One of the greatest aspects to Microsoft’s Azure Government software is their continual push to innovate and add new features. A lot of this comes through their attention to security for the cloud platform. However, they take it further to help those living in specific geographic regions.
If you work in government, your office location is perhaps in another country or region, even if you represent the U.S. As such, it could create problems in maintaining data sovereignty, as well as being unable to localize content.
When sending out important alerts, marketing materials, or other critical messages, this could become a major issue. Plus, having to reroute data through different endpoints could mean delays in getting an important message out to a specific region.
Microsoft now offers a solution by adding a Geographic Routing feature into their popular Traffic Manager in Azure.
Using Traffic Manager
If you’re new to using Azure Government, its Traffic Manager feature is already a popular tool for letting you distribute user traffic to other data centers. As a standalone feature, this helps many who use Azure virtual machines and Microsoft’s cloud service.
Traffic Manager is also great when you’re using non-Azure endpoints, proving how compatible Azure Government is with other technologies.
By adding Geographic Routing, Microsoft now expands the capability to direct traffic to specific endpoints in other countries.
Azure Data Centers
The benefit to Geographic Routing is that Azure already has data centers in different regions around the world. Now you can route your traffic to specific places where you need to send critical information.
In government, you may have data that needs proliferating quickly. Through the new geographic feature, you’ll find a lot of other scenarios where you’ll find its use essential when transferring data.
Localizing Data
When government agencies have to send important messages to regions around the world, it’s tougher to localize the content without geographic routing. This new feature lets you take data sent to local regions and customize it so it’s easier to consume.
Thanks to more precise routing, you’ll be able to create better user experiences. Whether this has to do with language barriers, or trying to convey a specific message for safety, it’s a potentially life-saving feature.
What makes this easier to use is you can break the geographic routing down to a granular level. You can set the routing to the entire world, regional grouping, country, or state and province.
Adhering to Mandates on Data Sovereignty
Geographic routing allows you to keep on top of data sovereignty mandates throughout the world. Not keeping up on these could bring violation penalties that affect your budget.
As an example, countries like Germany, France, and Russia are known for having strict data sovereignty laws. They demand citizen data being stored on their own servers.
The above is just the start, including specific laws for cloud security. Microsoft lets you keep up so you always know where your users are coming from.
When Will Geographic Routing Be Available?
This is already available through all Azure Public cloud regions, but isn’t available in Azure Government until May. It’s also going to become available in Azure Germany and Azure China during the same month.
For government offices like yours perhaps spread around the globe, geographic routing is going to improve your international communications. The good news is it’s going to cost the same as all the other routing options available.
Take some time to learn about best practices using on this new feature through the Traffic Manager FAQ page.
Keep reading us at cFocus Software Incorporated as we explore old and new features in Azure Government.
More Information
Want to learn more about Azure Traffic Manager? Let cFocus Software Inc. show you how we can help your agency make a smooth transition to Azure Government and fully utilize its traffic management features.