July 2017 – Sungard AS Avail IE

Managing Risk and Mastering Change with IT Consulting

By Sungard AS Ireland | July 21, 2017

As Senior Vice President of Consulting, Mike Threlfall talks about the role consultants can play in reducing risks and taking on the forces of change.

Q: What IT trends make consulting services more important than ever to customers now?

Mike: With recent security incidents, customers are now more focused on building an appropriate response to cyber risks, and we’re seeing that across the world. Another trend driving the need for consulting is digital transformation, where organisations are trying to respond to the increasing digitization of the global business landscape.

In both cases, they’re looking for insight into how other companies approached similar situations—what worked badly, what worked well—to help them decide the best course of action. Quite often, they don’t have that type of experience inhouse, so that’s why the injection of outside consulting services is important.

We provide advisory services around business resilience and continuity, risk management and infrastructure transformation. To help customers formulate an appropriate response if a security incident occurs, we assess their overall infrastructure and security processes from top to bottom, then run crisis simulations, coaching individual executives and teams about how to respond effectively, while maintaining a programme of ongoing vigilance.

When it comes to digital transformation, we assist customers in figuring out how to adapt their infrastructure technology and IT services to effectively support and enable the required change. We can also go on to develop, manage and implement an IT transformation programme to enable digital business services.

Q: Where are most companies in the digital transformation process?

Mike: In some industries, such as banking, retail and telecom, the more traditional Internet and mobile-based digital channels and their breadth through the value chain is relatively mature. In other sectors, such as manufacturing, transportation and logistics and construction, digital uptake is much lower.

For public sector, digital government services are leading the way. But, without doubt, the long period of austerity has held back developments. The paradox here is that digital transformation is a survival imperative for both local government services and the NHS in their current form. An aging and growing population and continued austerity require solutions to drive lower costs, while retaining citizen intimacy. However, it remains to be seen if investments and funding models will appear in the near term to enable the necessary large-scale changes required.

The next waves of the Internet of Things (IoT), machine learning and artificial intelligence (AI) with business analytic integration across the piece, are well underway. The enhanced relevance of these technological advances across industrial, construction, manufacturing, transportation and logistics and healthcare sectors, as well as their relevance to more mainstream digital protagonists, is undoubtedly fueling a massive drive for digital transformation.

The plethora of newly established positions, such as digital directors, heads of digital and other associated roles are evidence that, whilst this wave is still immature, traction is rapidly growing; with ecosystems of partners evolving driving proof of concept developments running alongside more traditional and business as usual technical environments.

So, digital maturity levels vary significantly across sectors and individual companies, but the rate of change and digital transformation across all sectors is ramping up massively. The difference is really just a matter of their starting point and target business outcomes. However, the magnitude and speed of digital transformation is also heavily intertwined with factors, such as investment appetite and economic uncertainty.

Q: How are other market forces creating a greater need for consulting services?

Mike: The wider acceptance of hyperscale cloud and the next waves of digital transformation incorporating IoT, machine learning, AI and associated business analytics are all increasing the demand for consulting engagements. Customers want to exploit the scope, price and competitiveness of hyperscale platforms, but need help figuring out which workloads and services to deploy in that environment.

They also want to understand and exploit the business benefits from the latest developments in digital technologies, but, again, they need assistance in defining business outcomes and developing the infrastructure and services to enable their digital services, including where hyperscale cloud plays within this context.

We have a modular set of transformation services that start with defining a cloud strategy, then surveying and documenting the application landscape to discover the business-critical characteristics of those applications, as well as their infrastructure dependencies, level of maturity, architectural, technical and commercial readiness.

Next, we map those applications and business services to the appropriate platforms. They can be hyperscale in the cloud or run in different types of hosted or physical environments, depending on the needs of a particular business service or application. We really don’t find any customers who have a requirement that fits entirely into any one of those platforms because we’re dealing with hybrid infrastructures today that have to run in harmony. We can then implement the infrastructure changes for them, assessing and remediating any availability and security risks as we do so.

Q: How do you help customers manage the challenges of IoT?

Mike: The number and hyper-connectivity of devices, including sensors and edge devices sitting alongside more traditional technology forms, is set to explode. This is creating an unprecedented amount of data that customers need to capture, transmit, store, secure, backup and recover. They also need to analyse it to turn the data into useful information, then deliver it to those in the organisations who need it to do things differently, better, faster and cheaper.

We’re working with one aviation customer who is aiming to automate resource scheduling, such as those required for refueling, based on real-time information about when planes land. So, they are stitching a lot of different pieces of data together from many different sources, including sensors, to make smarter decisions and increase efficiency.

That style of real-time access is being considered for all areas of commerce now, which is driving the need for specific consulting around infrastructure architectures to support IoT and business analysis platforms, data storage, backup, recovery and data security.

As smart devices collect large volumes of different data types and connect back into corporate resources and networks, they create the need for architectures and integration to support “real time” data transmission and access performance requirements, along with appropriate storage, backup and recovery solutions for large data files, such as images and videos, as well as small log file type data.

Invariably the ecosystem to support such services expands, requiring the appropriate service integration of providers to assure service quality. Further, with lots of extra entry points where threats can get in, companies need to determine how IoT affects their risk and security stance and what they can do to minimise additional exposures. Sungard AS consultants can help our clients assess their current environment and readiness and create appropriate strategies. They can assist customers in realising those strategies to cover all these areas in terms of people, process and technology.

Q: What makes Sungard AS different in the consulting area?

Mike: First of all, when it comes to technology, we are impartial. If you went to another vendor, you could be pushed to a specific technology, platform or partner solution—whether overtly or not. Customers also get to work with seasoned experts, with a deep competency in the areas of business resilience and continuity, risk, infrastructure transformation and security.

