BloxOne Threat Defense is the industry’s first hybrid DNS security solution enabling enterprises to strengthen and optimize their cybersecurity posture from the foundation up

Infoblox Inc., the leader in Secure Cloud-Managed Network Services, today announced BloxOne™ Threat Defense, the industry’s first hybrid security offering that leverages DNS as the first line of defense to detect and block today’s sophisticated cyberthreats. With a scalable hybrid architecture, BloxOne Threat Defense secures enterprises’ existing networks as well as digital transformations like cloud, IoT and SD-WAN deployments. It makes an organization’s threat analysts more productive and reduces the total cost of enterprise threat defense. The BloxOne Threat Defense solution combines the best of Infoblox’s on-prem (ActiveTrust) and cloud-based (ActiveTrust Cloud) security solutions into a unique integrated hybrid offering that provides enterprises scale, flexibility, and reliability. This enhanced solution reduces incident response time by providing actionable intelligence to the organization’s security stack, including SOAR (Security Orchestration Automation and Response), and by automating action using extensive ecosystem integrations.

Despite organizations utilizing multiple security tools in their stack, only a minimal number of alerts (about 4%) are investigated because they are short staffed. According to the Ponemon Institute, data breaches can take enterprises an average of 196 days to identify, resulting in a loss of $3.6 million per year and impacting brand reputation. Everyday CISOs are challenged to do more with less, simplify their security architecture, improve compliance and ensure protection for their data.

Enterprises require a scalable, simple, and foundational security solution that can catch threats in today’s dynamic networks. DNS, critical to the fabric of the Internet and any IP based communication, is also the least common denominator that can serve as the perfect foundation for security because it is ubiquitous in networks, is needed for connectivity and can scale to the size of the Internet. BloxOne Threat Defense presents a hybrid deployment that ensures enterprise networks will be protected at anytime, anywhere, leveraging the infrastructure organizations already own – DNS.

Organizations such as Bank Audi s.a.e. need to able to monitor mobile and roaming users connecting to their networks. “Our hybrid DNS security solution from Infoblox allows our team to easily monitor recursive DNS traffic for on-prem or remote users through a single pane of glass,” said Moustafa Marzouk, head of IT infrastructure and support at Bank Audi s.a.e.  “This allows us to automatically detect and respond to threats in real-time. Now our team can easily integrate with our existing security tools, manage the network from one platform, and scale for future growth and innovation.”

BloxOne Threat Defense uses highly accurate threat intelligence and machine learning based analytics to detect modern malware, ransomware, phishing, exploit kits, DNS-based data exfiltration, Domain Generation Algorithms, DNS Messenger, fast-flux attacks and more. In addition, the hybrid approach allows organizations to use the cloud to detect more threats, while providing deep visibility and full integration with the on-premises ecosystem. It also provides resiliency and redundancy.

“The traditional security model is inadequate for today’s borderless networks, especially as enterprises continue to adopt digital transformation technologies like SD WAN, IoT, and cloud,” said Kanaiya Vasani, executive vice president of products and corporate development at Infoblox. “With BloxOne Threat Defense, Infoblox is providing customers with a solution that protects everywhere, offers flexible deployment, and integrates with the security stack already in place, providing a more optimized and streamlined cybersecurity posture. Organizations can worry less about silos created by managing multiple security solutions and instead make their security stack work as one fabric.”

With BloxOne Threat Defense, Infoblox has further optimized its enterprise security offering, helping customers reduce the total cost of threat defense by:

• Offloading strained perimeter defenses:Reducing the amount of malicious traffic sent to Next Gen Firewalls, IPS and Web Proxy solutions by utilizing already-available DNS servers as the first line of defense
• Reducing incident response time by up to two-thirds*:Automate responses when malicious behavior is detected, block cyberthreats and provide data for the rest of the ecosystem to investigate and remediate.
• Power SOAR/SIEM platforms and Prioritize response: Leverage DNS, DHCP and IPAM data in SOAR/SIEM platforms to understand criticality of threats and to prioritize responses accordingly
• Make threat analysts three times[1]more productive:Empower security analysts to make quick and accurate decisions while reducing human error with automated threat investigation, insights into related threats, and bad actor and geographical information

[1]Based on real world customer deployments

Thunder® Containers Solutions Enhance Application Performance and Security for Multi-cloud Environments

A10 Networks(NYSE: ATEN) has announced a cloud-ready, light-weight set of container-based solutions to provide secure application services. They offer the industry’s highest performing container solutions with up to 200 Gbps of throughput for A10 Networks’ Thunder Application Delivery Controller (ADC), Carrier-Grade Networking (CGN), and Convergent Firewall (CFW) solutions. The addition of Thunder Containers extends the company’s multi-cloud portfolio and increases the performance, security and availability of applications, enabling customers to confidently run their critical workloads in multi-cloud environments at hyperscale. Customers can meet the increased traffic demands, while maintaining predictable service levels when deploying applications in multiple geographic locations and across public and private clouds.

