This G-Cloud 10 service is no longer available to buy.

The G-Cloud 10 framework expired on Tuesday 2 July 2019. Any existing contracts with Vysiion Ltd are still valid.
Vysiion Ltd

Cross Domain Secure zone OFFICIAL

This service allows secure communication of sensitive data between our Assured and Elevated public cloud platforms, which are designed exclusively for the UK Public Sector. It is compliant with GDPR and is based in UK Crown hosting datacentres to ensure data sovereignty with full support free of charge.

Features

  • Self-managed option supports complex and varied use-cases
  • UKCloud-managed option supports simple and inspectable traffic flows
  • Optimised for OFFICIAL - designed for OFFICIAL and OFFICIAL-SENSITIVE
  • Green; based in UK facilities which offer market leading efficiency
  • Create citizen facing services while maintain data security.
  • Leverages readymade solutions to reduce infrastructure and compliance costs.
  • Ensure you are meeting the required levels of solution compliance
  • Cross-domain functionality: controlled access between internet and Elevated domains
  • Evolve the service it to meet new and emerging needs.

Benefits

  • Choose the solution that best fits your needs
  • Support complex use-cases such as code migrations and video transfer
  • Supports and enables the Government Digital Strategy
  • Meet your environmental targets
  • Provides a secure, flexible, method of transferring data between domains
  • The Guard option is delivered a commodity template
  • The Guard uses a standardised system architectures, reviewed by NCSC
  • Cross Domain: Choose between ready-to-use managed Guard and Walled Garden

Pricing

£500 a unit a month

Service documents

Request an accessible format
If you use assistive technology (such as a screen reader) and need versions of these documents in a more accessible format, email the supplier at cloudsales@vysiion.co.uk. Tell them what format you need. It will help if you say what assistive technology you use.

Framework

G-Cloud 10

Service ID

4 2 8 8 6 0 8 3 3 1 8 1 1 5 3

Contact

Vysiion Ltd Vysiion Public Sector Team
Telephone: 01249 446500
Email: cloudsales@vysiion.co.uk

Service scope

Service constraints
Planned and Emergency maintenance windows are identified in the service description. Customers must complete an assurance activity prior to service provision
System requirements
Browsers supporting flash and allowing download of JAVA applets

User support

Email or online ticketing support
Email or online ticketing
Support response times
The Vysiion service desk is 24/7/365 and depending on the SLA required can respond to incidents within 30 minutes.
User can manage status and priority of support tickets
Yes
Online ticketing support accessibility
None or don’t know
Phone support
Yes
Phone support availability
24 hours, 7 days a week
Web chat support
No
Onsite support
Yes, at extra cost
Support levels
Vysiion's support service includes Service Delivery Managers, support engineers and a 24/7 service desk and network operations centre. We can respond to incidents within 30 minutes and our service desk is 24/7.
Support available to third parties
Yes

Onboarding and offboarding

Getting started
All new customers are assigned a Customer Success Manager that will provide proactive support and advise for the first 90 days. This also includes the assistance from devops and cloud architects to ensure the right solution is provisioned and maximised for the workloads, along with a range of user guides.
Service documentation
Yes
Documentation formats
  • HTML
  • ODF
  • PDF
  • Other
Other documentation formats
  • Video
  • Audio
  • Webinars/Webex
  • Presentations
End-of-contract data extraction
The customer has complete autonomy of how data is stored and managed within their virtual environment. Data can be extracted either from within the VM (for example, copying data over virtual networks), or the entire VM (for example, exporting as a VMDK or OVF).
End-of-contract process
We will return all your data and materials which cannot be deleted or exported by you, and securely destroy all copies of your data on your written instruction.  We will return any pre-paid sums for services not delivered to you. We will not penalise you for terminating your contract with us unless specifically stated in the Service Definition. We will also return all of your confidential information, unless there is a legal requirement that we keep it.

