Data Protection
An Effective Disaster Recovery Strategy for Branch Offices - April 12, 2008
Tampa Florida -- The 2008 Atlantic hurricane season will start early this year, the second time in five years a storm will formed before June 1. As a result, experts are again predicting an above average hurricane year, estimating that there is a 74 percent chance a category three or higher storm will hit the U.S. mainland.
While the chance your business will be affected by a major natural disaster or terrorist attack is slim, other causes of unplanned downtime such as a hardware component failure, fire, power outage or surge, network attack or even human error are more prevalent. It is important to ensure your company has a reliable strategy for getting the business up and resuming normal business operations, no matter what the cause. Without a disaster recovery strategy the consequences to your business could be paramount. According to the Wall Street Journal, 92 percent of small businesses that experience significant data loss due to a major disaster go out of business within five years. You don't want to become part of this statistic.
With mission-critical data growth exploding in the small to midsized enterprise (SME) market-much of it on the edge of the network in branch offices-traditional disaster recovery solutions may not be enough to ensure business continuity throughout your entire organization.
Complete Restoration Disaster Recovery
In order to protect all company data regardless of physical location and to ensure business continuity across the entire organization, SMEs need to deploy a complete disaster recovery solution that integrates local backups and remote off-site vaulting in a single solution. Using a complete and integrated solution allows your organization to restore entire systems quickly, and get them back in the production environment as soon as possible after experiencing downtime. A complete bare metal restoration solution restores systems from the ground up-including the operating system (Windows, Linux, Solaris, etc.), business applications (Exchange, SQL, Oracle, Novell, etc.), user profiles and data files, in addition to reformatting drives.
The following details what SMEs should look for in a complete disaster recovery solution that protects their data center as well as data and systems in remote offices.
Quick Recovery
When it comes to quick recoveries and an SME's ability to resume normal business operations after experiencing downtime, the stakes couldn't be higher. Simply put, if customers are inconvenienced by not being able to visit a retail location, access a Website, email a sales rep, or receive requested information in a timely manner-regardless of the reason-they will move on to a competitor. The availability of services and products at headquarters and in branch offices is absolutely vital to the health of the company, making quick restoration of the IT systems that run the business a top priority. Minutes do matter.
Most SMEs do not realize that quick restores not only rely on recovering lost data, but also rely on rebuilding damaged or lost servers and workstations. Operating systems need to be restored, drives need to be reformatted, business applications need to reinstalled, data needs to be recovered and user profiles need to be restored. End users cannot do their job unless workstations and servers are returned to their normal state before downtime occurred. This takes time.
The most effective disaster recovery solutions speed up the systems recovery process by automating this process through scripting. Automatic bare metal restore allows administrators to perform a complete systems restoration to an existing system or to a new system with different hardware. While it typically takes a seasoned IT veteran a full day or longer to completely restore a system manually, there are disaster recovery solutions that allow staffers with little IT training to recover a complete system in less than an hour.
Off-Site Backups and Vaulting
In an effort to protect against data center outages and regional natural disasters, it is essential that SMEs implement off-site backups and a remote vaulting system that store data and system information at least 150 miles away. Tape rotation at a warehouse across town, a common approach of SMEs, does not provide the same level of off-site protection since the facility will most likely be impacted by the same disruption. The best backup and recovery solutions incorporate both local and off-site backups in one package. After first performing a local backup in the branch office, the solution replicates data to an off-site location where it is stored in a data vault and is easily recoverable.
Because bandwidth and server requirements could affect performance for end users, it is essential that SMEs deploy a solution that incorporates electronic data synchronization to off-site vaults. By only sending data that is new or has changed since the last backup, the solution requires less resources and dramatically reduces the amount of data that has to be sent over the WAN. This allows backups to be completed more quickly, efficiently and reliably. In the same vein, synchronization technology enables administrators to pause and re-engage in the middle of a backup if a connection is disrupted during the data transfer, preventing administrators from ever having to manually restart a transfer.
Vendor Neutral
When a disaster hits and remote offices are pulled off-line, SMEs don't always have the luxury of being able to replace their servers with the exact model or even the same brand. Often, they must make a quick replacement with what is available. Because of this, it is important that the company's disaster recovery solution is able to restore systems to different hardware. For example, an HP server needs to be able to be restored on a Dell box if that is what is available. This also gives SMEs flexibility with their purchasing decisions, allowing them to choose hardware that is the best suited for specific business needs and budget rather than letting interoperability inhibit choice.
Point-in-Time Recovery
Giving customers the ability to restore systems to a set point in time is an essential element of a complete disaster recovery solution. This is especially useful if a single system crashes and a database needs to be synched up with other end users. Email is another example. Point-in-time recovery allows administrators to recover deleted emails or files as needed or restore systems to a point in time within the past 30 days.
Simple Management
Most SMEs do not have the IT and staffing resources to dedicate to backup management and monitoring, making it essential that any disaster recovery solution be easy to use and automate as much manual process as possible. This is especially true on the edge of the network in branch offices where often there is no full-time IT administrator and a business staff member is typically tasked with starting the backup process each night.
It doesn't have to be this way. SMEs can make sure their disaster recovery solution is managed consistently from a central management console, giving a trained and dedicated administrator at headquarters complete access and visibility into the backup cycle. In addition, the solution needs to automate basic tasks, including the recovery process. This can help streamline IT management, prevent human errors and take business continuity responsibility off the shoulders of untrained business staff.
Scalability
Complete restoration solutions also need to be scalable to allow SMEs to expand their disaster recovery strategy in line with the business. It seems strange to think that a company can over-protect its IT systems, but it is nearly impossible to protect every server all of the time. SMEs need to determine what systems need to be protected and how fast they need to be recovered. Deploying a scalable disaster recovery solution that is flexible is a good start, as growing companies' needs can change quickly.
Some providers price their solutions on a per gigabyte of user data basis in conjunction with time-to-recovery needs. This ensures that SMEs are getting exactly what they require at an affordable price and that the IT budget is directly tied to the needs of the business.
Security
Another feature that SMEs may need is encryption technology that secures data as it is in transit and while being backed up and restored. Industry and government regulations are getting tighter every year, forcing companies-especially growing businesses-to plan for future compliance requirements, making it essential that all sensitive data is properly encrypted from the outset.
It is vital that SMEs take into account remote office computing when implementing their business continuity strategy, relying on a robust and complete disaster recovery solution that enables efficient backups and quick restores. Administrators need to ensure that they are able to manage the backup and recovery process from a central location, conduct complete restorations and recover systems to different hardware. Only then can SMEs be truly prepared for whatever Mother Nature throws their way.
For more information please call (407) 265-6293 or visit us at: http://www.sencilo.com/storage-protection.php
For more information please call (407) 265-6293 or visit us at: http://www.sencilo.com/storage-data-deduplication.php
About Us
Sencilo Solutions is a Florida-based integrator specializing in storage and security solutions. Sencilo delivers a comprehensive portfolio of products from best-of-breed hardware and software from multiple manufacturers including VMware, EMC, Juniper Networks, Hitachi, Symantec, Barracuda Networks, and HP. Its technical expertise is known throughout the storage and security industry. Clients include leading corporations, major financial institutions, top universities, government facilities, as well as small to medium size businesses. Sencilo's professional services include consulting, integration, project management, installation, maintenance and knowledge transfer.