Enterprises today are leveraging almost five clouds[1]for their application infrastructure. Multiple disparate environments to manage, on top of inherent application complexity, make deploying applications more complex. Organizations need efficient, agile and high-performance solutions that also provide centralized management and analytics across the entire application infrastructure.

Agile, Cloud-Native Application Infrastructures

A10 Networks Thunder Containers-based solutions can help solve many issues faced by organizations today. The addition of a container-based solution to the A10 Networks’ portfolio helps support a mix of application architectures, from traditional monolithic to distributed microservices, with the same code, the same management all-inclusive API and the same feature-set to help organizations combine new and legacy services for more agile infrastructures. In addition, it can eliminate the struggle between NetOps/SecOps and DevOps with unified and consistent application, feature-set and policy control across traditional data center and multi-cloud environments.

“With the new Thunder Containers, we are delivering to the market the highest performance load balancing, firewall and carrier-grade NAT (CGNAT) solutions for a very complex multi-cloud world. We are extending our portfolio across traditional, virtual and microservices form factors, giving customers a unified solution to ensure agile and scalable infrastructures. And seamless integration with A10 Harmony® Controller gives customers visibility and centralized management for consistent operations and security across multi-cloud environments,” said Raj Jalan, CTO of A10 Networks.

Thunder Containers is also supported with Kubernetes. The highly portable solution is supported on standard Intel x86 servers and can be deployed across the largest cloud providers, including Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud Platform (GCP), as well as private data centers, allowing businesses to benefit from agility, flexibility and security. Combined with the unique FlexPool® licensing model, customers can aggregate capacity for flexible allocation and redistribution of resources for applications running in the cloud.

Thunder for Containers will be available in Q3, 2019.

 

[1]RightScale 2019 State of the Cloud Report by Flexera

By: Claude Schuck, regional manager, Middle East at Veeam

 

Last year, cloud computing entered the Slope of Enlightenmenton Gartner’s infamous Hype Cycle for the first time in its history. This marked the inflection point at which cloud stopped being something CIOs and IT managers talked about, but didn’t necessarily implement, and became a must-have for any digital business.

 

At the same time, if you look at the Gartner Hype Cycle for data management, there are a raft of technologies all with different levels of understanding, relevance and importance. From DataOps and Machine Learning-Enabled Data Management at the entry stage of Innovation Trigger to Data Integration and Information Archiving approaching the Plateau of Productivity. While cloud is fast-becoming recognised as an industry-standard for modern IT infrastructure, data management is growing rapidly in its importance to businesses.

 

Moreover, businesses are beginning to understand their data much better. Being able to access the right data at the right time, and recover it when it’s lost or damaged, can determine the success of a business.

 

Enter Cloud Data Management

With Cloud Data Management: an inherent part of Intelligent Data Management, data is available across the business, centrally managed, controlled and located where it will deliver the most value for the organization. In today’s digital and data-driven economy, organizations of all types and sizes require the ability to manage data across multi-cloud environments and ensure it is protected no matter where it resides. Maintaining data availability at all times is key to enabling teams to respond instantly and appropriately to what matters anywhere across the enterprise’s infrastructure.

 

Veeam’s 2019 Cloud Data Management report, which surveyed over 1,500 business leaders globally, found that almost half (44%) see data management as critical to their businesses’ success in the next two years. Amongst the businesses making the most intelligent use of data management, there were four common components: cloud, confidence, capabilities and culture.

 

Scaling with the cloud

European Commission statisticsshow that over half of EU enterprises are now using advanced cloud services relating to financial and accounting software applications, customer relationship management (CRM) or enterprise applications. This percentage is only rising as hyperscalers continue to layer value-add services onto their stacks – enabling customers to leverage AI and machine learning, big data analytics, and voice and image searching to deliver greater business value from their data.

