Category Archives: Datacenter Management

Azure IaaS and Azure Local: announcements and updates (September 2025 – Weeks: 35 and 36)

This blog post series highlights the key announcements and major updates related to Azure Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and Azure Local, as officially released by Microsoft in the past two weeks.

Azure

General

Microsoft to Tighten Cloud Security with Mandatory MFA for Azure Resource Management

Microsoft has announced that Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) will be enforced for all Azure resource management actions starting October 1, 2025. The enforcement will apply to sign-ins via Azure CLI, PowerShell, SDKs, REST APIs, Infrastructure as Code tools, and the Azure mobile app, as part of the Secure Future Initiative (SFI). SFI focuses on Secure by Design, Secure by Default, and Secure in Operations across engineering pillars such as identity protection, network security, threat detection, and rapid vulnerability remediation. To prepare, administrators are advised to upgrade to Azure CLI v2.76+ and PowerShell v14.3+, migrate automation from user identities to workload identities, use Azure Policy in audit/enforcement mode to assess impact, and monitor MFA registration with built-in reports or scripts. Enforcement will roll out gradually across all tenants, with global administrators able to defer until July 1, 2026. Microsoft’s research indicates that accounts with MFA enabled are 99.99% resistant to hacking attempts, and that MFA reduces unauthorized access risk by 98.56% even when credentials are compromised.

Compute

Upgrade Existing Azure Gen1 VMs to Gen2 Trusted Launch

Microsoft has made generally available the ability to enable Trusted Launch on existing Azure Generation 1 virtual machines by upgrading them to Generation 2 with Trusted Launch. This capability strengthens foundational compute security by enabling Secure Boot and virtual TPM (vTPM), and by measuring the VM’s boot chain for attestation. By helping defend against bootkits and rootkits, the upgrade enhances the security posture of existing workloads without requiring full redeployment.

Retirement of Confidential VM SKUs DCesv5, DCedsv5, ECesv5, ECedsv5

Microsoft is retiring the Confidential VM SKUs DCesv5, DCedsv5, ECesv5, and ECedsv5, with the DCesv6 and ECesv6 sizes designated as their successors. The next-generation sizes—currently in public preview—introduce enhancements such as integration with OpenHCL and will be the primary focus going forward. As part of the transition, all new and existing deployments of the retiring series will be stopped by September 12, 2025. After that date, no new VMs can be created, and any VM from these series that is rebooted will no longer be available. Customers are encouraged to plan migrations to the v6 series to maintain continuity and benefit from the latest confidential computing capabilities.

Networking

Multiple Address Prefixes for Subnets in Azure Virtual Networks

Support for multiple address prefixes per subnet in Azure Virtual Networks is now generally available. Previously, a subnet could hold only a single prefix, which complicated scale-out when the address space was exhausted. The new capability allows additional prefixes to be added directly to a subnet, expanding available address space without emptying or resizing the subnet. This enables dynamic subnet growth with minimal disruption and more efficient use of address space, while preserving headroom for future expansion.

Retirement of Azure CDN in Azure China—migrate to Azure Front Door by December 1, 2025

Azure CDN operated by 21Vianet in Azure China will be retired on December 1, 2025. Because Azure CDN relies on local provider POPs via API integrations and lacks deep, native Azure integration, Microsoft is directing customers to Azure Front Door as the native, more integrated alternative with built-in security features such as WAF and Private Link to origins. Customers should complete migration and validation and delete Azure CDN resources by November 15, 2025. If migration is not completed by that date, the Azure Front Door team will attempt to migrate eligible CDN profiles. Profiles that are disabled, have had no active traffic in the prior three months, or are otherwise incompatible will not be migrated and will experience service disruption starting December 1, 2025. In such cases, customers should migrate to Azure Front Door or another CDN solution before November 15, 2025.

Azure Front Door Standard and Premium now available in Azure China

Azure Front Door Standard and Premium are now generally available in the Azure China regions (China North 3 and China East 3), operated by 21Vianet. With this release, customers can deliver secure, reliable, high-performance applications using a natively integrated platform that provides global load balancing with instant failover, edge caching and protocol optimizations for acceleration, and enterprise-grade security including WAF, DDoS protection, and TLS/SSL offload. The service supports local compliance requirements such as ICP filing for custom domains and offers end-to-end observability through Azure Monitor metrics, logs, and analytics, enabling reduced latency, improved resilience, and a consistent operational experience across global and China regions.

CNI Overlay for Application Gateway for Containers and AGIC

Azure CNI Overlay support with Application Gateway for Containers and the Application Gateway Ingress Controller (AGIC) is now generally available. With CNI Overlay, AKS clusters can assign pod IPs from a separate CIDR, conserving VNet IP space and simplifying multi-cluster deployments. When paired with Application Gateway and Application Gateway for Containers, this approach provides secure, efficient load balancing to designated services inside the cluster’s private overlay network while reducing external exposure. Network configuration (CNI Overlay or traditional CNI) is detected automatically by the platform, eliminating additional setup and streamlining deployment.

Custom block response code and body for Application Gateway WAF (preview)

Azure Web Application Firewall (WAF) integrated with Application Gateway now supports customizable response status codes and bodies for blocked requests in public preview. By default, WAF returns HTTP 403 with “The request is blocked” when a rule is triggered; with this preview, administrators can define a custom status code and message at the policy level so that all blocked requests receive a consistent, tailored response. This enhancement aligns Application Gateway WAF with the customization already available on WAF with Azure Front Door, giving teams greater flexibility and control over client-facing behavior during enforcement.

Storage

Azure NetApp Files short-term clones (preview)

Azure NetApp Files short-term clones are available in public preview, enabling space-efficient, instant read/write access by creating temporary thin clones from existing volume snapshots rather than full data copies. Suitable for development, analytics, disaster recovery scenarios, and testing of large datasets, these clones can be refreshed quickly from the latest snapshots and remain temporary for up to one month, consuming capacity only for incremental changes. The capability accelerates workflows, improves quality and resilience, and lowers costs by avoiding full-copy storage and reducing operational overhead, and is available in all Azure NetApp Files supported regions.

Entra ID and RBAC support for supplemental Azure Storage APIs

Support for Entra ID (OAuth 2.0) and Azure RBAC is now generally available for the following Azure Storage operations: Get Account Information, Get/Set Container ACL, Get/Set Queue ACL, and Get/Set Table ACL. With this change, REST responses for unauthorized access have been aligned with other OAuth-enabled Storage APIs: calls made with OAuth that lack required permissions now return 403 (Forbidden) instead of the previous 404, while anonymous requests for a bearer challenge return 401 (Unauthorized). For example, GetAccountInformation requires the RBAC action Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts/blobServices/getInfo/action. Applications that depend on the old 404 behavior should be updated to handle both 403 and 404 responses, as SDKs will not automatically adjust this behavior.

Conclusion

Over the past two weeks, Microsoft has introduced a slew of updates and announcements pertaining to Azure Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and Azure Local. These developments underscore the tech giant’s unwavering commitment to enhancing its cloud offerings and adapting to the ever-evolving needs of businesses and developers. Users of Azure can anticipate improved functionalities, streamlined services, and enriched features as a result of these changes. Stay tuned for more insights as I continue to monitor and report on Azure’s progression in the cloud sphere.

Azure Hybrid Management & Security: What’s New and Insights from the Field – August 2025

Once again this month, I’m back with my recurring series focused on the evolution of Azure management and security services, with a special focus on hybrid and multicloud scenarios enabled by Azure Arc and enhanced by the use of Artificial Intelligence.

This monthly series aims to:

  • Provide an overview of the most relevant updates released by Microsoft;

  • Share operational tips and field-proven best practices to help architects and IT leaders manage complex and distributed environments more effectively;

  • Follow the evolution towards a centralized, proactive, and AI-driven management model, in line with Microsoft’s vision of AI-powered Management.

The main areas addressed in this series, together with the corresponding tools and services, are described in this article.

Security posture across hybrid and multicloud infrastructures

Microsoft Defender for Cloud

Retirement of Microsoft Defender for Cloud in Microsoft Azure operated by 21Vianet

Microsoft has announced the retirement of Microsoft Defender for Cloud in the Microsoft Azure environment operated by 21Vianet (Azure in China) due to increasing infrastructure and operational complexity, which no longer allows the expected levels of stability and effectiveness to be ensured. All related features and services will be discontinued and removed on August 18, 2026; after that date, the Defender for Cloud portal and any associated services or features in that environment will no longer be accessible. To manage the transition effectively, customers are encouraged to work with their Azure (operated by 21Vianet) account representatives to assess operational impact and plan the necessary actions; further details are available in the official documentation.

