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Federal agencies have been under pressure to make progress and to comply with the “Cloud First” mandate since it went into effect in 2010. The initiative was created to push agencies to accelerate their adoption of cloud solutions to help improve employee productivity, increase collaboration, and drive cost efficiencies.

Many federal agencies have made positive strides and recognize the value of moving to cloud capabilities. Nevertheless, most CIOs are still navigating the many challenges and obstacles along the road to adoption – complying with regulations, protecting sensitive data and defending against cyberattacks. Large amounts of information are created, shared, and stored in cloud environments, and while some organizations across industries have rushed full force into the cloud arena, government agencies are being (and should be) held to higher standards.

The Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP) is the cloud standard for the U.S. government and it will enable Federal agencies to securely achieve the cloud-first vision. FedRAMP makes it easier for agencies to evaluate the security of cloud solutions. Cisco is committed to delivering FedRAMP solutions that facilitate agencies’ missions with secure digital capabilities.

Cisco’s cloud portfolio recently reached another milestone when the FedRAMP PMO officially granted Cisco Cloudlock a FedRAMP Authority to Operate (ATO) at the Moderate level. This means Cloudlock is  eligible for use by all civilian agencies. It is also eligible for Impact Level (IL) 2 data in the Department of Defense so it can be used to support the unclassified data needs of the military.

Cisco already offers FedRAMP certificated solutions for communications (Cisco WebEx) and collaboration (Cisco Hosted Collaboration Solution for Government). The addition of Cloudlock extends Cisco’s FedRAMP offerings to include security capabilities. Cloudlock helps to create a holistic portfolio of FedRAMP solutions from one vendor for government customers.

Cisco Cloudlock is the cloud-native Cloud Access Security Broker (CASB) that helps accelerate use of cloud capabilities. Cloudlock secures cloud identities, data, and applications, while enabling compliance and improving productivity. With crowd-sourced security analytics across billions of data points and advanced machine learning, Cloudlock delivers actionable cybersecurity intelligence that provides reliable visibility and control in mission-critical cloud environments.

Cloudlock creates unique advantages for government agencies because:

  • It is part of the Cisco FedRAMP ecosystem which creates efficiencies and offers integrated value.
  • It is an API-driven solution, meaning it deploys full functionality in minutes, delivering immediate value without requiring resource-intensive and complex network configuration projects, and has no negative impact on end users.
  • It is widely used and trusted, having been deployed by over 1,000 organizations globally, including government institutions at the federal, state, and local levels.

Check out more details about Cloudlock and our other FedRAMP-authorized cloud solutions here.

Discover Cisco Webex for Defense.

 



Authors

Nick Michaelides

Senior Vice President

US Public Sector