We also have proven methodologies in areas of business resilience, continuity and risk, and responsibility for success pervades the whole organisation. With that in mind, we take a holistic approach, often starting with the most senior customer executives. With our heritage in protective services, we speak the language of both business and IT and can act as an effective integrator of the two.

Within the context of infrastructure transformation, we have a proven modular methodology, flexible enough to accommodate an agile approach and minimum viable solution concepts to deliver benefits more rapidly. As you can also imagine, our protective services heritage and proven and risk-managed migration methodology gives clients confidence as we migrate them from their current to their target mode of operation.

Within our cloud and infrastructure practice, we also address the growing skills gap in delivering and supporting digital developments. We offer residency services to augment our clients’ internal staffs, so that they can move forward with digital – enabling infrastructure transformation. We also offer post-implementation residency for knowledge transfer about their new infrastructure and IT services.

And finally, we’ve got a very solid track record, backed by an impressive set of customer references.

Q: Is there anything on the horizon that’s going to make it even more imperative to engage a consultant?

Mike: Concerns around the security of internet-facing services, and the increasing interconnection of services, will still be a challenge. As more IT services are connected between companies, it will change the way your organisation needs to think about your IT, because it’s no longer your IT, it’s in a much wider world.

So, the old-fashioned notion of building a fortress IT shop went away a while ago, but I think there are still plenty of organisations that haven’t really figured out how that impacts them.

Compliance regulations will also influence how organisations handle, protect and profit from data, and I don’t think many appreciate just how intrusive those regulations are likely to be. For example, although the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is a European law, it applies worldwide wherever your company is based. Regulators are operating behind the curve, given the pace of technology innovation that we are currently experiencing. I expect to see a raft of new regulatory requirements appear, both broadly and within sectors over the medium term, some of which are likely to have quite profound implications.

When it comes to the digital technology revolution, there are no signs of slowing pace. Current waves will mature and newer ones, such as those in the areas of robotics and digital currency, will start to mature and emerge.

So, in the future, I think there will continue to be technologically driven change and new risks and regulations for customers to deal with, but there will also continue to be tremendous opportunities.

Find out more about how Sungard AS IT Consulting Services can help your organisation.

To help strengthen your security stance, check out our free Risk and Resilience in 2017 webinar.

Shedding tears over WannaCry

By Sungard AS Ireland | July 21, 2017

By Michael Smith CEH, SSCP, CISSP

As I am sure you will be aware, on 12 May, organisations worldwide were hit by the WannaCry cyberattack, which crippled over 200,000 computers in more than 150 countries worldwide. At the time of going to press, the repercussions are still being felt. The global attack involves ransomware being installed on machines and encrypting them, with an average payment of around $675 in bitcoin demanded to decrypt the files^[1].

E-mail is the number one delivery vehicle for ransomware, accounting for 31% of attacks^[2]

Highlighting the importance of security awareness training for employees, machines became infected after a computer on a network opened an infected attachment contained in a ‘phishing’ e-mail. This contained a worm that proceeded to encrypt the machine, as well as infecting other machines on the network. The encryption occurred too fast for security software to catch it in many cases. The attack caught many off guard, and highlighted the flaws in several enterprises’ technology estates.

The WannaCry worm, created using stolen National Security Agency (NSA) cyber-offensive tools, exploited a fault in Windows Operating Systems between Windows XP and all Windows Operating Systems up to, but not including Windows 10. Although the fault was known to Microsoft, and a patch issued, many had not installed the patch.

Victims included the UK’s National Health Service, Russia’s Ministry of Interior, China government agencies, the Deutsche Bahn railway company, car manufacturers Nissan Motor Co. and Renault, PetroChina, logistics giant FedEx and other company and hospital computer systems in countries from Eastern Europe to the US and Asia. Russia and Ukraine appear to have had the heaviest concentration of infections.

The attack was finally halted in the UK when a 22-year-old cybersecurity researcher took control of an Internet domain that appears to have acted as a kill switch for the worm’s propagation. But there are concerns that the code will simply be rewritten, removing this initial flaw.

Why did this occur?

As explained in an AVAIL article last autumn, ransomware is big business, with payouts costing organisations over $1bn in 2016^[3] – a figure that is sure to rise this year with the impact of WannaCry. However, the attack was able to spread so quickly because many enterprises had not patched or upgraded their systems and lacked effective cyber defence capabilities.

Microsoft had released a patch in early 2017 to address the Windows loophole the NSA discovered, but many organisations had not installed it. This is not uncommon and is usually due to the cost and complexity of upgrading or, in some cases, ignorance of the risks involved in not staying up-to-date with patches. The public sector is particularly vulnerable in this regard due to the sheer size of their IT estates and underinvestment in many cases.

In Britain, the NHS was particularly badly hit because it faces a constant funding conflict between allocating scarce resources to patient care and spending on IT systems. Consequently, many hospitals have been using a version of Windows that is no longer supported by Microsoft, leaving them wide open to attack.

Many Sungard AS Managed Services clients subscribe to our patch management service and we advise them which upgrades they should install but for those customers who contract only colocation services this is their responsibility alone. (Sungard AS would never make any changes to a customer’s equipment – such as installing patches – without an express instruction to do so as while this could fix one problem, it could cause a host of others).

In some cases, a Disaster Recovery solution could potentially offer a means to mitigate the impact of ransomware attacks – in the event of an attack, one could simply restore a ‘clean’ version from backup. But that is more complex than it sounds. It is possible that malware could have been in the system for some time, dormant before an activation signal. In those cases, it would make restoring very difficult as the malicious software could be present in backups.

Added to this, any backup and recovery solution is just one piece of the puzzle, together with risk mitigation and resilience planning as part of a wider cybersecurity solution.