 

This notion is backed up by the fact that nearly three-quarters (72%) of companies are looking to Cloud Data Management to enable more intelligent use of data across the business. Business leaders are looking to data management to deliver benefits through increasing productivity, maintaining corporate stability and improving their ability to forecast and make better informed decisions. The majority stated that they are using Software as a Service (77%), citing reliability, flexibility and data security as their top three reasons for doing so.

 

Investing with confidence

Given the emphasis the needs of the digital business place on its IT infrastructure, CIOs need to have confidence in its ability to help their organization stay responsive, available and on the front foot. Incidents such as outages can sap this confidence, stunt future innovation, and damage customer confidence. Almost three-quarters (73%) of organizations are unable to meet users’ demands for uninterrupted access to applications and data. This may partly explain why only 25% of business leaders reported total confidence in their capability to meet their digital challenges.

 

As well as investing in robust, scalable and flexible solutions to mission-critical issues such as backup, disaster recovery and data protection, organizations need the right skills and capabilities to manage their data estates. That’s why business leaders said that they will spend an average of $41 million on deploying technologies to build a more intelligent business within the next 12 months.

 

Combining technological and human capabilities

Clearly, the expectations of what data management can deliver for the business are high and the appetite for return on technology investment is insatiable. Once new technologies are deployed, business leaders expect to see financial benefits in nine months, with operational benefits in seven months.

 

For effective results to be realised within a short space of time, businesses must ensure that they have the necessary skills to on-board employees with new systems. In fact, the vast majority (91%) of organizations view upskilling employees’ digital skills as vital to their success. This sometimes requires an element of cultural transformation, particularly when an organization is looking to establish more data-driven decision-making processes.

 

Establishing a data-driven culture

The cloud is a great equaliser for businesses – levelling the playing field in terms of the technological haves and have nots. Most businesses are now producing data at a rate of knots, so it’s more about how that data is managed, analysed and used to inform faster and more effective decision making. A business can produce huge amounts of data but if it doesn’t adopt a data-driven culture at the C-level, it can be a burden rather than an advantage.

 

More than two-thirds (69%) of business leaders agree that company culture needs to become more open and accepting as they digitally transform, while 93% agree that leadership styles will also need to change. Cloud Data Management is an opportunity for every business and something which must be implemented at the most senior level of the business and executed right across the pyramid.

 

In summary, building strong digital foundations that centre on data availability will be vital to the future of every organization. Within this context, technology has never been so important to a business’ success. Organizations around the world rely on a whole host of digital platforms for everything from keeping the lights on to creating ground-breaking, new offerings for customers. This, combined with implementing a data-driven culture which maximizes the value of the data available to the business, will enable the next-generation of industry disruptors and innovators to scale securely.

Fortinet to secure applications on AWS with FortiWeb Cloud WAF-as-a-Service

 “As organizations increasingly build out their business in the cloud and use web applications, they increase their exposure to known and unknown targeted attacks,” said John Maddison, EVP of Products and Solutions at Fortinet. “Delivered through the Fortinet Security Fabric, FortiWeb Cloud Web Application Firewall (WAF)-as-a-Service allows organizations to rapidly deploy web applications while providing best-in-class security for mission-critical applications.”

The Evolving Attack Surface in the Cloud

To keep up with digital transformation, IT teams are increasingly deploying applications to the cloud and building cloud-native applications. However, this rapid deployment can introduce vulnerabilities and requires robust security to defend the evolving attack surface and protect applications from threats. Organizations’ disaggregation of security tools compounds the challenge of protecting the attack surface. IT teams need security solutions that accurately protect web assets, are intuitive and are simple to deploy and easy to manage in order to truly take advantage of the benefits of migrating applications to the cloud or building cloud-native applications. Pairing this with the shortage of general cybersecurity expertise and web application security in particular, DevOps teams managing web applications are especially in need of security solutions that are easy to use as the resources to monitor threats across hybrid cloud environments are limited.  

