Central Government and its Data Management Challenges

COVID-19 is undoubtedly the most significant national crisis since World War Two. But even as the pandemic tore through society and ripped apart our everyday lives, the government did not slow its drive for departmental cloud adoption. A difficult task at any time, the pandemic made cloud adoption more complex — but also more crucial — for central government departments.

Yet progress has been consistent. In April, the government signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Microsoft — joining the likes of AWS and Google as officially recognised and endorsed cloud service providers. 

Still, public sector cloud migration is not without challenges. Perhaps the biggest of these is the mind-blowing amount of data that’s involved. The Cabinet Office alone has accumulated more than 200 million emails, digital files, and documents since it first started storing electronic communications more than 20 years ago. And this is expected to increase by 50 million records a year.

But there’s another very significant hurdle. Some of the government’s legacy IT infrastructure simply won’t function in the cloud. That means the regular and relatively straightforward ‘lifting and shifting’ migrations can’t be deployed, and specialist help is needed. 

Then there’s the question of inter-departmental data sharing and protection of sensitive information. Creating safe and secure inter-departmental data sharing that respects citizens’ rights and complies with GDPR sounds like a fine idea in theory. But different government departments share, store, archive and manage their data in different ways. Even with new Artificial Intelligence and Big Data tools, it would be a big job to combine all data, analyse it, and draw meaningful conclusions. To give some perspective, publication of the initial findings from the March 2021 census won’t be published until March 2022, and the final release of outputs is scheduled for March 2023.

How to make the move to the cloud

Many departments genuinely want to make the move to cloud and can see all the advantages. But they lack the data management expertise to audit their IT assets and gain visibility on all the software, hardware, and data they own. To make matters worse, they frequently have unstructured or orphaned data and worry — creating concerns that vital information will be lost or misplaced during a cloud migration.

Data management solutions can help overcome some of the most common barriers to cloud adoption while offering enhanced end-user protection and backup capabilities. But it’s important to remember that backups are not always carried out automatically and that some cloud providers have a shared responsibility model for data: They’ll take responsibility for the first 40 days, but then end-users need to step up. So check with your cloud service provider and, if necessary, activate backup functionality on your data management software.

It’s also worth remembering that data management solutions can protect against the increasing number of cyberattacks targeting public sector departments and institutions. Cyberattacks have shot up by 70 percent during the pandemic, and it’s estimated that there’s an attack every 11 seconds. The UK’s public sector is an easy target due to its size and complex overarching IT infrastructure — and because of the speed with which many departments embraced cloud technology.

Central government departments continue to process, analyse and store vast volumes of data. Transferring data and IT systems to the cloud — first because of cost-savings and then hastened because of COVID — means government departments have access to more agile, scalable, and secure data sharing capabilities regardless of employee location.

Initiatives such as the gov.UK commercial framework, cloud guide, and security guidelines continue to offer support in breaking down common cloud adoption barriers and encouraging cross-functional collaboration between government departments and, where appropriate, commercial organisations. However, legacy technology is still proving to be a significant roadblock as older systems without support restrict the ease with which critical data can be migrated. For this reason, moving to the cloud can feel like an uphill struggle – but the right data management solutions can lighten the load and make it a much easier climb.

Nigel Wood is head of public sector UK&I at Commvault