I interview Colin Hayes, F5 Business Development Manager for Global Services to discuss F5's Exchange Migration Service.
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I catch up with Jeff Bellamy, F5 Director of Business Development, to talk about the F5 – Microsoft relationship, where Exchange ranks with all the different applications BIG-IP helps deliver and just how easy it is to deploy Exchange with F5's iApps.
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As always, I show you how to find the F5 booth at a Trade Show. This time, it’s the Microsoft Exchange Conference from Orlando FL. On hiatus for a decade, MEC 2012 is dubbed The Lost Conference and along with finding F5 Booth 15, I also show off the new F5 Security and Speed – No Compromises T-shirts that we’re giving away. Join us for a week of MS Exchange solutions.
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From Cars to Clouds, The Hybrids are Here
Hybrid has even made it’s way into our IT terminology with hybrid cloud and hybrid infrastructures. There are Public Clouds, those cloud services that are available to the general public over the internet; Private (Internal or Corporate) Clouds, which provides cloud hosted services to an authorized group of people in a secure environment; Hybrid Clouds, which is a combo of at least one public cloud and one private cloud; and, what I think will become the norm, a Hybrid Infrastructure or Hybrid IT, where there is a full mix of in-house corporate resources, dedicated servers, virtual servers, cloud services and possibly leased raised floor – resources are located anywhere data can live, but not necessarily all-cloud.
This past June, North Bridge Venture Partners announced the results of its second annual Future of Cloud Computing Survey which noted that companies are growing their trust in cloud solutions, with 50% of respondents confident that cloud solutions are viable for mission critical business applications. At the same time, scalability remains the top reason for adopting the cloud, with 57% of companies identifying it as the most important driver for cloud adoption. Business agility ranked second, with 54% of respondents focused on agility. They also noted that cloud users are changing their view with regard to public vs. hybrid cloud platforms. Today, 40% of respondents’ are deploying public cloud strategies, with 36 percent emphasizing a hybrid approach and within five years, hybrid clouds will be the emphasis of 52% of respondents’ cloud strategies. Most respondents (53%) believe that cloud computing maintains a lower TCO and creates a less complex IT.
Earlier this year, CIO.com ran a story called, Forget Public Cloud or Private Cloud, It's All About Hyper-Hybrid, where they discussed that as more organizations adopt cloud services, both public and private, for mission critical business operations, connecting, integrating and orchestrating the data back to the core of the business is critical but a challenge. It’s no longer about cloud but it’s about clouds. Multiple cloud services that must link back to the core and to each other. Even when organizations that are cloud heavy, IT shops need to keep up the on-premise side as well, since it's not likely to go anywhere soon. They offer 5 attributes that, if relevant to a business problem, the cloud is a potential fit: Predictable pricing, Ubiquitous network access, Resource pooling & location independence, Self-service and Elasticity of supply.
If you are heading in the Hybrid direction, then take a look at BCW’s article from April this year called, Hybrid Cloud Adoption Issues Are A Case In Point For The Need For Industry Regulation Of Cloud Computing. They discuss that the single most pressing issue with hybrid cloud is that it is never really yours which obviously leads to security concerns. Even when a ‘private cloud’ is hosted by a third party, 100% control is still impossible since an organizations is still relying on ‘others’ for certain logistics. Plus, interoperability is not guaranteed. So a true hybrid is actually hard to achieve with security and interoperability issues still a concern. The fix? Vladimir Getov suggests a regulatory framework that would allow cloud subscribers to undergo a risk assessment prior to data migration, helping to make service providers accountable and provide transparency and assurance. He also mentions the IEEE's Cloud Computing Initiative with the goal of creating some cloud standards. He states that a global consensus on regulation and standards will increase trust and lower the risk to organizations when precious data is in someone else’s hands. The true benefits of the cloud will then be realized.
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Technorati Tags: F5, cloud computing, Pete Silva, security, business, technology,ieee,cloud, compliance, regulations,silva, virtualization,dynamic data center,cloud broker,hybrid cloud,architecture,compliance,security,policy,blog
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The BIG-IP® Edge Client™ for all Android 4.x (Ice Cream Sandwich) or later devices secures and accelerates mobile device access to enterprise networks and applications using SSL VPN and optimization technologies. Access is provided as part of an enterprise deployment of F5 BIG-IP® Access Policy Manager™, Edge Gateway™, or FirePass™ SSL-VPN solutions.
