An executive at the Australian Signals Directorate (ASD) who declined to sign off on Microsoft’s Azure and Office365 cloud services being granted Protected Certification has since left the agency, according to InnovationAus.com.
The certification, awarded in April, allows Microsoft’s “government-configured” clouds to be used for Australian government data classified up to PROTECTED level. But unlike all previous such certifications, Microsoft’s certifications were provisional, and came with what the ASD called “consumer guides”.
“The Australian Cyber Security Centre (ACSC) has certified the storage, communication, and processing of government data at PROTECTED in specified cloud services in Microsoft’s Australian-based public cloud. Additional compensating controls are to be implemented on a risk-managed basis by individual agencies prior to agency accreditation and subsequent use of these cloud services. The ACSC is working with Microsoft to ensure general compensating security control blueprints are made available in the coming weeks,” the guides said.
The ASD executive, a 24-year veteran of Defence,…
