Cloud Security Architecture & SLA Management

A cloud security architecture defines all technical and organisational measures to protect data, applications and infrastructure in cloud environments. It covers network segmentation, Identity & Access Management (IAM), encryption strategies, logging and incident response processes. Default provider configurations only cover baseline protection — in regulated industries, organisations must implement additional security layers to meet requirements from DORA, EBA guidelines and ISO 27001. ADVISORI designs security architectures tailored to your specific risk profile and regulatory obligations.

The shared responsibility model divides security accountability between cloud provider and customer. The provider secures the infrastructure (physical data centres, network, hypervisor), while the enterprise remains responsible for data, access rights, application configuration and compliance. With IaaS, more responsibility lies with the customer than with SaaS. In practice, security gaps emerge precisely at this boundary — when organisations assume the provider handles everything. ADVISORI documents responsibility boundaries for each service and ensures no protection gaps remain.

Business-critical SLA metrics go beyond pure availability figures such as 99.9% uptime. Key metrics include Recovery Time Objective (RTO), Recovery Point Objective (RPO), transaction processing latency, incident response times and compliance reporting deadlines. ADVISORI implements SLA monitoring dashboards that capture these metrics in real time and trigger automatic escalation when thresholds are breached. This way you detect SLA deviations before they impact business processes.

Zero Trust follows the principle of 'never trust, always verify' — every access request is authenticated and authorised regardless of network location. Integration starts with an inventory of all identities, devices and data flows. Then micro-segmentation, context-based access control and continuous verification are implemented. In existing cloud environments, this happens in phases: first identity-centric controls, then network segmentation, finally workload protection. ADVISORI guides this process from architecture planning to implementation with measurable milestones.

Financial regulators require detailed provisions for cloud usage: risk analysis before outsourcing, information security management, contingency planning, exit strategies and regular review of cloud providers. Under DORA, additional requirements apply — including ICT risk management, digital operational resilience testing and third-party risk management. Cloud security architectures must technically implement these requirements through encrypted data transmission, access logging and documented recovery processes.

Multi-cloud environments require a unified SLA governance framework that harmonises provider-specific differences. ADVISORI develops standardised metrics that are comparable across AWS, Azure and GCP. The framework includes vendor scorecards, automated performance reports, escalation paths and contractual safeguards for service outages. The crucial factor is correlating technical SLA metrics with business impact —

15 minutes of payment service downtime has very different consequences than the same outage on an internal reporting tool.

Costs depend on complexity, number of cloud environments and regulatory requirements. An initial cloud security assessment and architecture concept is typically completed within a few weeks. The investment pays off through avoided security incidents (average cost of a data breach: over EUR

4 million), reduced audit effort through structured documentation and optimised cloud spend through better resource management. ADVISORI provides a transparent cost estimate with a clear timeline after the initial assessment.