ITS COMPUTING LIMITED

Public, Private and Hybrid Cloud Hosting and Management

ITS can offer hosting on a number of Public cloud options, including Amazon Web Services (AWS) & Microsoft Azure, amongst others. We also offer Private Cloud and Hybrid Cloud options to deliver cloud-based systems and services that meet the UK Government Technology Code of Practice and Digital Service Standard.

Features

• Unified hub significantly simplifies building, deploying, and managing cloud resources
• Grant explicit management and access rights to the subscription
• Combine services to create amazingly powerful applications
• Gain visibility with no more billing blind spots
• Alert notification, view events and audit logs
• UK Data centres
• Fully Service Managed Service & Extensive support options
• security certified supported hosting, client configurable, vendor agnostic

Benefits

• Cost effective hosting solution
• Free up resources to focus on strategy
• Use only what you need
• Pay for only what you need

£1,050 a unit a day

• Free trial available

Service documents

• Pricing document

  PDF

• Skills Framework for the Information Age rate card

  PDF

• Service definition document

  PDF

• Terms and conditions

  PDF

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 G-Cloud@its-computing.co.uk. Tell them what format you need. It will help if you say what assistive technology you use.

Framework

G-Cloud 14

Service ID

137703517573544

Contact

Julie McMenemy
02895 929227
G-Cloud@its-computing.co.uk

Service scope

• Service constraints: Please see https://docs.microsoft.com/en-gb/azure/ to determine applicable constraints based on buyers requirements.
• System requirements: See https://docs.microsoft.com/en-gb/azure/

User support

• Email or online ticketing support: Email or online ticketing
• Support response times: ITS's service levels for incident response and restoration, are defined by Priority Level (P1 – P4) for time taken to provide an automated response (Acknowledge), in-person response (Respond) and Fix / Restore. Standard response times are : P1 – Critical Acknowledge - 30 minutes Response - 1 Hour Target Resolve - 4 Hours P2 – High Acknowledge - 1 Hour Response - 4 Hours Target Resolve - 8 Hours P3 – Medium and P4 – Low response times, are agreed per contract. The response times are applicable during 09:00 – 17:00, Monday to Friday and excludes public holidays and weekends.
• User can manage status and priority of support tickets: Yes
• Online ticketing support accessibility: WCAG 2.1 AA or EN 301 549
• Phone support: Yes
• Phone support availability: 9 to 5 (UK time), Monday to Friday
• Web chat support: No
• Onsite support: Yes, at extra cost
• Support levels: ITS's service levels for incident response and restoration, are defined by Priority Level (P1 – P4) for time taken to provide an automated response (Acknowledge), in-person response (Respond) and Fix / Restore. ITS's standard response times are as follows: P1 – Critical Acknowledge - 30 minutes Response - 1 Hour Target Resolve - 4 Hours P2 – High Acknowledge - 1 Hour Response - 4 Hours Target Resolve - 8 Hours P3 – Medium and P4 – Low response times, are agreed per contract. The above response times are applicable during 09:00 – 17:00, Monday to Friday and excludes public holidays and weekends. Software Support provided by Online portal available 24 x7. Additional Support & Service Management packages are available, based upon requirements.
• Support available to third parties: No

Onboarding and offboarding

• Getting started: Azure onboarding and offboarding documentation is available publicly online. The website with all documentation is available across all browsers and should work with all accessibility software/options that are commonly utilised for web browsing. https://docs.microsoft.com/en-gb/
• Service documentation: Yes
• Documentation formats:
  • HTML
  • ODF
  • PDF
  • Other
• Other documentation formats: Online Videos and Interactive Learning Portals
• End-of-contract data extraction: Customer are able to remove their data at any time through the same means they uploaded. Either over their network (internet or express route) or via the Azure Import/Export services. Also see https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/trustcenter/privacy
• End-of-contract process: Please see https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/trustcenter/privacy/you-own-your-data. In our Online Services Terms, Microsoft contractually commits to specific processes when a customer leaves a cloud service or the subscription expires. This includes deleting customer data from systems under our control. If you terminate a cloud subscription or it expires (except for free trials), Microsoft will store your customer data in a limited-function account for 90 days (the “retention period”) to give you time to extract the data or renew your subscription. During this period, Microsoft provides multiple notices, so you will be amply forewarned of the upcoming deletion of data. After this 90-day retention period, Microsoft will disable the account and delete the customer data, including any cached or backup copies. For in-scope services, that deletion will occur within 90 days after the end of the retention period. (In-scope services are defined in the Data Processing Terms section of our Online Services Terms.) See http://www.microsoftvolumelicensing.com/Downloader.aspx?DocumentId=13655