New features, bug fixes, and deprecated features of Microsoft Defender for Cloud

The development of Microsoft Defender for Cloud is constantly evolving, with continuous improvements being introduced. To stay updated on the latest developments, Microsoft updates this page, which provides information on new features, bug fixes, and deprecated features. Specifically, this month’s main news includes:

  • Defender for Storage: Optional index tags for malware scan results. Defender for Storage introduces optional index tags to record the outcomes of malware scans, both on-upload and on-demand. With this capability, users can choose whether to publish results to Blob index tags (the default setting) or not use them. Enabling or disabling can be done at the subscription and storage account levels, via the Azure portal or APIs, simplifying metadata governance and integration with triage and auditing processes.
  • Defender for Storage available in Azure Government. The service helps U.S. federal and government agencies secure their storage accounts, offering in Azure Government the same functional coverage as the commercial cloud. This lets security teams adopt uniform controls aligned with public-sector compliance requirements.
  • Defender CSPM and Defender for Servers Plan 2 available in Azure Government. Microsoft has made both Defender Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) and Defender for Servers Plan 2 available in Azure Government. This enables the Department of Defense (DoD) and civilian agencies to manage cloud security posture, strengthen compliance, and benefit from advanced capabilities for server workloads. Feature coverage is aligned with the commercial cloud, facilitating consistent standards and procedures across hybrid and multicloud environments.
  • AKS Security Dashboard. Within the Azure portal, the AKS Security Dashboard provides a centralized view of security posture and runtime protection for AKS clusters. The dashboard highlights software vulnerabilities, compliance gaps, and active threats, helping teams prioritize remediations. It also enables real-time monitoring of workload protection, cluster configuration, and threat-detection signals, improving the continuous prevent–detect–respond cycle.
  • Aggregated storage logs in Microsoft Defender XDR Advanced Hunting (preview). The CloudStorageAggregatedEvents table is available in preview within the Advanced Hunting experience in Microsoft Defender XDR. The table brings aggregated storage activity logs from Defender for Cloud—covering operations, authentication details, access sources, and success/error counts—into a single queryable schema, reducing noise, improving query performance, and providing a high-level view of access patterns. These logs are included at no additional cost in the new Defender for Storage plan for storage accounts, enabling more effective investigations and detections.

Governance and policy management

Azure Cost Management

Updates related to Microsoft Cost Management

Microsoft is constantly seeking new methodologies to improve Microsoft Cost Management, the solution to provide greater visibility into where costs are accumulating in the cloud, identify and prevent incorrect spending patterns, and optimize costs. This article reports some of the latest improvements and updates regarding this solution.

Monitoring

Azure Monitor

Azure Monitor: Tenant-level Service Health alerts (preview)

Microsoft is introducing tenant-level Service Health alerts in Azure Monitor (preview), a capability that delivers proactive notifications about service health issues that affect the entire tenant—not just individual subscriptions. Alert rules can be created with directory (tenant) scope directly from the Service Health page or via the alert-creation wizard in the Azure portal. This extension provides broader visibility and accelerates response to incidents involving tenant-scoped services; for full coverage, Microsoft recommends configuring both subscription-level and tenant-level Service Health alerts.

Log Analytics: Search Job now supports up to 100 million results

Search Job in Log Analytics enables asynchronous queries across all workspace data—including long-term retention—and can land the results in new Analytics tables for downstream analysis. The maximum size per result set has been increased from 1 million to 100 million records, enabling analysis of much larger datasets without splitting queries. This capability remains central for large-scale analytics, rapid investigations, and advanced log processing, delivering a more complete and accurate view of operational data.

Conclusions

This month strongly reaffirms the shift toward a centralized, proactive, AI-powered management model: from extending security posture across hybrid and multicloud scenarios with Defender for Cloud, to operational updates like the AKS Security Dashboard and aggregated storage logs in Advanced Hunting, through to tenant-level Service Health alerts in Azure Monitor. I urge architects and IT leaders to translate these updates into concrete actions now: plan the transition ahead of already announced deadlines (e.g., the retirement of Defender for Cloud in Azure operated by 21Vianet) and enable the new controls across your tenants and workspaces (AKS Security Dashboard, directory-scoped Service Health alerts). As always, the official documentation remains the authoritative source for details and prerequisites; in upcoming installments we will continue to follow the evolution of AI-powered management with practical guidance and field-tested best practices.

Azure IaaS and Azure Local: announcements and updates (August 2025 – Weeks: 33 and 34)

This blog post series highlights the key announcements and major updates related to Azure Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and Azure Local, as officially released by Microsoft in the past two weeks.

Azure

General

Microsoft recognized as a Leader in the 2025 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for Cloud-Native Application Platforms

Microsoft has been named a Leader in the 2025 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for Cloud-Native Application Platforms for the second consecutive year, positioned furthest to the right for Completeness of Vision. The recognition reflects Microsoft’s continued product innovation, cohesive developer experience, and leadership in AI—enabling customers to build cloud-native applications and AI agents across web apps, APIs, event-driven workloads, serverless functions, and containers, backed by global scale and deep enterprise expertise. Microsoft reiterates its commitment to helping organizations innovate with AI while maintaining scalable, cost-efficient operations.

Microsoft Azure now available from cloud region in Austria

Microsoft announced the opening of its cloud region in Austria to accelerate digital transformation and AI innovation. The new region enables enterprises and public sector organizations in Austria to store and process data locally and securely, in compliance with data protection regulations. To help customers adopt the new region and its Availability Zones, Azure supports region portability for many resource types via Azure Resource Mover, easing migrations and minimizing disruption.

Compute

DCesv6 and ECesv6 confidential VMs with Intel® TDX (preview)

Azure introduced the DCesv6 (general purpose) and ECesv6 (memory-optimized) series as its next generation of Confidential VMs, powered by 5th Gen Intel® Xeon® processors (“Emerald Rapids”) with Intel® Trust Domain Extensions (TDX). In private preview, these VMs are designed for tenants with stringent security and confidentiality requirements, providing a strong, hardware-enforced boundary so data and applications remain private and encrypted in memory while in use. They are intended to run confidential workloads without requiring application code changes and include in-guest attestation, enabling customers to verify the integrity of their environments before processing sensitive data.

Networking

Application Gateway adds MaxSurge support for zero-capacity-impact upgrades

Azure Application Gateway now supports MaxSurge, allowing new instances to be provisioned during rolling upgrades without taking existing ones offline. With this capability, customers can move to newer gateway versions while maintaining full traffic handling and reducing deployment risk. The enhancement strengthens resiliency and reliability for mission-critical applications that require consistent performance during infrastructure updates.

Private Application Gateway on Azure Application Gateway v2

Azure introduced Private Application Gateway on the Application Gateway v2 SKU, enabling fully private Layer-7 load balancing with a private frontend IP. This capability helps organizations publish internal web applications without exposing public endpoints, align with zero-trust network patterns, and simplify routing inside virtual networks and peered environments. By leveraging the v2 platform, customers also benefit from autoscaling, zone redundancy, and WAF integration for enhanced resilience and security.

Inbound IPv6 support on public multi-tenant App Service

Inbound IPv6 support for public multi-tenant Azure App Service is now generally available across all public Azure regions. The capability spans multi-tenant apps on Basic, Standard, and Premium SKUs, as well as Functions Consumption, Functions Elastic Premium, and Logic Apps Standard. With native IPv6 ingress, customers can meet dual-stack requirements, improve addressability, and align with regulatory and enterprise mandates while keeping existing deployment workflows unchanged.

Azure Bastion connectivity to private AKS clusters via tunneling (preview)

In public preview, Azure Bastion enables a secure tunnel from a user’s local machine—through Bastion—directly to an AKS API server using standard Kubernetes tooling. This capability provides seamless access to private AKS clusters, as well as to public clusters configured with API server authorized IP ranges, eliminating the need for complex VPNs, jump boxes, or exposing public endpoints. The result is simplified, consistent, and secure access for developers, operators, and partners working with private AKS environments.

Storage

Azure NetApp Files file access logs

The Azure NetApp Files file access logs feature is now generally available, delivering enterprise-grade visibility into file-level operations across SMB, NFSv4.1, and dual-protocol volumes. By capturing detailed telemetry—including user identity, operation type, and timestamps—the feature helps organizations bolster security, streamline operations, and meet compliance requirements in alignment with Azure’s Well-Architected Framework security best practices. File access logs are currently available in select regions, with broader regional support planned.

Azure Blob Storage Archive tier now in Malaysia West

The Archive access tier for Azure Blob Storage is now generally available in the Malaysia West region. This expansion lets customers in Malaysia store infrequently accessed data cost-effectively while meeting local data residency and compliance needs. Archive remains ideal for long-term backup, compliance, and archival scenarios and can be managed via the Azure portal, CLI, PowerShell, or REST API. With this addition, Malaysia West supports the full tier lineup: Hot, Cool, Cold, and Archive.

Azure Files provisioned v2 billing model for SSD (premium)

Azure Files now supports the provisioned v2 billing model on the SSD (premium) tier, allowing independent provisioning of storage, IOPS, and throughput so shares can be right-sized to precise performance and capacity targets. The model also increases the share size range from 32 GiB up to 256 TiB. Provisioned v2 for both SSD and HDD is generally available in all public cloud regions, giving customers consistent deployment options globally.

