Data Foundry Blog - Insights

These days, companies cannot grow successfully without planning an IT infrastructure strategy. If that infrastructure fails, the company fails. It seems that most organizations are coming to the conclusion that a hybrid cloud model is the best option. According to the 451 Alliance, around 70% of organizations are currently using a multi-cloud model. RightScale’s 2016 State of the Cloud Report shows similar results with 71% of companies using a hybrid cloud model. Adoption of a hybrid cloud model increased by roughly 12% year over year.

A massive DDoS attack on DNS provider Dyn last Friday resulted in limited or no access for many users on major websites and platforms such as Twitter, Pardot, Spotify, New York Times, Netflix, SoundCloud and other popular websites. (Learn more about DNS in our ICANN article.) The attack was conducted using a self-replicating botnet called Mirai to infect devices connected to the Internet. Tens of millions of IP addresses were associated with the attack. This is not the first time a DNS network has fallen under attack – NSI experienced a massive, combination DDoS attack back in May that involved simple volumetric attacks to complex DNS lookup attacks.

In a previous blog, we talked about assessing the need for cyber insurance. If your company has decided to seek coverage for cybercrime, these ten questions will help you through the rigorous process of finding the right policy based on your company’s needs and vulnerabilities.

Many of our customers have come to us with questions about HIPAA-compliant cloud storage. There’s a lot of marketing rhetoric online about HIPAA-certified Cloud Service Providers (CSPs) and other types of certified providers for that matter. First of all, there is no such thing as an official HIPAA certification. The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), the organization that enforces HIPAA, does not provide HIPAA certifications, nor does it require them. This doesn’t mean that a CSP cannot be HIPAA-compliant, only that HHS does not guarantee their compliance. Also, no matter what type of certification a CSP claims to have, compliance is ultimately up to you, the “covered entity” or health services provider.

According to IDG Research, costs associated with ransomware totaled $209 million in the first quarter of this year alone. One factor contributing to the rapid increase in ransomware and DDoS threats for ransom (also known as ransom DoS or RDos) is that people and companies are paying these ransoms, allowing cyber criminals to establish a steady stream of income. What would your company do if faced with a DDoS or ransomware threat? Here are four good reasons paying up shouldn’t be an option.

In a 2015 survey by Raytheon and the Ponemon Institute, only 22% of participants said that their organization’s IT leadership briefs the board on cybersecurity strategy. Furthermore, only 14% say that their organization’s security leader has a direct reporting relationship with the CEO. In a separate poll by PwC, one-third of corporate board directors said they aren’t sufficiently or at all engaged in overseeing/understanding the company’s annual IT budget, which is an important component of cyberattack prevention. Here’s why it’s past time to get the board on board with cyberattack prevention and how to get started.

This year has been hectic for the airline industry with three major airlines suffering computer outages since January: Delta, Southwest and JetBlue. Computer outages, or downtime, can cost major corporations several thousands of dollars by the minute. Southwest Airlines CEO Gary Kelly admitted their recent outage will cost the company between $28 and $54 million. As IT people, we at Data Foundry understand everything that can break will, at some point or another. However, we took a look (as good of a look as an outsider can take) into the costs and causes of these recent outages, and our experts had a few thoughts on how these catastrophic events may have been prevented.

There are a number of best practices data center operators should follow to maintain the ideal environment for IT equipment, such as monitoring humidity levels and atmospheric corrosion, replacing dust filters in a timely manner, using chemical filtration systems, limiting foot traffic and using tak mats or sticky mats. In addition to following these best practices, data center operators should conduct an annual contamination assessment and do a thorough cleaning to ensure that data center clean room standards are met.

Unstructured data is growing exponentially year after year with the advanced capabilities of modern devices. These devices generate mass quantities of emails, images and audio and video files. Growing pools of unstructured data become difficult to organize, manage and search. This is where object storage comes in. Object storage is ideal for organizing, managing and searching through high volumes (200 TB+) of diverse and unstructured data. Object storage platforms also give companies the ability to start making sense of the big data they have at hand and extract insights that aid in the development of business goals.

Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks have continued to escalate year after year, and this year was no exception. Attacks have increased 125% since 2015. Source and target countries have shifted. Ransom as a motive has increased and attackers are getting smarter. See our DDoS infographic to gain an understanding of how DDoS attacks have grown and evolved from 2015 to 2016. Our infographic is based on a compilation of DDoS and network security reports from Radware, Akamai and Neustar.