Danger has not passed

WannaCry appears to have been halted, almost by accident. But there are likely to be other, more sophisticated ransomware attacks. We have already seen the next global ransomware outbreak – known as NotPetya, Petrwap or a variant of Petya – spread rapidly across the UK, Europe, Russia and India and it seems unlikely that will be the end of it. The danger has not passed.

This suggests that ransomware protection and other types of cyber security will become a greater concern for many C-Level executives, at least in the short term (although the cyberthreat will never go away).

What you can do about the ransomware threat

With any kind of cyberattack, cybercriminals will typically go for the easiest targets first so efforts should focus on prevention. Possibly the most important advice I can give is to implement a Defence in Depth approach to security in which you don’t place your faith in any single technique or technology but put multiple layers of both proactive and reactive security controls in place to eliminate information security vulnerabilities.

So here are some proactive measures all organisations should follow to guard against attack:

The first line of defence against infection

Network edge (‘perimeter’) security to eliminate threats at the perimeter, the best location to eliminate the vast majority of attacks, with Managed Firewall Service, Managed Intrusion Prevention Services and Two Factor Authentication.
Operating system layer security such as Managed File Integrity Monitoring and Host-Based Intrusion Detection Services.
Update obsolete operating systems
Patch management services for infrastructure devices within the data centre. This includes devices under Sungard AS management such as servers, network devices, security devices and some applications.
Conduct Information Security Assessments, Vulnerability Assessments and regular penetration testing to assess the effectiveness of your defences.
Adopt a virtual desktop environment for remote devices
Implement specialist email filtering services to clean out malicious attachments and URLs
Block users from installing unauthorised applications and ensure applications are managed centrally
Disable macro scripts from office files transmitted over email
Implement proxy internet access, mail relays and mail scrubbing to form a barrier between an internal network and the open internet. Proxy servers intercept requests for internet pages from users within the network and perform various chores to protect the network, improving performance and enforcing company web use policies.
Segregate networks through the use of a Demilitarised Zone (DMZ) that separates your internal local area network (LAN) from other untrusted networks, usually the internet. External-facing servers, resources and services are located in the DMZ so they are accessible from the internet but the rest of the internal LAN remains unreachable. This provides an additional layer of security to the LAN as it restricts the ability of hackers to directly access internal servers and data via the Internet.
Application layer security – Install robust firewalls including Web Application Firewalls and monitor these to ensure they stay current and able to withstand the latest threats
Backup regularly and verify the integrity of those backups. Ensure they are not connected to the computers and networks they are backing up. Ideally, data should be held securely in a resilient, geographically separate location.

The second line of defence – detecting infection

On an ongoing basis through Managed File Integrity Monitoring Services, SIEM, Managed Intrusion Detection Systems and Incident Response Services.

Third line – mitigate losses

Managed Backup and Recovery Services – Crisis-driven decisions worsen the impact so prepare for a potential incident in advance and put plans to the test. Remember to think beyond technology and address the people and process aspects of your plan. For example:
Specify who is responsible for each step of the response, whether it’s someone in-house or a third party.
If your business involves e-commerce, have a ‘Plan B’ in place to keep orders flowing.
Plan your communication strategy – who needs to be notified and when.

While we have focused on technical security measures above, don’t forget to educate your people who will otherwise become the weak links in the chain:

Draw up an Information Security Policy and ensure it is rigorously adhered to
Create an education programme for users explaining the risks posed by inadequate defences, the threats faced by organisations and their responsibility to prevent breaches
Insist on strong password controls for users but, importantly, for System Admin too. No users should be assigned administrative access unless absolutely necessary and, for this reason, do not use the same Admin passwords on servers as for users, a common mistake. Escalation of privileges is one of the first steps to compromise a network so strictly limit access.
Adhere to basic security doctrines such as allowing users to see only the information necessary to do their jobs.

If this sounds like a daunting To Do list, remember Sungard Availability Services’ cybersecurity and resilience experts can help. To find out more, call us on 0800 143 413 or email avail@sungardas.com.

About the author

Mike Smith has spent over 30 years in IT, 24 of which have been spent with Sungard Availability Services. During this time, he has provided hands-on communications support; post and pre-sales support for both systems and communications and has been manager of both pre-sales support, technical support groups and worked extensively as a Senior Product Development Manager.

He is currently a Solutions Architect specialising in Security Services for Sungard AS. This position involves matching customer requirements to solution sets or product offerings with the emphasis on getting the balance right between cost and functionality and selecting the right suppliers.

^[1]http://www.symantec.com/content/en/us/enterprise/media/security_response/whitepapers/ISTR2016_Ransomware_and_Businesses.pdf

^[2] Osterman Research

^[3] https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/ransomware-cost-businesses-1bn-in/

^[4] https://www.trendmicro.com/vinfo/us/security/news/cybercrime-and-digital-threats/by-the-numbers-ransomware-rising

Latest Webinars: ‘Combat Cyber Crime’ and ‘Risk & Resilience’

By Sungard AS Ireland | July 21, 2017

Webinars provide a wealth of information. Don’t miss out on the valuable, free resource that are Sungard Availability Services webinars!

Here are two new webinars currently available on demand.

Top building blocks to combat cyber crime

The highly informative ‘Top building blocks to combat cyber crime’ is presented by Sungard AS solutions architect Michael Smith in conjunction with Richard Cassidy, UK cyber security evangelist at Sungard AS partner Alert Logic.

Watch the webinar

Risk & Resilience in 2017

In ‘Risk & Resilience in 2017’, Chris Butler, principal cyber & information security consultant for Sungard AS, looks specifically at the current risks to businesses, the threat landscape and the importance of resilience. He explains how cyber resilience is more than just cyber security and explores what companies need to do to become and stay resilient.

