What are you going to do when your cloud goes down? Rethinking shared responsibility

A short history of modern business IT might report that the Noughties were all about taking baby steps in cloud applications such as Salesforce, Google Apps, Taleo, Ariba and NetSuite. The 2010s saw clouds proliferate as pioneers took a ‘cloud-first’ stance and used platforms including AWS, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud Platform to pilot, test and run services. In the 2020s, we can be confident that businesses will attempt to harness their existing cloud investments, formalising...

By | 2 June 2020 | Data Management

Three reasons to perform your cloud security risk assessment ASAP

The unprecedented shock to world markets in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic will likely permanently change the way we work. Millions must work from home, and businesses are scrambling to find ways to maintain productivity.

The shift to utilising a completely remote workforce has been relatively seamless for some companies and utterly chaotic for others. Adding to the chaos, cybercriminals are targeting organisations of all types with coronavirus-related phishing campaigns and...

By | 30 April 2020 | Data & Analytics

Microsoft expands European Azure presence with Germany and Switzerland launches

Microsoft has announced the launch of new Azure availability in Germany and Switzerland, citing increased data residency and security concerns as key to European expansion.

Azure is now available from cloud data centre regions located in Zurich and Geneva, for the Switzerland release announced at the end of last month, while Germany’s newest regions are in the North and West Central zones, in...

By | 10 September 2019 | Data Centres

Cloud providers are under attack – and sabotaged services will freeze operations

Over the next two years, cloud service providers will be systematically sabotaged by attackers aiming to disrupt critical national infrastructure (CNI) or cripple supply chains. Organisations dependent on cloud services will find their operations and supply chains undermined when key cloud services go down for extended periods of time.

Nation states that engage in a digital cold war will aim to disrupt economies and take down CNI by sabotaging cloud infrastructure through traditional...

By | 22 May 2019 | Data Loss

Defying data gravity: How can organisations escape cloud vendor lock-in?

The process of deriving the maximum possible business value from the data you hold is not a new challenge, but it is one that all too many organisations are still learning to address in the most sustainable way.

The concept of ‘data gravity’, coined by software engineer Dave McCrory in 2010, refers to the ability of bodies of data to attract applications, services and other data. The larger...

By | 23 November 2018 | Data & Analytics

WikiLeaks claims to publish confidential AWS data centre location information

WikiLeaks has published what it claims is a 'highly confidential' document outlining the addresses and operational details of Amazon Web Services (AWS) data centres.

The whistle-blowing organisation claims to have published the document, originating from late 2015, as an attempt to shed light on the 'largely hidden' nature of cloud infrastructure locations.

"While one of the benefits of the cloud is the potential to increase reliability through...

By | 15 October 2018 | Amazon

Why data sovereignty is the only truly safe path to avoid Privacy Shield turmoil

Privacy is not just a legal obligation, it is an ethical commitment and a demonstration that you care about your customers’ privacy as much as they do.

Many people will be surprised to hear that although the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) took effect on May 25, many companies are not yet GDPR-compliant. The regulation  requires organisations to comply, and our Information...

By | 30 August 2018 | Compliance

Equinix aims to utilise the power of SDN to connect its global data centre network

Talk about a global outlook: data centre provider Equinix has announced the launch of a new strategy to connect its data centres around the world through software defined networking (SDN).

The inter-metro connectivity, which enables users to dynamically connect its own infrastructure across Equinix locations as well as connect to any other customer, comes through the Equinix Cloud Exchange Fabric (ECX Fabric). For enterprises, it helps them with agility, while for service providers...

By | 5 December 2017 | Data Centres

Netskope raises $100m in series E round, aims to move security platform beyond the cloud

Cloud security provider Netskope has announced the close of a $100 million (£77.5m) series E funding round to press ahead with its go to market strategy as well as explore new ventures.

The round, which brings Netskope’s total funding to $231.4 million, was led by Lightspeed Venture Partners and included contributions from existing investors Social Capital and Iconiq Capital, as well as new participation from Sapphire Ventures and Geodesic Capital.

Among the...

By | 6 June 2017 | Data & Analytics

Why businesses must not assume GDPR compliance in the cloud

You may have noticed that more companies are storing data in the cloud and utilising cloud-based services than ever before. But many are failing to ensure that the data is secured or stored in a compliant manner, placing themselves and their customers at risk from data breaches.

With the European Parliament passing the new General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) last year, businesses have less than a year before fundamental changes to the way they store and secure data come into...

By | 2 June 2017 | Compliance