Microsoft Azure is poised to help the motion picture industry at large save tens of millions of dollars every year a potential saving which could be achieved through cloud-based functionality paired with security mechanisms which prevent the theft or accidental sharing of film pre-releases.  The potential for higher efficiencies in production is another story all together – this is the new future of film creation, and its unfolding now.

With this in mind, the Microsoft Azure compliance team has been working with the Motion Picture Association of America to assess Azure’s compliance with their best-practices guidelines for content protection. Today, I’m thrilled to announce that Azure is the first—and so far only—hyperscale, multi-tenant public cloud to successfully complete this audit according to the MPAA’s three main frameworks: Common Guidelines, Application Security, and Cloud Security.

This compliance achievement adds to our existing portfolio of more than two-dozen industry standards and certifications, including other media-specific certificates such as the Content Delivery and Security Association’s (CDSA) Content Protection and Security (CPS) Standard.

To help customers understand Azure’s processes and capabilities for content protection, we have published our responses to the three frameworks, available for download on the Microsoft Service Trust Portal.

We have also added to our Cloud Security Alliance (CSA) Security, Trust and Assurance Registry (STAR) attestation by completing the updated Consensus Assessments Initiative Questionnaire (CAIQ) v3.0.1, which is available here. The CAIQ adds to the level of detail previously published in our response to the CSA Cloud Controls Matrix (CCM) v3.0.1 here.

Dane Smith, Producer
Threshold Immersive Virtual Reality

As producers in the emerging fields of virtual reality and immersive media, we looked to Azure to become the backbone of our global pipeline.

The interface is intuitive and helps first-time users hit the ground running—our programmers loved the setup time and ease of use. The ability to launch multiple instances of machines has allowed our team to quickly share data in a secure pipeline. We are big fans, and look forward to continued development that relies on Azure.

If you are interested in our latest attestations or information about Microsoft’s MPAA assessment, you can find it on the Microsoft Trust Center.