back to article We reveal what's inside Microsoft's Azure Govt Secret regions... wait, is that a black helico–

Microsoft has set up two new Azure cloud regions in the US – dubbed Azure Government Secret regions – to store data involving American national security. The services are in private preview, and are pending official government accreditation. The Windows giant hopes the pair of regions will obtain a Dept of Defense Impact Level …

  1. Anonymous Coward
    Black Helicopters

    Eh, I don't see this becoming a successful offering...

    What with the whole promotional message being ""I could tell you about Azure Government Secret, but I'd have to kill you." That stuff tends to limit repeat customers.

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Not needed

    The Dems just keep all the secret stuff on crooked Hillary’s email server.

  3. Ken Moorhouse Silver badge

    Microsoft's method of security...

    Judging by their recent performance with W10 updates, Microsoft's method of security is to not allow anyone - not even those whose data it is - access to it.

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    It will be interesting to see what would happen when enough eggs will be in a cloud basket...

    ... and the company running it fails and goes bankrupt.

    And remember, even companies that were once big and successful can fail and go bankrupt.

    Or they maybe thing they are also buying an insurance, as government will need to bail them out once they actually control government and citizen data, most of them having a very long storage and availability needs?

    1. bpfh

      Re: It will be interesting to see what would happen when enough eggs will be in a cloud basket...

      Depending on what they host, either they will be considered too big to fail and bailed out.... or they will be requisitionned to government service.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        ... or they will be requisitionned to government service.

        At which point the government will get an infrastructure they don't know how to manage - hopefully before it's been auctioned off....

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: ... or they will be requisitionned to government service.

          Doesn't the US has some means of requiring citizens to co-operate in matters of national security?

  5. Ima Ballsy
    Coat

    I ..

    azure you it is on the up and up ...

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    The Azure Government Secret data centers are so secret Microsoft doesn't disclose their location, only stating on Thursday that they are located more than 500 miles apart.

    Sure, and since we cannot check this we will, for risk management purposes, assume they're next door to each other, interconnected with a bit of wet string. Sorry sunshine, what I don't know is tagged worst case as a risk - that's doing the job properly.

    Then again, if you're serious about managing security risks you wouldn't use anything coming from Redmond in the first place..

    1. A.P. Veening Silver badge

      Then again, if you're serious about managing security risks you wouldn't use anything coming from Redmond in the first place..

      It is quite easy to secure a computer with a Microsoft OS and other software on it. You first start by unplugging the display, the keyboard, the mouse, other peripherals, the network cable and finally the power cord. After that, you put it in a vault, close and lock the door of that vault and as the very last thing you melt down the key (donate it to Forged in Fire ;) ).

    2. Velv
      Headmaster

      I’m pretty sure Microsoft will give the locations to those Government departments who are eligible to use the service, they’re just not making the location public knowledge.

  7. Paul 87

    So, basically they've setup a "secret" zone, then go and have a press release with the name and the fact it exists.

    Kinda opposite of a secret really.

    Not to mention why on earth would you want information deemed to be critical for National Security on the internet. If it were me, I'd setup an entirely seperate network using a non-standard communication method.

    1. Brad Ackerman
      Holmes

      John Deutch wasn't involved in this program, so they're not on the internet.

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    "every virtual machine sitting on its own physical node"

    So, hang on a second.

    If "every virtual machine sitting on its own physical node"

    Then why virtualise in the first place ?

    One-to-one virtualisation (as implied by the quote) seems to be an exercise in pointlessness.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: "every virtual machine sitting on its own physical node"

      I think "exercise in pointlessness" is a plus when it comes to government IT programs.

      It's probably being sold to the DoD as an additional layer of redundancy.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: "every virtual machine sitting on its own physical node"

      "Then why virtualise in the first place ?"

      I would imagine to reduce the required number of servers for HA. Along with provisioning time to get a server back up and running in case of hardware failure. If its a VM, in case of hardware failure, just start the VM on other hardware, dedicated to it. If it wasn't a VM, it would require automated provisioning of new hardware (which they should have) but that would take longer to get back up than starting a VM.

      The alternative would be to have everything boot directly off block storage, but then the hardware would need to be identical to ensure no problems.

    3. sum_of_squares
      Big Brother

      Re: "every virtual machine sitting on its own physical node"

      >Then why virtualise in the first place ?

      So you can run your hardened Red Head Linux on your Hyper-V.

      Or do you REALLY think TLAs trust Microsoft? The very company that delivers..

      Oh wait, what's that? Is that a snip..

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