Using the service

Web browser interface
Yes
Using the web interface
A control panel is available allowing users to provision, manage and decommission various aspects of this service. It also allows users to interface with the UKCloud service management system including raising tickets and requests. The web interface also provides access to a comprehensive set of documentation and videos. Launch, manage and delete virtual network, compute and storage resources. Display network topology. Manage images including creation and recover of backups. Control access and security including key pairs, API access and floating IPs. Manage load balancers.
Web interface accessibility standard
None or don’t know
How the web interface is accessible
The web interface is accessible using the most common web browsers and is delivered over various public and private networks including the internet, PSN, N3/HSCN and Janet. The web interface is protected by standards-based encryption, two-factor authentication and optionally IP address restrictions. The web interface is entirely HTML5 and does not require any auxilary plug-ins, therefore the web interface is accessible by any modern day desktop or mobile internet browser able to support secure HTTPS connections.
Web interface accessibility testing
None
API
Yes
What users can and can't do using the API
You can use API calls to create, manage and monitor Service Requests and view information about the components of your environment. We provide native access to underlying APIs such as vCloud and OpenStack. These are compatible with tools such as Terraform and platforms such as AWS S3.
API automation tools
  • Ansible
  • Chef
  • SaltStack
  • Terraform
  • Puppet
  • Other
Other API automation tools
Jenkins
API documentation
Yes
API documentation formats
  • Open API (also known as Swagger)
  • HTML
  • ODF
  • PDF
Command line interface
Yes
Command line interface compatibility
  • Linux or Unix
  • Windows
  • MacOS
Using the command line interface
Customers can fully manage their virtual infrastructure resources including compute, storage and networking, including management of virtual images, programmatically or manually via the CLI

Scaling

Scaling available
Yes
Scaling type
  • Automatic
  • Manual
Independence of resources
In order to guarantee that users are not affected by the demands from other users, resource reservations and shares such as internet bandwidth shaping are used. In addition, the capacity planning team ensure that usage in terms of all resources are constantly monitored and increased accordingly relating to user demand.
Usage notifications
No

Analytics

Infrastructure or application metrics
Yes
Metrics types
  • CPU
  • Disk
  • Memory
  • Network
  • Number of active instances
  • Other
Other metrics
  • IP Management
  • User quotas
  • Backup Status & Availability
  • VMOTION Events
Reporting types
  • API access
  • Real-time dashboards
  • Reports on request

Resellers

Supplier type
Reseller providing extra support
Organisation whose services are being resold
UKCloud

Staff security

Staff security clearance
Other security clearance
Government security clearance
Up to Developed Vetting (DV)

Asset protection

Knowledge of data storage and processing locations
Yes
Data storage and processing locations
United Kingdom
User control over data storage and processing locations
Yes
Datacentre security standards
Managed by a third party
Penetration testing frequency
At least once a year
Penetration testing approach
Another external penetration testing organisation
Protecting data at rest
  • Physical access control, complying with CSA CCM v3.0
  • Other
Other data at rest protection approach
Customers are encouraged to protect their own data using encryption technologies where only they have the decryption key. In this way, our customers are assured that their data can never be accessed by a third party.
Data sanitisation process
Yes
Data sanitisation type
  • Explicit overwriting of storage before reallocation
  • Deleted data can’t be directly accessed
  • Hardware containing data is completely destroyed
Equipment disposal approach
Complying with a recognised standard, for example CSA CCM v.30, CAS (Sanitisation) or ISO/IEC 27001

Backup and recovery

Backup and recovery
Yes
What’s backed up
  • The service is able to backup virtual machines and data.
  • Customers can redeploy their entire solution to different UKCloud regions.
Backup controls
Depending on the backup or replication service that the customer chooses, this can be done either via the API or the UKCloud portal
Datacentre setup
Multiple datacentres with disaster recovery
Scheduling backups
Users schedule backups through a web interface
Backup recovery
  • Users can recover backups themselves, for example through a web interface
  • Users contact the support team

Data-in-transit protection

Data protection between buyer and supplier networks
  • Private network or public sector network
  • TLS (version 1.2 or above)
  • IPsec or TLS VPN gateway
  • Bonded fibre optic connections
  • Other
Other protection between networks
We offer the choice of connecting:
• Via the internet using additional encryption such as TLS 1.2
• IPSec VPN tunnels
• Via private networks such as leased lines or MPLS
• Via public sector networks such as PSN, N3, Janet
Data protection within supplier network
  • TLS (version 1.2 or above)
  • Other
Other protection within supplier network
Dedicated CAS-T circuits between each of the sites are used to ensure the protection of customer data in-flight. Additionally this data is encrypted within the Elevated OFFICIAL platform. All data flows are also subject to the protective monitoring service.

Availability and resilience

Guaranteed availability
99.9%
Approach to resilience
Our service is deployed across a number of sites, regions and zones. Each zone is designed to eliminate single points of failure (such as power, network and hardware). Customers are encouraged to ensure their solution spans multiple sites, regions or zones to ensure service continuity should a failure occur.
Outage reporting
All outages will be reported via the Service Status page and the notifications service within the UKCloud Portal.  Outages are identified as Planned maintenance, Emergency maintenance, and platform issues.  In addition, the designated Service Delivery Manager will proactively contact customers as appropriate.

