TY - JOUR N2 - Rapid development and massive use of Information Technology (IT) have since produced a massive amount of electronic data. In tandem, the demand for data outsourcing and the associated data security is increasing exponentially. Small organizations are often finding it expensive to save and process their huge amount of data, and keep the data secure from unauthorized access. Cloud computing is a suitable and affordable platform to provide services on user demand. The cloud platform is preferable used by individuals, Small, and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) that cannot afford large-scale hardware, software, and security maintenance cost. Storage and processing of big data in the cloud are becoming the key appealing features to SMEs and individuals. However, the processing of big data in the cloud is facing two issues such as security of stored data and system overload due to the volume of the data. These storage methods are plain text storage and encrypted text storage. Both methods have their strengths and limitations. The fundamental issue in plain text storage is the high risk of data security breaches; whereas, in encrypted text storage, the encryption of complete file data may cause system overload. This paper propose a feasible solution to address these issues with a new service model called Confidentiality-based Classification-as-a-Service (C2aaS) that performs data processing by treating data dynamically according to the data security level in preparation for data storing in the cloud. In comparison to the conventional methods, our proposed service model is strongly showing good security for confidential data and is proficient in reducing cloud system overloading. © 2022 THE AUTHORS TI - A Confidentiality-based data Classification-as-a-Service (C2aaS) for cloud security KW - Big data; Classification (of information); Cloud security; Cryptography; Information use KW - Cloud securities; Cloud storage method; Cloud storages; Data classification; Data confidentiality; Electronic data; Plain text; Security level; Service modeling; Small-and-medium enterprise KW - Cloud storage Y1 - 2023/// ID - scholars18885 UR - https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?eid=2-s2.0-85141316631&doi=10.1016%2fj.aej.2022.10.056&partnerID=40&md5=dc63ab80e126575947bdb1a9a107671c A1 - Ali, M. A1 - Tang Jung, L. A1 - Hassan Sodhro, A. A1 - Ali Laghari, A. A1 - Birahim Belhaouari, S. A1 - Gillani, Z. N1 - cited By 18 EP - 760 SP - 749 JF - Alexandria Engineering Journal AV - none VL - 64 ER -