Watch the webinar

New webinars will continue to be added throughout the year so visit the Sungard AS webinar page regularly to keep yourself up-to-date on today’s burning issues.

Little Book of IT paints challenging picture of CIO life

By Sungard AS Ireland | July 21, 2017

The research and benchmarking contained in our Little Book of IT provides both solace and insight into our IT profession. The solace is that you are not alone in the fight to create an effective, efficient and ever-transforming IT estate. And the insight is in showing the nuances of IT strategies, and how your peers and competitors face their obstacles and challenges.

Some readers will find that the research results offer validation that their IT strategy is on the right path. Others will gain insights about emerging issues that aren’t yet on their radar. This study is designed to prompt internal debate and inspire examination of the ways in which IT services can be delivered. How does your organisation compare to the research findings? What is the balance of budget and staffing investments in innovation versus legacy infrastructure? Is your IT function on a different path than the majority of the market — and if so, can you justify that path given the uniqueness of your business model?

It’s important to ask the right questions within your organisation. With data from this survey providing a baseline understanding of what your peers and competitors are doing across many aspects of IT, the Little Book of IT may help you gain insights that support a stronger foundation for decisions. The results highlighted in this global survey include insights in the coming year into how decision-makers invest and innovate, where they allocate IT budget and staffing resources, and which technologies they adopt, as well as their organisational priorities and business drivers.

Modernisation headaches

One of the key findings speaks to a constantly discussed challenge: the pain of transformation and modernisation headaches. In this age of IT disruption — where digital technologies are transforming how, where and when business gets done — the speed at which we can embrace those technologies determines our ability to compete. Today, remaining relevant means picking up the pace of technology adoption and transformation.

The results tell of significant pressures — and great opportunities. New business models are driving requirements, while IT leaders leverage new approaches to IT service delivery and renovate legacy systems to prepare for the challenge at hand. The IT function is looking to build expertise in areas such as security, cloud and mobility, yet it’s never been more vital to maintain a sharp focus on the everyday operations that define the traditional role of IT.

61% of respondents believe that current strategies to manage modernisation requirements are limiting efforts elsewhere in innovation. The transformation challenge is top of mind. Maybe it’s time to re-think or question the markets’ solutions. This requires a high degree of fluidity, which is not a word often associated with traditional IT environments. Designed for stability and longevity, rather than agility, IT is the workhorse of the organisation. To enable innovation and speed, organisations look to more flexible IT infrastructures, like those found in the cloud.

Bimodal IT a potential solution

One approach, often referred to as ‘bimodal’, delivers a predictable platform for the applications and workloads that exist today (Mode 1), as well as a platform for exploring and experimenting with new agile technologies and ways of working (Mode 2). That can include leveraging anything from the Internet of Things (IoT), artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning, to big data analytics with real-time results and the immersive experiences of virtual reality.

Although this study reveals a funding conflict, with the majority of organisations surveyed reporting they lack the funds to invest in innovative technologies, funding is not the only challenge. The data has shown that managing both traditional and newer, more agile environments at the same time poses a huge resourcing issue, especially for legacy IT environments.

These are just some of the insights found in the Little Book of IT. Register to receive your copy to find out more about how executive peers are tackling the big issues of the day and ensuring their organisations remain relevant in the future. And if you’d like to see how you compare to your peers, complete the short benchmarking survey here.

Case study: Sungard AS cloud gives students new horizons

By Sungard AS Ireland | July 21, 2017

Hibernia College is an internationally accredited, global provider of high quality education programmes and is recognised as a world leader in teacher training. Its success is based on a blended learning format that combines interactive, multimedia-rich online content with periodic face-to-face tuition.

As the College has grown, it recognised it needed more than a reliable hosting provider but an expert technology partner with a robust, resilient infrastructure, global reach and the proven capability to provide support around-the-clock. Aware of its reputation in the industry, Hibernia College put Sungard AS at the top of its list when evaluating potential partners.

As Rob O’Neill, Director of IT at Hibernia College points out, “We are not data centre experts so I had to make sure we had people who know what they are doing looking after our infrastructure and, in the event of something going wrong, had a plan in place to deal with that.”

The College relies on managed multi-tenanted cloud services from Sungard Availability Services to ensure its critical online learning environment is available 24/7, giving students access to their learning materials, enabling them to upload their assignments and interact with fellow students on discussion forums. “It was important that we didn’t give them a platform that was flaky in any way, limiting their access. We wanted to work with a world leader in data centre hosting and Sungard AS met those requirements,” says Rob O’Neill.

He adds, “One of the things I was really impressed by was their policy and procedures regarding security and access. We laid out what our requirements were – we needed robustness, resilience, security and capacity – and they guided us to the best solution.”

The managed cloud service provided by Sungard AS gives Hibernia College the reassurance of 99.95% availability, backed by an enterprise-grade service level agreement. “The internet is effectively our college campus so any downtime is equivalent to slamming the gates on our students,” Rob O’Neill explains. “So far, since 2012, we have had zero unplanned downtime, which is great for me and fantastic for our students.”

The College experiences distinct peak periods with intense demand when students upload assignments and daily lesson plans. Rob O’Neill says, “The guaranteed bandwidth provided by Sungard AS’ managed cloud service is essential to cope with bursts in demand. Scalability is also a key factor for us. We have certain peak times, particularly around assignments. We don’t have to build a massive infrastructure for the peaks but can build it for the norm and flex out for the peaks as required.”

Hibernia College effectively subscribes to the compute power and storage it needs today in the knowledge that Sungard AS’ vast resource pool will give it the flexibility it needs in the future.