Azure NetApp Files Flexible service level: cool access support (preview)

Azure NetApp Files now extends its Flexible service level with cool access in public preview, allowing customers to independently configure capacity and throughput while automatically tiering cold data from volumes in Flexible service level capacity pools to Azure storage accounts. This helps optimize cost and performance across diverse workloads—supporting scenarios that require high capacity with low throughput or vice versa—while maintaining seamless access for active data. Cool access also supports cross-region replication for destination-only volumes, enhancing data protection without affecting source latency, and is available in all Azure NetApp Files regions.

Azure Local

Veeam support for Azure Local 24H2 (version 26100.x)

Veeam has added support for Azure Local 24H2 (version 26100.x). The minimum required release is Veeam Backup & Replication 12.3.2 (build 12.3.2.3617). The update excludes Azure Arc VM management; however, Arc-enabled VMs in a “Running” state can be backed up. On restore, these VMs are converted to standard Hyper-V workloads, and if the original VM no longer exists, the Azure Arc connection is expected to persist when the VM is restored to the same cluster within the Azure Arc reconnection window (typically up to 45 days).

Conclusion

Over the past two weeks, Microsoft has introduced a slew of updates and announcements pertaining to Azure Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and Azure Local. These developments underscore the tech giant’s unwavering commitment to enhancing its cloud offerings and adapting to the ever-evolving needs of businesses and developers. Users of Azure can anticipate improved functionalities, streamlined services, and enriched features as a result of these changes. Stay tuned for more insights as I continue to monitor and report on Azure’s progression in the cloud sphere.

Azure IaaS and Azure Local: announcements and updates (August 2025 – Weeks: 31 and 32)

This blog post series highlights the key announcements and major updates related to Azure Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and Azure Local, as officially released by Microsoft in the past two weeks.

Azure

Compute

Azure 128 & 192 vCPU sizes for the Esv6 and Edsv6 series VMs

Microsoft has introduced new VM sizes in the Esv6 and Edsv6 series, offering configurations with up to 192 vCPUs and 1832 GiB of RAM. These high-capacity virtual machines are designed for enterprise-scale workloads, including in-memory analytics, large relational databases, and in-memory cache scenarios. Equipped with Intel® Total Memory Encryption (Intel TME) and NVMe-enabled local and remote storage, these VMs deliver both robust performance and enhanced data security. Key advantages include up to 400K IOPS and 12 GB/s remote storage throughput with 200 Gbps network bandwidth, three times the local storage IOPS thanks to the NVMe interface, and strong memory protection capabilities provided by Intel TME.

Networking

Network Security Perimeter

Microsoft has introduced Network Security Perimeter, a feature that allows organizations to define a logical network isolation boundary for PaaS resources, such as Azure Storage accounts and SQL Database servers, deployed outside their virtual networks. This capability restricts public network access to PaaS resources within the perimeter, with exceptions managed through explicit inbound and outbound access rules. Key benefits include secure resource-to-resource communication within perimeter members to prevent data exfiltration, centralized management of external public access, detailed access logs for audit and compliance, and a unified experience across supported PaaS resources.

Customer-controlled maintenance

Microsoft has announced that customers can now define configurable maintenance windows for the Point-to-Site (P2S) VPN Gateway in the Virtual WAN service, which has reached general availability. This capability allows greater control over planned updates and enhances operational predictability. With this release, maintenance window configuration is now supported across multiple gateway resources in Azure networking services, including: Virtual Network Gateway in ExpressRoute, Virtual Network Gateway in VPN Gateway, Site-to-Site VPN Gateway in Virtual WAN, Point-to-Site VPN Gateway in Virtual WAN, and ExpressRoute Gateway in Virtual WAN. This improvement ensures that organizations can align gateway maintenance with their operational and compliance requirements.

Azure DNS Public Zones DNS Security Extensions (DNSSEC) in US Gov and China regions

Microsoft has announced the general availability of Domain Name System Security Extensions (DNSSEC) for Azure DNS Public Zones in US Gov and China regions. This enhancement enables cryptographic authentication of DNS data, providing protection against threats such as cache poisoning and man-in-the-middle attacks. Administrators can enable DNSSEC for both new and existing DNS zones via the Azure Portal, CLI, PowerShell, or API. Azure manages all key operations, simplifying deployment and maintenance while ensuring high availability and performance through its global infrastructure.

Azure Virtual Network Manager mesh now supports 5,000 virtual networks (preview)

Azure Virtual Network Manager now supports grouping up to 5,000 virtual networks in a mesh connectivity configuration, available in public preview for supported regions. A mesh topology establishes bi-directional connectivity between every virtual network in the group, removing the need for manual peerings, reducing network hops, and ensuring low-latency traffic flows under a unified control plane. This approach is particularly beneficial in hub-and-spoke environments, where spokes can communicate directly without routing through the hub, lowering latency while retaining security oversight via Azure Virtual Network Manager security admin rules, NSGs, and comprehensive traffic monitoring through flow logs.

Storage

Log or block shared access signature (SAS) tokens for Azure Storage based on expiration policy

Azure Storage now supports enhanced enforcement options for Shared Access Signature (SAS) token expiration policies. Administrators have long been able to define the validity interval for SAS tokens using a storage account’s expiration policy. However, it was previously possible to override this with a longer signed expiry date on the SAS token itself. With the new SAS expiration action capability, administrators can now choose to either log or block requests that violate the configured expiration policy. The ‘Log’ action provides visibility into out-of-policy usage without disrupting service, making it ideal for auditing and trend analysis. Conversely, the ‘Block’ action enforces strict compliance by denying access to expired tokens. Microsoft recommends beginning with the ‘Log’ action to monitor access patterns, followed by implementing ‘Block’ to secure environments against unauthorized or outdated token usage.

Azure Data Box Next Gen is now generally available in additional regions

Azure Data Box Next Gen is now generally available in new regions, including Australia, Japan, Singapore, Brazil, Hong Kong, UAE, Switzerland, and Norway. This expansion complements the existing availability of both the 120 TB and 525 TB models in the US, UK, Canada, EU, US Government, Australia, Japan, and Singapore. Additionally, the 120 TB model is now available in Brazil, UAE, Hong Kong, Switzerland, and Norway. These next-generation NVMe-based devices have already facilitated the ingestion of several petabytes of data across various industries, delivering up to 10× faster transfer speeds. Customers value their reliability and efficiency for large-scale migration projects, making them a preferred choice for secure and high-speed data movement.

Azure Storage Actions now in 22 more regions

Azure Storage Actions is now available in 22 additional Azure regions, expanding its global reach and providing customers with more options for data residency and compliance. This broader availability enhances the ability to automate data management tasks across a wider range of geographic locations, supporting diverse operational and regulatory requirements.

Azure Storage Discovery (preview)

Microsoft has announced the public preview of Azure Storage Discovery, a fully managed service providing enterprise-wide visibility into Azure Blob Storage estates. This solution offers deep insights into capacity usage, activity trends, cost optimization opportunities, and security enhancements, all accessible directly within the Azure Portal. Azure Storage Discovery integrates with Azure Copilot, enabling users to obtain actionable insights through natural language queries without needing to learn a query language or write code.
Organizations can analyze trends over time, drill down into top storage accounts, and filter reports by configuration details such as region, redundancy, performance type, and encryption. The service supports analysis of up to one million storage accounts across multiple subscriptions and resource groups in a single workspace. Key benefits include automated aggregation of metrics, interactive reporting, 30 days of historical data upon deployment, and retention of insights for up to 18 months. The Standard tier is free to use until September 30, after which charges will apply, while the Free tier offers basic insights at no cost.

Conclusion

Over the past two weeks, Microsoft has introduced a slew of updates and announcements pertaining to Azure Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and Azure Local. These developments underscore the tech giant’s unwavering commitment to enhancing its cloud offerings and adapting to the ever-evolving needs of businesses and developers. Users of Azure can anticipate improved functionalities, streamlined services, and enriched features as a result of these changes. Stay tuned for more insights as I continue to monitor and report on Azure’s progression in the cloud sphere.

Azure Hybrid Management & Security: What’s New and Insights from the Field – July 2025

Once again this month, I’m back with my recurring series focused on the evolution of Azure management and security services, with a special focus on hybrid and multicloud scenarios enabled by Azure Arc and enhanced by the use of Artificial Intelligence.

This monthly series aims to:

  • Provide an overview of the most relevant updates released by Microsoft;

  • Share operational tips and field-proven best practices to help architects and IT leaders manage complex and distributed environments more effectively;

  • Follow the evolution towards a centralized, proactive, and AI-driven management model, in line with Microsoft’s vision of AI-powered Management.

The key areas we will cover in this series, along with the corresponding tools and services, include:

🔹 Hybrid and multicloud environment management – with Azure Arc, which extends policy, security, management, and automation capabilities to on-premises and multicloud resources.

🔹 AI and intelligent automation – enabled by Microsoft Copilot in Azure, AIOps capabilities, and predictive tools to streamline operations and support smarter decision-making.

🔹 Security posture across hybrid and multicloud infrastructures – using Microsoft Defender for Cloud and other native services for vulnerability management and advanced threat protection.

🔹 Governance and policy management – leveraging tools such as Azure Policy, Azure Cost Management, and Resource Graph to ensure control, standardization, and cost/resource optimization.

