We’ve distilled lessons learned from Snowden scandal and created 5 questions every CEO should be asking their CIO / CISO in order to avoid a catastrophic rogue insider event in the private sector both in using cloud as a vector of exfiltration as well as protecting their data stored in the cloud.
Today is the one-year anniversary of the historic Snowden disclosure. In the year since the first stories about Edward Snowden appeared, one of the lasting affects of the scandal is a heightened awareness of the risk posed by rogue insiders. This increased focus on rogue insiders has spread beyond the government to the private sector, and from security circles to corporate executives.
Archivo mensual: junio 2014
Why DevOps Needs a Friend
Application Performance Management (APM) has been bred with all the right elements to give us the insights we need to see the health of our applications. Similar to your most trusted watch dog, it alerts us to anomalies when events occur, providing awareness to the environment that only they can observe.
As enterprises embrace the DevOps philosophy, and the coalescence of the Development and Operations continues, I foresee the conditions ripening to foster innovative methods of making application performance better and code deployments smoother. To me, the argument that system monitoring is just a “nice to have” and not really a core requirement for operational readiness dissipates quickly when a critical application goes down with no warning.
Tech News Recap for the Week of 6/9/2014
Were you busy last week? Here’s a quick recap of tech news and stories you may have missed!
- Google Pays $500 Million to Buy Satellite Maker Skybox Imaging
- Brown University goes personal with 100 percent virtualized cloud
- How Hackers Set Up Illegal Mines for Virtual Currencies
- Increased Productivity & Design Flexibility: The Case for Migrating to SharePoint 2013
- Georgia Tech Engineering Students Use Virtual Desktops to Access Specialized Tools Anywhere, Anytime
- Google Offers Cloud Database to Aid Autism Research
- Some clouds may bypass IT, but someone still needs to keep the lights on
- Food Chain, PF Chang’s, Investigates Possible Card Breach
- LEAKED: LG’s First Android Wear Smartwatch Will Supposedly Offer 36-Hour Battery Life
- Clean Cloud Is the Future
- Top Ten Competencies of the Modern CIO
- Target Names Its First CISO
- How Big Data is Redefining the Role of a CIO
- Data Never Sleeps {Infographic}
- University of Wisconsin-Madison Gets from 97 Data Centers Down to 8
- 14 year olds finds manual online, hack an ATM during their school lunch hour
Are you interested in learning more about 5 common mistakes in consolidating & virtualizing the datacenter?
Wearable tech and the future of cloud ERP
A recent study conducted by the University of London looked into the positive aspects of introducing wearable technology at the workplace.
One of the key takeaways from the study is that wearable technology can improve employee productivity by as much as 8.5% while enhancing job satisfaction by 3.5%. Writing for CNN, Dr. Chris Brauer, the person who spearheaded the study tells us that such wearables could help in building a symbiotic growth relationship between the employer and the employee – while the employer could use behavioural data from such technology to pick the best resource for a task, the employee could use this very data to build a “biometric CV” that would help them personalize their work space.
While the use of such technology at the workplace still seems like a distant dream, at least one industry has taken the first stride towards using wearable technology to enhance their …
Here’s What NOT Using Cloud Storage Is Costing You
It’s no secret that doing nothing is often considered a safe bet. The psychology behind inaction is well understood, particularly in the case of IT — the path of least disruption is usually maintaining the status quo rather than trying something new,
But once in a while, a decision of inaction can prove very costly. For instance, would you ignore leaky plumbing in your home? Barring any flooding or damage, there may not be much urgency to act — perhaps until the water bill arrives, at which point you experience a change of heart. But what if the leak preexisted before you moved in to the home and you never realized you were overpaying for water to begin with?
Barclays: “Market is still excited” for cloud
2014 hasn’t been the same type of year for cloud as 2013. If you go back into 2013, it’s almost as if cloud could do no wrong. Was 2014 the wake-up call that cloud needed? Box’s IPO is now on hold after the company admitted that it was hemorrhaging 9 figures.
Cloud companies that were seeking investments in the stock market or by drumming up venture capital have been met with a cold shoulder since the beginning of the year. When will the investing mood cheer up for cloud companies around the globe?
Laurence Goldberg, who works for Barclays mentions, “Valuations got a little bit ahead of themselves through March.” Goldberg goes on to say that, “The market is still excited about these types of companies.”
Large cloud players such as Microsoft, Amazon and Google haven’t been hit nearly as hard as the smaller players such …
GovCloud Founder and Veteran’s 360 Showcased in US Veteran’s Magazine
Kevin L. Jackson, CEO and Founder of GovCloud Network, LLC, was showcased in US Veteran’s Magazine for his work with Veteran’s 360, a San Diego, California non-profit.