Sencilo has offices throughout Florida including: Jacksonville, Daytona Beach, Miami, Tampa, St. Petersburg, Orlando, Hialeah, St. Augustine, Gainesville, Ocala, Palm Coast, Clearwater, Kissimmee, Lakeland, Maitland and Cape Canaveral
Offerings Projects: Replication De-Dup De-Dupe iSCSI SAN NAS VMware Security EMC NetApp HP IBM Quantum Compliance VTL Data Domain vs Gartner Magic Quadrant Quadrent LTO Backup Exc Pure Disk NetBackup Networker TSM Commvault BakBone D2D D2D2T compare cloud data deduplication thin provisioning DXi Global Compression DDX virtual tape library Data Reduction SEPATON FALCON compare Celerra CLARiiON Equallogic Dell NS20 NS40 CX4 CX3-20 CX3-40 CX3-80 FAS2050 FAS3050 Xiotech Nexsan Avamar DLD3 1500 D3 Storwiz storage compression data Ocarina Networks A-SIS compare Sepaton infopro BlueArc OnStor Microsoft Unified Storage data protection StorageX Brocade FAQ
'Well Above-average' Hurricane Season Forecast For 2008 - Will You be Ready? - April 12, 2008
Miami Florida Science Daily (Apr. 10, 2008) — The Colorado State University forecast team upgraded its early season forecast today from the Bahamas Weather Conference, saying the U.S. Atlantic basin will likely experience a well above-average hurricane season.
"Current oceanic and atmospheric trends indicate that we will likely have an active Atlantic basin hurricane season," said William Gray, who is beginning his 25th year forecasting hurricanes at Colorado State University.
The team's forecast now anticipates 15 named storms forming in the Atlantic basin between June 1 and Nov. 30. Eight of the storms are predicted to become hurricanes, and of those eight, four are expected to develop into intense or major hurricanes (Saffir/Simpson category 3-4-5) with sustained winds of 111 mph or greater. Long-term averages are 9.6 named storms, 5.9 hurricanes and 2.3 intense hurricanes per year. DR BC plans will be tested this year.
"Based on our latest forecast, the probability of a major hurricane making landfall along the U.S. coastline is 69 percent compared with the last-century average of 52 percent," said Phil Klotzbach of the Colorado State hurricane forecast team. "We are calling for a very active hurricane season this year, but not as active as the 2004 and 2005 seasons." Disaster Recovery should be on the minds of every Florida based companies.
Current conditions in the Atlantic basin are quite favorable for an active hurricane season. The current sea surface temperature pattern in the Atlantic - prevalent in most years since 1995 - is a pattern typically observed before very active seasons. Warm sea surface temperatures are likely to continue being present in the tropical and North Atlantic during 2008 because of a positive phase of the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO). Also, the currently observed weak Azores High will likely promote weaker-than-normal trade winds over the next few months enhancing warm SST anomalies in the tropical and subtropical Atlantic. Be it Backup Exe, NetBack, CDP or Snap Shot just backup your data.
Additionally, the team expects neutral or weak La Nina conditions in the tropical Pacific, which, combined with a predicted warm north and tropical Atlantic, is a recipe for enhanced Atlantic basin hurricane activity. These factors are similar to conditions that occurred during the 1950, 1989, 1999, and 2000 seasons. The average of these four seasons had well above-average activity, and Klotzbach and Gray predict the 2008 season will have activity in line with the average of these four years. When you backup to disk or tape look for companies with VTL De-dupe Data Domain, Quantum, EMC or Exagrid.
The hurricane forecast team predicts tropical cyclone activity in 2008 will be 160 percent of the average season. By comparison, 2005 witnessed tropical cyclone activity that was about 275 percent of the average season.
The hurricane forecast team reiterated its probabilities for a major hurricane making landfall on U.S. soil:
A 69 percent chance that at least one major hurricane will make landfall on the U.S. coastline in 2008 (the long-term average probability is 52 percent).
A 45 percent chance that a major hurricane will make landfall on the U.S. East Coast, including the Florida Peninsula (the long-term average is 31 percent)
A 44 percent chance that a major hurricane will make landfall on the Gulf Coast from the Florida Panhandle west to Brownsville (the long-term average is 30 percent).
The team also predicted above-average major hurricane landfall risk in the Caribbean.
"The United States was quite fortunate over the last two years in that we had only one hurricane landfall (Humberto - 2007)," Klotzbach said. "None of the four major hurricanes that formed in 2006 and 2007 made U.S. landfall." Using virtualization from VMware vs. Virtual Iron for disaster recovery is the best way to keep businesses running.
The Colorado State hurricane forecast team has cautioned against reading too much into the hurricane seasons of 2004 and 2005 when Florida and the Gulf Coast were ravaged by four landfalling hurricanes each year. Hurricanes Charley, Frances, Ivan and Jeanne caused devastating damage in 2004 followed by Dennis, Katrina, Rita and Wilma in 2005.
"The activity of these two years was unusual, but within the natural bounds of hurricane variation," Gray said.
Probabilities of tropical storm-force, hurricane-force and intense hurricane-force winds occurring at specific locations along the U.S. East and Gulf Coasts within a variety of time periods are listed on the forecast team's Landfall Probability Web site. The site provides U.S. landfall probabilities for 11 regions, 55 sub-regions and 205 individual counties along the U.S. coastline from Brownsville, Texas, to Eastport, Maine. The Web site, available to the public at http://www.e-transit.org/hurricane, is the first publicly accessible Internet tool that adjusts landfall probabilities for regions, sub-regions and counties based on the current climate and its projected effects on the upcoming hurricane season. Klotzbach and Gray update the site regularly with assistance from the GeoGraphics Laboratory at Bridgewater State College in Massachusetts.
The hurricane team's forecasts are based on the premise that global oceanic and atmospheric conditions - such as El Nino, sea surface temperatures and sea level pressures - that preceded active or inactive hurricane seasons in the past provide meaningful information about similar trends in future seasons.
The team will issue seasonal updates of its 2008 Atlantic basin hurricane activity forecast on June 3, Aug. 5, Sept. 2 and Oct. 1. The August, September and October forecasts will include separate forecasts for each of those months.
Tropical Cyclone Forecast for 2008
(1950-2000 Averages in parenthesis)
Named Storms 15 (9.6)*
Named Storm Days 80 (49.1)
Hurricanes 8 (5.9)
Hurricane Days 40 (24.5)
Intense Hurricanes 4 (2.3)
Intense Hurricane Days 9 (5.0)
Net Tropical Cyclone Activity 160 (100%)
* Numbers in ( ) represent average year totals based on 1950-2000 data.
The entire report is available on the Web at http://hurricane.atmos.colostate.edu
For more information please call (407) 265-6293 or visit us at: http://www.sencilo.com/storage-protection.php
About Us
Sencilo Solutions is a Florida-based integrator specializing in storage, security and networking solutions. Sencilo delivers a comprehensive portfolio of products from best-of-breed hardware and software from multiple manufacturers including VMware, EMC, NetApp, Juniper Networks, Hitachi, Symantec, Barracuda Networks, and HP. Its technical expertise is known throughout the storage and security industry. Clients include leading corporations, major financial institutions, top universities, government facilities, as well as small to medium size businesses. Sencilo's professional services include consulting, integration, project management, installation, maintenance and knowledge transfer.
Sencilo has offices throughout Florida including: Jacksonville, Miami, Tampa, St. Petersburg, Orlando, Hialeah, Fort Lauderdale, Tallahassee, Cape Coral, and Pembroke Pines.
