11 March, 2021; Dubai, United Arab Emirates: Microsoft delivered a strong message on the application of cloud technologies in the field of regulatory compliance in the Middle East when it participated in this year’s Gartner Security & Risk Management Summit.
The Middle East event was held through a series of virtual sessions and concentrated on the delivery of operational resilience, as enterprises across the region reinvent corporate IT infrastructure in the wake of COVID-19-related lockdowns.
Microsoft UAE’s Joanne Fischlin, Head of Corporate, External and Legal Affairs (CELA) delivered a keynote address on the intricacies of managing compliance in cloud environments. Mrs Fischlin demonstrated how Microsoft’s cloud services offer the broadest compliance capabilities in the industry.
“As we watch regional cloud migration soar, it is vital that we ensure that enterprises protect themselves effectively against external threats and regulatory missteps”, said Mrs Fischlin. “Organisations are rightly concerned about how cloud service providers protect and govern the use of their data. We must have serious discussions about how we assess our compliance statuses. How do we enable strong economic growth that is delivered through risk-managed operating practices?”
Microsoft addresses such concerns through a protection and governance strategy built on six key privacy principles. Customers are put in complete control of their own privacy with easy-to-use tools and clear choices. Microsoft ensures total transparency when it comes to the collection and use of data, so customers can make informed decisions.
Microsoft was the first hyperscale cloud provider to deliver GDPR compliance across its platform. Along with other local, regional, and global standards and contractual commitments, Microsoft offers strong legal protections to customers. It also guarantees no content-based targeting, a promise that means email, chat, files, and other personal data are not leveraged to direct ads towards customers. And data collection that does take place is done solely to deliver the agreed services and for the benefit of the security and experience of customers.
“Microsoft is committed to empowering every individual and organisation on the planet to achieve more”, Mrs Fischlin added. “Compliance is an integral part of that commitment and Microsoft works tirelessly to build cloud environments that live up to it”.
Tools such as Microsoft Compliance Manager allow organisations to track, monitor and act on their compliance objectives and can generate metric-based maturity assessments in the form of scorecards that help stakeholders assess their organisation’s regulatory posture at any point in time.
