Contact our sales team today: UK: 0800 999 3600 US: 800-220-7013
Backup Technology’s senior staff publish regular posts based on their experience of the market and the feedback they receive from new and existing customers. Backup Technology encourage visitors to interact with the blog and post comments, if you are interested in finding out more about any of their solutions please contact them.
The energy sector is a sitting duck when it comes to cyberattacks; don’t let your business be caught in the same pond.
According to Ludolf Luehmann, IT manager at Shell Europe, the petroleum industry needs to be concerned about the growing risk of sophisticated hacker attacks One of the most recent sources of concern is the Stuxnet computer worm, a powerful new virus that was launched in March or April of 2010. One of the industry’s biggest concerns centers around the fact that Stuxnet could be used to remotely open or close a valve — so a successful attack aimed at the oil industry could result in widespread environmental devastation, Luehmann said.
“If anybody gets into the area where you can control opening and closing of valves, or release valves, you can imagine what happens,” Luehmann said at the December 2011 World Petroleum Conference in Doha. “It will cost lives and it will cost production . . . cause fires and cause loss of containment, environmental damage – huge, huge damage.”
Luehmann also stressed that a large-scale attack could drive oil prices up dramatically. Since computers control almost all of the world’s oil production, an industrywide IT shutdown would cause oil prices to skyrocket. Millions of gallons of oil would vanish from the market – and this would have a devastating effect on consumers.
“If they [hackers] could bring down one of the big players in the oil and gas market you can imagine what this will do for the oil price – it would blow the market,” says Riemer Brouwer, head of IT security at Abu Dhabi Company for Onshore Oil Operations.
Cybersecurity experts say that they’ve been able to stay one step ahead of hackers and avoid major incidents. But that doesn’t mean that the industry is safe, they warn. Most experts agree that, thanks to the Internet, the risk of an attack by cyberterrorists is greater than ever. Hackers are able to create viruses faster than cybersecurity teams can eradicate them, and there is a surplus of online video tutorials that can teach anyone how to create computer worms.
How capable is your company’s infrastructure to handle a cyberattack? Even if you’re not in the oil and gas industry, it’s imperative that you have strategies lined up to protect your organization’s sensitive information. What is your company’s backup plan?
Choosing a good data center location requires smart research and planning – make the best choice using the guidelines below.
You’ve chosen the perfect backup data center: the rates are affordable, the site is reasonably close to your company’s main office, and there’s always someone on staff in case of an after-hours emergency.
It’s also located in a flood plain, which you didn’t know until a tropical storm blew through your city and put your newly selected data center – and all of your company’s critical information – under three feet of water.
When it comes to choosing an offsite data center, you have to think beyond prices. After all, a competitive yearly rate doesn’t mean much if your data center is prone to floods or other disasters.
Is your company in the market for data storage? Here are three questions to ask before making a choice.
Question 1: Can the location withstand natural disasters?
Avoid locations near the coast, which is prone to hurricanes and flooding, and avoid areas with a high risk of tornadoes and earthquakes. Ideally, a data center located underground will provide the best protection against natural disasters–as long as it isn’t in a flood plain or earthquake zone.
If your data center happens to be in a seismic hotspot, realize that you will need to take proper building code precautions. Requirements include securing equipment to the floor, latching all cabinet drawers and isolating servers for their own protection.
Question 2: Is the location easily accessible?
Think in terms of emergencies or equipment delivery. Say a server shuts down unexpectedly and needs to be replaced immediately. Having a data center located off of a major highway means that delivery trucks can easily get there and switch out equipment without causing much down time. If the center is located underground, it would also be ideal to have an elevator to aid in the transfer of servers.
Question 3: Who will be working the data center?
Reliability in the people running the center is essential, so find out who your operations manager will be as well as the person responsible for day-to-day maintenance of the servers. Make sure that there are clear procedures to follow in the case of an emergency, and ensure that your staff strictly adheres to regular inspection schedules of the building and equipment.
These three questions should help you find a reliable and professional offsite data center. What do you think of this list? Are there any other factors that you think are important? Leave a comment below and let me know.
Autodesk and Microsoft Increasing Cloud-Related R & D Spending
After tightening their belts in 2009 and 2010, big-name software companies like Microsoft, Autodesk, Intuit, and EMC are all reporting increased R & D spending for 2011 and into 2012.
