Cloud Vendors Need to Prepare for Certification

Data Centers

Third party data centers have long been accustomed to being audited in order to be a valid part of the service delivery supply chain. This practice will continue. This means MSPs who do not own or control their own data center need to be sure those facilities have been verified.

Cloud Backup

The popularity of hybrid and pure cloud based backup and storage solutions has grown rapidly in the last few years. For many MSPs, they have opted to use third parties to provide the hardware, software, and the cloud environment for the backed up data. These facilities need to be verified in order to satisfy many of the regulated industries around the world.

NOC and Help Desk

Third party network operation centers and help desk services are frequently used by both smaller MSPs and those companies new to the managed services profession. Too few, however, of these third party providers have ever been verified by a third party. In many cases involving industries like financial services and health care, the access of customer data by these third parties is not sanctioned. We are already seeing scenarios where customer auditors are requesting that MSPs show that ALL their third party vendors are compliant and audited by a third party.

Infrastructure as a Service

IaaS is a very popular methodology for assisting service providers in their cloud computing endeavors. However, IaaS providers also need to be compliant with whatever scenarios in which the MSP uses them.

MSPs need to use third party providers in order to grow and scale their practices. This will not change. What does need to change is the amount of transparency between the MSP and all their vendors and service providers. Specifically, MSPs need to treat all their third parties as is they will one day be asked for an audit report. The chances are high that this will happen.

It is better that the MSPs source third parties who already demonstrate compliance and possess third party issued certifications and audits prior to engaging with them. This will save a lot of time later on.