Anna Forrester
Liz Heiston, national account manager at Hitachi Data Systems Federal, said that agencies using the Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program should consider applying system management and automation tools to manage cloud migration efforts.
In a guest piece published Thursday on Federal Times, Heiston noted that while FedRAMP covers the security of cloud services offered by vendors, agencies must also look at ways to make the move to cloud more streamlined.
“Unfortunately, for many agencies, the historically siloed nature of data and infrastructure presents unique challenges to move to the cloud,” she wrote.
Heiston said that an automated IT architecture that combines storage, infrastructure, management and data protection will help organize agencies’ disparate local data.
They could assess their data environment as well to establish placement in the cloud based on factors such as latency and to reduce total cost of ownership.
“Industry must work together with agency partners so that no matter how government decides to facilitate the sharing of information down the road, they will have the tools to work together in the future,” Heiston said.
