The state plans to spend $ 325 million on the “Quebec Cloud”

To protect Quebeckers’ highly sensitive data and prevent them from accessing a country like the United States in the event of a global crisis, the government wants to create its own cloud computing technology at a cost of $ 325 million.

The Ministry of Cybersecurity and Digital provided this budget to set up a personalized cloud that would store up to 40% of Quebeckers data, which is highly sensitive.

“You have to build. This is a very big project, “said Minister Eric Khair in an interview.

The most sensitive data

The CAQ government has promised to clean up obsolete public service computer data centers and host the majority of data on existing cloud services such as Amazon and Microsoft. 20% of the most sensitive information in Quebec’s cloud must be protected.

However, the pandemic forced the government to re-evaluate the situation to better preserve its operational data.

“We go from 20% to 40%.”

In the context of global conflicts, certain foreign laws, such as the Patriot Act of the United States, have undermined the confidence of the Ministry.

“What will happen here if Americans pass an executive order tomorrow morning and repatriate all Amazon services? It could be. Now, this is not just sensitive data, ”said Eric Khair.

It responds to the concerns of computer security professionals.

A dependency problem

However, Quebec does not have the expertise to set up such a technology. However Amazon could build the project before handing over the key to Quebec.

“The project is managed by the ministry, but tenders have to be called for implementation. Then, the project belongs to Quebec, ”he explained, admitting that he was afraid to rely on a single supplier for the remaining 60% of the data.

“That’s my concern,” he stressed.

His concern was justified as the majority of agencies and departments turned to Amazon’s AWS product to store less sensitive state information.