Using the service

• Web browser interface: No
• API: Yes
• What users can and can't do using the API: Users are able to utilise the Azure API Managament service to create their own API's for the solutions they deploy on to the platform. Additionally we have the Azure Service Management API which provides programmatic access to much of the functionality available through the Management Portal. Available here https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/azure/ee460799.aspx
• API automation tools:
  • Ansible
  • Chef
  • OpenStack
  • SaltStack
  • Terraform
  • Puppet
• API documentation: Yes
• API documentation formats:
  • Open API (also known as Swagger)
  • HTML
  • PDF
• Command line interface: Yes
• Command line interface compatibility:
  • Linux or Unix
  • Windows
  • MacOS
  • Other
• Using the command line interface: Azure CLI 2.0 is optimized for managing and administering Azure resources from the command line, and for building automation scripts that work against the Azure Resource Manager. See https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/cli/azure/install-azure-cli

Scaling

• Scaling available: Yes
• Scaling type:
  • Automatic
  • Manual
• Independence of resources: Azure represents a hyper-scale public cloud service.
• Usage notifications: Yes
• Usage reporting: Email

Analytics

• Infrastructure or application metrics: Yes
• Metrics types:
  • CPU
  • Disk
  • HTTP request and response status
  • Memory
  • Network
  • Number of active instances
• Reporting types:
  • API access
  • Real-time dashboards

Resellers

• Supplier type: Reseller providing extra support
• Organisation whose services are being resold: Microsoft

Staff security

• Staff security clearance: Conforms to BS7858:2019
• Government security clearance: Up to Security Clearance (SC)

Asset protection

• Knowledge of data storage and processing locations: Yes
• Data storage and processing locations:
  • United Kingdom
  • European Economic Area (EEA)
  • Other locations
• User control over data storage and processing locations: Yes
• Datacentre security standards: Complies with a recognised standard (for example CSA CCM version 3.0)
• Penetration testing frequency: At least once a year
• Penetration testing approach: ‘IT Health Check’ performed by a CHECK service provider
• Protecting data at rest:
  • Physical access control, complying with CSA CCM v3.0
  • Physical access control, complying with SSAE-16 / ISAE 3402
  • Encryption of all physical media
  • Scale, obfuscating techniques, or data storage sharding
  • Other
• Other data at rest protection approach: See http://download.microsoft.com/download/0/D/D/0DD8FB12-6343-4A50-80B2-545F2951D7AE/MicrosoftAzureDataProtection_Aug2014.pdf , and https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/storage/storage-service-encryption
• Data sanitisation process: Yes
• Data sanitisation type:
  • Explicit overwriting of storage before reallocation
  • Deleted data can’t be directly accessed
• 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: Files virtual machines & databases
• Backup controls: Under user control
• Datacentre setup: Multiple datacentres with disaster recovery
• Scheduling backups: Users contact the support team to schedule backups
• 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
  • Other
• Other protection between networks: ACL Based Network Security Groups are also used. See https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/network-security-groups/
• Data protection within supplier network:
  • TLS (version 1.2 or above)
  • IPsec or TLS VPN gateway
  • Other
• Other protection within supplier network: ACL Based Network Security Groups are also used. See https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/network-security-groups/

Availability and resilience

• Guaranteed availability: See Microsoft's Online Service Terms at http://www.microsoftvolumelicensing.com/Downloader.aspx?DocumentId=13655
• Approach to resilience: Please see https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/cloud-platform/global-datacenters and https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/TrustCenter/
• Outage reporting: Please see https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/status/ and https://portal.azure.com/#blade/HubsExtension/ServicesHealthBlade