BIG-IP® Edge Client™ for all Android 4.x (Ice Cream Sandwich) Devices Features:
BEFORE YOU DOWNLOAD OR USE THIS APPLICATION YOU MUST AGREE TO THE EULA HERE:
http://www.f5.com/apps/android-help-portal/eula.html
BEFORE YOU CONTACT F5 SUPPORT, PLEASE SEE:
http://support.f5.com/kb/en-us/solutions/public/2000/600/sol2633.html
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Right off the bat, I know the title sounds like it’s all connected but they are only slightly related so I’ll give you the option of dropping out now. Still here? Cool. I’ve been traveling over the last couple weeks and stories catch my eye along the way that I probably would’ve written about but didn’t. Until now. Besides it’s always fun to roll up a few stories in one to get back on track.
TV’s are becoming cutting edge multimedia devices that reside on your living room wall. You can stream movies, browse the web, check weather, plug in USBs for slideshows/video, play games, home network along with simply catching the latest episode of your favorite program. This article from usatoday.com talks about many of the internet enabled TVs and their capabilities. For instance, some TVs are now including dual-core processors to make web browsing more enjoyable since many TVs don’t have the processing power to load web pages quickly, or at least what we’re used to on our computers. Also coming out are TVs with screen resolutions four times greater than full HD screens – these are the 4K sets. These new 4K sets apparently has dampened any lingering 3D enthusiasm, which seems waning anyway. In addition to TVs, other appliances are getting smart, so they say. There are new refrigerators, air conditioners, washers, and dryers which are all app-controlled. Users can turn them on and off from anywhere. I know there are mobile ‘apps’ but it would be a easy transition to start calling our appliances, apps also. Close enough. How’s the clothes cleaning app working? Is the food cooling app running? I’ve mentioned many times that while all this is very cool stuff, we still need to remember that these devices are connected to the internet and subject to the same threats as all our other connected devices. It’s only a matter of time when a hacker takes down all the ‘smart’ refrigerators on the East Coast. I also think that TVs, cars and any other connected device could be considered BYOD in the near future. Why wouldn’t a mobile employee want secure VDI access from his car’s Ent/GPS display? Why couldn’t someone check their corporate email from the TV during commercials?
Smartphones, as most of you are aware, are changing our lives. Duh. There is an interesting series over on cnn.com called, "Our Mobile Society," about how smartphones and tablets have changed the way we live. The first two articles, How smartphones make us superhuman and On second thought: Maybe smartphones make us 'SuperStupid'? cover both sides of the societal dilemma. In 2011, there were 6 Billion mobile phone subscriptions worldwide servicing the 7 Billion people who live on this planet, according to the International Telecommunication Union. These connected devices have made trivia, trivial and we can keep in constant contact with everyone along with people driving, texting and generally not paying attention to anything around them while interacting with their appendage. Pew also released a survey indicating that 54% of cell phone consumers who use mobile apps have decided not to install an app after learning how much personal information they'd have to share; and 30% of that group has uninstalled an app for privacy reasons. We are so concerned about our privacy that we’re now dumping apps that ask for too much info. I know there is a ‘We all have one & use it everyday day but don’t look, ok’ joke somewhere in there.
To Educate or Not Educate. I have no idea why I only saw this recently but back in July, there was a lively discussion about whether security awareness training for employees was money well spent. I’ve often written about the importance of ongoing training. In Why you shouldn't train employees for security awareness, Dave Aitel argues that even with all that training, employees still click malicious links anyway. Instead of wasting money on employee training, organizations should bolster up their system’s defenses to protect employees from themselves. Boris Sverdlik of Jaded Security posted a rebuttal saying that employees are and should be accountable for what happens in the environment and no amount of controls can protect against people spilling secrets during a social engineering probe. In a rebuttal to both, Iftach Ian Amit, from Security Art says they are both right and wrong at the same time. He states, ‘Trying to solve infosec issues through technological means is a guaranteed recipe for failure. No one, no technology, or software can account for every threat scenario possible, and this is exactly why we layer our defenses. And layering shouldn’t just be done from a network or software perspective – security layers also include access control, monitoring, tracking, analysis, and yes – human awareness. Without the human factor you are doomed.’ His position is that when it comes to ‘Information Security,’ we focus too much on the ‘information’ part and less on the holistic meaning of ‘security.’ His suggestion is to look at your organization as an attacker would and invest in areas that are vulnerable. That’s your basic risk analysis and risk mitigation.
We are in a fun time for technology, enjoy and use wisely.
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