🔹 Update & Patching – through Azure Update Management, Azure Automation, and native patching capabilities across Azure Arc-enabled environments.

🔹 Backup & Resilience – using Azure Backup and Azure Site Recovery to ensure business continuity, data protection, and disaster recovery.

🔹 Monitoring – with tools like Azure Monitor, Log Analytics, and Application Insights for comprehensive visibility and effective troubleshooting.

Hybrid and multicloud environment management

Azure Arc

Azure File Sync Extension for Azure Arc

The Azure File Sync Arc extension is now generally available, enabling simplified deployment and management of Azure File Sync on Azure Arc–enabled Windows Servers. With this extension, you can install the Azure File Sync agent directly from the Azure portal, via PowerShell, or CLI—supporting Windows Server starting from version 2012 R2. The extension is available in all Azure File Sync–supported regions at no additional cost, marking a significant step forward in the unified management of distributed environments.

New SQL Server Database Migration Experience in Azure Arc (Preview)

A new integrated migration experience for SQL Server databases in Azure Arc environments is now available in public preview, designed to streamline the entire migration journey to Azure SQL Managed Instance. Integrated with Azure Database Migration Service, the process is now fully manageable from a single interface within the Azure portal. This centralized, automated approach offers ongoing database assessments with cost insights, simplified target provisioning, and near real-time replication support, minimizing downtime. You can also validate migration readiness through read-only replicas and client connection reports. Microsoft Copilot is embedded at key stages of the workflow, providing AI-powered decision support that makes the entire transition faster, more informed, and more reliable.

Security posture across hybrid and multicloud infrastructures

Microsoft Defender for Cloud

New features, bug fixes, and deprecated features of Microsoft Defender for Cloud

The development of Microsoft Defender for Cloud is constantly evolving, with continuous improvements being introduced. To stay updated on the latest developments, Microsoft updates this page, which provides information on new features, bug fixes, and deprecated features. Specifically, this month’s main news includes:

  • Four New Regulatory Compliance Standards (Preview): Microsoft Defender for Cloud is expanding its compliance support with the introduction of four new regulatory frameworks, now available in public preview for Azure, AWS, and GCP environments. The newly added standards include the Digital Operational Resilience Act (DORA), the European Union Artificial Intelligence Act (EU AI Act), the Korean Information Security Management System for Public Cloud (k-ISMS-P), and the CIS Microsoft Azure Foundations Benchmark v3.0. These frameworks can be enabled directly from the Regulatory Compliance dashboard in Microsoft Defender for Cloud, offering increasingly comprehensive coverage for multicloud scenarios. Their integration allows security and compliance teams to continuously monitor and align cloud environments with the most current and globally relevant regulations.
  • Container Image Scanning Support for Chainguard and Wolfi: Microsoft Defender for Cloud’s vulnerability scanning engine—powered by Microsoft Defender Vulnerability Management—now extends its coverage to Chainguard container images and the Wolfi distribution. This new capability enables the detection of vulnerabilities within these container images, helping to validate the security of builds before they are deployed to production. The goal is to ensure that the images in use meet the highest security standards while supporting the adoption of modern, secure containerized environments. Note that expanding scan coverage to new image types may lead to increased costs, depending on the number and frequency of scans performed.

Backup & Resilience

Azure Backup

Standard Backup Policy Support for Trusted Launch Virtual Machines

Standard backup policy support for Trusted Launch–enabled virtual machines is now generally available. Trusted Launch is a key security feature for enhancing VM protection in Azure, and this update simplifies backup configuration for VMs using it—now the default setting in major VM creation flows. It ensures full operational continuity for automated processes via PowerShell, CLI, or REST API. Existing scripts require no policy changes, reducing potential errors and enhancing the resilience of backup workflows. This marks a significant step toward a secure, automated approach to backup management across cloud and hybrid environments.

Migration of Azure VM Backups from Standard to Enhanced Policy

Azure Backup now allows the migration of virtual machine backups from standard policies to enhanced policies, offering more advanced and flexible data protection. With this capability, you can schedule backups up to every 4 hours and retain snapshot-based recovery points for longer periods. Recovery points created with the enhanced policy reside in the snapshot tier and are zone-resilient, increasing reliability. Additionally, multi-disk crash consistency is supported. Migrating to an enhanced policy also enables VMs to be upgraded to Trusted Launch and to adopt Premium SSD v2 or Ultra Disk storage—without disrupting or compromising existing protection. This evolution supports a modern, scalable, and mission-critical–ready data protection strategy.

Agentless Crash-Consistent Backup for Multi-Disk Azure VMs

Azure Backup now supports agentless crash-consistent backups for multi-disk Azure virtual machines. This feature enables backups without the need to install additional software such as the VM agent or snapshot extension inside the VM. It is particularly beneficial for performance-sensitive workloads that can tolerate crash-consistent backups, minimizing downtime during backup operations. It’s also useful for systems with OS versions that do not support application-consistent or file-system–consistent backups. You can enable this functionality by specifying the desired consistency type within the backup policy.

Azure Backup: Advanced Protection for VMs with Premium SSD v2 Now Available in Norway and Japan

Azure Backup continues to enhance protection for critical workloads in hybrid cloud environments with the general availability of Geo-Redundant Storage (GRS) and Cross-Region Restore (CRR) for virtual machines using Premium SSD v2. These features provide geographically redundant backups and on-demand restores in secondary regions, ideal for audit scenarios or disaster recovery plans. Availability has now been extended to Norway West, Norway East, Japan West, and Japan East, enabling even greater resilience for performance-sensitive, distributed architectures.

Monitoring

Azure Monitor

Log Analytics Summary Rules: Efficient Analysis for High-Volume Data Streams

Microsoft has announced the general availability of Summary Rules in Log Analytics—a powerful tool designed to optimize the management of high-ingestion data streams. Summary Rules enable aggregation and summarization of data from Analytics, Basic, or Auxiliary plans, allowing for robust analysis, high-performance dashboard creation, and long-term reporting based on summarized Analytics tables. With the GA release, Microsoft has also increased the configurable rule limit per workspace to 100, a key improvement for teams managing complex and distributed environments.

Log Analytics: Enhanced Search Jobs for More Flexible Data Management

Several major enhancements to Search Jobs in Log Analytics are now generally available. Search Jobs allow asynchronous queries across all data within a workspace, including data stored in long-term retention. New improvements include a more intuitive and streamlined user interface, cost estimation prior to execution, and increased concurrency—enabling multiple jobs to run simultaneously without additional limits. Support for up to 100 million results is also coming soon, along with expanded KQL capabilities and other anticipated enhancements.

Conclusions

Once again this month, the evolution of Azure services in the areas of management and security confirms the ongoing shift toward increasingly integrated, intelligent, and proactive management of hybrid and multicloud IT environments. The latest updates—from the enhancement of Azure Arc to the increased resilience provided by Azure Backup, the continuous enrichment of Microsoft Defender for Cloud, and the new advanced monitoring capabilities—demonstrate Microsoft’s commitment to delivering practical tools to address the challenges of complexity and security. In a context where the adoption of AI and automation is becoming ever more strategic, it is essential for architects and IT leaders to stay informed and ready to seize the opportunities these innovations offer. Stay tuned for next month’s updates, as we continue to explore the developments shaping the future of IT management.

Azure IaaS and Azure Local: announcements and updates (July 2025 – Weeks: 29 and 30)

This blog post series highlights the key announcements and major updates related to Azure Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and Azure Local, as officially released by Microsoft in the past two weeks.

Azure

General

CISPE Secures Landmark Licensing Reform in Agreement with Microsoft

CISPE (Cloud Infrastructure Services Providers in Europe) has reached a landmark agreement with Microsoft that introduces significant licensing reforms for Microsoft software running on CISPE member infrastructure. As part of this agreement, Microsoft will allow qualified CISPE members to offer Microsoft software—such as Windows Server and SQL Server—on a pay-as-you-go basis through the CSP-Hoster (CSP-H) program, aligning pricing more closely with that of Microsoft Azure.

This agreement delivers multiple benefits. CISPE members gain access to competitive Pay-As-You-Go licensing models, enhancing flexibility and cost-effectiveness for customers. It also supports digital sovereignty by enabling deployment of Microsoft 365 Local on European cloud infrastructure—pending general availability within Microsoft’s Cloud Solution Program. A major privacy improvement allows CISPE members to host Microsoft workloads without disclosing customer data to Microsoft, addressing long-standing concerns about data sovereignty and vendor neutrality.

The agreement applies to current CISPE members and is also open to eligible European cloud providers that join CISPE in the near future. Microsoft has committed to reviewing the program after one year, with a view to expanding access further—excluding hyperscale cloud providers designated as “Listed Providers” in order to protect competition and support innovation in the European cloud ecosystem.