Reaping the Benefits of the Cloud with Fortinet’s Security-Driven Approach

Fortinet is addressing the issues that IT teams, including DevOps, face with the addition of FortiWeb Cloud WAF-as-a-Serviceto its cloud security portfolio. FortiWeb Cloud WAF-as-a-Serviceis available for purchase on AWS Marketplaceor through your preferred Fortinet reseller and leverages the flexibility of AWS by automatically provisioning security protection for customers across multiple AWS Regions. As part of the Fortinet Security Fabric, FortiWeb Cloud WAF-as-a-Serviceprovides the following benefits:

 

• Accurate and easy to manage Cloud WAF offering: As one of the first machine learning-enabled WAF technology in the industry, customers deploying FortiWeb Cloud WAF-as-a-Servicebenefit from high accuracy of detection and threat prevention, eliminating false positives and ensuring applications keep running. The solution also gives users the ability to perform a comprehensive self-tuning of policies to eliminate the operational overhead of managing a WAF service. FortiWeb Cloud WAF-as-a-Servicealso provides web application security that is easy to deploy and maintain with minimal configuration and management. The solution allows access to advanced configuration options when needed, removing the usual complexity required when setting up a WAF.
• Advanced threat protection for web applications: FortiWeb Cloud WAF-as-a-Servicesafeguards applications from vulnerability exploits, bots, malware uploads, DDoS attacks, advanced persistent threats (APTs), both unknown and zero-day attacks, among others. It also includes services from Fortinet’s award-winning FortiGuard Labs, providing signatures, sandboxing and IP reputation to ensure organizations have the latest protection and updates on threats.

 

• Low total cost of ownership (TCO): As a cloud-native SaaS solution deployed in the same AWS Region as an organizations’ applications, FortiWeb Cloud WAF-as-a-Servicedoesn’t require maintenance of hardware or software and can reduce outbound data transfer costs significantly. Organizations pay Intra-Region Data Transfer rates for traffic to the service and FortiWeb Cloud WAF-as-a-Service handles the data transfer out costs as part of its subscription. IT teams can leverage the benefits of low latency and intra-region bandwidth rates for traffic between applications and the WAF.

 

• Simplifies compliance requirements: Fortinet delivers FortiWeb Cloud WAF-as-a-Serviceusing a colony of WAF gateways in the same AWS Region as an organizations’ application. This avoids potentially subjecting the application to additional regional regulatory requirements.

 

• Flexible purchasing options: Whether customers prefer pre-provisioned capacity or paying by the volume of processed data, FortiWeb Cloud WAF-as-a-Servicesupports the most suitable option for customers’ business priorities and budgetary considerations.

 

 

By: Mrugesh Chandarana, Senior Product Manager, Identity and Access Management Solutions at HID Global

Business Email Compromise (BEC) is a type of phishing attack in which an attacker impersonates a high-level executive and attempts to trick an employee or customer into transferring money or sensitive data. According to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), as of

2018

this scheme has already caused $12.5 Billion in losses to companies. The FBI warned that there was a 60% increase in 2018 in fake email schemes that aim at stealing money or tax data. These figures support the fact that BEC attacks are technically simple but extremely effective in nature.

How to Prevent BEC Attacks

The simplicity of spoofing an email address, the advanced technology cybercriminals can easily access, along with the social engineering techniques to stage attacks—can leave an organization wondering if they are helpless to prevent this threat. However, digital certificates can easily and cost-effectively be used to protect email communications from compromises. Depending upon the type of certificate used to secure your email, organizations can realize a variety of benefits including:

• Ensuring the integrity of communications at rest and in transit
• Confirming to a recipient that the email is from a known sender or email address
• Locking the contents of a message to prevent tampering during transit

Selecting the Right Digital Certificate to Secure Your Email

Selecting a digital certificate to secure email communication depends on the usage and level of security necessary. There are three main considerations when choosing a digital certificate to secure your email.

1. Digital Signing – Emails can be digitally signed so that the recipient can confirm the identity of the sender. Email signing requires a certificate that contains a signing attribute. There are two types of certificates:
   • IDENTITY BASEDCERTIFICATES: Identity-based certificates validate the person who is named in the certificate. The identity of the individual sending the email will be confirmed to the individual receiving the email.
   • S/MIME CERTIFICATES: S/MIME certificates validate the email address that is named in the certificate. The recipient of the email will know that the email came from a validated email account.
2. Non-Repudiation – Email signing, when non-repudiation is needed, requires an identity-based certificate that contains a non-repudiation attribute. Non-repudiation means that when something is signed using an identity-based credential, that signature is legally-binding and cannot be repudiated or refuted.
3. Encryption – Email encryption requires a certificate that contains an encryption attribute. If you have the public key for a recipient, you can also encrypt the contents of the email sent to that individual. Likewise, if you would like others to send you encrypted emails, you will need to share your public key with them before they can send you an encrypted email.

