Short answer: Atlassian Cloud moves responsibility for the hosted platform, infrastructure, and the applications Atlassian provides to Atlassian. With Data Center, your organization operates and secures the infrastructure itself. In either model, your team remains responsible for user access, data governance, Marketplace app decisions, and meeting its own compliance obligations. Neither option is automatically more secure for every organization; the better fit depends on which duties and controls your team can own.
What security work belongs to your team in Data Center?
Data Center is self-managed. Atlassian supplies product software, security fixes, built-in features, defaults, and setup guidance, but your administrators operate the environment around that software. Atlassian’s Data Center security checklist states that “Atlassian doesn’t take responsibility for self-managed hardware infrastructure.”
- Infrastructure: Secure physical or virtual servers, storage, networks, and the underlying operating systems and dependencies.
- Maintenance: Apply Atlassian product fixes promptly, and patch and harden the operating system and other components you manage.
- Identity and permissions: Configure identity-provider connections, SSO or MFA, account lifecycle processes, and least-privilege access.
- Data protection: Implement encryption and access controls according to your policies, protect stored data, and maintain backups.
- Operations and assurance: Audit the environment and operate the controls needed for your organization’s security, resilience, and compliance obligations.
- Integrations: Select, configure, and secure the apps and other integrations used with the environment.
In practice, Data Center gives your organization operational ownership of the environment, but that ownership requires staff and processes to keep its components maintained and protected.
What changes—and what does not—in Atlassian Cloud?
For Cloud, Atlassian says it assumes responsibility for the security, availability, and performance of the applications, systems, and hosting environments it provides. That transfers responsibility for the hosted platform layer; it does not transfer your organization’s governance of its users, content, or obligations. See Atlassian’s Cloud security practices.
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- Your organization still manages users and information: Set up accounts and permissions, govern stored content, and make decisions about who can access or share it. Atlassian warns that customer-configured permissions can expose information publicly.
- Your organization chooses which apps to trust: Marketplace apps are a separate decision. Review their security, privacy, availability, and data flows rather than assuming they inherit the platform’s protections.
- Your organization remains accountable for its use: Provider controls or attestations do not, by themselves, establish that your specific use meets your contractual, regulatory, or internal requirements.
- Your organization still plans for continuity: Map your recovery and business-continuity needs to the service and operating model you select.
Cloud encryption and tenant separation
Atlassian reports TLS 1.2 or higher with Perfect Forward Secrecy for data in transit, AES-256 full-disk encryption at rest, and logical tenant separation for the Cloud services covered by its security-practices page. These are Atlassian’s descriptions of its controls, not an independent assessment of your configuration or a guarantee that your use satisfies a particular requirement. Encryption also does not replace decisions about classification, sharing, retention, and permissions.
Identity and centralized access
Atlassian recommends domain verification and centralized access management. Atlassian Guard is an option for centralized administration and capabilities such as enforced MFA and SSO; whether it is appropriate or available for your needs depends on the capabilities and plan entitlements you require. Check current product details rather than assuming Guard is included in every Cloud plan. A useful starting point is Atlassian’s security-practices guidance.
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Responsibility comparison
| Security area | Data Center | Cloud |
|---|---|---|
| Hosting and infrastructure | Your organization secures and operates the physical or virtual infrastructure, network, and storage. Atlassian supplies product software and guidance. | Atlassian manages the hosting environment and the applications and systems it provides. |
| Maintenance | Your administrators apply product fixes and maintain operating systems and dependencies. | Atlassian operates and maintains its hosted product environment; your team still manages its own account, policy, configuration, and app choices. |
| Authentication and access | Your administrators configure identity integrations, SSO/MFA, account lifecycle, and permissions. | Your organization manages users and data permissions; centralized access capabilities should be checked against your requirements. |
| Data and encryption | Your team implements encryption and access protections in the environment according to policy. | Atlassian describes platform encryption controls for listed services; your organization governs content, permissions, sharing, and compliance decisions. |
| Marketplace apps | Your team selects, configures, and secures integrations in its environment. | Your team decides which apps to install and trust, and should review app security, privacy, and data flows. |
| Compliance and resilience | Your organization operates controls in its environment and is responsible for its obligations. | Atlassian publishes compliance and architecture materials, but your organization must check their scope and assess its own obligations, residency, and reliability needs. |
How to choose between the security models
“Which is more secure?” is not a useful answer without a defined threat model and requirements. Compare the operational boundary and the controls your organization actually needs.
Operational ownership
Choose Data Center only if your organization can staff and maintain its infrastructure, patching, network and storage protections, backups, and audits. Cloud may better fit a team that prefers Atlassian to operate the hosted platform, while recognizing that account, permission, app, and data-governance work remains.
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List the controls your security standards require and identify which must be directly configured or operated by your organization. Then compare them with the actual Cloud capabilities available for the products and plan you are considering. Do not assume that a platform-level control substitutes for a customer-operated control without confirming that it meets the requirement.
Identity, permissions, and content
Compare how you will manage account creation and removal, SSO and MFA, domain administration, least privilege, and sharing. In Cloud, make permission design and public-sharing exposure explicit parts of the review. For either model, decide how content is classified, retained, and governed.
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Apps and data flows
Inventory Marketplace apps and other integrations before choosing a migration path. Check whether each app is available in the target environment, what information it can access or transmit, and whether its vendor and controls meet your organization’s privacy and security needs. Platform protections do not automatically settle these app-specific questions.
Compliance, privacy, and location
Ask security, privacy, and legal stakeholders to verify the exact product, region, data-residency options, attestations, contractual terms, and use case relevant to your organization. A provider’s certification or compliance material is evidence about the provider and its stated scope; it does not establish that your organization’s particular deployment or use is compliant.
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Reliability and recovery
Compare your recovery-time and business-continuity requirements with the operating model and the service information Atlassian publishes. Decide which recovery responsibilities remain with your team and document how your organization will respond if the service or an integration is unavailable.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.Security checklist for a Cloud migration decision
- Bring the right stakeholders together. Involve security, privacy, and legal teams early, alongside the administrators and service owners responsible for the migration.
- Inventory apps and integrations. Assess Marketplace apps for availability, security, privacy, and data flows before moving workloads.
- Map requirements to the exact target. Check security, privacy, compliance, reliability, and data-residency needs against the specific products, regions, and Cloud capabilities under consideration.
- Validate identity and permissions. Confirm account lifecycle, domain verification, SSO/MFA, centralized administration, least privilege, and sharing controls against your requirements.
- Review evidence and scope. Examine current Atlassian compliance and architecture materials, and confirm that their product and regional scope fits your use case.
- Record residual duties. Document what Atlassian operates and what your organization must continue to manage, including users, content permissions, app trust, compliance decisions, and continuity planning.
Atlassian’s Cloud migration security guidance recommends this kind of cross-functional assessment, including early review of Marketplace apps and evaluation of security, privacy, compliance, and reliability requirements against Cloud capabilities.
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