Microsoft Azure Cloud HSM

Azure Cloud HSM is now generally available, offering a FIPS 140-3 Level 3 certified, highly available, single-tenant Hardware Security Module (HSM) service. Designed to meet the highest security and compliance standards, Azure Cloud HSM gives customers full administrative control over their HSMs, enabling secure cryptographic key management and operations within dedicated Cloud HSM clusters. It supports key cryptographic libraries such as PKCS#11, OpenSSL, and JCE, making it ideal for workloads like Apache/Nginx SSL offload, SQL Server or Oracle TDE, and ADCS hosted on Azure VMs. The solution also supports certificate storage with private keys via PKCS#11 and allows for secure document and code signing. As the successor to Azure Dedicated HSM, this new service provides improved support for general-purpose scenarios requiring isolated and secure key management. Microsoft plans to expand availability across Public, US Gov, and Sovereign Clouds.

Modernizing Azure Resource Manager Throttling for Sovereign Clouds (preview)

Microsoft has announced the public preview of its updated throttling model for Azure Resource Manager (ARM) in sovereign clouds. This update is part of a broader modernization effort aimed at achieving parity between public and sovereign cloud environments by the end of 2026. The revised throttling model brings consistent limits and architecture across all Azure deployments, enhancing operational reliability and simplifying cross-environment workloads. As previously communicated in 2024, the new throttling configuration delivers substantial improvements, including a 30x increase in write limits, a 2.4x increase for deletes, and a 7.5x increase in read operations, greatly improving performance and scalability for ARM users.

Networking

Azure Firewall now supports ingestion-time transformation in Log Analytics

Azure Firewall has introduced support for ingestion-time transformation in Log Analytics, a feature now generally available. This capability allows organizations to filter and transform logs before they are ingested into Log Analytics, offering a flexible and cost-effective logging strategy. The benefits are substantial: security teams can log only suspicious or critical traffic for more effective threat detection; storage costs are reduced by avoiding unnecessary log ingestion; compliance requirements can be met by routing logs through Data Collection Rules (DCRs); and incident response is accelerated through streamlined access to relevant logs. Additionally, users can create customized dashboards and alerts in Azure Monitor, enhancing visibility and control over network activity.

ExpressRoute – Auto-assigned Public IP for ExpressRoute Gateways

Microsoft has introduced a simplification in the deployment of ExpressRoute Virtual Network Gateways: all newly created gateways will now use auto-assigned Public IP addresses. This change eliminates the need for customers to manually assign Public IPs during configuration, streamlining the setup process and reducing operational overhead. The new model enhances deployment consistency across different gateway types. It’s important to note that existing ExpressRoute gateways will remain unaffected by this update.

Web Application Firewall on Application Gateway for Containers (preview)

Azure has introduced Web Application Firewall (WAF) support for Application Gateway for Containers in public preview. Application Gateway for Containers is the next-generation layer 7 load balancing solution for workloads running in Kubernetes clusters, combining the capabilities of Application Gateway and Application Gateway Ingress Controller. With WAF integration, users can now protect their containerized applications from common web vulnerabilities such as SQL injection, cross-site scripting, and protocol anomalies. The solution includes Azure-managed Default Rulesets (DRS), offering protection based on OWASP standards and Microsoft’s Threat Intelligence Center (MSTIC). Additional features include bot protection through bot manager rulesets and rate-limiting custom rules to mitigate DDoS attacks, delivering enterprise-grade security for modern containerized environments.

Storage

AZNFS (3.0) for BlobNFS with FUSE for superior performance (preview)

Microsoft has released the public preview of AZNFS (3.0) for BlobNFS, offering a major upgrade for customers utilizing Azure Blob Storage with native NFSv3 access. The new version leverages the libfuse3 library—also used by BlobFuse—to bring substantial performance and scalability improvements. With this update, users benefit from higher throughput, support for larger files, enhanced metadata performance, and the removal of user group limits. These enhancements make AZNFS (3.0) particularly well-suited for performance-intensive, POSIX-compliant workloads on Linux systems that require consistent and reliable access to Blob Storage using the NFS protocol.

Azure Local

Version 2507 Release: Security Updates and Fixes

Microsoft has released version 2507 of Azure Local, delivering two targeted security updates tied to specific OS builds. The release also addresses several key issues reported in earlier builds. Fixes include resolution of a solution update failure caused by an exception in the ComposedImageUpdate role, and clarification for Azure Government cloud users where the upgrade banner is shown but the environment checker incorrectly flags lack of support. Another critical fix resolves an issue where, during VM deployment, the absence of a specified storage path would cause all resources to be placed on the first available path—potentially leading to disk space exhaustion and deployment failures over time.

End of Support Reminder: Azure Stack HCI Version 23H2

Microsoft has announced that Azure Stack HCI version 23H2 will reach end of support on October 31, 2025. Currently, Azure Local supports two active OS versions: 25398.xxx and 26100.xxx. With update 2510, systems running the 25398.x OS will automatically be upgraded to the latest 26100.x build. For deployments already based on 26100.x, the update will be applied as a feature upgrade. Organizations using Azure Local should plan accordingly to ensure ongoing support, security, and access to new features beyond the 23H2 lifecycle.

Software Defined Networking (SDN) enabled by Azure Arc on Azure Local (preview)

Microsoft has announced the public preview of Software Defined Networking (SDN) enabled by Azure Arc, now available starting with Azure Local version 2506. This release brings native Azure-style network security and control to on-premises infrastructure through Azure Arc integration. Customers can now define and manage Logical Networks, Network Interfaces, and Network Security Groups (NSGs) from the Azure control plane using the Azure Portal, CLI, or ARM templates.

Key capabilities include the ability to deploy VLAN-backed logical networks, assign static or dynamic IP addresses to virtual machines, and enforce granular traffic control policies via NSGs. NSGs can be applied both at the VLAN level and directly to VM network interfaces, using complete 5-tuple rules (source/destination IP, port, and protocol). Default network policies can also be applied during VM creation to secure workloads with predefined rules for inbound and outbound traffic.

This SDN solution is powered by the Network Controller running on Azure Local infrastructure and eliminates the need for dedicated SDN controller VMs by running as a Failover Cluster service. While advanced features such as virtual networks (vNETs), Software Load Balancers (SLBs), and Gateways are not yet supported in this preview, customers can continue to rely on traditional SDN management tools—like SDN Express and Windows Admin Center—if they require those functionalities. Notably, only one SDN management model (Azure Arc or on-premises tools) can be used per environment.

Microsoft 365 Local: New Sovereign Offering with Azure Local Foundation

Microsoft has unveiled a new sovereign solution for regulated and high-compliance environments: Microsoft 365 Local, a “Private Cloud” variant built on Azure Local infrastructure. This solution enables customers to deploy Microsoft productivity workloads such as Exchange Server and SharePoint Server directly in their own datacenters or sovereign cloud regions. With full control over security, compliance, and governance, Microsoft 365 Local extends trusted productivity experiences to environments where data residency and isolation are essential. While specific technical details are still forthcoming, this initiative marks a significant step forward in supporting sovereign cloud strategies globally.

Conclusion

Over the past two weeks, Microsoft has introduced a slew of updates and announcements pertaining to Azure Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and Azure Local. These developments underscore the tech giant’s unwavering commitment to enhancing its cloud offerings and adapting to the ever-evolving needs of businesses and developers. Users of Azure can anticipate improved functionalities, streamlined services, and enriched features as a result of these changes. Stay tuned for more insights as I continue to monitor and report on Azure’s progression in the cloud sphere.

Azure IaaS and Azure Local: announcements and updates (July 2025 – Weeks: 27 and 28)

This blog post series highlights the key announcements and major updates related to Azure Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and Azure Local, as officially released by Microsoft in the past two weeks.

Azure

General

Two-Way Forest Trusts for Microsoft Entra Domain Services

Microsoft has announced the general availability of Two-Way Forest Trusts for Microsoft Entra Domain Services. This enhancement enables organizations to establish bi-directional forest trusts between Microsoft Entra Domain Services and on-premises Active Directory Domain Services (AD DS). Previously, only one-way outbound trusts were supported, which allowed users in the on-premises environment to access resources in the managed domain. Now, administrators can configure one-way inbound, one-way outbound, or two-way forest trusts, granting users from either domain reciprocal access to resources. This added flexibility allows enterprises to better align their hybrid identity strategies, with support for more granular control over trust relationships. An Enterprise or Premium SKU license is required to configure these trusts.

Compute

Enable Trusted Launch on Existing Virtual Machine Uniform Scale Set

Microsoft has announced the general availability of the ability to enable Trusted Launch on existing Virtual Machine Uniform Scale Sets by upgrading these resources to Gen2-Trusted Launch. This enhancement allows organizations to bolster the foundational security of their existing infrastructure without needing to redeploy. Trusted Launch VMs support Secure Boot and virtual Trusted Platform Module (vTPM), protecting the guest operating system from bootkits, rootkits, and other low-level threats. Additionally, attestation capabilities measure the integrity of the VM’s boot process, further strengthening security posture.

Trusted Launch Default for New Gen2 VMs & Scale Sets (preview)

A new public preview introduces Trusted Launch as default (TLaD) for newly deployed Generation 2 Virtual Machines, Virtual Machine Scale Sets, and Azure Compute Gallery resources. This default behavior enables foundational security features, including Secure Boot and vTPM, without requiring any changes to deployment templates or automation scripts (e.g., SDKs, Bicep, ARM templates, Terraform). With Trusted Launch enabled by default, new deployments gain enhanced protection against rootkits and bootkits, while also enabling attestation to verify the VM’s boot process integrity, simplifying secure adoption of Generation 2 resources.