So far, the biggest R & D spender is Autodesk. Autodesk, an engineering and design software developer, has a reputation for investing heavily in research and development. The company has recently announced plans to shift its R & D spending to focus primarily on the cloud. A spokesperson for Autodesk says that the company expects most of its core products to be available via cloud within the next three years. The company is already using the cloud to deliver several web-based products and serivces. Autodesk is also using the cloud for its smartphone apps, including the popular SketchBook app, which is available for the iPad, iPhone, and Android.
Autodesk isn’t the only developer investing in the cloud, though. Microsoft, Intuit, and EMC are all investing in the transition to cloud-based products. In fact, software and Internet companies are expected to increase their research spending more than seven percent, according to a 2010 report by the nonprofit Battelle Memorial Institute and R&D Magazine.
Why is this important? I think this is just one more indication that the cloud is here to stay.
What do you think about the shift toward cloud-based software? Is your organization planning to transition in the next few years, or are you taking a wait-and-see approach? What do you see as the major benefits of the cloud?
Leave a comment and let me know what you think.
Backup Technology would like to extend it’s congratulations to Asigra after they were named Search Storage’s Backup and Disaster Recovery product of the year 2011.
After being founded in 1986 by the current CEO, David Farajun, Asigra has continually led the market with unique features, product innovation, support and scalability. The Asigra software has been integral to all of Backup Technology’s Cloud Backup and Virtual Disaster Recovery services since 2005, in which time we have managed to create a global customer base protecting over 8 PetaBytes of data with individual customers exceeding 50 TeraBytes, this simply would not have been possible with any other backup and recovery solution.
Asigra were chosen from hundreds of very impressive product entries, SearchStorage’s judging panel then selected an exceptional group of 48 finalists. In turn the 18 winners were then selected from among the finalists based on innovation, performance, ease of integration, ease of use and manageability, functionality and value.
In recent years Asigra has appeared for the first time in Gartner’s prestigious Magic Quadrant and become increasingly prominent in analyst insights produced by organisations such as CRN, Forrester and the 451 Group. Such recognition validates Asigra’s credentials to all existing partners and customers, whilst also raising it’s profile amongst organisations who are experiencing problems using outdated tape backup solutions or other less scalable or robust Online Backup Services.
One of the key benefits of the Asigra solution which was highlighted by Storage Magazine is that it can be deployed as an on premise Private Cloud solution or as a Fully Managed Public Cloud service depending on a clients Data Protection and Disaster Recovery requirements.. This flexible approach has allowed Backup Technology to create bespoke Asigra Private Clouds for organisations such as The Government Offices, British Red Cross and Cheshire Police whilst Public Clouds are utilised by the likes of Liverpool Football Club, LK Bennett and Suzuki.
One of the judges even commented “There’s nothing like Asigra Cloud Backup in the market for enabling backup and recovery as a service.”
Asigra not only leads on features but also performance. SearchStorage highlighted the many performance enhancements included in version 11 such as “400% improvement in throughput over previous versions, support for 10 Gbps local-area network (LAN) interfaces, and data read/write acceleration with multi-threaded data dedupe, parallel processing for read I/O and data throughput, multiple overlapped I/O and delta differencing.”
“Our goal is to focus organizations on what data protection is really all about, data recovery,” said David Farajun, CEO for Asigra. “We are thrilled that Storage Magazine has recognized the unique advantages our solution brings. Asigra offers a multi-dimensional solution that can reside in and protect physical and virtual environments simultaneously while being device agnostic to protect all instances of data throughout an organization, substantially reducing data protection management requirements.”
2012 promises to be a record year for Asigra and Backup Technology. We hope that this is also the first of many awards this year, after over 26 years of pioneering the market Asigra certainly deserve it.
Backup Technology have been confirmed as a supplier suitable for the G-Cloud.
The G-Cloud has been a long time coming about but the government is finally taking steps in order to roll out its new initiative.
The £60m project is divided into four subsets: ‘Infrastructure as a Service’, ‘Software as a Service’, ‘Platform as a Service’ in addition to other specialist cloud services. Backup Technology have been selected as an approved SaaS supplier.
The government’s attitude toward its IT infrastructure has changed in recent years. Earlier in the year Mark O’Neil, proposition director for innovation and delivery at the Government Digital Service (GDS) implemented cloud-based desktop services, including email and collaboration tools to over 125 users. This cut costs by 80% relative to traditional on-premise services.
One of the major changes to the way in which the government approaches G-Cloud contractual agreements will be the length of time it is willing to sign for. Traditionally it was commonplace for IT contracts to be in place for 10 years. However going forward contracts are expected to only last 12 months! IT contracts are going to become more of a fluid commodity rather than a long-term commitment.