With more than 30,000 troops return to civilian life after serving the country, Vets360 helps them through this sometimes difficult transition by providing training designed to provide skills that will ensure long-term success in the future job market. With eyes on that future, and after extensive research,Veterans 360 decided that cloud technology was a perfect venue for veterans looking for meaningful employment and a long-term career.
Progress Software and the bet with Node.js after Modulus acquisition #AppsWorld
Matt Robinson, VP technology at Progress Software, explains to CloudTech why the company is betting on Node.js with the acquisition of PaaS provider Modulus.
The deal, announced earlier this week, aims to put progress in the enviable position of offering an industry-beating cloud, mobile, hybrid and on-premise development capability – and according to Robinson, the growth of Node.js, and JavaScript in general, makes this move a no-brainer.
“Modulus is a real purpose built platform for Node developers,” he explains. “We talked to prospects and customers of Modulus and they all say similar feedback of ‘it’s just a natural experience for us to go in and deploy their applications and scale them really easily from a simple user interface.’
“It gives us a way to really attach ourselves to this very fast moving emergent technology,” he adds.
Robinson arrived at Progress after being CEO at rapid app development firm …
Increased Productivity & Design Flexibility: The Case for Migrating to SharePoint 2013
By Kevin Hall, Managing Director
Deciding when and how to migrate to SharePoint 2013 is not a small decision. If you’re on an earlier version than SharePoint 2010, Microsoft doesn’t offer an officially supported method for upgrading directly to 2013. Even if you are operating on 2010, upgrading the platform that so much of your business depends on creates risks and costs that must be offset by measurable business benefits.
There are already a significant amount of resources available around the benefits of migrating to 2013. At GreenPages, we have helped many organizations with SharePoint projects. This post will cover some real world examples of organizations migrating that we’ve experienced that highlight some of the key benefits.
Design flexibility to extend your public brand to the intranet
One client, a high-tech medical device supplier, has built its reputation on ease of use and modern mobile technology. With earlier versions of SharePoint, the client struggled to reinforce its brand promise and promote its high-tech, mobile culture among its employees on the corporate intranet. After they migrated to SharePoint 2013, the organization was able to take advantage of the improved design flexibility and standards compliance of the platform to create an intranet that truly reflected their brand and values. The site not only looks great on 2013, but it also uses responsive web design to allow access on any device.
Increased productivity with secure document sharing and predictive search
In the financial services industry, protecting sensitive client information is mission critical. Due to information security and compliance goals, a large financial services and analytics client decided to replace internal file shares with SharePoint. While SharePoint immediately helped better protect information, it was not until the migration to 2013 that this client started to see day-to-day business value from SharePoint. With the combination of cross-site publishing and the integration of FAST search, 2013 allowed for a single repository of documents to be indexed and securely shared with multiple intranet and extranet sites, all still governed by SharePoint security. Additionally, the built in predictive search capabilities available in 2013 greatly reduced the amount of time employees and partners spent searching for documents and information.
Out with the new and in with the old
We talk with a lot of clients about Microsoft and whether or not the industry has surpassed it from an innovation standpoint. Often times, a platform switch is under consideration as an alternative to migration. One of our clients, a hip technology firm, had some specific goals which seemed out of reach with Microsoft in general, and SharePoint specifically. In some respects, they had bought into the hype about the industry surpassing Microsoft and went with a competitive solution. GreenPages is now helping this client migrate back to Microsoft and SharePoint 2013 because our client found the product they went with couldn’t scale like SharePoint, required arcane technical skills to manage, and was difficult to brand and build a great user experience on. With 2013’s improvements to design and search, as well as the stability of SharePoint as a platform, the client is excited to get back to the “old way” of doing things.
Collaboration at scale with the technology and platform you already know
As I mentioned, sometimes the complexity of a potential migration opens up a bigger conversation about Microsoft and potentially shifting to a competing technology. Depending on your specific needs, leaving SharePoint may make sense. However, make sure you do not act too hastily. Microsoft as a company is doing quite well, and SharePoint 2013, along with Office 365, lies at the core of where Microsoft is heading and is enjoying tremendous success.
There is real business value to be gained from taking on a SharePoint 2013 migration. By migrating, you will ensure that your business is taking advantage of the improvements that Microsoft has made to the platform, and you will be well positioned to make a smooth transition once Microsoft makes the next version available.
Click here if you’re interested in learning more about the unique business benefits SharePoint 2013 can provide your organization.
Do you have any experience with SharePoint? What’s your opinion? Leave a comment below!
CloudExpo 2014: Future of the Cloud
Lori MacVittie, Sr. Product Manager Emerging Technologies, discusses the future of the cloud and where do we go from here. She talks about some of barriers, tools and solutions to take cloud adoption to the next level along with how DevOps and Cloud play together.