Networking

Azure DNS Security Policy

Azure DNS Security Policy is now generally available, offering comprehensive control and visibility over DNS traffic at the virtual network level. This new capability allows administrators to filter DNS queries by allowing, alerting, or blocking name resolutions based on domain lists, helping to protect against access to known malicious or undesired domains. Security policies can be applied to virtual networks within the same region and can be linked to multiple VNets. Organizations can gain deep visibility into DNS traffic by sending detailed logs to a storage account, Log Analytics workspace, or Event Hubs. The feature also supports granular DNS traffic rules and location-based domain lists, providing a powerful mechanism to enhance DNS security and compliance across Azure environments.

FQDN Filtering in DNAT Rules in Azure Firewall

Azure Firewall now supports Fully Qualified Domain Name (FQDN) filtering in Destination Network Address Translation (DNAT) rules, which is now generally available. This feature allows administrators to define backend resources using domain names instead of static IP addresses for inbound traffic routing. It is particularly beneficial in environments where backend IPs are dynamic or managed via DNS. With FQDN-based targeting, organizations gain improved flexibility and easier backend management. Additionally, administrators can monitor DNAT activity through AZFWNatRule logs to ensure proper policy enforcement and troubleshooting.

Customer Controlled Maintenance for Azure Firewall

Azure Firewall now supports customer-controlled maintenance windows, offering greater flexibility and operational control. With this update, users can define a recurring daily maintenance window of at least five hours during which updates and upgrades to the firewall will be applied. Firewalls that are configured with such a maintenance policy will not undergo upgrades outside the specified window, reducing the likelihood of unexpected downtime and allowing organizations to align updates with their internal change management processes. This enhancement helps ensure service continuity and better aligns with enterprise maintenance practices.

Storage

Granular Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) for Azure File Sync

Azure File Sync now includes two new built-in RBAC roles: Azure File Sync Administrator and Azure File Sync Reader. These roles are designed to improve security and streamline operations by offering more granular access control than traditional roles such as Owner or Contributor. With these purpose-built roles, organizations can better enforce the principle of least privilege when assigning permissions related to Azure File Sync. Users can create and manage essential components such as Storage Sync Services, Sync Groups, Server Endpoints, and Cloud Endpoints, as well as register servers, all while avoiding broader permissions like VM management. This update removes the need to define custom roles for common administrative tasks, supporting compliance and operational efficiency by limiting access only to what is required.

Encryption in Transit for Azure Files NFS Shares

Encryption in Transit (EiT) for Azure Files NFS shares is now generally available, providing secure data transmission over the network by using TLS 1.3. This enhancement ensures the confidentiality, integrity, and authenticity of all NFS traffic. It supports a wide range of environments, including all major Linux distributions, Azure Linux virtual machines, and on-premises Linux servers. To simplify deployment, Microsoft offers the open-source AZNFS mount helper, which automates the TLS tunneling and volume mount process. This added security layer helps organizations meet compliance requirements while preserving performance and usability in enterprise-scale file sharing scenarios.

Azure Storage Mover Adds Free, Direct AWS S3-to-Azure Blob Migration (preview)

Azure Storage Mover has introduced a new public preview feature that enables free, direct migration of data from Amazon S3 to Azure Blob Storage. Designed for organizations with multi-cloud strategies or planning a complete transition to Azure, this Cloud-to-Cloud migration capability supports secure, petabyte-scale data transfers without disrupting ongoing operations. In addition to this new path, Azure Storage Mover already supports migrating on-premises SMB shares to Azure File and transferring both SMB and NFS data to Azure Blob Storage. The integration of Azure Arc streamlines authentication when connecting to AWS, ensuring secure and seamless operations. As a fully managed and cost-free service, Azure Storage Mover helps businesses modernize their storage architectures more efficiently and with minimal complexity.

Azure Local

Updates in the 2506 Release

The 2506 release of Azure Local delivers a comprehensive set of updates across operating system support, security, networking, and deployment processes. New deployments now use OS version 26100.4349, with driver compatibility required for this version or Windows Server 2025. Existing deployments remain on version 25398.1665. The release also integrates improved deployment validation through updated environment checkers for Microsoft On-premises Cloud and Azure Resource Bridge. On the security front, a new baseline expands to 407 evaluated rules, improving alignment with CIS and DISA STIG standards, and introduces enhanced Microsoft Defender Antivirus configurations. Administrators can now fine-tune drift control settings instead of disabling them globally, and the minimum password length has been raised to 14 characters to meet NIST 2 compliance. In preview, Software-Defined Networking (SDN) enabled by Azure Arc allows the creation and assignment of Network Security Groups (NSGs) and security rules for a consistent cloud-to-edge networking model. Additional features include an overprovisioning alert to warn of insufficient compute capacity before updates, .NET 8.0.17 runtime support, and the archival of Azure Local version 22H2 documentation. Notably, this release is not supported for Azure Local instances deployed in Azure Government cloud.

Conclusion

Over the past two weeks, Microsoft has introduced a slew of updates and announcements pertaining to Azure Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and Azure Local. These developments underscore the tech giant’s unwavering commitment to enhancing its cloud offerings and adapting to the ever-evolving needs of businesses and developers. Users of Azure can anticipate improved functionalities, streamlined services, and enriched features as a result of these changes. Stay tuned for more insights as I continue to monitor and report on Azure’s progression in the cloud sphere.

Azure Hybrid Management & Security: What’s New and Insights from the Field – June 2025

Once again this month, I’m back with my recurring series focused on the evolution of Azure management and security services, with a special focus on hybrid and multicloud scenarios enabled by Azure Arc and enhanced by the use of Artificial Intelligence.

This monthly series aims to:

  • Provide an overview of the most relevant updates released by Microsoft;

  • Share operational tips and field-proven best practices to help architects and IT leaders manage complex and distributed environments more effectively;

  • Follow the evolution towards a centralized, proactive, and AI-driven management model, in line with Microsoft’s vision of AI-powered Management.

The key areas we will cover in this series, along with the corresponding tools and services, include:

🔹 Hybrid and multicloud environment management – with Azure Arc, which extends policy, security, management, and automation capabilities to on-premises and multicloud resources.

🔹 AI and intelligent automation – enabled by Microsoft Copilot in Azure, AIOps capabilities, and predictive tools to streamline operations and support smarter decision-making.

🔹 Security posture across hybrid and multicloud infrastructures – using Microsoft Defender for Cloud and other native services for vulnerability management and advanced threat protection.

🔹 Governance and policy management – leveraging tools such as Azure Policy, Azure Cost Management, and Resource Graph to ensure control, standardization, and cost/resource optimization.

🔹 Update & Patching – through Azure Update Management, Azure Automation, and native patching capabilities across Azure Arc-enabled environments.

🔹 Backup & Resilience – using Azure Backup and Azure Site Recovery to ensure business continuity, data protection, and disaster recovery.

🔹 Monitoring – with tools like Azure Monitor, Log Analytics, and Application Insights for comprehensive visibility and effective troubleshooting.

Security posture across hybrid and multicloud infrastructures

Microsoft Defender for Cloud

New features, bug fixes, and deprecated features of Microsoft Defender for Cloud

The development of Microsoft Defender for Cloud is constantly evolving, with improvements being introduced on an ongoing basis. To stay updated on the latest developments, Microsoft maintains this page, which provides information on new features, bug fixes, and deprecated functionalities. Below are the main updates for the month:

Optional index tags for malware scan results in Defender for Storage (preview) – Microsoft has announced a new feature in Public Preview for Defender for Storage that introduces support for optional index tags in malware scan results, both during file uploads and on-demand scans. This option allows users to choose whether or not to publish scan results in the blob index tags, providing greater flexibility in managing stored information. The activation or deactivation of tags can be configured at the subscription or storage account level, via the Azure portal or API. This feature enables the service to be adapted to specific needs in terms of governance, compliance, and performance.

API discovery and security posture assessment for Function Apps and Logic Apps (preview) – Defender for Cloud extends its API Discovery and API Security Posture Management capabilities to Azure Function Apps and Logic Apps, previously supported only through Azure API Management. Thanks to this extension, security teams can gain a centralized and up-to-date view of the entire API attack surface within the organization. Key features include:

  • automatic inventory of APIs,
  • risk assessment of outdated, exposed, or unencrypted endpoints,
  • targeted remediation suggestions.

Agentless File Integrity Monitoring (preview) – File Integrity Monitoring (FIM) is now available in Public Preview in agentless mode, complementing the existing agent-based solution via Microsoft Defender for Endpoint. This new mode allows monitoring of file and registry key changes without the need to install agents, making monitoring simpler and more scalable—ideal for environments that require reduced operational complexity. Key features include:

  • custom definition of paths to monitor,
  • consolidation of events (agentless and agent-based) into a single table within the workspace, with clear source identification.

