Choosing a managed service provider (MSP)
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An SME’s guide to selecting and working with managed service providers.
Adapted edition
- Document type
- Reference Guide
- Format
- DOCX
- Pages
- 7
- Language
- English
- Version
- 1.0
- Updated
- 2026-09-16
- Category
- Information security
- Licence
- Open Government Licence v3.0
Description
An SME’s guide to selecting and working with managed service providers for organisational planning, review and training. NCSC guidance is advisory and should be applied to the organisation's own risks and obligations.
Contents
- Note:
- Introduction: SMEs are at risk
- Choosing an appropriate MSP
- Certifications matter
- Check client references
- Transparency and good communication
- Clear contracting
- Security issues to discuss with your MSP
- Patching and updates
- Backups
- Access
- Logs
- Incident response
- Details to check in your MSP contract
- Service level agreements (SLAs)
- Regular review and reporting
- Source links
Source and licence
National Cyber Security Centre
AttributionNational Cyber Security Centre, “Choosing a managed service provider (MSP)” (24 November 2025), reused under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
ChangesAdapted 16 September 2026: converted the official HTML article into neutral text-only DOCX and PDF editions. Preserved article headings, paragraphs, lists and plain-text source-link destinations; normalized web whitespace and typographic punctuation; omitted site navigation, topic and download cards, images, logos, scripts, styles and page furniture.
Version history
- v1.016/09/2026