Watch the video here

To read the full case study, click here

Keith’s Foreword: Summer brings sunshine and clouds

By Sungard AS Ireland | July 21, 2017

Welcome to the Summer edition of AVAIL. We caught up with Sungard AS’ Senior Vice President of Consulting Mike Threlfall who explains how IT consulting can help organisations manage risk and master change. Among the many fascinating points he makes, perhaps the most powerful is his observation that as more IT services are connected between companies, organisations need to change the way they think about their IT, because it’s no longer their IT but part of a much wider world.

Indeed, this is one of the issues highlighted in our Little Book of IT, which sheds light on the many challenges and opportunities that face IT decision-makers today. If you haven’t registered to receive your own copy yet, this is a chance to see what your peers and competitors are doing across many aspects of IT and see how you compare.

As the recent global WannaCry attack forcefully demonstrated, the cybercrime market is also developing rapidly. Read our article on the steps you should be taking to give yourself a fighting chance against attack. And if you’d like to know more about ransomware, why not watch our ‘Top building blocks to combat cybercrime’ webinar?

The next big deadline on virtually all organisations’ calendars should be 25 May 2018 – the immovable date when the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) will be enforced. You’ve probably heard a lot about this already but research suggests that close to 40% of businesses have not started their preparations yet. If yours is among them, beware – the clock is ticking!

As testament to our recovery capabilities, Sungard AS has been positioned in the ‘Leaders’ quadrant of Gartner’s Magic Quadrant for the third year in a row. This after being named as one of the ten most significant Disaster Recovery as a Service providers in the authoritative Forrester Wave^TM report.

While on the subject of recovery, we don’t believe in making unsubstantiated claims so arranged independent validation of our test statistics by the Disaster Recovery Institute International. These confirmed that our recovery rate is indisputably 2.5 times better than the market average. Read the full story here.

Finally, as always, I hope you enjoy this issue and my team welcomes your feedback on any aspect of the magazine. Just send your comments to the editor at AS.UK.AvailEditor@sungardas.com.

Keith Tilley

Executive Vice President and Vice-Chair, Sungard Availability Services

Get set for GDPR

By Sungard AS Ireland | July 21, 2017

By Rogelio Aguilar – Senior Consultant, Cyber Resilience, Security & Privacy – Sungard Availability Services

Last issue, we talked about what the new General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) means for business. With the directive coming into force on 25 May next year, organisations need to prepare now if they are not to be in breach of the regulations. In just nine months, a two-tier sanctions regime will be enforced with breaches of the law leading to hefty fines of up to €20 million (or 4% of global annual turnover) being levied by data watchdogs. But to focus on potential fines is to miss the point: what is more important is that implementation of the GDPR will give compliant businesses a real competitive advantage.

Research suggests up to 61% of businesses have yet to wake up to the reality that Brexit or not, GDPR requirements are not going to go away^[1]. The clock is ticking for organisations to act on what Information Commissioner Elizabeth Denham describes as “the biggest change in data protection law for a generation.”

She says, “If your organisation can’t demonstrate that good data protection is a cornerstone of your business policy and practices, you’re leaving your organisation open to enforcement action that can damage both public reputation and bank balance. But there’s a carrot here as well as a stick: get data protection right, and you can see a real business benefit.”

The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) is the UK’s independent body set up to uphold information rights. Its work is to ensure data protection law is respected and while they will impose fines to achieve that goal, it is not their purpose. The big question is how your organisation would measure up if the ICO was to conduct an audit or advisory visit. This is what the ICO is looking to see when they visit:

Senior management has taken ownership of Data Protection
There is a GDPR programme in place that has the necessary resources and involves all relevant stakeholders
A Data Protection Officer (DPO) has been appointed in those cases where it is mandatory and that this individual has access to senior management and can work without pressure being brought to bear
A Privacy Impact Assessment has been conducted
Areas of compliance have been documented
Areas that require further work have been identified and there is a plan in place to tackle them
There should be a plan to deal with a data breach when (not if) it occurs that includes:
A procedure to notify the ICO within 72 hours of identifying the breach
A process to decide whether data subjects must be notified and a mechanism to do so
Senior management being prepared to deal with the crisis that would arise

Sungard Availability Services can support you on your GDPR journey. Our consultants can help you establish a GDPR compliance programme, develop the business case and draw up a plan of action to gain competitive advantage by achieving cyber resiliency and regulatory compliance. To find out more, speak to your account manager, call 0800 143 413 or email avail@sungardas.com

Everything you wanted to know about GDPR but were afraid to ask

If you’d like to be prepared for GDPR, you can find out everything you need to know at a Sungard AS GDPR masterclass. GDPR masterclasses are delivered by experienced practitioners at the top of their game who offer unique insights based on real-world experience across a range of industries. All our speakers have been selected because they challenge conventional thinking and cut through the waffle to give practical insights that can deliver a real business advantage.

During the one-day workshop, periods of round-table learning are reinforced by short, sharp, practical exercises designed to reinforce the learning experience through memorable, relevant and up-to-date examples. Topics covered include:

The foundations of modern privacy law and the essential elements of GDPR
What is a Privacy Impact Assessment?
Personal data and consent: the pathways to lawful business
The rights of the data subject
Monitoring and profiling: the impact on businesses, IT and social media
Data Controller and Data Processor: their relationship and obligations
Exemptions and opt-outs
The Data Protection Officer: responsibilities, authority and accountability
International transfers, adequacy regimes, contractual mechanisms and Brexit
Key business issues: outsourcing, the Internet of Things, Big Data and the Regulator

Following the GDPR masterclass you will have:

Increased awareness of GDPR requirements
Improved confidence in your own abilities to judge the relevance of the legislation to specific business processes
Greater understanding of appropriate behaviours on a Privacy by Default and a Privacy by Design organisation
Improved teamworking at strategic, tactical and operational levels as you gear up for GDPR
A practical understanding of the requirements, role and responsibilities of a Data Protection Officer

To find out more or arrange a masterclass for your C-suite, call 0800 143 413 or email avail@sungardas.com.