Agentless code scanning: GitHub support and customizable coverage (preview) – The agentless code scanning capability has been enhanced with new features, now available in Public Preview, to offer broader coverage and greater control over development environments. Notable updates include:

  • native support for GitHub repositories, in addition to Azure DevOps,
  • ability to choose scanning tools (e.g., Bandit, Checkov, ESLint),
  • granular configuration of scan scope (projects, repositories, or entire organizations).

Governance and policy management

Azure Advisor

Azure Advisor improves VM right-sizing with new SKUs and families

Azure Advisor has expanded the scope of its virtual machine right-sizing recommendations, now including a broader range of SKUs and support for the latest VM families in the D, E, and F series.
This update enables more accurate analysis of CPU performance and provides more precise suggestions for optimizing workloads. Organizations can identify oversized VMs and resize them based on actual usage, achieving tangible benefits in terms of:

  • reduced operational costs,
  • minimized resource waste,
  • contribution to environmental sustainability.

Azure Cost Management

Support for FOCUS 1.2 standard in Microsoft Cost Management (preview)

Microsoft has announced the Public Preview availability of support for the FinOps Open Cost and Usage Specification (FOCUS) 1.2 standard in Microsoft Cost Management. This update marks a significant step forward for FinOps teams by simplifying reporting, unifying multi-cloud billing data, and enabling financial analysis across multiple currencies.

FOCUS 1.2 is a standardized, cloud-agnostic schema designed to improve cost management across IaaS, PaaS, and SaaS services. Key updates include:

  • improved column naming conventions,
  • introduction of new fields to support future extensions,
  • alignment with key billing constructs such as InvoiceId, ServiceModel, and AmortizationClass.

The main benefits include unified and consistent reporting, enhanced support for multi-currency scenarios, improved data quality and integrity, and streamlined FinOps workflows thanks to the schema’s increased extensibility.

Backup & Resilience

Azure Backup

Increased disk capacity for Azure virtual machine backup

Microsoft has announced the availability of extended disk capacity support for Azure VM Backup. It is now possible to protect virtual machines with individual disks up to 64 TB, with a total limit of up to 512 TB per VM. This update enhances business continuity and disaster recovery scenarios by enabling native protection—within the Azure ecosystem—even for the largest and most critical workloads.

Long-term backup for Azure Database for PostgreSQL – Flexible Server

Azure Database for PostgreSQL – Flexible Server introduces a new long-term backup capability through integration with Azure Backup. This development addresses compliance and data protection requirements by allowing custom backup policies, individual backup management, and a simplified configuration process. Key highlights include the ability to retain data for up to 10 years—an essential feature for regulated or audit-driven scenarios. These new options strengthen the data protection strategy in hybrid and multicloud environments, providing administrators with greater granularity in managing backup retention and accessibility, while ensuring regulatory and operational compliance.

Azure Site Recovery

Azure Site Recovery supports Linux VMs with Trusted Launch

Azure Site Recovery (ASR) support for Linux virtual machines with Trusted Launch is now generally available. This feature enables automated protection for Azure Generation 2 VMs that leverage the advanced security capabilities of Trusted Launch, including Secure Boot and vTPM (Virtual Trusted Platform Module). With this update, Linux VMs can now benefit from a fully managed and integrated disaster recovery solution in Azure, enhancing the resilience of environments that require high security standards. Support for Windows VMs with Trusted Launch was already available, and this extension to Linux completes the coverage, making ASR an even more robust choice for hybrid and mission-critical scenarios.

Azure Site Recovery support for virtual machines with Premium SSD v2 disks (preview)

Microsoft has announced the Public Preview of Azure Site Recovery (ASR) support for virtual machines using Premium SSD v2 disks. This enhancement extends disaster recovery capabilities to workloads that require high performance, such as SQL Server, Oracle, SAP, and big data environments. ASR enables efficient VM replication across Azure regions or from on-premises environments to the cloud, offering automated failover and the ability to run disaster recovery drills. The introduction of support for Premium SSD v2 disks—known for low latency, consistent performance, and independent scalability of IOPS and throughput—further increases flexibility and efficiency in protecting critical environments.

Support for Ultra Disks in Azure Site Recovery (preview)

Support for Azure Site Recovery (ASR) for virtual machines using Ultra Disks is now available in Public Preview. This enhancement enables advanced disaster recovery scenarios for performance-intensive workloads, extending resilience to VMs equipped with disks that offer sub-millisecond latency and extremely high throughput. Ultra Disks represent the highest-performing block storage in Azure, ideal for critical systems such as SAP HANA, enterprise-grade databases, and high-intensity transactional environments. With this update, ASR continues to strengthen its integrated workload protection offering, enabling replication across Azure regions or from on-premises environments, with features like automated failover and test failovers. It’s a key extension for organizations aiming for robust business continuity using native Azure tools for mission-critical workloads.

Monitoring

Azure Monitor

Ingestion issue monitoring with Azure Monitor Workspace (preview)

A new feature for proactive data ingestion issue monitoring in Azure Monitor Workspace is now available in Public Preview. This innovation enhances visibility into incoming data streams, allowing administrators to more easily detect errors, anomalies, or slowdowns in the monitoring pipeline. In complex and distributed environments, the ability to promptly identify such issues is essential to ensure the continuity of observability processes, improve operational responsiveness, and reduce the risk of losing critical data.

Query Editor in Azure Monitor Metrics now generally available

Microsoft has announced the General Availability of the new Query Editor within Azure Metric Explorer, now integrated with Azure Monitor Workspace. This feature enables direct querying of metric data collected from Prometheus using the PromQL language, all accessible directly from the Azure portal. This update introduces a more powerful and flexible way to explore and analyze monitoring data, allowing users to quickly gain targeted insights to optimize resources and improve performance in both cloud and hybrid environments. The native integration of PromQL in Metric Explorer represents a significant step toward more efficient, analytical, and data-driven management of distributed systems.

Conclusions

The landscape of hybrid and multicloud environment management and security continues to evolve with significant innovations. The updates introduced by Microsoft in June 2025 further strengthen organizations’ ability to protect, optimize, and effectively govern their infrastructures—both in the cloud and on-premises. The preview features of Microsoft Defender for Cloud, along with new resilience tools such as support for Ultra and Premium SSD v2 disks in Azure Site Recovery, represent a tangible step forward toward more secure, scalable, and high-performance architectures. At the same time, improvements in monitoring, cost management, and proactive resource recommendations enable more granular and informed control of distributed environments. It is essential for IT and security teams to stay up to date with these developments, adopt a data-driven approach, and progressively integrate new capabilities into their processes to ensure strong security posture and efficient governance in increasingly dynamic and complex scenarios.

Azure IaaS and Azure Local: announcements and updates (June 2025 – Weeks: 25 and 26)

This blog post series highlights the key announcements and major updates related to Azure Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and Azure Local, as officially released by Microsoft in the past two weeks.

Azure

General

Microsoft announces comprehensive sovereign solutions for European organizations (preview)

Microsoft has introduced a broad expansion of its sovereign cloud offerings with the goal of empowering European organizations with enhanced data privacy, operational autonomy, and digital resilience. Building on its longstanding presence in Europe, the new Microsoft Sovereign Cloud initiative spans public cloud, private cloud infrastructure, and national partner environments. Among the new capabilities announced are Data Guardian, which ensures only European personnel oversee remote system access; External Key Management, allowing customers to control encryption with their own HSMs; and Regulated Environment Management, a centralized portal for configuring and monitoring sovereign workloads.

The Sovereign Public Cloud—an evolution of the Microsoft Cloud for Sovereignty—supports Microsoft Azure, Microsoft 365, Security, and Power Platform services across all European datacenter regions, guaranteeing data stays within the EU and is operated under European law by local staff. Additionally, Sovereign Private Cloud (preview), powered by Azure Local and the newly announced Microsoft 365 Local, enables deployment of productivity and cloud services in customer-controlled environments, supporting high levels of compliance and business continuity.

Microsoft is also expanding support for National Partner Clouds through collaborations such as Bleu in France and Delos Cloud in Germany, offering independently operated sovereign environments. These initiatives aim to deliver the most comprehensive sovereignty solutions in the industry, allowing European customers to operate confidently and in full compliance with evolving regulations—without sacrificing access to innovation or requiring data migration.

Microsoft Azure now available from new cloud region in Chile

Microsoft has announced the general availability of its first cloud region in Chile, further expanding its global infrastructure footprint. The new Chile Central region offers Azure Availability Zones and provides scalable, highly available, and resilient cloud services to customers across Latin America and beyond. This launch reinforces Microsoft’s commitment to accelerating digital transformation and innovation in Chile, while ensuring high standards of security, privacy, and regulatory compliance for data residency. Organizations in the region can now benefit from low-latency access to trusted Microsoft Cloud services hosted within the country.

