Accenture Federal Services named Cloudflare’s GSI Partner of the Year
April 20, 2022
Accenture Federal Services was recently named Cloudflare’s Government Systems Integrator (GSI) Partner of the Year for the Americas. This honor recognizes our success to-date as the first federal implementor of Cloudflare’s technologies to greatly improve the cyber posture of agencies.
We initially partnered with Cloudflare as we saw their technology filling important gaps in the zero trust architecture that federal agencies need to implement to stay secure. Already, we have worked with them on our Protective DNS Resolver service to deliver advanced protections for Federal Civilian Executive Branch (FCEB) agencies on behalf of the Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) within the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
This is just one example of how we are building upon this proven relationship to bring additional cybersecurity innovation to the federal market.
Simplifying cybersecurity for federal agencies
Many federal agencies are struggling to implement multiple point solutions in support of enhanced cybersecurity. Time-consuming and labor-intensive, this heterogenous approach may fail to keep pace with emerging threats.
Cloudflare, a web infrastructure company, offers a novel means of addressing the cyber threat — a strategy that simplifies cybersecurity for agencies while elevating the level of protection.
As an intermediary layer between end users and the threat-laced Internet, Cloudflare now handles more than 10 percent of all internet requests and blocks billions of cyber threats per day. Its massive network of servers protects systems from malicious attacks, delivering a safer browsing experience.
Typically, agencies will deploy cyber defenses onto every device, a labor-intensive process with hit-or-miss results: It’s too easy for attacks to slip by unnoticed. The alternate method — having end users connect via VPN — is proving impractical at a time when remote work is obliterating the traditional IT perimeter.
By acting as an intermediary layer, Cloudflare offers a way forward. It’s all about knowing what the computer is doing and who it’s talking to.
In action and in the future
Cloudflare’s technology is an integral part of our DNS Resolver service for CISA. It enforces policies that federally managed devices only connect with authenticated sites and services. This helps to protect federal users from masked sites and similar phishing attempts.
The reality is that federal agencies require increasingly sophisticated technologies like Cloudflare to stay ahead of cyber threats. However, they are often challenged to assess, acquire, implement, and most importantly, get value from these technologies, especially in a timely manner. The risk is that they find themselves playing catch-up with a technology market that’s moving much faster than federal procurement policy. Thus, this is the advantage of government-wide capabilities that deliver benefits to all departments and agencies such as cyber threat intelligence, web and email gateways, and browser isolation protection for all. These are just some of the innovations we’re working on together to drive the future of security.
What Accenture Federal Services offers is the ability to integrate best-of-breed technologies like those offered by Cloudflare quickly and continually to provide our federal clients with the most robust cyber defense possible. By marrying these technologies with our best practices and global experiences, federal agencies can more quickly achieve both value and improved cyber resilience from their investments.
