Dynamics 365 Government Achieves FedRAMP High Authorization
Microsoft took another step forward in our commitment to providing government customers with the most complete, trusted and secure cloud. Microsoft, with Dynamics 365 Government (Customer Engagement), is the first and only SaaS service as of March 2018 to obtain a FedRAMP High Impact Provisional Authority to Operate (P-ATO) through the Joint Authorization Board (JAB). It is only one of 5 services officially through FedRAMP High. The Dynamics 365 Government FedRAMP High authorization includes more than 400 security controls providing agencies with the ability to leverage SaaS services for sensitive information including Personal Identifiable Information (PII), Protected health information (PHI), financial data, law enforcement data, and other Controlled Unclassified Information (CUI).
The FedRAMP High approval builds on Microsoft’s partnership with the Government. In September 2016, Microsoft Dynamics 365 was granted a Moderate level P-ATO in just 15 weeks by the JAB through the FedRAMP accelerated authorization process. Matt Goodrich, director for FedRAMP’s program management office at the U.S. General Services Administration, affirmed the significance of this news, saying:
“The creation of FedRAMP Accelerated provides a faster authorization process with the JAB. Microsoft’s work demonstrates the industry and government partnership to reduce the time to earn FedRAMP authorizations and streamline the process in moving from the Moderate to High baseline.”
Securing high-impact level data—defined as data that, if leaked or improperly protected, could have a severe adverse effect on organizational operations, assets, or individuals is a priority for Microsoft. Organizations can now take advantage of Dynamics 365 Government not only for applications that use low and moderate impact data, but also those that use sensitive high impact data. In other words, government organizations can accelerate their digital transformation by using Dynamics 365 Government for customer service, contact centers, correspondence management, grants management, task management, mission planning and even more purpose-built cloud applications than they were able to previously.
In addition to FedRAMP High, we recently announced Dynamics 365 Government will support the requirements of the DoD, as well as contractors holding, or processing DoD controlled unclassified information or subject to International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR). The Dynamics 365 Government GCC High environment will provide support for the DoD Cloud Computing Security Requirements Guide for information up to Impact Level 4. The Level 4 and ITAR support will come in Dynamics 365 Government Customer Engagement in 4th quarter (Q4) of calendar year 2018. Tom Greiner, Senior Managing Director at Accenture Federal Services, discussed the significance of the security capabilities, saying:
“The Dynamics 365 FedRAMP High authorization brings the power of commercial cloud to agencies with sensitive workloads, including applications with PII or PHI data. Microsoft’s commitment to addressing the unique security needs of government is a key reason why we chose Microsoft for our Task Management Tool (TMT). TMT is a widely adopted collaboration and approval solution used for mission-sensitive data. Solutions like this benefit from Microsoft’s FedRAMP accredited as-a-service technology – in this case, helping agencies simplify correspondence and task management while boosting staff efficiency and productivity.”
Microsoft provides partners and customers with cloud services across–SaaS, aPaaS, PaaS, IaaS–which help enable building apps securely in a no-code, low-code manner. Our Dynamics 365 investments are a component of Microsoft’s application platform that also includes Power BI, PowerApps, Flow, Stream and the Common Data Service—these services power the extensibility of Dynamics 365 and Office 365. This platform helps empower customers to easily customize, develop, and deploy applications that work online and offline, for consumption on mobile devices and the web.
At Microsoft, we’re committed to delivering the most complete, trusted cloud platform. Since its inception, we’ve been working with FedRAMP, which provides a standardized methodology for assessing, authorizing, and monitoring cloud services. The FedRAMP High accreditation for Dynamics 365 Government helps demonstrate our differentiated ability to support the unique needs of government agencies as they transition to the cloud.
Learn more about Microsoft Dynamics 365 Government and how Microsoft can help enable no-code, low-code government applications with the content I have shared on LinkedIn.