^[1] https://iapp.org/news/a/survey-61-percent-of-companies-have-not-started-gdpr-implementation/

Gartner positions Sungard AS in Leader quadrant for third year running

By Sungard AS Ireland | July 21, 2017

We’re pleased to say we’ve been positioned by Gartner in the ‘Leaders’ quadrant of its Magic Quadrant for Disaster Recovery as a Service for the third year in a row.

Gartner evaluated 24 Disaster Recovery as a Service (DRaaS) providers for this year’s Magic Quadrant. Service providers were evaluated against their ‘ability to execute’ – to provide a DRaaS offering that meets customer requirements with a high level of service and customer support – and a ‘completeness of vision’ – the ability to understand customer needs and translate them into products and services that shape or enhance the market.

According to Gartner, the firms in the Leaders quadrant of the DRaaS Magic Quadrant have “large, mature DRaaS practices. These players have significant industry experience, global capabilities, a focus on DRaaS as a standalone offering, and industry-leading vision with respect to meeting the needs of its intended target customer segments.”

With nearly four decades’ experience in delivering recovery solutions that apply to all facets of customers’ production environments, Sungard AS understands that IT must deliver business results. Looking beyond just protecting data, Sungard AS’ DRaaS solutions deliver a holistic approach to business resiliency. Our comprehensive DRaaS solutions are designed to be flexible enough to work with complex, bi-modal production and recovery environments, scaling up and down according to specific business requirements, and meeting a full range of recovery time and recovery point objectives (RTOs/RPOs). Sungard AS’ DRaaS solutions can be integrated with the full range of Sungard AS disaster recovery and business continuity services, including Managed Recovery services.

“With the increasing digitisation of key business functions, there is more at stake than ever before for organisations, which can no longer afford to rely on cheap or simple disaster recovery,” said Josh Crowe, Chief Technology Officer for Sungard AS. “Today’s business threats demand a more holistic and fluid business resiliency and recovery approach that evolve with an organisation. We designed our DRaaS offering to respond to our global customers’ needs, and we will continue to shape our DRaaS vision for future scenarios. We take great pride in being named by Gartner as a leader in Disaster Recovery as a Service for the third consecutive year and we will continue to identify and react to new market needs.”

Click here to view a copy of the 2017 Gartner, Inc., Magic Quadrant for Disaster Recovery as a Service

Gartner Disclaimer:
This graphic was published by Gartner, Inc. as part of a larger research document and should be evaluated in the context of the entire document. The Gartner document is available upon request from Sungard AS here.

Gartner does not endorse any vendor, product or service depicted in its research publications, and does not advise technology users to select only those vendors with the highest ratings or other designation. Gartner research publications consist of the opinions of Gartner’s research organization and should not be construed as statements of fact. Gartner disclaims all warranties, expressed or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.

Sungard AS Recovery Management: more than twice as good as all the rest

By Sungard AS Ireland | July 21, 2017

Independent validation of 87% recovery success rate.

As a Leader in Gartner’s Magic Quadrant and Forrester Waves^TM for Disaster Recovery as a Service, you would expect Sungard Availability Services to know a thing or two about getting companies back in business again after an interruption. And you would be right. But after almost 40 years of providing technology and workplace recovery services to customers worldwide, we decided to engage the Disaster Recovery Institute International (DRII) to provide independent scrutiny of our recovery success rates and set a benchmark for the rest of the industry to aspire to.

DRII evaluated Sungard AS’ Managed Recovery Program’s (MRP) statistical analysis of US-based customers who successfully tested their business continuity/disaster recovery plans under Managed Recovery contracts with Sungard AS between 1 January and 31 December 2016.

DRII’s approach and methodology are regimented and beyond reproach to ensure the accuracy and reliability of the findings. Accordingly, the assessment process conducted was extensive, both in depth and breadth. DRII had access to Sungard AS documentation, multiple customers who agreed to be interviewed directly by DRII and key personnel who performed the actual testing.

Taking the most conservative approach possible, results were measured binarily – either the full result was successfully attained or the results were scored as a total fail. ‘Success’ was defined as meeting all of the customer’s testing objectives, including meeting or bettering the Recovery Time Objective (RTO). By eliminating partial successes and failures, the most objective and accurate means of scoring was used.

At the end of the thorough validation process, DRII was able to verify that Sungard AS achieved an 87% customer testing success rate (excluding those whose tests failed solely due to customer issues) and a 78% testing success rate overall. This is two-and-a-half times better than the industry average, which according to the Disaster Recovery Preparedness Council, is just 35%^[1].

Recovery of complex IT is difficult: This would appear to be backed up by Gartner’s findings in its 2016 ‘Gartner Predicts’ report involving a survey of 854 organisations. Only 13 were able to achieve a reasonable level of recovery success while the vast majority of respondents were unable to meet their recovery objectives and ran into difficulties^[2].

Daren Howell, Marketing Manager, who led the project noted that Al Berman, CEO of the DRII, commented that we had “scored ourselves conservatively, demonstrating great integrity.”

Keith Tilley, EVP and vice chair Sungard AS, paid tribute to Kaushik Ray and his recovery team who are delivering recovery service performance that is way above any of the industry benchmarks that we can find. Whether Forrester Waves or Gartner Magic Quadrants, you will find Sungard AS in a leadership position.

Sungard AS recognises that this assessment and others are only possible with the support of our customers who give up their time to complete research surveys and participate in interviews. This is very much appreciated.

