2021-02-03-Certification

Foto: Campus University Baureuth

Get better together

The certifications of the Leibniz Supercomputing Centre (LRZ) are setting a precedent: In April 2020, the IT Service Center (ITS) of the University of Bayreuth also received the certificate for information security according to international ISO/IEC standard 27001, and the next certificate according to ISO/IEC standard 20,000 for IT service management is in preparation. LRZ colleagues helped with their experience, analyzed processes at the university data centre and identified opportunities for optimization. This is how a consulting partnership came into being: To renew their certificates, the two data centres are now evaluating each other's IT security and service quality: "The audits encourage employees to get to know each other, so we can intensify the exchange of experience and cooperation," says Prof. Dr. Torsten Eymann, Chair for Business Informatics and Vice President of the University of Bayreuth.

After around 18 months of preparation, the LRZ had itself certified in summer 2019 as Germany's first scientific data centre in the disciplines of IT service management and information security. The IT team at the University of Bayreuth learned about this through working groups and news and asked for help. Certificates must be renewed regularly and the analyses of relevant processes and the documentation of security or service measures must be repeated for this purpose: "In addition to audits by certification bodies, the standards provide for further examinations by independent auditors to ensure that the organization is constantly improving," explains Prof. Dr. Helmut Reiser, deputy director of the LRZ. "Only a few commercial auditors have experience with scientific or university data centres. This special know-how is more what both partners profit from the most in this partnership." The first mutual audits showed success, strengthend the desired exchange and cooperation, and have the side effect of being more cost-effective. In April 2021, a team from Bayreuth will therefore again put the LRZ under the microscope and vice versa. Both data centres will qualify interested employees as auditors, and the LRZ will use this knowledge to expand its consulting and services. (vs)