“We really don’t think we’re going to be seeing many contracts in the cloud service area that are beyond 12 months,” Liam Maxwell, Director of ICT Futures at the cabinet office.
However the positive side to this is that the procurement process is set to be much shorter and more efficient. Any MSP is all too familiar with how long the tendering process for public sector services can be.
Such lengthy qualification questionnaires are going to be replaced with processes which allow requirements to be expressed in the simplest way possible.
The process is set to become something of an ‘e-marketplace’ which entails a ‘Cloud Store’ detailing services and suppliers.
“Rather than rigid requirements expressed in overly complex tenders, we are asking suppliers what they can offer and setting out our requirements in the simplest way,” Francis Maude, Cabinet Office Minister.
If there’s one thing that everybody can agree on, it’s that there’s no such thing as a one-size-fits-all data recovery plan. Your company’s industry; the part of the country you live in; your budget – all of these factors play a part in a backup and storage plan.
But whether your company is in health care or finance; small or large; whether you’re located in Tornado Alley or the hurricane-prone Gulf Coast – one of the most important questions about data recovery is, “In-house or offsite?”
Many business owners and administrators like the idea of keeping things in-house. They feel that keeping things on-site helps protect sensitive data safe while keeping costs down. This is understandable – after all, why not let your own IT team handle things instead of paying monthly and yearly service fees to have someone else do it for you
The truth is, there are four good reasons to let someone else take control of your company’s data storage and recovery:
What do you think? Do you handle your data storage in-house or offsite? Why? Leave a comment and let me know your thoughts.
A cyber defence survey which was conducted by the Security and Defence Agenda think tank rated the UK cyber-readiness four stars out of five. This ranks the UK alongside countries such as Germany and the USA and suggests that recent initiatives that have been implemented have improved the UKs cyber-readiness.
Israel, Finland and Sweden led the way with a rank of four and a half stars out of five whilst Mexico languished behind in last place with a total of two stars out of five.
The main focal points that the rankings were based on consisted of the country having sufficient firewalls and antivirus protection and factors such as the level of education on cyber-security.
The Defence Agenda think tank team based there rankings on the perceived quality of cyber-readiness which is seen as a massive positive of conducting the research. Raj Samani, McAfee’s chief technology officer stated “The subjectiveness of the report is its biggest strength. What it does is give the perception of cyber-readiness by those individuals who kind of understand and work in cyber security on a day-in, day-out basis.”
So far Israel has set the bench mark for cyber-defence as it is reported that the country receive over 1,000 cyber-attacks every minute but do not suffer a huge amount of disruption or damage. Isaac Ben-Israel, senior security advisor to Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stated “The hacktivist group Anonymous carries out lots of attacks but they don’t cause much damage. The real threat is from states and major crime organisations.” Ben-Israel also revealed that the country has set up a cyber-taskforce which assesses the threats to key infrastructure such as power and water plants.
Meanwhile, the prominent gang and drug problems in Mexico have been blamed for their poor results. It is widely regarded that such problems have forced the government to focus their efforts on improving the situation and therefore they haven’t had the time or funds to look at implementing policies to improve their cyber defence infrastructure.
The report commended the efforts made by the UK government to improve the country’s cyber defence such as an investment program which is worth £650 million. Not everyone is happy with this investment and what the money is being for. Peter Sommer who is an information security expert argued “A great deal depends on co-operation from the private sector, which controls about 80% of the critical national infrastructure. Over half of the new funding will go to the ‘secret vote’, the intelligence agencies, where value for money will be difficult to investigate. I would have preferred more emphasis on public education – helping potential victims help themselves.”
The report concluded that in order to improve cyber-defence, there needs to be better communication between countries and a willingness to share data. The report also stated that cross boarder law enforcements needs to be improved and given more power.
Samani argued “Cybercriminals route their connection through multiple different countries. If criminals are particularly clever, they go through countries where they know there isn’t any co-operation. The bad guys share information – we need to do the same as well.”
These suggestions have been constantly acknowledged as the most efficient and effective way to improve cyber defence but the feasibility of it is very unrealistic. Dr Joss Wright who is from the Oxford Internet Institute argues “They’re recommendations that people have been saying for maybe 10 years. I would love to see good information sharing but when you’re talking about national security, there’s a culture of not sharing. They’re not suddenly going to change 70, 100, 1000 years of military thinking.”
As Cloud Computing becomes more prevalent onsite hardware sales will feel the impact. However the Cloud has manifested itself in many forms and distributors will not necessarily suffer on all fronts.
Distributors must stay relevant to solution providers as the technology landscape shifts. The danger for distributors is that solutions providers start dealing directly with Cloud providers, and miss out the distribution middle man.