^[1] Disaster Recovery Preparedness Council Benchmark Report 2014

^[2] https://www.gartner.com/doc/3514518/predicts–business-continuity-management

Forrester names Sungard AS in DRaaS top ten

By Sungard AS Ireland | July 21, 2017

We are delighted to share the news that Forrester, a leading market research firm, has included Sungard Availability Services in its ten most significant Disaster Recovery as a Service (DRaaS) providers in its most recent Forrester Wave^TM report^[1].

Forrester identifies the ten most significant DRaaS providers based on 26 different criteria in three categories. The detailed report shows how each provider measures up against each of these measures and also where they stand in relation to one another. Thorough analysis showed that Sungard AS, along with three other providers from a shortlist of ten, “lead the pack”. We received the highest score for ‘Strategy’ and ‘Current offering’:

Current offering: Core DRaaS offerings, recovery objective capabilities, technology support, security, self-service and management interface, and consulting services
Strategy: Service strategy and corporate strategy
Market presence: Installed base, revenue, revenue growth, geographic scope, customer feedback, and technology partners

The report notes our “wide range of physical and virtual infrastructure and storage area network (SAN)-based replication”, as well as our “business continuity consulting team to help customers identify business processes and technology elements at risk and develop a risk mitigation strategy.” The report also cites our “continuity strategy and planning, risk assessment and business impact analysis (BIA) services”. It also commended our future strategy, which includes “enhanced automation and orchestration of application-level recovery.”

“In my view, this Forrester Wave^TM report shows that we stand out for our large breadth of services not just in recovery, but also in consulting and additional services, such as Discovery and Dependency Mapping (DDM) and Assurance^CM, our suite of continuity management tools,” said Joseph George, vice president, product management at Sungard AS. “I believe that we also illustrated that we can recover to the application layer to complement the infrastructure OS and virtualisation-level cloud-based recovery capabilities, another differentiator.”

Forrester’s research is frequently used by infrastructure and operations professionals to help them select the right partner for their resiliency and recovery needs and is a further independent endorsement of our DRaaS strategy.

Download the full report here

Forrester Wave^TM: Disaster-Recovery-As-a-Service, Q2 2017
Source: Forrester (April 2017)

^[1] Forrester Wave^TM report published 20/4/17

News: Major Data Centre investments worldwide

By Sungard AS Ireland | July 21, 2017

In line with our overall business strategy, Sungard Availability Services is investing in markets where we can deliver our range of broad, integrated solutions. That’s why in the past few years we have opened or expanded more than ten data centres serving the UK, Stockholm, Toronto, Philadelphia, New York, Denver and other key markets. As a result, we are delighted to announce that additional high quality data centre space is now available in both the UK and US.

Technology Centre 3 Expansion (Woking, UK)

The new area can accommodate around 180 cabinets with an average of 4KW per rack, although the environment can support up to 8KW. In common with all Sungard Availability Services facilities, the new area has the minimum N+1 standard for power and cooling and high security perimeter fencing. There is a 24/7/365 onsite security presence and, importantly, the CCTV system is compliant with the Police Scientific Development Branch’s (PSDB) Home Office standard, which means it has been built to a government-approved specification for crime reporting.

The additional space can support the full range of Sungard AS services including Cloud, Hosted Private Cloud, Colocation and Managed Services, and is now open and fully operational.

Download the data sheet here

New Data Centre in Silicon Valley

Opened on June 30^th, our newest data centre in Santa Clara, CA combines the innovation you expect from Silicon Valley with the versatility of a cloud-centric infrastructure. The facility features, location characteristics, and environmental controls come together with expansive connectivity options to provide an ideal environment for your most critical workloads.

The data centre is strategically located near major fiber routes and multiple power grids, so you can connect quickly to the infrastructures you rely on, delivering the flexibility needed for today’s mixed environments. Production systems hosted at this facility can be readily integrated with our award-winning cloud recovery service, and fail-over to our Scottsdale facility can provide hiccup-free performance.

This Silicon Valley data centre can be an ideal foundation for hosted private cloud, where dedicated compute, storage and networking resources in an isolated environment can protect sensitive data and help meet regulatory compliance requirements. Dedicated resources combine with high-speed networking to accelerate performance. The flexibility to choose from partial to fully dedicated environments means you can select the degree of infrastructure isolation that aligns with your needs.

Flexibility. From partial to fully dedicated, our private cloud environment allows a customizable set of compute, storage and networking elements—so you have the freedom to choose the degree of infrastructure isolation that makes sense for your needs. A wide range of flexible managed services are also available to match your IT resource capabilities, allowing you to spend more time using the cloud than maintaining the cloud, and enabling you to focus on delivering innovation back to the business.

Find out more about the new Santa Clara data centre here

For further information on either data centre call 0800 143 413 or email avail@sungardas.com

Your gateway to Sungard AS applications and services

By Sungard AS Ireland | July 21, 2017

Today, we are comfortable running numerous aspects of our lives online, from shopping and downloading music to booking holidays and banking because it enables us to do what we want, quickly and simply, at any time of the day or night. And, of course, we expect the same convenience in our working lives. With this in mind, Sungard Availability Services has introduced some changes to its Managed Services portal – ‘Viewpoint’ – that allows you to find all the information you need to manage your IT environment and action requests around the clock.

Viewpoint retrieves data from our numerous systems to provide you with a comprehensive view for monitoring and managing your environment. It puts you in control by giving you:

Efficient and self-explanatory means to check security clearance for granting access and the ability to both administer these where applicable and raise temporary access for your staff and trusted supplier network.
Simple and secure access to important data about your Sungard AS hosted and managed assets.
Deep analytic views of your monitored devices, including network, servers, and storage area
Real-time and historical event views for reviewing forensic data and analysing past activities.
Performance data views, including real-time and historical data.
Various reporting options for on-demand, or scheduled, delivery.

