Data and information are the key production assets of the 21st century. To retain control over our data and ensure citizens and businesses can trust their data is safe, the government must invest in a government-wide sovereign cloud service to store and process certain data. Sovereign, in this context, means reduced reliance on a small number of external suppliers.
The objective
To achieve this, the national government, provinces, water authorities, municipalities, public service providers, and industry are working together to develop a government-wide sovereign cloud service. At the same time, efforts are underway to establish a central government marketplace for cloud technologies that matches demand with the right supply, based on standards and European experience. The aim is to stop hosting critical data and services in the public cloud.
Accelerators
The NDS’s Cloud priority has identified 5 accelerators:
Cloud definitions
An overview of uniform definitions for the different types of cloud. This enables government organisations to use the same definitions and standards for ‘cloud’, contributing to better alignment and collaboration across the accelerators and among the various government organisations involved.
Cloud demand articulation
An inventory of cloud service needs among ministries, public-law entities, and partner governments, making government-wide procurement demand visible.
Cloud standardisation
A selection of existing standards forms a framework that governments must meet when developing government cloud services. This provides choice and independence, which is desirable in the context of sovereignty and necessary to meet resilience and cybersecurity requirements.
Sovereign government cloud
An exploration of how to establish a government-wide sovereign cloud service in collaboration with existing government service providers and the market, reducing fragmentation across government cloud solutions.
Government-wide cloud services marketplace
A central government marketplace for cloud services, set up in collaboration with other government organisations. The marketplace matches government organisations’ demand with the right supply, creating opportunities to use the same services across government and support each other in implementing them.