Identity and authentication

• User authentication:
  • 2-factor authentication
  • Identity federation with existing provider (for example Google apps)
  • Username or password
  • Other
• Other user authentication: Azure Active Directory is Microsoft’s multi-tenant cloud based directory and identity management service. Azure-AD provides an affordable, easy to use solution to give employees and business partners single sign-on (SSO) access to thousands of cloud SaaS Applications like Office365, Salesforce.com, DropBox, and Concur. For application developers, Azure-AD lets you focus on building your application by making it fast and simple to integrate with a world class identity management solution used by millions of organizations. Azure-AD also includes a full suite of identity management capabilities including multi-factor authentication, device registration, self-service password management, self-service group management, privileged account management.; ; https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/active-directory/active-directory-whatis
• Access restrictions in management interfaces and support channels: Azure-AD can designate separate administrators to serve different functions. These administrators will have access to features in the Azure portal and, depending on their role, will be able to create or edit users, assign administrative roles to others, reset user passwords, manage user-licenses, and manage domains, among other things. A user who is assigned an admin role will have the same permissions across all of the cloud services that your organization has subscribed to, regardless of whether you assign the role in the Office365 portal, or in the Azure classic-portal, or by using the Azure-AD module for Windows PowerShell.; ; https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/active-directory/active-directory-assign-admin-roles
• Access restriction testing frequency: At least once a year
• Management access authentication:
  • 2-factor authentication
  • Identity federation with existing provider (for example Google Apps)
  • Username or password
  • Other
• Description of management access authentication: See https://docs.microsoft.com/en-gb/azure/role-based-access-control/manage-access-to-azure-resources
• Devices users manage the service through: Dedicated device on a segregated network (providers own provision)

Audit information for users

• Access to user activity audit information: Users have access to real-time audit information
• How long user audit data is stored for: Between 6 months and 12 months
• Access to supplier activity audit information: Users receive audit information on a regular basis
• How long supplier audit data is stored for: Between 6 months and 12 months
• How long system logs are stored for: Between 6 months and 12 months

Standards and certifications

• ISO/IEC 27001 certification: Yes
• Who accredited the ISO/IEC 27001: SGS United Kingdom Ltd
• ISO/IEC 27001 accreditation date: 16/01/2024
• What the ISO/IEC 27001 doesn’t cover: Development
• ISO 28000:2007 certification: No
• CSA STAR certification: No
• PCI certification: No
• Cyber essentials: No
• Cyber essentials plus: No
• Other security certifications: Yes
• Any other security certifications: ISO 9001

Security governance

• Named board-level person responsible for service security: Yes
• Security governance certified: Yes
• Security governance standards:
  • CSA CCM version 3.0
  • ISO/IEC 27001
  • Other
• Other security governance standards: FACT, FedRamp, NIST 800-171, EU Model Clauses, Cyber Essentials Plus
• Information security policies and processes: An Information Security Management Program has been established to enable Microsoft Azure to maintain and improve its management system for information security. Through establishment of the ISMS, Azure plans for and manages protection of its assets to acceptable security levels based on defined risk management processes. In addition, Azure monitors the ISMS and the effectiveness of controls in maintaining the confidentiality, integrity and availability of assets to continuously improve information security. ; ; The ISMS framework encompasses industry best-practices for information security and privacy. The ISMS has been documented and communicated in a customer-facing Information Security Policy, which can be made available upon request (customers and prospective customers must have a signed NDA or equivalent in place to receive a copy).; ; Microsoft Azure performs annual ISMS reviews, the results of which are reviewed by management. This involves monitoring ongoing effectiveness and improvement of the ISMS control environment by reviewing security issues, audit results, and monitoring status, and by planning and tracking necessary corrective actions.; Also see https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/TrustCenter/Compliance/ISO-IEC-27001 and The Microsoft Cloud Security Policy is available via the Service Trust Platform aka.ms/stp