The Best Web Application Accelerator unit is the Juniper Networks DX - April 6, 2008
Transparent acceleration, protection, and encryption make this pricey load balancer worth the money
Jacksonville Florida -- The days of the proprietary client are waning fast, as more and more enterprise applications become Web-enabled or entirely Web-based. Critical applications from e-mail to CRM to custom internal apps are all running on either internal or external Web sites, and they need both quick response times and fault tolerance. vs. Cisco. That's where load balancers come in. Adding redundancy and scalability to Web applications, load balancers create a cluster of Web servers, over which they distribute incoming requests, sending new requests to the server with the least load at any given moment. If a Web server goes offline, the other servers in the cluster take up the slack. Geographic load balancers create clusters at different physical locations so that applications will still be available even if an entire datacenter loses connectivity. vs Barracuda or Websense Citrix
The Juniper DX3680 goes well beyond the relatively simple task of creating clusters of Web servers – it can accelerate Web applications with several methods, including by compressing the HTTP sent between the Web server and the client, caching static parts of the Web page, and offloading SSL processing from the Web server. It will also optimize the network traffic so that the viewing of a Web page, which might normally take 100 back-and-forth messages between the Web server and client, can be accomplished with only a few messages.
In addition, the DX3680 shields applications running on Web servers from Internet-based attacks, preventing hackers from issuing unauthorized commands or taking advantage of known bugs in the Web server software, and it can handle user authentication via RADIUS or LDAP. Look for us in the Gartner Magic Quadrant
Cluster call
Juniper Bucking the trend of cramming load balancers with switches and as many as 20 Ethernet ports, Juniper decks out the DX3680 with a total of 4 ports, which should be enough in most cases – one in and one out is all a load balancer really needs. Initial setup of the system is straightforward, via serial terminal, though it’d be nice to see a default IP address allowing for initial configuration via browser.
Once the basic networking information is set, you can begin creating virtual clusters, as well as rules for how each cluster will be used. There are three types of clusters: a basic cluster, a forwarder, or a redirector.
A basic cluster defaults to high security and allows only basic HTTP functions – anything more has to be explicitly allowed through a rule. The DX3680 has predefined rules for a number of standard Web applications, including Microsoft Outlook Web Access (OWA) and SharePoint, PeopleSoft, and IBM/Lotus Domino. Most of the rules have to be applied at the command line rather than through the Web GUI. If you want to create your own rules, there are examples to work with, but it's not a simple process – be prepared to test and debug your new rules. This is equally true with similar load balancer products, such as F5’s application rules.
For non-HTTP traffic, a forwarder simply passes all traffic to the server cluster without processing it or accelerating the outgoing traffic. A redirector takes traffic addressed to a given address and sends it to a different one, without processing it at all.
A basic load balancing cluster can be set up quickly and easily. Adding functions such as encryption, server application protection, "sticky" sessions for e-commerce or other stateful transactions, and acceleration of Web traffic will make the cluster as complex as you like.
Balancing acts
To test this system, I set up a standard Web site and simulated lots of clients accessing the site. The DX3680 should be able to handle large amounts of traffic without problems; in my testing, I had to use artificially small requests to generate any load on the system, but with normal requests, the system can handle more users than the network connection will support. (As for the DX3680's basic stats, it handles up to 256 HTTP proxy clusters; 1,024 server load balancing clusters; 64 servers per application cluster; 7,300 SSL transactions per second; 80,000 concurrent SSL connections; and 1.1 million concurrent SLB connections.)
Characterizing acceleration is more difficult – the amount of noticeable acceleration a user sees will vary greatly, depending on the type of application, how many users are on the system, which browser the user has, and many other factors. I tested response times for several types of Web transactions, including OWA, the serving of static pages, and a basic Java application, and found that applications were 30 to 400 percent faster than without the load balancer in place. One process that is simplified is converting a Web site from HTTP to HTTPS. Instead of rewriting all of the code on the site, the DX3680 handles the conversion automatically, and it takes care of the SSL processing, too.
The standard ruleset available when the DX3680 box is initially configured is called the Nitro.apprule. This set of rules protects against common attacks, causes clients to cache images, enables active acceleration of Web pages, and more. It's a simple starting point for getting acceleration working without having to do any programming.
The DX3680 can offload quite a bit of processing to reduce the load on the Web servers. In addition to SSL processing, it will cache images and other static content – even JavaScript so that requests from browsers are served by the DX3680 rather than by the Web servers in the cluster. This is intended to reduce loads on the servers, but it may increase performance for end-users as well.
Logging and reporting functionality is broad and deep, covering all aspects of cluster operations, and offers up as much detail as you want. The system provides detailed logs for all the clusters it serves (it pushes them to a central log server), including real-time performance logging for every user connection, if desired. The reporting tools provide a wealth of information, and I found them well organized and easy to follow.
Additional features include quality of service, which can be specified separately for each cluster, and ActiveN clustering that makes adding more DX systems a simple process. vs Radware
Pricey, but worth it
The Juniper DX3680 is not a system that someone would buy for simple load balancing. With a price as tested of $70,485 and a base price of $49,995, there are many less expensive load balancers out there that will create clusters of Web servers.
However, the system's sophisticated rules engine and acceleration features, as well as its ability to provide authentication, to protect Web servers and application servers, and to transparently add SSL encryption to a Web site without redoing code, will not be found on inexpensive load balancers. The DX3680 should allow even a small company to provide enterprise-class Web applications without a big investment in recoding.
For more information please call (407) 265-6293 or visit us at: http://www.sencilo.com/network-application-acceleration.php
About Us
Sencilo Solutions is a Florida-based integrator specializing in storage, security and networking solutions. Sencilo delivers a comprehensive portfolio of products from best-of-breed hardware and software from multiple manufacturers including VMware, EMC, NetApp, Juniper Networks, Hitachi, Symantec, Barracuda Networks, and HP. Its technical expertise is known throughout the storage and security industry. Clients include leading corporations, major financial institutions, top universities, government facilities, as well as small to medium size businesses. Sencilo's professional services include consulting, integration, project management, installation, maintenance and knowledge transfer.
Sencilo has offices throughout Florida including: Jacksonville, Miami, Tampa, St. Petersburg, Orlando, Hialeah, Fort Lauderdale, Tallahassee, Cape Coral, and Pembroke Pines.
Key words: Barracuda Networks Security RSA Encryption Cisco Decru Neoscale EMC NetApp HP IBM Quantum Compliance VTL Data Domain vs Gartner Magic Quadrant SSL SonicWall Secure Computing Firewall VPN Endpoint
Is Quantum blasting pass Data Domain in Data De-dup Market? - April 4, 2008
De-duplication eliminate redundant data to improve space and power efficiencies for really green storage
Miami Florida NetApp Inc. on Tuesday announced that the de-dupe adoption rate among its customers has tripled since November 2007, reaching more than 3,500 systems and 100 petabytes (PB) of raw storage capacity.
The storage vendor claimed that more than 1,000 customers have deployed de-dup across all tiers of data, including primary, backup and archival data. Companies like Data Domain Quantum Sepaton vs Falcon Stor Exagrid are not growing close to this.
De-duplication technology, which plays an important role in virtualized environments, is quickly gaining traction among customers who are struggling with data proliferation. Look for EMC Diligent and IBM to join in.
Now customers can eliminate redundant data quickly to improve space and power efficiencies, as well as to reduce the amount of raw storage required. Unlike other Disk to disk or D2D technologies.