Cloud Computing is not just another fad which distributors need to slightly adjust their business model to. In the past businesses tweaked their models through charging for services they had produced for free, such as tech support.
The Cloud phenomenon is different and appears to be here to stay, leading to distributors having a bit of an identity crisis. They want to get in on the action, especially as the industry is set to become a $241 billion industry by 2020. However they are unsure where they fit into the equation.
UBM estimate that up to 38% of all IT expenditure is going to move to purchasing off-premise solutions by 2013. To meet this a third of all solution providers are aiming to change their business model within this time period.
Where distributors may not loose out so badly is within the Private Cloud space. In this market companies are buying hardware in order to produce a Cloud infrastructure behind their own corporate firewalls. IDC estimates that Private Cloud implementations will grow at an annual rate of 28.8% through to 2015.
It is the SMEs which are more likely to jump two footed into a Public Cloud solution hosted by a 3rd party provider, producing no need for a distributor. This is the market where distributors they will loose out, and could be labelled as unnecessary purchasing mechanisms.
So what about the distributors who are supplying the Cloud providers themselves? There is a harsh irony in the way that IT distributors have supplied Cloud providers in the past few years inadvertently supplying the force that hopes to steal their sales. However distributors have no choice other than to supply the future.
For distributors the future is unsure but may not be a gloomy as some would have you believe. In the past they have proven to adapt well to changes in computing. The task now is to establish a firm identity in the Cloud space. Perhaps the safe option would be to specialise in working with companies implementing Private Cloud solutions.
Need more proof that the cloud is the future of healthcare? How about this: General Electric and Microsoft – two big names in cloud-based healthcare technology — have recently announced plans to create a joint healthcare venture designed to address important changes in the healthcare industry.
The new company, which has not been named yet, will enable doctors and healthcare facilities to share patient information, streamline and manage new payment models, and shift focus from single-patient care to continuous population management, said Jeffrey R. Immelt, chairman and CEO of GE.
“The global healthcare challenges of access, cost and quality of care delivery are creating a new focus on the performance and accountability of healthcare delivery systems — in every country, at every level of care,” Immelt said in a joint press release issued by GE and Microsoft. “This venture will demonstrate what is possible when leading companies with complementary capabilities work together to meet a common goal.”
GE and Microsoft are both known for producing a wide range of products and services related to healthcare. The new joint venture will give users in the healthcare industry the option to mix-and-match some of each company’s most popular and widely-used products, including electronic data-sharing platforms like Microsoft Amalga and GE Healthcare eHealth, as well as Microsoft expreSSO, Microsoft Vergence, and GE Healthcare Qualibria.
“Combining Microsoft’s open, interoperable health platforms and software expertise with GE’s experience and healthcare solutions will create exciting opportunities for patients and healthcare providers alike. Working together, GE and Microsoft can help make healthcare systems more intelligent and cost efficient while improving patient care,” said Steve Ballmer, CEO of Microsoft.
In addition to streamlining communication and making it easier to access patient data, the new company – which is still awaiting regulatory approval before it launches early this year – is expected to cut down on healthcare-related infections by helping medical professionals more quickly identify patients who are especially at risk. Additionally, the new venture should make it easier for patients and their doctors to co-manage diseases and chronic conditions by sharing and tracking home testing devices.
What do you think of this announcement? What’s your take on healthcare and the cloud? Leave me a comment and let me know what you think.
Asigra’s agentless architecture was designed with scalable manageability in mind.
For an organisation with an expansive IT environment or one planning rapid expansion an agentless architecture is extremely beneficial.
Such a solution means that only one backup agent is required across an entire network. Backups can therefore be managed from a single console making administration infinitely easier.
The software is generally installed on a dedicated backup box and if granted with universal administrative privileges, can ‘agentlessly’ browse across any network.
The pricing model which goes hand in hand with having agentless architecture is another attractive aspect. This is because of its simplicity.
Often the cost of backup will seem extremely reasonable on the surface. However then the end customer will be hit with agent, plugin and licensing costs. If their environment is large, these can be extensive.
Asigra’s architecture allows Backup Technology to offer a service whereby the pricing structure is entirely based upon the amount of data being backed up. There are no hidden costs whatsoever relating to licensing, plugins or agents.
In addition support is provided across Windows, Linux, UNIX, Novell & IBM, again from a single point of administration.
When choosing a backup product do not be mis-led by extremely cheap data quotas, only to find that there are huge setup and licensing costs. Choose a service which is geared for the enterprise market and which envisages expansion with ease.