How to Digitally Sign and Encrypt Email

There are two primary components of a digital certificate:

• A public key, used by others, to send encrypted email communications to you
• A private key, used by you, to sign emails and unlock encrypted email communications sent to you

A public key is published and/or exchanged to facilitate email encryption and can be:

• Exchanged via a signed email communication
• Attached to your contact card in your associate’s address book
• Published to a Global Address List (GAL)

Digital signatures are compatible with most enterprise email clients, and most clients can be configured to sign all outgoing mail automatically. It’s relatively easy to standardize company-wide.

When recipients open a digitally signed email, a red ribbon indicates that it’s been signed with the name of the signer. Since the signature was applied using the sender’s certificate and only issued after an identity verification process, the recipient can be confident that the email came from the sender and is not part of a phishing attack.

 

 

HID Global®, a worldwide leader in trusted identity solutions, today announced that it has signed an agreement to acquire the international identity solutions business of De La Rue (LSE:DLAR). The acquisition will broaden HID Global’s leadership position in the government-to-citizen identification market and extend its capabilities.

Through its identity solutions business, De La Rue delivers identity documents and software solutions for governments around the world. It issues secure identity documents for more than 25 countries, with significant market presence in Africa, Asia, Europe, Latin America and the Middle East.

“With complementary products, solutions and services that are highly synergistic with HID Global’s current offerings, De La Rue’s identity solutions business is an excellent strategic fit with our mission to power the trusted identities of the world’s people, places and things,” said Stefan Widing, President and CEO of HID Global. “Customers of both organizations will benefit from the expanded range of e-government solutions that will be offered as a result of the acquisition.”

De La Rue’s identity solutions business excels as a prime solution provider to government departments, working directly with ministries of the interior, immigration departments, police departments, and numerous other government entities and agencies.

The acquisition is subject to regulatory approval and customary closing conditions. The transaction is expected to close by Q3 2019. Financial terms of the agreement are not being publicly disclosed. Following the close, De La Rue’s identity solutions business will become a part of HID’s Citizen Identity Solutions business area, which is led by Jessica Westerouen van Meeteren, Vice President and Managing Director.

The next five years will mark a dramatic enterprise shift toward the edge of networks, where emerging technologies can be harnessed to radically improve user experiences, transform business models, and generate vast revenue opportunities. That’s according to a new book launched today byAruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company.

Opportunity at the Edge: Change, Challenge, and Transformationon the Path to 2025, developed byFast Futurein collaboration with Aruba, reports that edge technologies – those which process and analyze user data where people connect to a network – will revolutionize customer and employee experiences, create more dynamic, responsive, and personalized business models, and even catalyze the growth of entirely new industries. The book also argues that enterprises must embrace fundamental change to realize these opportunities, engaging in widespread strategic, structural, and leadership transformation.

Morten Illum, VP EMEA at Aruba, comments: “The findings in this book highlight the vast commercial potential for enterprises utilizing edge technologies, if companies are willing and able to enact the considerable organizational changes needed. The edge represents a dramatic overhaul in how companies understand, service, and meet the needs of their customers and employees. It will be a world defined by dynamic, immediate, and personalized services.”

Key themes and findings

Commissioned to explore the scale of possibilities presented by edge technologies in the next 3-5 years, the book features insights from 19 leading global CIOs, technology leaders, and industry experts and a perspectives survey of 200 future thinkers from across the globe. It explores the edge technologies that are driving change, the use cases and businesses opportunities these are creating, and the ways in which organizations can adapt to take advantage. Key trends that emerged include:

• The edge of the network holds the key to industry transformation:The edge is designed to enable and capitalize on modern digital experiences at the convergence of people, apps, and things – allowing customer and ecosystem partners to take these actionable insights to then create “experiences” for employees and customers. This is making it possible for businesses and organizations in various industries to leverage data and insights to deliver new and immersive experiences to consumers and end customers. It is driving sectors from education and retail to healthcare and hospitality to rethink how they act today. New types of experiences such as location-aware mobile engagement, digitally assisted patient care, and user-aware meeting rooms can give organizations a competitive advantage.
• One-third of businesses will create edge-enabled mainstream personalization by 2025: The study shows that a clear majority (67%) of respondents believe at least 30% of businesses will be using the edge to create “mainstream personalization” in the next five years. From the classroom to the office, retail stores, and major event venues, edge technologies will enable personalized service delivery that meets growing user expectations of an immediate, customized experience.
• New benefits from the edge will be realized: Other benefits arising include localized products, services, and pricing (52% of respondents), enhanced real-time market insight (50%), improved customer and user satisfaction (48%), and faster product and service innovation (47%).