NetApp claimed that it is the only major storage and data management vendor to embed de-duplication technology across its entire line of storage systems and to provide an end-to-end solution. Magic Quadrant by Gartner and Awarding winning no doubt. So why LTO-4 tape?
Brian McCarthy President of Sencilo Solutions and Storage Veteran of 25 years said there is a definite trend in the market today toward virtualizing storage environments.
"De-duplication is just one example. Organizations are embracing de-duplication because of the efficiencies it provides their organizations [and] significantly reducing the amount of physical capacity that must be purchased and managed," she said.
Dexma Inc., a company that creates and hosts mortgage-lending software for financial institutions, has used de-duplication to expand its data storage management capabilities.
By combining NetApp and VMware Inc. offerings, the company has created a virtual environment that enhances storage provisioning and increases its ability to more easily scale its storage system to meet its data management needs.
Since the installation of NetApp deduplication in September 2007, Dexma has recovered much of its previously utilized disk space.
This has freed up crucial disk space to be used by other applications, according to the David Waterhouse, the company's senior systems administrator.
"We were able to decrease our storage requirements for our customer file retention by 35%," Waterhouse said. "This has had a direct effect on our bottom line."
De-duplication, which is free of charge to customers as an inherent feature in all NetApp storage systems, will also be free when it is extended to NetApp's virtual tape library (VTL) offering later this year.
The de-duplication option for NearStore VTL will dramatically reduce the cost of storing backups on disk by providing effective storage capacities that are greater than today's systems, according to the vendor.
Patrick Rogers, NetApp vice president of solutions marketing, said de-duplication has become a core element of his company's storage offerings as more customers grapple with growing amounts of data.
While the technology helps customers control growth, Rogers said it's apparent that customers are rethinking their traditional data-backup approaches as VTL becomes more prevalent.
He said recent hardware and software updates introduced in March have more than doubled the maximum usable storage capacity of NearStore VTL and increased write-compressed performance by up to 20%, enabling enterprise customers to protect more data in less time.
For more information please call (407) 265-6293 or visit us at: http://www.sencilo.com/storage-area-network.php
For more information please call (407) 265-6293 or visit us at: http://www.sencilo.com/storage-data-deduplication.php
About Us
Sencilo Solutions is a Florida-based integrator specializing in storage and security solutions. Sencilo delivers a comprehensive portfolio of products from best-of-breed hardware and software from multiple manufacturers including VMware, EMC, Juniper Networks, Hitachi, Symantec, Barracuda Networks, and HP. Its technical expertise is known throughout the storage and security industry. Clients include leading corporations, major financial institutions, top universities, government facilities, as well as small to medium size businesses. Sencilo's professional services include consulting, integration, project management, installation, maintenance and knowledge transfer.
Sencilo has offices throughout Florida including: Jacksonville, Daytona Beach, Miami, Tampa, St. Petersburg, Orlando, Hialeah, St. Augustine, Gainesville, Ocala, Palm Coast, Clearwater, Kissimmee, Lakeland, Maitland and Cape Canaveral
Offerings Projects: Replication De-Dup De-Dupe iSCSI SAN NAS VMware Security EMC NetApp HP IBM Quantum Compliance VTL Data Domain vs Gartner Magic Quadrant Quadrent LTO Backup Exc Pure Disk NetBackup Networker TSM Commvault BakBone D2D D2D2T compare cloud data deduplication thin provisioning DXi Global Compression DDX virtual tape library Data Reduction SEPATON FALCON compare Celerra CLARiiON Equallogic Dell NS20 NS40 CX4 CX3-20 CX3-40 CX3-80 FAS2050 FAS3050 Xiotech Nexsan Avamar DLD3 1500 D3 Storwiz storage compression data Ocarina Networks A-SIS compare Sepaton infopro BlueArc OnStor Microsoft Unified Storage data protection StorageX Brocade FAQ
Quantum Wins Another Major Account vs. Data Domain in the De-Dupe Race - April 2, 2008
Orlando Florida --Quantum Corp. the leader in cost-effective and scalable disk-based backup solutions D2D with byte-level data de-duplication, today announced that.............................at the request of Bill Anderson the CEO of Exagrid bandrews@exagrid.com we have been asked to remove this post.
For more information please call (407) 265-6293 or visit us at: http://www.sencilo.com/storage-data-deduplication.php
About Us
Sencilo Solutions is a Florida-based integrator specializing in Cost Cutting storage, security and managed services solutions. Sencilo delivers a comprehensive portfolio of products from best-of-breed hardware and software from multiple manufacturers including VMware, Data Domain, EMC, Hitachi, Symantec, HDS, IBM, Commvault, Xiotech and HP. Its technical expertise is known throughout the storage and security industry. Clients include leading corporations, major financial institutions, top universities, government facilities, as well as small to medium size businesses. Sencilo's professional services include consulting, integration, project management, storage virtualization installation, maintenance and knowledge transfer.
Sencilo has offices throughout Florida including: Jacksonville, Daytona Beach, Tampa, St. Petersburg, Orlando, Hialeah, St. Augustine, Gainesville, Ocala, Palm Coast, Clearwater, Kissimmee, Lakeland, Maitland and Cape Canaveral Green Simpana Offerings Projects: BC DR planning Replication De-Dup De-Dupe iSCSI SAN NAS VMware Security EMC NetApp HP IBM Quantum Compliance VTL Data Domain vs Gartner Magic Quadrant Quadrent LTO Backup Exc Pure Disk NetBackup Networker TSM Commvault BakBone D2D D2D2T compare cloud data deduplication thin provisioning DXi Global Compression DDX virtual tape library Data Reduction SEPATON FALCON compare Celerra CLARiiON Equallogic Dell NS20 NS40 CX4 CX3-20 CX3-40 CX3-80 FAS2050 FAS3050 Xiotech Nexsan Avamar DLD3 1500 D3 Storwiz storage compression data Ocarina Networks A-SIS compare Sepaton infopro BlueArc OnStor Microsoft Unified Storage data protection StorageX Brocade FAQ SSD Solid state disk SANmelody FalconStor tier zero Xiotech ISE nx4 ax4 greenBytes ZFS Sun Top 10 ROBOBak managed services hosting cloud grid Datacore Compellent compellant equallogic lefthand networks don't buy storage stop buying storage itguardian cherub networks Arkeia Network Backup appliance Data Recovery Backup Health IT Healthcare IT Digital Hospital Allscripts
Migrating Data from Direct Attached Storage (DAS) to SAN - March 29, 2008
Orlando Florida - After you go through the purchasing and deployment process to implement your new storage area network (SAN), you'll need to migrate all of your data to the new platform and switch off the old file servers or arrange some downtime to remove those redundant direct-attached disks.
When migrating your data from direct-attached storage (DAS) to iSCSI or FC SAN, consider the following: how to move the data from file servers; how to move your database-type information; and whether to go to that final mile and host operating systems on the SAN, so your servers don't need any local disks at all.
Moving the data from file servers is perhaps the easiest task to manage, but it takes the longest. "Historically, Fibre Channel (FC) been the de facto SAN connection, but many small and midsized businesses (SMBs) opt for an iSCSI-based solution that connects to the network over Ethernet and effectively joins the domain for security purposes", states Brian McCarthy CEO of Sencilo Solutions and Storage Veteran of over 25 years. This allows you to create shares on the SAN just as you'd create a share by using your workstation Computer Management snap-in to create remote shares on a Windows-based server.
