Red Hat urges CIOs to pay attention to key security concerns.

CIOs looking to make the most of innovative enterprise-grade containers must pay attention to crucial security concerns.

That is the latest advice from technology specialist Red Hat, which says – if implemented correctly – containerisation offers many businesses benefits, including extreme application portability, flexibility, and rapid application delivery.

Red Hat refers to containers as the "latest hot technology in IT", which offers organisations the ability to isolate and run applications in their own environment with just the necessary operating system components.

While the innovative approach provides many potential upsides, enterprises are not necessarily rushing to adopt containers, with Red Hat suggesting many businesses are put off by key security concerns.

Improperly implemented or even malicious containers can cause real damage, just like an improper or malicious application.

As a result, Red Hat reports in a blog statement that: "Containers must also operate within the security and certification ecosystem that covers applications today."

The statement says enterprises must be able to clearly identify where a container originated, and what components are packaged in the container.

Containers, suggests Red Hat, will have a lifecycle that must be managed: "We want IT organizations to be able to verify that a container originated at a trusted, verified source, to track that container as it is deployed across all manner of platforms, and to be confident that the container will receive the support and updates required throughout its lifecycle."