Compute

Azure FXv2-series Virtual Machines

Microsoft has announced the General Availability of Azure FXv2-series Virtual Machines (VMs), powered by the 5th Generation Intel® Xeon® Platinum 8573C processor. These VMs deliver substantial enhancements in CPU performance, memory capacity, and storage throughput, making them ideal for compute-intensive workloads such as databases and data analytics. The FXv2-series VMs provide up to 50% better CPU performance compared to the previous generation, with sizes supporting up to 96 vCPUs and 1,832 GiB of memory. NVMe support ensures high-performance remote storage, with up to 400K IOPS and 11.25 GBps throughput. Designed for high-demand scenarios, such as SQL Server and electronic design automation (EDA), the FXv2-series offers enhanced memory configurations and improved I/O bandwidth.

Networking

Azure WAF integration in Microsoft Security Copilot

The integration of Azure Web Application Firewall (WAF) with Microsoft Copilot for Security has reached general availability. This integration spans both Azure Front Door WAF and Azure Application Gateway WAF, enabling organizations to enhance their threat detection and response capabilities through AI-powered insights. The solution provides automated analysis of SQL Injection (SQLi) and Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) attacks, delivering summaries and justifications for WAF actions. It also includes advanced diagnostics such as tracking attack trends, identifying top offending IPs, and analyzing frequently triggered WAF rules. These features help security teams streamline investigations and proactively adjust their defenses based on real-time intelligence.

Azure Virtual Network Manager IP address management

The IP address management capability in Azure Virtual Network Manager is now generally available, offering centralized tools to enhance IP planning and allocation across complex network environments. This feature allows automatic assignment of non-overlapping IP addresses, supports IP reservations for specific workloads, and prevents conflicts across Azure, on-premises, and multi-cloud environments. Integrated with Azure Policy, it also enforces network creation using designated IP pools, ensuring consistency and compliance. The feature provides clear visibility into IP usage across network resources, helping organizations maintain efficient and conflict-free IP address spaces.

Draft & Deploy on Azure Firewall (preview)

The new Draft & Deploy feature for Azure Firewall Policy introduces a more efficient, two-phase approach to managing firewall configurations, now available in public preview. Previously, any change to a policy would initiate a full deployment of both the policy and associated firewall, resulting in delays of 2–4 minutes per update. With this feature, users can create a draft version cloned from the current policy, allowing collaborative edits without impacting the live environment. Once all changes are finalized, the updated policy can be deployed in a single operation, streamlining the update process and reducing operational disruption.

Azure Front Door supports managed certificate for wildcard domains (preview)

Azure Front Door Standard and Premium profiles now support managed certificates for wildcard domains, a feature previously limited to Bring Your Own Certificate (BYOC) configurations. This enhancement allows customers to secure multiple subdomains using a single managed certificate, which is especially beneficial for SaaS providers and organizations operating large-scale, multi-tenant applications. The new capability simplifies operations by eliminating the need to manage certificates per subdomain, improves scalability by reducing configuration overhead, and enhances security through automated certificate renewals.

Storage

Transition existing platform-managed keys to customer-managed keys for Azure NetApp Files volumes

Customers can now seamlessly transition Azure NetApp Files volumes from platform-managed keys (PMK) to customer-managed keys (CMK), without requiring data migration. This capability is now generally available across all Azure NetApp Files supported regions. Using CMK provides enhanced security and control, allowing organizations to manage their own encryption key lifecycle, including renewals and rotations. It also aligns with stringent regulatory and compliance requirements typical in industries such as finance, healthcare, and government. Importantly, there is no performance impact when using CMK, as the feature simply secures the account encryption key with Azure Key Vault, offering protection against unauthorized access and insider threats.

Conclusion

Over the past two weeks, Microsoft has introduced a slew of updates and announcements pertaining to Azure Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and Azure Local. These developments underscore the tech giant’s unwavering commitment to enhancing its cloud offerings and adapting to the ever-evolving needs of businesses and developers. Users of Azure can anticipate improved functionalities, streamlined services, and enriched features as a result of these changes. Stay tuned for more insights as I continue to monitor and report on Azure’s progression in the cloud sphere.

Azure IaaS and Azure Local: announcements and updates (June 2025 – Weeks: 23 and 24)

This blog post series highlights the key announcements and major updates related to Azure Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and Azure Local, as officially released by Microsoft in the past two weeks.

Azure

Compute

New Storage Optimized Laosv4, Lasv4, and Lsv4 Azure VM Series

Azure has announced the general availability of the Laosv4, Lasv4, and Lsv4 storage-optimized virtual machine series. The Laosv4 and Lasv4 VMs are powered by 4th Gen AMD EPYC™ (Genoa) processors, while the Lsv4 series uses 5th Gen Intel® Xeon® (Emerald Rapids) CPUs. These VMs offer sizes ranging from 2 to 96 vCPUs, with 8GB of memory and substantial local NVMe disk capacity per vCPU. In particular, the largest VMs offer up to 23TB of local storage. All three VM series come with Azure Boost and Azure Boost SSDs, support NVMe local SSD disk encryption by default, and feature an NVMe remote storage interface with premium storage caching, enhancing remote storage performance. These VMs are ideal for storage-intensive, distributed workloads such as big data analytics, Elasticsearch, distributed file systems, and data warehousing, delivering the high performance and flexibility needed for modern enterprise applications.

Networking

Profile and Route WAF Policies on Azure Front Door (private preview)

Azure has introduced a private preview of profile and route-based Web Application Firewall (WAF) policies for Azure Front Door. Previously, WAF policies could only be associated with a Front Door instance via frontends or custom domains. With this update, WAF policies can now also be applied at the Front Door profile level and at the individual route level within a domain. This new flexibility allows administrators to define a global policy at the profile level to cover all associated domains, while also enabling more granular security through route-specific policies. For instance, more sensitive routes—such as login or payment pages—can have stricter rules applied. The policy hierarchy ensures that more specific policies override broader ones: route-level policies take precedence over domain-level policies, which in turn override profile-level policies. This enhancement empowers organizations to implement targeted protection strategies within a unified WAF framework.

Azure Virtual Network Manager in Azure China

Azure Virtual Network Manager is now generally available in Azure China, bringing centralized control over connectivity, security rules, and routing configurations across subscriptions at scale. This service simplifies network topology management using hub-and-spoke or mesh configurations, helping administrators ensure consistent connectivity and policy enforcement throughout complex environments. The security admin rules feature allows organizations to define security policies that take precedence over traditional Network Security Group (NSG) rules, helping to avoid misconfigurations and maintain compliance across environments. Additionally, flow logs offer visibility and diagnostics for traffic governed by these rules. Routing configurations can also be standardized and applied automatically to multiple subnets or virtual networks, supporting scenarios like routing spoke traffic through Azure Firewall or enabling cross-hub connections, further simplifying enterprise network architecture.

Storage

Archive Access Tier Now Available in Italy North

The Archive access tier for Azure Blob Storage is now generally available in the Italy North region. This development enables customers to store infrequently accessed data in a highly cost-effective manner while ensuring data residency and compliance with Italian regulations. Ideal for long-term data retention, backup, and compliance scenarios, the Archive tier supports comprehensive data lifecycle management. Users can manage data in the Archive tier through the Azure portal, CLI, PowerShell, or REST API. With this release, the Italy North region now supports the full spectrum of Azure Blob Storage tiers—Hot, Cool, Cold, and Archive—aligning it with other fully featured Azure regions.

Azure Storage Mover support for SMB source to Azure Blob target

Azure Storage Mover has expanded its capabilities to support the migration of SMB shares directly to Azure Blob containers. This fully managed migration service enables seamless and secure transfer of on-premises files and folders to Azure Storage, minimizing downtime during migration processes. With integration features like just-in-time permission setting and Azure Key Vault support, organizations can perform secure migrations end-to-end. This enhancement complements the existing support for migrations from NFS shares to Azure Blob and from SMB sources to Azure File shares.

NFS Azure Files volume mount support in Azure Container Apps (preview)

Azure Container Apps now support mounting Network File System (NFS) Azure Files volumes to containerized applications. This enhancement allows developers to leverage a scalable and high-performance file system that can be shared across multiple containers within an application. The use of NFS Azure Files volumes also ensures data persistence across container restarts, making it ideal for stateful workloads or data-intensive jobs running in container environments.

Encrypt Premium SSD v2 and Ultra Disks with Cross-Tenant Customer Managed Keys (preview)

Microsoft has introduced a public preview for encrypting Premium SSD v2 and Ultra Disks using Cross-Tenant Customer Managed Keys (CMK) in select regions. This feature enables encryption of managed disks using a CMK that resides in an Azure Key Vault located in a different Microsoft Entra tenant from the disk itself. This advancement is particularly beneficial for service providers building Software as a Service (SaaS) solutions on Azure, as it allows their customers to manage their own encryption keys independently. Customers can now host and control their CMKs in their own tenant, granting them full sovereignty over their data and encryption practices.

Conclusion

Over the past two weeks, Microsoft has introduced a slew of updates and announcements pertaining to Azure Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and Azure Local. These developments underscore the tech giant’s unwavering commitment to enhancing its cloud offerings and adapting to the ever-evolving needs of businesses and developers. Users of Azure can anticipate improved functionalities, streamlined services, and enriched features as a result of these changes. Stay tuned for more insights as I continue to monitor and report on Azure’s progression in the cloud sphere.