Before moving anything, see what users are mapping to over and above the drive letters that you've assigned through policies or login scripts. If you're lucky, you're in a business where the users are given everything they need and never go searching for other secret places to stash their files. Once all of your users are logged off the affected systems, change the share permissions so that they either have no access -- or at best read-only access. Then, use Robocopy to move the files from the server to the SAN. Re-mapping the login scripts will allow your users to carry on working the next day as if nothing had happened. The shares will all look the same and the permissions they had when the files were on the server will be the same when the files are on the SAN with products from NetApp or MDI of Lake Mary, Florida.
Database servers are a little bit more complex, and can be time-consuming because of the preparatory steps that you need to take. Depending on the type of SAN you are deploying, connecting the server to the storage network is a matter of additional Ethernet ports or FC host bus adapters (HBA). How the servers and the SAN are physically connected doesn't matter for this article. However, the way that all the storage on the network is presented to the server does. Each SAN vendor does it a little differently, but the bottom line is that either the reseller will have taught you how to create and configure logical unit numbers (LUNs), or they'll have done an initial setup for you. Setting up LUNs doesn't take long and can be as quick as half a dozen clicks through a browser interface. Once created, the server will automatically pick them up in the Disk Management snap-in. All you need to do is to give them a drive letter and format them.
The next step is to research the best or supported way to move a database from one drive letter to another. In the case of Microsoft Exchange and SQL databases, this can be done from either the command line or from the graphical user interface. After the migration of the information, you'll need to schedule additional downtime to decommission the unused local disks from the server.
For Web servers and other applications that don't actually have any data that's kept on local disks, booting the server from networked storage could be a good option for you. "Boot from SAN" is a term that might strike fear in many people, but it's really nothing to be afraid of. There are two very good reasons for looking at this particular technology. First, an operating system and application rarely need more than 30 GB of space to run. Disks from server vendors these days are up to four or five times that size. That's a lot of wasted space that you really can't use for anything else. Second, leaving disks in the server to generate heat when there's more than enough space in the SAN, isn't particularly ecological. iSCSI and FC networks are far quicker and more resilient than they were some years ago, so the FUD -- fear, uncertainty and doubt -- around booting from the SAN is now simply irrelevant. Moving from local disks to a SAN is not a complex operation either. DDChanger is an application that will take the operating system on local disks and push it up to a bootable LUN on the server.
For more information please call (407) 265-6293 or visit us at: http://www.sencilo.com/storage-area-network.php
About Us
Sencilo Solutions is a Florida-based integrator specializing in storage and security solutions. Sencilo delivers a comprehensive portfolio of products from best-of-breed hardware and software from multiple manufacturers including VMware, EMC, Juniper Networks, Hitachi, Symantec, Barracuda Networks, and HP. Its technical expertise is known throughout the storage and security industry. Clients include leading corporations, major financial institutions, top universities, government facilities, as well as small to medium size businesses. Sencilo's professional services include consulting, integration, project management, installation, maintenance and knowledge transfer.
Sencilo has offices throughout Florida including: Jacksonville, Daytona Beach, Miami, Tampa, St. Petersburg, Orlando, Hialeah, St. Augustine, Gainesville, Ocala, Palm Coast, Clearwater, Kissimmee, Lakeland, Maitland and Cape Canaveral
Offerings Projects: Replication De-Dup De-Dupe iSCSI SAN NAS VMware Security EMC NetApp HP IBM Quantum Compliance VTL Data Domain vs Gartner Magic Quadrant Quadrent LTO Backup Exc Pure Disk NetBackup Networker TSM Commvault BakBone D2D D2D2T compare cloud data deduplication thin provisioning DXi Global Compression DDX virtual tape library Data Reduction SEPATON FALCON compare Celerra CLARiiON Equallogic Dell NS20 NS40 CX4 CX3-20 CX3-40 CX3-80 FAS2050 FAS3050 Xiotech Nexsan Avamar DLD3 1500 D3 Storwiz storage compression data Ocarina Networks A-SIS compare Sepaton infopro BlueArc OnStor Microsoft Unified Storage data protection StorageX Brocade
Midmarket Enterprises embrass iSCSI SANs vs. FC SANs - March 29, 2008
Jacksonville Florida - Storage networks allow disparate storage resources to be centralized and organized within the data center. The available storage can then be centrally managed and allocated to users or applications. Fibre Channel (FC) has been the dominant storage area network (SAN) architecture for years, but its high cost and management complexity have deterred many SMBs from adopting this SAN technology.
Internet SCSI, or ISCSI, addresses these SAN problems by carrying SCSI commands and storage traffic over existing IP networks. Transporting "SCSI over IP" leverages ubiquitous Ethernet networks, and that translates to lower costs, easier maintenance and simpler management, which in turn makes SAN deployment more attractive to SMBs. This article examines the basics of iSCSI, enumerates deployment roadblocks and anticipates future trends.
Understanding iSCSI SANs
The development of iSCSI is a good example of problem-solving by using existing technologies in new ways. "Traditional FC storage networks use the SCSI command set, carrying SCSI storage commands over physical FC infrastructures" say Andy Mapp CTO of Sencilo Solutions of Lakeland Florida. As developers sought ways to overcome the cost, configuration and management complexities associated with FC networks, it made sense to place SCSI commands across other network architectures. Thus, iSCSI is SCSI block-storage access that is mapped to run across an IP network -- almost universally an Ethernet network. Although the iSCSI standard was ratified in 2003, iSCSI technology has only recently started receiving broad attention.
iSCSI SANs offers several benefits to an organization; cost, labor/management, and reach. The ubiquitous nature of Ethernet means that IP networks can be deployed quickly and easily in organizations of all sizes. Ethernet is also readily understood, so IT personnel can deploy and maintain an IP environment without specialized FC SAN training. It's not necessary to hire more IT personnel to implement and manage the SAN. Where FC SANs are typically small islands of technology located in a data center, the use of IP networks also gives iSCSI a global reach leading from a LAN to a WAN and onto the Internet -- allowing storage to be located almost anywhere.
"Although the terms "iSCSI" and "storage over IP" are often used interchangeably, this is technically incorrect", says Mapp of Sencilo Solutions. While iSCSI may be the dominant subset of IP storage, there are other IP storage technologies to consider, such asFCIP (Fibre Channel over IP) for exchanging data between FC networks across the Internet and iFCP (Internet Fibre Channel protocol) for extending FC networks across the Internet.
Debunking common IP network myths
The low cost of iSCSI is usually its strongest selling point, but the issue of iSCSI cost is a bit more complicated than people think. People buy iSCSI because they want a cheaper alternative to FC. "Users have $2,000 Windows servers that they'd love to put on a SAN, but they can't afford to spend $2,000 more to connect them to a Fibre Channel SAN," says Stephen Fosk. Leveraging an existing Ethernet network can indeed be far less expensive than deploying and interfacing to a new FC SAN, but businesses will ultimately spend capital on iSCSI storage arrays or specialized iSCSI adapters to enhance a server's connectivity.
The IP network itself is often a point of confusion. While iSCSI will certainly work over an existing Ethernet network using hardware, storage and software already on hand, it's vital to keep iSCSI traffic off the main production network. Not only can iSCSI traffic congest an everyday network, it's necessary to keep sensitive corporate data segmented from the general user population. "It is a SAN, and you don't want data essentially 'leaking out' of the data center," Fosk says.
