The reason companies do not use escrow services are

1) the cost too much - My employer offers escrow as an option to clients but they when told the escrow costs are a significant percentage of the total they rethink the requirement.

2) temptation to kill you - My employer is a SMB providing services and technology to mostly large telcos and some of these have in the past decided that once escrow is in place the cheapest option is to try and drive us out of business then grab the IPR's for free via escrow. You have to be very very carefull how you word contracts and escrow agreements.

So escrow can be a good idea but only if you have a decent client base who are prepared to

pay for it.

Of course, I would not recommend using an escrow company so desperate for business that it punts fake FUD articles in trade rags to scare up custom.

... The issues described in this article apply to ALL cloud computing... if it is important then you are putting your risk in someone else's hands and all the contracts in the world will not make up for having your own back up solution ...

I dont want to dis cloud computing and inccurring the wrath of the people who think its just dandy, but didn't we learn anything from outsourcing.. i.e. that it is not the cure for all evils, but it may be useful in some ways..