and countries with strong regulatory requirements — such as Europe, with its data protection legislation.

Regardless, the cloud-based security services market will be worth $2.1 billion in 2013 — growing to $3.1 billion in 2015, according to the latest market study by Gartner.

“The cloud-based security market remains a viable one, offering providers many opportunities for expansion,” said Ruggero Contu, research director at Gartner. “Encryption will be a new area of growth, but it …