AWS publishes FINMA ISAE 3000 Type 2 attestation report for the Swiss financial industry

May 4, 2021: We’ve added links to download this post translated into French or German.

March 23, 2021: We’ve updated this post to note that the report covers 22 global AWS Regions.

Gaining and maintaining customer trust is an ongoing commitment at Amazon Web Services (AWS). Our customers’ industry security requirements drive the scope and portfolio of compliance reports, attestations, and certifications we pursue. Following up on our announcement in November 2020 of the new EU (Zurich) Region, AWS is pleased to announce the issuance of the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority (FINMA) ISAE 3000 Type 2 attestation report. The scope of this report includes 22 global AWS Regions.

The FINMA ISAE 3000 Type 2 report, conducted by an independent third-party audit firm, provides Swiss financial industry customers with the assurance that the AWS control environment is appropriately designed and implemented to address key operational risks, as well as risks related to outsourcing and business continuity management. Additionally, the report provides customers with important guidance on complementary user entity controls (CUECs), which customers should consider implementing as part of the shared responsibility model to help them comply with FINMA’s control objectives. The report covers the period from 4/1/2020 to 9/30/2020, with a total of 124 AWS services and 22 global Regions included in the scope. A full list of certified services and Regions are presented within the published FINMA report.

The report covers the five core FINMA circulars that are applicable to Swiss banks and insurers in the context of outsourcing arrangements to the cloud. These FINMA circulars are intended to assist regulated financial institutions in understanding approaches to due diligence, third-party management, and key technical and organizational controls that should be implemented in cloud outsourcing arrangements, particularly for material workloads. The report’s scope covers, in detail, the requirements of the following FINMA circulars:

• 2018/03 “Outsourcing – banks and insurers” (31.10.2019);
• 2008/21 “Operational Risks – Banks” – Principle 4 Technology Infrastructure (31.10.2019);
• 2008/21 “Operational Risks – Banks” – Appendix 3 Handling of electronic Client Identifying Data (31.10.2019);
• 2013/03 “Auditing” (04.11.2020) – Information Technology (21.04.2020);
• Business Continuity Management (BCM) minimum standards proposed by the Swiss Insurance Association (01.06.2015) and Swiss Bankers Association (29.08.2013);

The alignment of AWS with FINMA requirements demonstrates our continuous commitment to meeting the heightened expectations for cloud service providers set by Swiss financial services regulators and customers. Customers can use the FINMA report to conduct their due diligence, which may minimize the effort and costs required for compliance. The FINMA report for AWS is now available free of charge to AWS customers within the AWS Artifact. More information on how to download the FINMA report is available here.

Some useful resources related to FINMA:

• AWS Compliance Center Switzerland – https://thinkwithwp.com/financial-services/security-compliance/compliance-center/ch/
• Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority FINMA – https://www.finma.ch/en/
• AWS Compliance Program – FINMA ISAE3000 – https://thinkwithwp.com/compliance/finma/

As always, AWS is committed to bringing new services into the scope of our FINMA program in the future based on customers’ architectural and regulatory needs. Please reach out to your AWS account team if you have questions about the FINMA report. You can also download this blog post translated into French or German.

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