Right now, the "sweet spot" for iSCSI is the midmarket. Where iSCSI is most readily embraced is in a Windows storage environment by organizations that have not previously implemented a SAN -- typically SMBs. However, iSCSI is also making inroads in the enterprise within the department or large workgroup where it can serve as primary storage to support Exchange, Oracle databases, VMware, and other block applications. Larger enterprises are even adopting iSCSI as secondary or even tertiary storage. "It's being used as an alternative to direct attached, Fibre Channel SAN attached, or even NAS [network attached storage]," says Greg Schulz, founder and senior analyst with the StorageIO Group.
Implementing iSCSI SANs
It takes three components to establish an iSCSI SAN: a network, a target and an initiator. The network component is relatively easy; virtually any IP network, such as Ethernet, will work. ISCSI is ideally suited to Gigabit Ethernet (GigE) and faster deployments, but it's crucial to keep the iSCSI SAN separate from the production LAN through a VLAN. Either that, or implement a different LAN segment and switch just for the iSCSI SAN. This separates storage and user traffic, and reins storage within the SAN.
The "target" is basically a storage destination. In the early days of iSCSI, routers were popular targets, allowing iSCSI hosts to access FC storage. Although this approach is still a viable transition technology, it has largely been abandoned, due to the availability of dedicated hardware and software products. Hardware iSCSI targets include dedicated storage arrays from vendors such as Nexsan, MDI and Hitachi Data Systems.
Today it is increasingly common to use a software-based iSCSI target running on a PC -- turning the server and its storage into an iSCSI target. Many open source products can be applied to Linux and BSD environments. Commercial software can also be employed, including iSCSI Storage Server for Windows from FalconStor Software Inc., SANmelody from DataCore Software Corp. and Microsoft's iSCSI target software, released as part of Windows Storage Server.
We should emphasize that there is no such thing as an iSCSI hard drive; any disk, such as SATA, in a server or array fitted with target software can be treated as "iSCSI storage." According to Schulz, "You can roll your own iSCSI storage, or you can redeploy a server to be an iSCSI array."
Each system that will access iSCSI storage will also need a hardware or software "initiator." Today, free iSCSI initiator software is already available for download with Windows 2000, Windows 2003 and Windows XP Pro. Software is the most popular initiator choice. "The majority, maybe 90% to 95% of all iSCSI implementations, involve a software initiator," Schulz says. Hardware initiators are also available as controller cards from many FC and TCP/IP offload engine (TOE) controller vendors, such as QLogic Corp. and Broadcom Corp.
Areas of concern
Most analysts and users agree that iSCSI is easier to deploy and manage than FC -- especially in the IP network and initiator. Some training and configuration may be needed to optimize iSCSI targets, but this depends on the target. A dedicated iSCSI array may demand more training and management than an iSCSI server deployed in-house. Ultimately, an iSCSI storage administrator will still need to be concerned with LUNs, volumes, provisioning and other common SAN issues. Pilot deployments can often help organizations identify potential problem areas and determine the tangible value of iSCSI.
Network architecture and performance is also critical to iSCSI. The technology is not tolerant of network interruptions, and an iSCSI array can easily crash as a result of interruptions or bottlenecks. Consequently, an iSCSI implementation should include an aluation of network performance and reliability. Old or outdated hardware components should be overhauled to improve network performance or ease bottlenecks, and failover measures should be deployed wherever possible to ensure network reliability. Typically, iSCSI is not recommended for use in large transactional environments where performance is critical.
ISCSI storage performance is also related to the number of spindles (drives) available in the network. you can achieve excellent iSCSI storage performance by load balancing more storage nodes (clustering) rather than placing more drives into fewer large iSCSI boxes. "Most high-end iSCSI arrays balance I/O across many more spindles than a Fibre Channel array," Foskett says. "If you look at the performance tests, you'll see that iSCSI outperforms Fibre Channel [due to the design of the storage array]."
The future of iSCSI SANs
ISCSI will have to find a way to flourish in the shadow of NAS, which is currently easier to deploy and manage -- particularly when coupled with virtualization techniques from companies like Compellent, MDI, and NetApp. But analysts say that iSCSI has a bright future in the SMB and enterprise, mainly because there is so much potential for growth. According to Foskett, about 80% of all servers (primarily low-end Windows servers) are not connected to shared storage, so iSCSI can expand shared storage dramatically by interconnecting that untapped wealth of storage.
The eventual move to 10 GigE and faster wireless networking standards will also impact iSCSI further in the future, enabling additional bandwidth for iSCSI and ultimately challenging the dominance of FC. "We're just scratching the tip of the iceberg with iSCSI," Schulz says. "[The year] 2008 is when I think iSCSI will really start to come into its prime." ***
For more information please call (407) 265-6293 or visit us at: http://www.sencilo.com/storage-area-network.php
About Us
Sencilo Solutions is a Florida-based integrator specializing in storage and security solutions. Sencilo delivers a comprehensive portfolio of products from best-of-breed hardware and software from multiple manufacturers including VMware, EMC, Juniper Networks, Hitachi, Symantec, Barracuda Networks, and HP. Its technical expertise is known throughout the storage and security industry. Clients include leading corporations, major financial institutions, top universities, government facilities, as well as small to medium size businesses. Sencilo's professional services include consulting, integration, project management, installation, maintenance and knowledge transfer.
Sencilo has offices throughout Florida including: Jacksonville, Daytona Beach, Miami, Tampa, St. Petersburg, Orlando, Hialeah, St. Augustine, Gainesville, Ocala, Palm Coast, Clearwater, Kissimmee, Lakeland, Maitland and Cape Canaveral
Offerings Projects: Replication De-Dup De-Dupe iSCSI SAN NAS VMware Security EMC NetApp HP IBM Quantum Compliance VTL Data Domain vs Gartner Magic Quadrant Quadrent LTO Backup Exc Pure Disk NetBackup Networker TSM Commvault BakBone D2D D2D2T compare cloud data deduplication thin provisioning DXi Global Compression DDX virtual tape library Data Reduction SEPATON FALCON compare Celerra CLARiiON Equallogic Dell NS20 NS40 CX4 CX3-20 CX3-40 CX3-80 FAS2050 FAS3050 Xiotech Nexsan Avamar DLD3 1500 D3 Storwiz storage compression data Ocarina Networks A-SIS compare Sepaton infopro BlueArc OnStor Microsoft Unified Storage data protection StorageX Brocade FAQ
Best Practices for E-Discovery, E-mail Archiving and Data Retention - March 29, 2008
Tampa Florida - Understand what your main problems are before you purchase technology.
The biggest mistake IT managers make when researching e-mail archiving is to not fully understanding the reasons for it. Often, companies are reacting to one problem of concern, such as an audit suggestion, which leads to rushing out to buy e-mail archiving technology for FRCP, Florida Sunshine Laws, PCI or Sarbanes-Oxley compliance, and not taking into account productivity or storage problems.
Most companies will have more than one problem that can be solved with e-mail archiving and record retentation. Whether it be regulatory compliance, litigation support or storage management, make sure you understand all of your needs before you take the next step.
Create or update e-mail retention policy to reflect today's business needs.
Very few companies have an up-to-date record retention policy. An effective document retention policy will address what the document retention policy covers, the company data retention philosophy, responsibilities and procedures. It will also have retention timeframes for all types of records in a company including unstructured data like Microsoft Office files, semi-structured records like e-mail and structured records like mainframe databases. You will also want to create retention schedules that employees can easily follow and remember. Make these documents short and simple. Also document how long you will keep records (including e-mails). There is lots of good software to assist you with data migration or working with a local reseller or consulting firm is always an option.
