Mississippi Department of Employment Security Cuts Infrastructure Costs by 72% on AWS
Project Achtergrond
MDES collects unemployment taxes and provides an unemployment benefits program for the state. It also works with approximately 55,000 employers in Mississippi to connect them with qualified employees through its workforce services. The agency developed the idea of the consortium, which centered on the use of a shared cloud system, so that partnering states could optimize the infrastructure for the long term and reduce costs. MDES received funding from the US Department of Labor in 2012 to take the lead in developing this consortium, and now ReEmployUSA includes Mississippi, Connecticut, and Maine.
Probleemstelling van het project
At the time, there were no other shared UI systems on the cloud, and many states were dubious of the shared system’s viability. Security was the most prominent concern: MDES had to convince other states that a shared cloud system would be at least as secure as an on-premises system. MDES’s on-premises data center couldn’t offer the scalability and high availability that the consortium would require and couldn’t meet the levels of security mandated by the Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program. The agency also had to negotiate the security agreements with the Internal Revenue Service and the Social Security Administration.
Technologische innovaties
Cloud
Doelstelling van het project
After initially trying another cloud provider, MDES turned to Amazon Web Services (AWS), migrating the system and refactoring it as a multitenant system that can be shared with other states. The result, ReEmployUSA, became the first UI system shared by multiple US states to be hosted in the cloud. By hosting ReEmployUSA on AWS, MDES has achieved high security and scalability, reduced the system’s operating costs, and helped other states take advantage of the system.
Technology Providers
AWS