Address UK Government security compliance in weeks, not months

To comply with UK Government strategy guidelines, government organisations are looking to migrate their services to the cloud. Beyond meeting the mandate, these organisations also want to make the most of all the cloud has to offer — to reduce costs, adopt transformative technologies and, ultimately, provide better services to the public — all in a secure and compliant cloud environment.

But to reach these cloud outcomes, government organisations face many challenges:

• Compliance requirements
• Cloud security concerns
• Shortage of relevant skills and experience
• Budget restrictions
• Strategies for cost optimisation

To set yourself on a path to cloud migration success, we recommend you focus on four key areas: automation, security and compliance, continuous monitoring and cost reduction. Let’s take a closer look at what these involve.

Four keys to a fast, secure and cost-saving cloud migration

1. Automation

With automated migration tools and processes, you can reduce your migration timeline — so your organization can get to the cloud faster. Whether you have one workload or many, automation can streamline the process and help build consistency across your cloud environment.

2. Security and compliance

To be secure and compliant, your environment needs to be fully aligned with NCSC 14 Cloud Security Principles and ready for UK-OFFICIAL workloads. From Public Services Network (PSN) accreditation and Cyber Essentials Certification, to Security Information and Event Management (SIEM), firewalls and endpoint security, it all works together to protect your organization and its assets.

3.   Continuous monitoring

The U.K. Information Commissioner's Office received 495 data breach notifications from government entities during the 2019–20 fiscal year. At least 10 of the data security lapses prompted the affected agencies to take remedial action.

You can protect your organisation by building on an environment that’s reliable and designed for business continuity. Be sure to include continuous monitoring, governance and disaster recovery capabilities into your migration plan.

4. Cost reduction

Throughout your cloud migration, you need to look for ways to control costs, while also getting all the benefits of the cloud. Automated tools and processes and continuous monitoring can reduce risk, speed up your timeline and cut costs, without sacrificing your ability to innovate in the cloud. Automation can also enable shorter landing zone deployment cycles, at a lower cost.

About Rackspace Government Cloud on Microsoft Azure

Rackspace Government Cloud on Microsoft Azure helps our customers address the challenges posed by the UK Government cloud first strategy. This solution targets cloud adoption barriers, harnessing the innovative technologies offered by cloud hyperscale providers — including Microsoft Azure, VMware and AWS — to accelerate adoption, deliver best-value services and power the development of future digital citizen-centric government.

Rackspace Government Cloud on Microsoft Azure delivers a fully secure, fully compliant and fully managed environment ready to host your secure Government workloads. We have taken a deliberately different approach to solving cloud adoption challenges, combining a turn-key UK-OFFICIAL Azure Landing Zone, a Public Services Network (PSN) accredited management environment and a UK sovereign, ITIL-aligned managed service.

Reduce your timeline, risk and cost while using automation technologies to deploy fully assured cloud environments on day 1 and to continuously manage the security and compliance posture. Learn more about how Rackspace Government Cloud on Azure can accelerate your adoption of UK Government compliant Microsoft Azure services.