For instance, instead of raising a ticket or sending an email request for access, you can simply make requests yourself via the portal and receive an immediate system confirmation. However, as a safeguard and for your peace of mind, Secure Site Access in the UK incorporates a 24-hour time restriction to allow one of Sungard AS’ experts to review and veto a request if it will harm your environment.

In the event of emergency access (where less than 24 hours’ notice is given) these requests can still be arranged in the traditional way using the Global Service Desk or nominated Service Management Team.

Sungard AS customers in India, EMEA and the US can log in to Viewpoint via the Sungard AS website or access the portal directly here. (We suggest bookmarking it as a favourite)

We strive to ensure the portal is easy to use, whatever the device, so it is optimised for use on tablets, mobile-friendly and compatible with the latest browser releases. Currently, optimal browsers include:

Chrome™ in the Windows®, Macintosh®, and Linux environments
Mozilla Firefox® in the Windows®, Macintosh®, and Linux environments
Internet Explorer® 10 in the Windows® environment
Safari® in the Macintosh® environment

We anticipate the ability to request access to the major Sungard AS data centre sites globally and also to keep your Authorisation Matrix up-to-date – both tasks that can be performed quickly and easily through Viewpoint – will prove highly popular.

We will be running a series of easy-to-follow tutorials and quick guides to assist customers through the portal and the most commonly used tasks but are always on-hand to help. If you would like training in the use of Viewpoint or have any queries on performing a particular task, please contact the Service Desk on 0800 279 9166.

Channel awards recognise Sungard AS people and partnerships

By Sungard AS Ireland | July 21, 2017

We were honoured to be recognised with two Dell EMC Global Alliances Awards in May: 2017 Dell EMC Global Alliances Marketing Partner of the Year and the Global Alliances Industry Partner of the Year.

With more than 15 years of partnership between the two companies, we are able to offer a broad portfolio of services that bring enhanced value to our mutual customers. The awards, presented at the Dell EMC Global Partner Summit in Las Vegas, reflect the strength of our mutual commitment to the partnership.

The Global Alliances Marketing Partner of the Year Award honours Sungard AS for excellence in execution on unique, industry-oriented and integrated marketing and sales enablement campaigns with Dell EMC, while the Global Alliances Industry Partner of the Year recognises Sungard AS for significant achievements as a strategic Dell EMC partner.

“These honours underscore our dedication to providing customers with continuous access and protection for mission-critical data,” said Carmen Sorice, senior vice president, global channel sales & programs, Sungard AS. “Users expect access to information on any device, anytime and anywhere. Our goal in working with Dell EMC is to give customers the access to applications and data they need, while ensuring their data is protected at all times, wherever it resides.”

Sungard AS is a Titanium Solution Partner in the Dell EMC Velocity Service Provider Program. Our two companies collaborate to combine Sungard AS’ Managed Cloud Services, Managed Recovery Services, and Managed Services with Dell EMC Corporation’s cloud and infrastructure solutions. Together, Sungard AS and Dell provide a collection of third-party validated and industry-certified solutions to support customers’ IT environments. These are designed to ensure high availability, ease of management, and business continuity for mission-critical applications and business operations.

“We congratulate Sungard Availability Services on receiving Dell EMC’s Global Alliances Marketing Partner of the Year Award and Global Alliances Industry Partner of the Year Award, both of which recognise partners that have exhibited an exemplary commitment to Dell EMC, and have placed a true focus on bringing enhanced value to our mutual customers,” said Jay Snyder, senior vice president, global alliances, service providers and industries. “Alliance partners play a vital role in the Dell EMC Go to Market (GTM) and are critical in helping enable us to transform our customers on their digital transformation agenda.”

High calibre

In other channel news, CRN®, a brand of The Channel Company, named Melissa McCoy, Sungard Availability Services’ vice president of global channels and alliances, to its prestigious Power 100 list in its 2017 Women of the Channel awards. Seven other Sungard AS executives were also included in the annual Women of the Channel list, including:

Heidi Biggar, Director, Alliances Marketing
Jennifer Caria, Senior Director, Global Marketing
Karen Falcone, Principal Director, EMEA Channel Sales and Programs
Sarah Hamilton, Senior Director, Solutions & Alliances Marketing
Michelle LeVan, Vice President, Global Channel Strategy
Dena Marean, Director, Channel Development
Melany Zweifel, Channel Sales Director

The executives selected span the IT channel, representing vendors, distributors, solution providers and other organisations that figure prominently in the channel ecosystem. Each is recognised for her outstanding leadership, vision and unique role in driving channel growth and innovation.

“These awards recognise what we acknowledge every day at Sungard AS,” said Carmen Sorice, senior vice president, global channels, Sungard AS. “We employ some of the most dedicated, influential, and accomplished players in the channel, who are continually forging stronger partnerships and generating greater value for our partners and customers. It would be an honour to have a single team member included among the Women of the Channel, but to have eight confirms our depth of talent and their degree of accomplishment.”

CRN’s editorial team selects Women of the Channel recipients based on their professional accomplishments, demonstrated expertise and ongoing dedication to the channel. The Power 100 belong to an exclusive group drawn from this larger list: women leaders whose vision and influence are key drivers of their companies’ success and help move the entire IT channel forward. This is the third year in a row in which Melissa McCoy has been included.

“These extraordinary executives support every aspect of the channel ecosystem, from technical innovation to marketing to business development, working tirelessly to keep the channel moving into the future,” said Robert Faletra, CEO of The Channel Company. “They are creating and elevating channel partner programs, developing fresh go-to-market strategies, strengthening the channel’s network of partnerships and building creative new IT solutions, among many other contributions. We congratulate all the 2017 Women of the Channel on their stellar accomplishments and look forward to their future success.”