Identity and authentication

User authentication
  • 2-factor authentication
  • Limited access network (for example PSN)
  • Dedicated link (for example VPN)
  • Username or password
  • Other
Other user authentication
For online systems (e.g. Customer Portal & API interfaces), all users are required to have a unique username, password and memorable word combination. Customers may also use 2FA authentication tokens.
Access restrictions in management interfaces and support channels
Customers have the option to raise a support request via telephone, portal or email. Vysiion will always authenticate the identity of the user by validating known phone numbers, names and email addresses.
Access restriction testing frequency
At least once a year
Management access authentication
2-factor authentication
Devices users manage the service through
  • Dedicated device on a segregated network (providers own provision)
  • Dedicated device on a government network (for example PSN)
  • Dedicated device over multiple services or networks
  • Any device but through a bastion host (a bastion host is a server that provides access to a private network from an external network such as the internet)
  • Directly from any device which may also be used for normal business (for example web browsing or viewing external email)

Audit information for users

Access to user activity audit information
Users contact the support team to get audit information
How long user audit data is stored for
Between 1 month and 6 months
Access to supplier activity audit information
Users contact the support team to get audit information
How long supplier audit data is stored for
Between 1 month and 6 months
How long system logs are stored for
Between 1 month and 6 months

Standards and certifications

ISO/IEC 27001 certification
Yes
Who accredited the ISO/IEC 27001
ACM
ISO/IEC 27001 accreditation date
10/07/2016
What the ISO/IEC 27001 doesn’t cover
Nothing
ISO 28000:2007 certification
No
CSA STAR certification
No
PCI certification
No
Other security certifications
Yes
Any other security certifications
Cyber Essentials Plus

Security governance

Named board-level person responsible for service security
Yes
Security governance certified
Yes
Security governance standards
ISO/IEC 27001
Information security policies and processes
Vysiion is ISO27001 and Cyber Essentials Plus accredited and has a full suite of associated accredited information security policies that are managed and maintained by our Head of Business Services. We design and implement solutions which meet stringent security requirements and meet current industry standards as well as aligning with customers’ information policies and procedures to ensure we protect our customers’ systems and data from security breaches and cyber attacks. We continually monitor and review our security practices, working closely with officially appointed security advisors and accreditation bodies, and as such are very familiar with current legislation and standards, best-practice guidelines and the approaches required to protect UK government assets. Our employees are security cleared to enable them to deliver services to the highest information security requirements.

Operational security

Configuration and change management standard
Supplier-defined controls
Configuration and change management approach
We follow ITIL 3 aligned Change and Configuration processes for all changes
All changes to infrastructure and systems are managed through these processes ensuring that standardised methods and procedures are followed for all. The process ensures that all changes are formally assessed, authorised and controlled to minimise any adverse service impact.
Our Change Advisory Board assess and validates all Changes from a business, technical, security and delivery perspective, drawing on subject matter experts when required.
A Forward Schedule of Change is maintained.
Vulnerability management type
Supplier-defined controls
Vulnerability management approach
We utilise the MaxRM product for vulnerability monitoring, on receipt of an alert from the system it is immediately investigated by an engineer. Should any threat be identified it will be removed from the network to remove any risk of potential infection.
Critical patches will be tested on a sand-boxed device on receipt and once proven good deployed across the infrastructure in the most effective manner in order to achieve maximum cover with minimum business impact .
Information about potential threats is via suppliers ie notification from Microsoft
Protective monitoring type
Undisclosed
Protective monitoring approach
Where protective monitoring services are required, Vysiion work with a trusted third party to deliver these processes.
Incident management type
Supplier-defined controls
Incident management approach
Vysiion has a well-defined ITIL 3 aligned incident management process with a 24/7 service desk and a comprehensive service toolset that allows incidents to be raised by phone, email and portal. Incident reports are regularly provided by email and users can log on to the portal at any time to get the status of an incident. Customer satisfaction surveys are carried out on closure of an incident.

Secure development

Approach to secure software development best practice
Supplier-defined process

Separation between users

Virtualisation technology used to keep applications and users sharing the same infrastructure apart
Yes
Who implements virtualisation
Third-party
Third-party virtualisation provider
UKCloud
How shared infrastructure is kept separate
At the compute/storage layer, consumers are separated via robust hypervisor controls based on VMware vSphere technology. This solution has been previously been validated by the NCSC PGA and the implementation is regularly tested via by regular PGA scoped independent IT Security Health Checks conducted by a CHECK service provider.

Energy efficiency

Energy-efficient datacentres
Yes

Pricing

Price
£500 a unit a month
Discount for educational organisations
No
Free trial available
No

Service documents

Request an accessible format
If you use assistive technology (such as a screen reader) and need versions of these documents in a more accessible format, email the supplier at cloudsales@vysiion.co.uk. Tell them what format you need. It will help if you say what assistive technology you use.