Periodically perform a legal or regulatory refresh.
When you have a data retention policy, be sure to review it annually. Regulations and laws change regularly, and so must your data retention policy. New regulations are created regularly as well as judicial rules of evidence. Government regulatory agencies and the courts expect companies to be fully aware of new regulations and laws.
Include all stakeholders: legal, compliance, HR, finance, investor relations, engineering, production and administration.
A data retention policy affects every employee in the company and should reflect input from everyone. Create a cross-functional team that represents most business operations or departments. Interview a wide sampling of employees and departments to determine how and why they create documents; if they re-use or reference them later; and where they store the documents. This helps you create a retention policy that won't adversely affect the employees and their day-to-day work.
Focus on similarities in laws or regulations and create "high water mark" retention lengths.
Multipage retention schedules are rarely effective or followed. Simplify them as much as possible. Most data retention requirements are for minimum retention periods. Create "high water marks" for similar types of documents. For example, retention regulations for employment records vary widely from one year to 10-plus years. "It is easier for employees to follow one retention period that meets all retention requirements for all employee-related records than to try to remember many different retention periods," states Brian McCarthy CEO and Archiving Consultant for Sencilo Solutions of Daytona Beach. "Creating high-water marks for retention periods will also make it much easier to adopt automated e-mail archiving processes," says McCarthy.
Socialize your policy companywide.
Be sure to adequately inform employees about the new or existing policy and make it easily accessible. Many employees don't know if their company has a data retention policy or where to find it if there is one. All employees should be "trained" on a new policy, including knowing why the policy was created (legal, regulatory or other); how to use any new technology associated with the new policy; and consequences for the company and employee if the policy is not followed. Offer annual training refreshers.
Don't attempt to teach employees to subjectively recognize "business" records.
It is very difficult to create a uniform archive across a company if you are asking employees to individually decide which records are business records and what can be archived. For example, in a company of 1,000 employees, you will have 1,000 different retention policies if you rely on employees to interpret the policy and make archiving decisions. The less complicated the policy, the more uniform the archives will be.
Don't forget the e-mail use policy.
Even when you have a data retention policy, you should still publish an e-mail use policy that informs the employees of their responsibilities, including things they shouldn't do, privacy expectations and consequences for system misuse. There are alot of good archiving products on the market like award winning Barracuda Archiver, Intradyn Orca eMail archiver vs Mimosa Systems. Some of the legacy products are for the most part over priced by today's standards like Symantec Enterprise Vault, CA's Message Manager vs EMC's Legato.
Move e-mail retention from a manual process to an automated process.
Take e-mail archiving out of the hands of employees. Automated e-mail archiving will ensure uniform archiving, increase employee and IT productivity and most importantly, put in place a system that can ensure no message protection if a litigation hold procedure is instituted.
Discourage employees from creating personal archives (PSTs).
Most employees, in companies without e-mail archiving automation, create their own "personal archives" or PSTs for many reasons. They create them for future protection, for reference or re-use. This adversely affects employee productivity. If the company is capturing e-mail traffic, employees won't need to spend time trying to find, access and create archives.
For more information please call (407) 265-6293 or visit us at: http://www.sencilo.com/c2c.php
About Us
Sencilo Solutions is a Florida-based integrator specializing in storage, security and networking solutions. Sencilo delivers a comprehensive portfolio of products from best-of-breed hardware and software from multiple manufacturers including VMware, EMC, NetApp, Juniper Networks, Hitachi, Symantec, Barracuda Networks, and HP. Its technical expertise is known throughout the storage and security industry. Clients include leading corporations, major financial institutions, top universities, government facilities, as well as small to medium size businesses. Sencilo's professional services include consulting, integration, project management, installation, maintenance and knowledge transfer.
Sencilo has offices throughout Florida including: Jacksonville, Daytona Beach, Miami, Tampa, St. Petersburg, Orlando, Hialeah, St. Augustine, Gainesville, Ocala, Palm Coast, Clearwater, Kissimmee, Lakeland, Maitland, Cape Canaveral
Other Projects: DR BC Replication De-Dup De-Dupe iSCSI SAN NAS VMware Security EMC NetApp HP IBM Quantum Compliance VTL Data Domain vs Gartner Magic Quadrant Quadrent LTO Backup Exc NetBackup Networker TSM Commvault BakBone D2D D2D2T compare cloud data deduplication thin provisioning DXi Global Compression DDX virtual tape library Data Reduction SEPATON FALCON compare Celerra CLARiiON Equallogic Dell NS20 NS40 CX3-20 CX3-40 CX3-80 FAS2050 FAS3050 Xiotech Nexsan Avamar CX4
TJX to face security audits for the next 20 years for losing data - March 28, 2008
Tampa Florida -- TJX Cos Inc. will implement tighter security and allow its data to be audited to settle charges that its poor security led to the massive data security breach, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission said on Thursday.
Under a settlement agreement reached with the FTC, the discount retailer agreed to open its records to an audit. Specifically, TJX must obtain audits by independent third-party security professionals every other year for 20 years, the FTC said.
TJX also agreed to establish and maintain a comprehensive security program. The FTC said the program must protect the personal information it collects from or about consumers. The FTC is requiring the retailer to conduct a risk assessment to identify holes that could put consumer data at risk and then design and implement policies and security technologies to mitigate the risks. Had TJX had the right Firewalls from companies like Juniper or Barracuda Networks maybe thing would be a whole lot different.
The agreement also addresses TJX's process of selecting service providers to handle credit card transactions. The company must take steps in selecting a service provider and in handling consumer information it receives from business partnerswhich should of included encryption.
"By now, the message should be clear: companies that collect sensitive consumer information have a responsibility to keep it secure," said FTC Chairman Deborah Platt Majoras. "These cases bring to 20 the number of complaints in which the FTC has charged companies with security deficiencies in protecting sensitive consumer information. Information security is a priority for the FTC, as it should be for every business in America."
Scott Crawford, an analyst with Boulder, Colo.-based Enterprise Management Associates, called the settlement significant for the FTC, which is trying to send the message that it is ensuring enforcement of data security on businesses.
"The impact on individual consumers is what is at stake here and the FTC wants to make sure that TJX is not just paying a penalty but it is required to practice some standard of appropriate security," Crawford said.
The FTC does not have the ability to impose fines, but the agency has reached settlements before. In January, 2006, the FTC reached a settlement with ChoicePoint, which agreed to pay $10 million in civil penalties and $5 million in consumer redress to settle charges that its security and record-handling procedures violated consumers' privacy rights and federal laws.
A full, independent security audit monitored by the FTC would be a costly process, Crawford said. While enterprises won't be able to plug all holes, the FTC is trying to send the signal that organizations should be proactive on security of consumer data.
"The idea that you could hermetically seal an organization from outside threats is unrealistic," he said.
At last year's RSA conference, Majoras said the FTC would be aggressive in taking action against firms that fail to protect consumer data. She said the FTC has taken action against companies for a variety of issues from failing to protect against SQL injection attacks to low-tech attacks such as dumpster diving.
TJX, which operates over 2,500 stores worldwide used legacy Wi-Fi security. A report issued by Canadian privacy officials said the retailer should have moved faster to upgrade its Wi-Fi security from WEP encryption to WPA encryption. Hackers tapped into TJX's servers using the weaker Wi-Fi encryption, pilfering millions of credit and debit cards over an 18-month period by in what experts say was the biggest data breach in history.
