Auditor criticises gov’t for not assessing cloud service risks

The interior of a server farm. Photo: Depositphotos.com

Government auditors have warned that the widespread use of commercial cloud services to store data has not been properly thought through and that, if a service should go bust, companies and private citizens could face problems.

In addition, there is a risk that private information is not properly secured, the audit office said in a new report.

Using cloud services allows data to be accessed from multiple sources. In total, auditors looked at the way government ministries use cloud storage to manage 1,588 services. Of these, 700 are based on open services offered by American companies such as Amazon, Microsoft, and Google.

Ministers have failed to consider the risks in two-thirds of the 126 most important processes, the audit office said.

“There is a risk that foreign governments, particularly the US, could access or even amend information from the Dutch government or private individuals,” audit office spokesman Ewout Irrgang said. “Whether they actually do is a different matter, but the option is there.”

Digitalisation minister Zsolt Szabó has pledged to make improvements, Irrgang said.

Szabó’s predecessor had called for the development of a European alternative to US cloud services.

Last year, Dutch domain registration foundation SIDN announced it would transfer the dot nl domain and its “complete ICT services” to Amazon’s cloud, much to the anger of some tech entrepreneurs.

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