Operational security

• Configuration and change management standard: Conforms to a recognised standard, for example CSA CCM v3.0 or SSAE-16 / ISAE 3402
• Configuration and change management approach: Azure has developed formal standard operating procedures (SOPs) governing the change management process. These SOPs cover both software development and hardware change and release management, and are consistent with established regulatory guidelines including ISO 27001, SOC 1 / SOC 2, NIST 800-53, and others.; ; Microsoft also uses Operational Security Assurance (OSA), a framework that incorporates the knowledge gained through a variety of capabilities that are unique to Microsoft including the Microsoft Security Development Lifecycle (SDL), the Microsoft Security Response Center program, and deep awareness of the cybersecurity threat landscape. ; Please see https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/SDL/OperationalSecurityAssurance and https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/sdl
• Vulnerability management type: Conforms to a recognised standard, for example CSA CCM v3.0 or SSAE-16 / ISAE 3402
• Vulnerability management approach: When providing the Antimalware solution for Virtual Machines, Azure is responsible for ensuring the service is highly available, definitions are updated regularly, that configuration through the Azure Management Portal is effective and that the software detects and protects against known types of malicious software. MCIO-managed hosts in the scope boundary are scanned to validate anti-virus clients are installed and current signature-definition files exist.; ; Vulnerability scans are performed on a quarterly basis at a minimum. Microsoft Azure contracts with independent assessors to perform penetration testing of the Microsoft Azure boundary.
• Protective monitoring type: Conforms to a recognised standard, for example CSA CCM v3.0 or SSAE-16 / ISAE 3402
• Protective monitoring approach: Microsoft Azure employs sophisticated software-defined service instrumentation and monitoring that integrates at the component or server level, the datacenter edge, our network backbone, Internet exchange sites, and at the real or simulated user level, providing visibility when a service disruption is occurring and pinpointing its cause.; ; Proactive monitoring continuously measures the performance of key subsystems of the Microsoft Azure services platform against the established boundaries for acceptable service performance and availability. When a threshold is reached or an irregular event occurs, the monitoring system generates warnings so that operations staff can address the threshold or event.
• Incident management type: Conforms to a recognised standard, for example, CSA CCM v3.0 or ISO/IEC 27035:2011 or SSAE-16 / ISAE 3402
• Incident management approach: Microsoft has developed robust processes to facilitate a coordinated response to incidents. ; • Identification – System and security alerts may be harvested, correlated, and analyzed. ; • Containment – The escalation team evaluates the scope and impact of an incident. ; • Eradication – The escalation team eradicates any damage caused by the security breach, identifies root cause for why the security issue occurred. ; • Recovery – During recovery, software or configuration updates are applied to the system and services are returned to a full working capacity.; • Lessons Learned – Each security incident is analyzed to protect against future reoccurrence.

Secure development

• Approach to secure software development best practice: Independent review of processes (for example CESG CPA Build Standard, ISO/IEC 27034, ISO/IEC 27001 or CSA CCM v3.0)

Separation between users

• Virtualisation technology used to keep applications and users sharing the same infrastructure apart: Yes
• Who implements virtualisation: Supplier
• Virtualisation technologies used: Hyper-V
• How shared infrastructure is kept separate: Please see https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/TrustCenter/Security/default.aspx

Energy efficiency

• Energy-efficient datacentres: Yes
• Description of energy efficient datacentres: Please see https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/corporate-responsibility/sustainability

Social Value

• Social Value:

  Social Value

  • Fighting climate change
  • Equal opportunity
  • Wellbeing

  Fighting climate change

  ITS currently has ISO 14001:2015 accreditation and have had so since 2004. As part of achieving this accreditation on a recurring basis, ITS have a living Environment Policy which outlines the environmental and sustainable efficiencies in place and audited within the organisation. These are extensive in nature, but include; 1. Carbon Reduction Plan, 2. Property Rationalisation - The impact of Covid-19 has accelerated the change in working practices with increased remote working. Accordingly, we have reviewed our property footprint and plan to reduce our property square footage in 2024 to recognise our remote working policy and reduce our overarching carbon footprint and energy consumption. 3. Waste Management - At ITS, we are committed to reducing waste to landfill, by refusing, reusing and recycling wherever possible. As an office-based business, our waste is minimal and where it cannot be recycled, it is sent to a waste-to-energy facility. We have reduced single-use plastic from our offices, by providing reusable alternatives to single-use coffee and water cups. 4. Colleague Engagement - A network of Eco Champions drawn from across the business is in place with the objective of raising awareness of environmental issues, encouraging environmentally responsible behaviour and running employee led environmental projects. 5. Environmental Monitoring - The Environmental Oversight Committee is responsible for overseeing the recording of electricity and gas usage. 6. Environmental Legislation - The Environmental Oversight Committee is responsible for the successful establishment and maintenance of the Register of Environmental Legislation. Relevant Environmental Legislation, governing the environmental aspects of the activities, products and services of the company is documented in the register. 7. Identification of new environment aspects - The Environmental Oversight Committee has overall responsibility for the maintenance of the Register of environmental aspects.

  Equal opportunity

  As a business, we are committed to being diverse and inclusive. We focus on understanding, appreciating, and valuing 'difference', both visible and invisible, and recognise the positive impact a diverse workforce can have on our business and our clients and customers. At ITS, we strive to offer a working environment that provides equality and acceptance for all, regardless of age, gender, gender identity, race, national or ethnic origin, religion or belief, language, political beliefs, sexual orientation, and physical ability. The differences our employees bring enrich and enhance our culture, creating one that is open, inclusive, and reflective of the diverse society in which we all live and work. This then enables our people to leverage: • Diverse thinking • Skills • Leadership experience • Working styles. Through our commitment to diversity and inclusion, you will benefit from engaging with a wide range of people at ITS, all with differing backgrounds, skills, and experience. You can be confident that our employees have been selected based on their relevant experience and what they can bring to the relationship. Our diverse workforce and inclusive business environment are underpinned by our global guiding principles, robust policies, clear goals, and appropriate training. We ensure diversity and inclusion is embedded throughout the organisation from the establishment of our Diversity and Inclusion (D&I) team. The Board and Executive Team have endorsed a Diversity and Inclusion Policy and a Strategic Plan which holds clear statements of our values, standards, and the actions we are taking.

  Wellbeing

  Through the ITS People and Culture forum, great focus is placed on employee health and wellbeing. The forum covers the following area, each run by a dedicated sub group:- DISABILITY AND MENTAL HEALTH; The Disability and Mental Health team are very passionate about supporting all our colleagues and ensuring great mental health. Each member of the team is a qualified mental health first aider and available for one-to-one support. PHYSICAL HEALTH; At ITS we know that physical and mental health are equally as important. Our Physical Health champions are always looking for opportunities to bring awareness and arrange activities for colleagues. The aim of the activities are to achieve physical health in a no pressure, supportive environment and on some occasions a little competitiveness! DIVERSITY AND INCLUSION (D&I); The Diversity & Inclusion team champions gender, culture, equality, diversity & inclusion across ITS. The champions embed this within our culture; This is reflected in how we operate and the decisions we make. As advocates of our diversity and inclusion strategy we provide leadership support and raise awareness of the value Diversity & Inclusion brings. CHARITY; At ITS we have annually nominated Charity of the year, as suggested & voted for by our colleagues. Our Charity champions facilitate and arrange activities, which are not only fun, but help raise money for our colleagues chosen good cause. ENVIRONMENT; Our Environment champions are passionate and key to helping us as a society, reduce our negative impact on the environment, but also as a business to meet our company target of reducing carbon and achieving net zero target. SOCIAL; Our Social Champions are key to ensuring a successful work life balance and, as well as promoting colleague relations inside and outside of the workplace, through a fun packed calendar of social events.

Pricing

• Price: £1,050 a unit a day
• Discount for educational organisations: No
• Free trial available: Yes
• Description of free trial: Please see https://azure.microsoft.com/en-gb/free
• Link to free trial: https://azure.microsoft.com/en-gb/free/

Service documents

• Pricing document

  PDF

• Skills Framework for the Information Age rate card

  PDF

• Service definition document

  PDF

• Terms and conditions

  PDF

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 G-Cloud@its-computing.co.uk. Tell them what format you need. It will help if you say what assistive technology you use.