 Opportunities on the Edge

The edge will create transformative business opportunities for industries in all facets of the economy, using data to understand customers and tailor services to their needs, such as:

• A retailer that can provide custom-made clothing, fitted to your 3D hologram, as the industry evolves to provide an anywhere and everywhere experience;
• A classroom environment that automatically adapts to each student’s comprehension and comfort level, as schools and colleges harness edge technologies to enhance student performance, confidence, and mental wellbeing;
• A hospital that uses IoT monitoring sensors to provide continuous patient reporting at the point of care and real-time diagnosis, enhancing the ability of healthcare professionals to deliver efficient and effective care;
• A workplace with always-on tools, enabling collaboration from any device around the world, as offices evolve to facilitate the same level of access and functionality for employees anywhere in the world.

These shifts will be underpinned by emerging business and revenue models, such as payment by facial recognition or biometrics (highlighted by 70% of survey respondents), commercial application of customer data accumulated via the IoT (67%), hyper-personalized instant offers (63%), demand-driven and location-specific pricing (55%), and subscription models for everyday purchases such as food and clothing (52%).

How enterprises must adapt to take advantage

While the opportunities of the edge are considerable, relatively few companies have moved quickly to embrace them. Simply implementing the technologies will not be enough; companies must rethink their entire business strategy to take advantage of edge opportunities. The book outlines several key changes for enterprises to consider, including:

• Embrace a more progressive, experimental approach: A majority of survey respondents said that a change in business mindset was needed to embrace the concept of edge strategies (64%). This could include accepting autonomous decision-making by edge devices (60%), greater top-level support and leadership for the pursuit of driving smarter experiences (53%), and a willingness to experiment with solution design and business models for edge applications (53%).
• Focus on investment, training, and customer need:There were also calls to more clearly define the customer benefits of edge applications (50%), allocate appropriate investment funds (42%), and provide training in how to spot and specify potential edge applications (45%).
• Address emerging security concerns:Enterprises must address the security challenges of a network hosting many more connected devices. These include the creation of potentially thousands of points of risk exposure across the network (82%), uncertainty over whether a device has been compromised (67%), hacking of voice or biometric security (62%), and concerns that IoT devices and sensors are not being built with security in mind (62%).

Rohit Talwar, CEO at Fast Future, comments: “To access the opportunities of the edge, companies need a mindset shift to drive both structural and strategic change. Leaders must take responsibility for navigating the journey to the edge, working hand in hand with IT to pursue open technology options, and maintaining a consistent dialogue with employees, customers, and other key stakeholders. Focused experiments, with clearly defined goals, proactive project owners, and dedicated resources, are likely to be the best way forward.”

Morten Illum, VP EMEA at Aruba, concludes: “Enterprises should be excited about the edge opportunity, but they should not underestimate the degree of change needed to unlock it – including the implementation of a network infrastructure that is strong and flexible enough to withstand the greater demands edge technologies impose, and the security threats they create. Given the pace and uncertainty of the change ahead, it is also essential to base any edge strategy on an open technology ecosystem that leaves flexibility to adapt and evolve over time.”

To read the full book, visit www.arubanetworks.com/ebook/opportunity-at-the-edge/

Research methodology

The research was commissioned by Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company, and conducted in 2019 by Fast Future. The study used a blended approach drawing on Fast Future’s foresight expertise, targeted secondary research, and in-depth qualitative interviews with 19 global CIOs, technology leaders, industry experts, and futurist thought leaders. The project also undertook a broad survey to test emerging ideas and incorporate additional perspectives from 200 business and technology future thinkers across Fast Future’s global networks.

Manufacturers will more than double multicloud use in the next two years

Nutanix, Inc.(NASDAQ: NTNX), a leader in enterprise cloud computing, today announced the findings of its Enterprise Cloud Index results for the manufacturing sector, measuring manufacturing companies’ plans for adopting private, public and hybrid clouds. The report revealed that the manufacturing industry’s hybrid cloud usage and plans outpace the global average across industries. The deployment of hybrid clouds in manufacturing and production companies has currently reached 19% penetration, slightly ahead of the global average. Moreover, manufacturers plan to more than double their hybrid cloud deployments to 45% penetration in two years; outpacing the global average by 4 percent.