Several banking associations reached an agreement with TJX in December, to be reimbursed for the costs associated with canceling and reissuing credit cards.
Since the breach, TJX has been steadily improving its security safeguards. In a prepared statement following the settlement, Daniel J. Forte, president, of the Massachusetts Bankers Association praised TJX for the steps it took to improve security following the breach.
"TJX maybe the first, but they will not be the last". "The message is lock it down or pay the price", states Brian McCarthy CEO and Security Consultant for Sencilo Solutions of Orlando Florida.
"We are pleased to see the steps undertaken by TJX to improve the protection of cardholder data. Those steps have resulted in TJX having recently been certified as fully PCI DSS compliant by an independent PCI-approved assessor," Forte said.
For more information please call (407) 265-6293 or visit us at: http://www.sencilo.com/products-security.php
About Us
Sencilo Solutions is a Florida-based integrator specializing in storage, security and networking solutions. Sencilo delivers a comprehensive portfolio of products from best-of-breed hardware and software from multiple manufacturers including VMware, EMC, NetApp, Juniper Networks, Hitachi, Symantec, Barracuda Networks, and HP. Its technical expertise is known throughout the storage and security industry. Clients include leading corporations, major financial institutions, top universities, government facilities, as well as small to medium size businesses. Sencilo's professional services include consulting, integration, project management, installation, maintenance and knowledge transfer.
Sencilo has offices throughout Florida including: Jacksonville, Miami, Tampa, St. Petersburg, Orlando, Hialeah, Fort Lauderdale, Tallahassee, Cape Coral, and Pembroke Pines.
Key words: Barracuda Networks Security RSA Encryption Cisco Decru Neoscale EMC NetApp HP IBM Quantum Compliance VTL Data Domain vs Gartner Magic Quadrant SSL SonicWall Secure Computing Firewall VPN Endpoint
FUJIFILM Launches World's First Datatape Tracker with SC-Integrity's LoJack InTransit(TM) Monitoring Network - March 28, 2008
Orlando Florida (BUSINESS WIRE)--FUJIFILM Recording Media today announced the immediate availability of the Fujifilm Tape Tracker™, a first-of-its-kind wireless tool to help data managers increase security of data by tracking in real-time the location and status of sensitive removable media cartridges while in transit.
Fujifilm is partnering with SC-Integrity (SCI), the world's most comprehensive covert cargo monitoring, recovery and loss prevention service to provide real-time monitoring and notification for the Tape Tracker using the Fujifind™ interactive web application. Based in Bothell, Wash., SCI entered into an agreement in 2006 with the LoJack Corporation to add the power of the LoJack® brand to SCI’s well-known theft prevention, investigation, tracking and recovery solution for the global cargo security market. Fujifind is based on SCI’s powerful LoJack InTransit™ software platform and provides simple management of multiple Tape Trackers.
“The tremendous feedback we received from customers when we introduced this concept last year made clear – there is a significant desire to maintain visibility and control over removable media during shipment from one location to another,” said Daniel Greenberg, New Product Manager, Marketing, Fujifilm Recording Media. “The ability of tape to store large quantities of data in a cost effective, energy efficient, removable format make it a preferred medium to backup and archive critical business data. The Tape Tracker gives power back to the data managers to maintain a chain of custody for these assets as they move between data center backup, vault or disaster recovery destinations.”
This is no doubt a service required with what appears to be daily lost tapes reported in the media, usually starting off with "Iron Mountain again lost a batch of tapes off a truck today".
Unique Product, Established Network
The Fujifilm Tape Tracker (patents pending) is designed within a half-inch tape cartridge format, enabling it to fit snugly and discreetly inside nearly any tape media case. The Fujifind application uses the information, tracking, geo-fencing and notification capability of the LoJack InTransit monitoring solution that currently provide corporations and government the ability to track and monitor high value cargo, audit driver activities, and conduct surveillance operations to ensure that their valuable assets are protected, worldwide.
LoJack InTransit uses the largest Law Enforcement Protocol and Dispatch Network in the cargo security business and the SCI Communications Command Center can dispatch appropriate authorities direct to the data tape location to ensure recovery, facilitate resolutions and prevent future losses.
“Data assets are well-protected in the data center and within a vault or duplicate operations center – but there has been no way to maintain continual chain of custody in real time. Now, with Tape Tracker combined with the LoJack InTransit, there is an effective solution,” said Robert Furtado, CEO, SC-Integrity. “If left unmonitored, back up, disaster recovery and archive data assets can become the Achilles heel to any business or an industry – particularly if the data is sensitive.”
Key features of the Fujifilm Tape Tracker system include:
- Discreet tracking cartridges that resemble other tape media in transit
- Fujifind web application for geo-mapping location with satellite imagery and online mapping created and supported directly by SCI
- Geo fencing capability, perimeter entry/exit notifications, in transit route discrepancy alerts
- Evidentiary reporting for continuous incident resolution and security protocol improvements
- User-defined activity and chain of custody history reports
- 24/7 expert staffed monitoring center, service and support
The Fujifilm Tape Tracker will be available through Fujifilm resellers in the United States at an MSRP of $150 per month.
About FUJIFILM
FUJIFILM Recording Media is the US-based manufacturing, marketing and sales operations of professional broadcast video and data tape recording media for FUJIFILM Corporation. Based on a history of thin-film engineering and magnetic particle science such as Fujifilm NANOCUBIC technology, Fujifilm creates breakthrough products for partners and end users.
Fujifilm is a leader in supplying the IT industry with advanced storage media including LTO Ultrium and enterprise-class data tape featuring the lowest cost per GB for mass storage applications while requiring very low power. Fujifilm provides broadcast and data center customers and industry partners with a wide range of unique data center accessories, value-added services and programs.
About Supply Chain Integrity (SCI)
Based near Seattle, Washington, SCI is committed to providing its community of members with the industry’s most comprehensive covert cargo theft detection, recovery, loss prevention and shared intelligence analysis service. At the core of SCI’s services is the federally-sanctioned Supply Chain Information Sharing and Analysis Center (ISAC), a secure and trusted information-sharing community for members to share incident information and actionable intelligence needed to protect the supply chain infrastructure. SCI services also include LoJack InTransit™, the world’s most comprehensive covert cargo monitoring, recovery and loss prevention service, and SC Investigate™, a powerful investigative sharing and management system with global intelligence-sharing capability.
For more information please call (407) 265-6293 or visit us at: http://www.sencilo.com/products-security.php
About Us
Sencilo Solutions is a Florida-based integrator specializing in storage, security and networking solutions. Sencilo delivers a comprehensive portfolio of products from best-of-breed hardware and software from multiple manufacturers including VMware, EMC, NetApp, Juniper Networks, Hitachi, Symantec, Barracuda Networks, and HP. Its technical expertise is known throughout the storage and security industry. Clients include leading corporations, major financial institutions, top universities, government facilities, as well as small to medium size businesses. Sencilo's professional services include consulting, integration, project management, installation, maintenance and knowledge transfer.
Sencilo has offices throughout Florida including: Jacksonville, Miami, Tampa, St. Petersburg, Orlando, Hialeah, Fort Lauderdale, Tallahassee, Cape Coral, and Pembroke Pines.
Key words: Barracuda Networks Security RSA Encryption Cisco Decru Neoscale EMC NetApp HP IBM Quantum Compliance VTL Data Domain vs Gartner Magic Quadrant SSL SonicWall Secure Computing Firewall VPN Endpoint
