The NSW (New South Wales) government has signed a new agreement with Vault Cloud to improve access to secure cloud services.
The deal will have Vault’s pre-negotiating terms and pricing for a period of five years.
In the wake of controversy over hosting the COVIDSafe app, Australia’s federal and the NSW state governments have expressed their intent to increase reliance on local cloud providers.
Vault Cloud CEO Rupert Taylor-Price said the deal marks an important next stage in delivering “transparent, ethical privacy, and security solutions with the ultimate aim of building trust with local communities.”
“The NSW government’s cloud deal with Vault Cloud represents a commitment to the security of Australia’s data,” Taylor-Price said. “We are proud to be securing sensitive and private citizen data for our government.”
The deal comes as Vault Cloud announces an additional new region in Western Sydney.
Other state and local governments and other government agencies, including the federal government, can also access the agreement.
Vault Cloud CEO Rupert Taylor-Price said the new deal “represents a commitment to the security of Australia’s data”.
“We are proud to be securing sensitive and private citizen data for our Government,” he said.
“Vault is a trusted provider to Australian Government agencies precisely because data hosted with us is kept only on-shore and managed by security-cleared Australian citizens in Australia.”
In an effort to support the deal’s infrastructure requirements, the company has also announced a new cloud region in partnership with Canberra Data Centers (CDC) in Western Sydney.
“CDC has been investing alongside Vault Cloud for many years to help the government deliver better secure, sovereign cloud services,” CDC CEO Greg Boorer added.
Vault Cloud has also marked presence in the NSW government with GovDC, which the company said would enable “rapid, secure access to its cloud and partner solutions”.
The company said Tuesday’s announcements were based on a partnership with the NSW government since the beginning of 2018 when it entered its first venture with Vault Cloud.
Vault is one of the first additions to the Australian Signals Directorate (ASD) Certified Cloud Services List (CCSL), which secured a protected-state classification in March 2017 to store highly classified government information.
In March, ASD announced it was closing the current form of its cloud certification program.
“CDC and Vault Cloud’s investment in NSW is in recognition of the increasing security needs of the state government.”