The manufacturing industry is at an “innovation impasse,”[1]  meaning manufacturers have a desire to innovate and drive transformation, but legacy IT systems have the potential to constrain their ability to do so. The opportunity for manufacturers to embrace digitization efforts including “Industry 4.0” initiatives can break the impasse, but executives must focus on new opportunities to create value and not only prioritize traditional business operations. Manufacturing organizations face the constant challenge of trade-offs: they are under pressure to meet current productivity and operational goals in an increasingly global and highly competitive marketplace, but they also need to invest in future growth.

This challenge has created a demand for new technology solutions that can help balance the trade-off between current and future goals. IT leaders in manufacturing must avoid the beaten path of finding short-term fixes for increasing revenue; instead, they should look to long-term solutions that enable automation, enhanced use of data and improvements in customer experience. The Enterprise Cloud Index findings indicate that manufacturing leaders are aggressively adopting new technology to embrace modernization instead of getting left behind with legacy systems. The distributed cloud model offers a solution that delivers speed, flexibility, and localization, allowing manufacturers to improve efficiency without compromising quality.

While 91% of survey respondents reported hybrid cloud as the ideal IT model, today’s global average hybrid cloud penetration level is at 18.5% — the disparity due in part to challenges of transitioning to the hybrid cloud model. Manufacturing industries reported barriers to adopting hybrid cloud that mirrored global roadblocks, including limitations in application mobility, data security/compliance, performance, management and a shortage of IT talent. Compared to other industries, manufacturers reported greater IT talent deficits in AI/ML, hybrid cloud, blockchain, and edge computing/IoT.

Other key findings of the report include:

• 43% of manufacturers surveyed are currently using a traditional data center as their primary IT infrastructure, slightly outpacing the global average of 41%
• However, manufacturers currently use a single public cloud service more often than any other industry.20% of manufacturing companies reported using a single cloud service, compared to the global average of 12% — a testament to the fact that manufacturers are starting to turn to the cloud as a solution, given that they deal with legacy IT systems and cannot handle workloads on-prem.
• Manufacturers are also advancing the movement to private cloud: 56% of manufacturers surveyed said that theyrun enterprise applications in a private cloud, outpacing the global average by 7%.
• Manufacturers are struggling to control cloud spend.One motivation for deploying hybrid clouds is enterprises’ need to gain control over their IT spend. Organizations that use public cloud spend 26% of their annual IT budget on public cloud, with this percentage predicted to increase to 35% in two years’ time. Most notable, however, is that more than a third (36%) of organizations using public clouds said their spending has exceeded their budgets.
• Manufacturers chose security and compliance slightly more often than companies in other industries as the top factor in deciding where to run workloads: while 31% of respondents across all industries and geographies named security and compliance as the number one decision criterion, 34% of manufacturing organizations chose security and compliance as the top factor.

The bullish outlook for hybrid cloud adoption globally and across industries is reflective of an IT landscape growing increasingly automated and flexible enough that enterprises have the choice to buy, build, or rent their IT infrastructure resources based on fast transforming application requirements.

“Manufacturers are investing in modernizing their IT stack, and adopting industry 4.0 solutions to keep up with ever-changing business demands in areas like production and supply chain management,” said Chris Kozup, SVP of Global Marketing at Nutanix. “A hybrid cloud infrastructure gives manufacturers a fresh approach to modernizing legacy applications and services, enabling manufacturing IT leaders to focus on their long-term investments in big data, IoT, and next-generation enterprise applications. While the manufacturing industry is still facing obstacles in transitioning to multi-cloud use, this study shows us that manufacturing organizations are ready to accelerate growth and take the lead in IT innovation in the future.”

To create this report, Nutanix commissioned Vanson Bourne to survey more than 2,300 IT decision makers, including 337 worldwide manufacturing and production organizations, about where they are running their business applications today, where they plan to run them in the future, what their cloud challenges are and how their cloud initiatives stack up against other IT projects and priorities. The survey included respondents from multiple industries, business sizes and geographies in the Americas; Europe, the Middle East, Africa (EMEA); and Asia-Pacific and Japan (APJ) regions.

 

By: Danny Allan, Vice President, Product Strategy, Veeam

 

It’s been a little over a year since the European Commission(EC) made its hotly anticipated General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) enforceable on May 25, 2018. 

