\n<\/p>\n
Today, we\u2019re announcing general availability of Microsoft Cloud for Sovereignty across all Azure regions. Microsoft Cloud for Sovereignty helps governments meet their compliance, security, and policy requirements while utilizing the cloud to provide superior value to their citizens.<\/p>\n
Governments around the world must meet a wide range of national and regional compliance requirements for applications and workloads, including governance, security controls, privacy, and in some cases data residency and sovereign protections. Until now, most solutions for addressing these regulatory requirements have relied upon private cloud and on-premises environments, creating a lag in adoption of scalable, secure and resilient cloud capabilities.<\/p>\n
Microsoft Cloud for Sovereignty \u2014 offering governance, security, transparency and sovereign technology \u2014 supports the digital transformation of government customers unlike any other cloud provider in the world. Customers gain automation of best practices to address regulatory requirements while benefiting from the rapid pace of innovation in the hyperscale cloud.<\/p>\n
When we talk with government customers, we hear common questions in terms of achieving data sovereignty in the cloud. These often include questions around (1) residency, security and compliance of the hyperscale cloud; (2) controls for data access; and (3) the complexity of addressing regulations that vary by country.<\/p>\n
First, Microsoft Cloud for Sovereignty is built on the foundation of more than 60 cloud regions, providing industry-leading cybersecurity along with the broadest compliance coverage. Microsoft offers the most regions of any cloud provider. Customers can implement policies to contain their data and applications within their preferred geographic boundary, in alignment with national or regional data residency requirements.<\/p>\n
Second, Microsoft Cloud for Sovereignty provides sovereign controls to protect and encrypt sensitive data and control access to that data, enabled by sovereign landing zones and Azure Confidential Computing.<\/p>\n
A sovereign landing zone is a type of Azure landing zone designed for organizations that need government-regulated privacy, security and sovereign controls. Organizations can leverage landing zones as a repeatable best-practice for secure and consistent development and deployment of cloud services. As many government organizations face a complex and layered regulatory landscape, utilizing sovereign landing zones makes it much easier to design, develop, deploy and audit solutions while enforcing compliance with defined policies.<\/p>\n
Customers can also leverage\u00a0Azure Confidential Computing<\/a> to secure sensitive and regulated data even while it\u2019s being processed in the cloud. Azure Confidential Computing protects data in memory in hardware-based trusted execution environments, helping prevent unwanted data access by the cloud provider, administrators and users.\u00a0Customers can benefit from this capability on Azure without having to change existing applications.<\/p>\n Third, customers can adopt specific, sovereignty-focused Azure policy initiatives to address the complexity of compliance with national and regional regulatory requirements. These help customers create cloud guardrails and enforce specific regulations more easily. Customers can layer these policy initiatives to form a complete solution for their specific needs, and use deployment automation to ensure consistency, best practices and save time.<\/p>\n For example, our customers typically start with Azure Cloud Security Benchmark<\/a> then layer the new Sovereignty Policy Baseline<\/a> to ensure best practices for digital sovereignty. Then, customers can leverage a regional specific layer, such as Baseline informatiebeveiliging overheid (BIO)<\/a>, a foundational standards framework for information security within the Netherlands government, or the strategic guidelines for migration to the cloud of data and digital services of the Italian Public Administration National Cybersecurity Agency (ACN).<\/a><\/p>\n Additionally, the new Cloud Security Alliance Cloud Controls Matrix (CSA CCM v4)<\/a> policy initiative is oriented toward a global standard that many other regional standards build upon.<\/p>\n Through our product development lifecycle, we\u2019ve had the privilege of collaborating with customers around the world and their trusted partners. These collaborations continue to inform both our technical roadmap as well as solution design and delivery.<\/p>\n In the Netherlands, the National Cyber Security Center (NCSC-NL) has achieved significant traction in their work to establish a cloud center of excellence, deploying Microsoft Cloud for Sovereignty to accelerate innovation in the cloud while still managing sovereign controls. Arnoud van Petersen, CIO & Head of IT Services at NCSC-NL, explains: \u201cOur innovation teams are exploring ways to use advanced data and AI capabilities to reduce the time required to interpret signal data and produce advisories from days to minutes, delivering an EU leading rapid response and information sharing in a dynamic cyber threat landscape.\u201d<\/p>\n The municipality of Amsterdam is partnering with InSpark (a subsidiary of Royal KPN) to bring on-premises datacenter workloads to the cloud in compliance with the relevant classification within the Dutch BIO regulation. Patrick Scholte, Director Platforms & Development, shares: \u201cMunicipality of Amsterdam opted for Cloud for Sovereignty primarily due to privacy considerations, specifically in compliance with GDPR. Beyond its effective implementation of innovative security technologies, Microsoft Cloud for Sovereignty plays a crucial role in facilitating significant internal advancement for us.<\/p>\n \u201cAs an organization, it is imperative for us to address the establishment of processes, policies, and guidelines, as an addition to the use of innovative technologies that pertain to data sovereignty,\u201d Scholte adds. \u201cThese measures are essential in mitigating evolving risks, and the use of Microsoft Cloud for Sovereignty allows us to encode and audit them effectively.\u201d<\/p>\n In Italy,\u00a0Leonardo<\/a> is now migrating their public and private customers to a secure public cloud service on the new Italy North Azure region, leveraging sovereign landing zones and\u00a0advanced technologies such as Azure Confidential Computing. \u201cWe have chosen Microsoft Cloud for Sovereignty to deliver solutions for our customers in compliance with digital sovereignty attributes and regulations, leveraging the economies of scale, security levels and pace of innovation that today are only available with hyperscale clouds,\u201d says Massimo Tedeschi, Senior Vice President Cyber & Security Engineering, Leonardo.<\/p>\n In Belgium, Proximus has selected Microsoft Cloud for Sovereignty in its work with customers across Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands to deliver cloud capabilities along with advanced security layers and sovereignty controls to protect sensitive data in the cloud.<\/p>\n \u201cOur customers expect us to provide them with the highest data protection and sovereignty, says Anne-Sophie Lotgering, Enterprise Market Lead at Proximus. \u201cThat is exactly why we collaborate with Microsoft to offer advanced cloud capabilities together with the highest security and privacy controls to our Benelux customers.\u201d<\/p>\n As the Microsoft Cloud for Sovereignty enters general availability today, we\u2019re also announcing new capabilities in preview. These solutions underscore our continued investment in a rapid pace of innovation to advance sovereignty in the hyperscale cloud:<\/p>\n Get started<\/a> with Microsoft Cloud for Sovereignty today to advance government innovation in the cloud.<\/p>\n Visit microsoft.com\/sovereignty<\/a> for the latest news, visit Microsoft Learn<\/a>, and reach out to your Microsoft representative to learn more.<\/p>\nCustomer and partner collaborations delivering local solutions<\/strong><\/h3>\n
Driving a rapid pace of innovation<\/strong><\/h3>\n
\n
Learn more and get started today<\/strong><\/h3>\n