Categorise shadow cloud services

Based on what your shadow cloud services do, put them into your organisation’s existing categories and check what is already approved in those categories.

Sort to match existing categories

Sort shadow cloud services into the categories already used in your organisation’s taxonomy structure — the way NZ government organises its business and technology using a common language.

What are the reference taxonomies?

Use the reference taxonomy for application and software services

For help with sorting, the Government Chief Digital Officer (GCDO) has guidance for:

Existing categories help you to prioritise

Mapping shadow cloud services to the categories already in use helps you to identify where your organisation may already have approved public cloud services.

Approved services exist for a category

It might or might not make sense to use an approved public cloud service instead of seeing if a shadow cloud service fits with your organisation’s risk tolerance.

Yes — approved services solve needs

Talk to the people in the affected business units to make sure the approved public cloud service meets their business needs and ways of working.

Use the approved service if either the business:

  • units agree, or
  • needs and information are better placed as part of your organisation’s common ground in its cloud plan.

Stop using the shadow cloud service.

Cloud plans

No — approved services do not solve needs

Your people may genuinely need the shadow cloud service to do their jobs. Put the service through a risk assessment if the:

  • business units state that they need it
  • service is a high priority.

Once you’ve prioritised it and assessed the risks, you’ll be able to see if the shadow cloud service should be added to your organisation’s catalogue of approved public cloud services.

Next step — prioritise the most important services

From your list of shadow cloud services, put them in order of the importance of the information being used by those services.

Use multiple factors to find out how important each information system is to NZ government and New Zealanders.

Prioritise the most important services

Utility links and page information

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