 

There has been a tremendous amount of fear, uncertainty and doubt surrounding GDPR since its introduction. But it is time for the conversation to evolve beyond the noise and into the next level of discussion.

 

Over the course of the past year, the regulation, which replaced its predecessor the Data Protection Directive from 1995, has displayed two key characteristics: it’s both specific and has teeth. 

 

The impact of these characteristics is that data privacy is now recognized globally, similar to the way basic human rights are considered. Not only should any business that processes data want to respect GDPR, but they are now required by the EU to do so. This can be viewed as forward momentum, and a success for the technology industry. Technology is unable to reach its full potential until consumers have the trust required in the security and privacy associated with their data.

 

Data privacy gets specific

One of GDPR’s most virtuous traits is that it is specific. It’s clear about who it serves, who it applies to, what it enforces and what the penalties for failure to do so are. As a result of this, people are increasingly viewing data privacy as a basic human right, akin to freedom of speech. 

 

The reason for this step-change is that GDPR has given us both individual and organizational awareness. The same as the tragic events of 9/11 gave us locked cockpit doors, GDPR has led to specific, fundamental changes in the way data privacy is managed, regulated and reported.

 

According to official EC figures, there have been over 95,000 GDPR complaints made by citizens, which demonstrates that individuals now have higher awareness levels of whether their data rights are being disrespected. An additional figure revealsa heightened sense of understanding from businesses, with 41,000 self-reported breach notifications.

 

Other tangible impacts that can be traced back to GDPR are a decline in the use of third–party website tracking cookies, andan increasing mistrust within the marketing supply chain. TheReuters Institute for the Study of Journalism reported a 22% drop in the use of cookies three months after the introduction of GDPR, while publishers, ad-tech firms and agencies are rewriting contracts to avoid being implicated by data breaches.

 

So, just like locked cockpit doors increase the safety of air travel without negatively affecting the overall experience of flying, the impacts of GDPR have been invisible, but significant. Cisco research has found that 75% of customers are realising broader benefits from their privacy investments, citing better agility and innovation resulting from better data management.

 

GDPR bares its teeth

One of the most notable reasons that GDPR caused the stir that it did outside of the data privacy and corporate legal fields, is the hefty penalty for failure to comply. The EC has the authority to fine organizations €20 million, or 4% of theirglobal revenue — whichever is higher — if they are proven to have breached a single line of the regulation.

 

What’s more, data privacy regulators have enforced these measures with EC figures accounting for 91 reported fines within eight months of GDPR being enforced. 

 

The most infamous of these financial penalties was issued by the French National Data Protection Commission, fining Google a massive €50 million in January 2019. German authorities have also handed out over 40 smaller fines for GDPR violations.

 

As well as financial sanctions, which can be crippling for smaller organizations with shallower pockets than the world’s largest data processors, there is a subtler deterrent at work: reputational damage. As data privacy becomes increasingly seen as a basic civil liberty, organizations of all sizes really cannot afford the stigma associated with abusing that right.

 

What’s next for GDPR?

There won’t be a radical shift from a regulatory perspective in the next year. Simply put, GDPR is working. The result is that we can expect more of the same from data privacy regulators: more fines, harsher penalties and further efforts to expose incompliance. 

 

One interesting area to watch is whether the types of conversations GDPR is forcing CIOs to have will lead to repercussions at a global level; particularly when it comes to data privacy practices in countries such as China and the USA. 

 

We will continue to see the EC flex its data privacy muscles, but we’ll also see a shift in the way organizations use personal data. Data is the lifeblood of businesses in the digital era, despite examples of some firms taking a radical stance on GDPR and deleting entire user databases.

 

Data collected today can be mined for insight tomorrow, and used to create better user experiences, develop products which address genuine market needs and reward customers for loyalty. As user awareness increases, tolerance towards organizations who are seen to be collecting, but not respecting data, will get lower. 

 

Therefore, organizations that fail to get to grips with data privacy, making privacy part of its corporate culture, will face a backlash from customers, as well as draconian punishments from regulators. At Veeam, we believe that data privacy and protection should not be viewed as a box-ticking exercise, or something you just do because you must.

 

Becoming GDPR-compliant is an ongoing journey, and success should not be viewed as not being fined, or worse yet, getting away with something. Organizations must take pride in understanding, managing and protecting their data. Compliance is just one step on the way to becoming a data-driven business, which is constantly looking for new ways to leverage information to create better products, services and experiences for customers.