UK iomart Adopts International Standard ISO/IEC 27018 on Cloud Privacy

iomart Group Plc has become one of UK cloud service providers to adopt the new international standard on cloud privacy which has been created to establish a uniform worldwide approach to protecting personal data in the public cloud.

ISO/IEC 27018 is a code of practice that has been developed by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). iomart will incorporate this international standard into its Information Management System and work with customers to keep Personally Identifiable Information (PII) private and secure by delivering its services in a way that allows both parties to meet the requirements of applicable legislation and regulations covering the protection of PII.

Angus MacSween, CEO, iomart, said: “iomart works to the very highest standards in delivering hosting solutions for our customers. For many of them data security, privacy and legal compliance is of the utmost importance. We have therefore worked hard to become one of the first adopters of this new international data security standard. Not only can we can tell our customers exactly where their data is, we can ensure there is no unauthorised access to it and that the way it is handled meets all relevant privacy obligations.“

iomart provides a range of public, private and hybrid cloud solutions to a range of customers from a network of data centres across the UK and a series of international points of presence. Its customers are looking to cloud backup and DR as part of their storage strategies which involves protecting many petabytes of data for them away from their business premises.

Bill Strain, CTO, iomart, added: “Microsoft is one of the first global cloud providers to announce that it has adopted ISO/IEC 27018 and as a Tier 1 member of the Microsoft Cloud Solution Provider Program iomart is proud to be operating to the same high standards. Privacy is still a key issue for businesses looking to move to the cloud so being able to offer our services with this level of confidence in how we protect data for our customers is an important step.“

The new international standard focuses on protecting personal data in the cloud by specifying minimum security measures that must be implemented for customers including encryption and access controls and security awareness policies for staff.

iomart has adopted two other international cloud computing standards, ISO/IEC 17788 and ISO/IEC 17789, which were published late in 2014. These standards draw on the knowledge of experts from over 30 countries and lay down the basic terminology and architectural framework for the delivery of Software as a Service (SaaS), Platform as a Service (PaaS) and Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS).

Since 2008 iomart has gained accreditation by the UK Accreditation Service (UKAS) for the following standards: ISO 27001:2013 (Information Security Management); ISO 20000-1:2011 (Information Technology Service Management); ISO 22301:2012 (BC Management); ISO 14001:2004 (Environmental Management); and ISO 9001:2008 (Quality Management).