It’s rare that I get excited about solutions. Yeah, we can say it’s the geeky side of me that can appreciate how good technology operates, but there are very few things that I come across that I think have a huge potential to change (read: simplify) next generation network visibility. Meet Centerity Monitor, a next generation tool to give you visibility into all types of environments. Continue reading
Security
Ever heard of a place, I think it’s called Norway? That was one of mine, I got an an award for it.
As someone who is a huge fan of cloud-storage as a way to access files across multiple devices, it’s always been a tricky conversation knowing that these types of services are also a huge back-door from a security perspective. Cloud-storage services like iCloud and Dropbox fill a need in the marketplace and are a great tool for sharing files across multiple devices, but since they leverage cloud storage, aren’t very secure and pose a huge DLP risk for corporations. So I was a little skeptical when I came across a new solution called Polkast, but I think it is exactly the type of solution that might address the security aspect of the conversation. Continue reading
Looks like you’ve been missing a lot of work lately. I wouldn’t say I’ve been *missing* it, Bob.
Yes, before you start to wonder what ever happened with Tinder Stratus, I’ve been enjoying some well-deserved downtime. I’m going to be cutting down the blog to write as much as I can, but as cloud starts to ramp up in Canada, I am going to be working on a few other side projects. It’s been awhile since I’ve posted, and since it’s Tuesday, I am happy to get back into the swing of things with a quick update from a security company that I first came across years ago, and are still creating some great solutions, especially now for the virtualization space.
Tripwire’s ConfigCheck is a great (and free!) utility that helps organizations get a quick picture of how secure their VMware ESX 3.0/3.5 hypervisor is by measuring it against the VMware Infrastructure 3 Security Hardening guidelines. While there are some other tools that do similar types of verification, I like that Tripwire not only identifies the vulnerabilities, but since it was designed from the ground up with VMware, it provides the steps towards full remediation of the vulnerabililities.
But why is something like this so critical? Well, as organizations struggle to identify security deficiencies within their virtual environments, tools like this make it a lot easier by giving a standard baseline for which to start. While it’s not a replacement for having experienced security folks, it’s a great solution for midmarket or other organizations who don’t have such luxury.
Aside from discovering vulnerabilities, ConfigCheck helps organizations deploy virtualization in a manner that is safe and secure, increase the security posture of the entire organization, reduce configuration drift and easily implement security and compliance best practices. It’s a cheat sheet if you will, to help identify and manage vulnerabilities in your virtual environment.
Yeah. I got the memo. And I understand the policy. And the problem is just that I forgot the one time. And I’ve already taken care of it so it’s not even really a problem anymore.
When you ask a security professional about the biggest security threat they think exists, there is a good chance it will be related to people. After all, no matter what security controls you put in place, it really comes down to human nature as to whether they follow such controls or not. It’s like I always say, “If you don’t give your employees some flexibility, then you might as well hire more security people to deal with the increased workload. So when it comes to fostering an environment of awareness, there are several views on what is the best way to deal with high risk applications such as Dropbox. Continue reading
This caused the 1977 New York blackout. A practical joke by the great attractor. He thought it was funny as hell.
Most of Canada and the US’s power, water and manufacturing facilities leverage some kind of industrial control system (ICS). These systems are usually built on Windows and have some kind of front end backing onto the Internet, which means they are prime targets for web based attacks. Continue reading
Nyet! Nyet! No More! No! Not tonight! This son of b***h, all night he, “Check. Check. Check.” He trap me!
I love attending conferences, especially since you get such a diverse group of speakers covering a wide variety of not just security, but cloud issues too. One of the more interesting presentations I stumbled across was delivered by a speaker who spoke nothing about technology, yet presented some of the most compelling information on why cybersecurity is one of the hardest issues to manage on a global scale. Here’s what he spoke about. Continue reading
Well, it’s a wonderful device nonetheless, despite the poorly written instruction manual.
OK, I’ll admit it. I love cloud storage. Not huge, datacentre style stuff, just simple stuff like Dropbox. Why? Well, mostly because it makes keeping things available on all devices a lot easier, and honestly, it makes me way more productive. In fact, it makes employees as a whole way more productive. So why aren’t more organizations touting these solutions? Continue reading
It doesn’t matter what happened. What matters is what looks like what happened and what looks like what happened…is purdy nasty!
On Tuesday at the InfoSecurity Summit in Hong Kong, a very interesting point about cloud came up for discussion. While I’ll be one of the first to say cloud gives organizations of all sizes lots of great benefits and resources they might normally have access to, there is another side to cloud. A much darker, scarier side that is being used by cyber-criminals. Continue reading
Ten percent of nuthin’ is…let me do the math here…nuthin’ into nuthin’…carry the nuthin’…
One of the more recent topics around cloud and security to garner media attention is around the risks associated with inadequate patching policies as they relate to virtual machines. I know most people are thinking “Endpoint? Really? Isn’t that a simple thing to take care of in any environment?”, but the reality is that there are still nuances that are part of virtual and cloud environments that add a layer of complexity that a lot of IT professionals might not think of simply because they haven’t had to think in such terms yet. In particular, the notion of endpoint tagging as it relates to virtual snapshots or moving VMs is one of those instances. Continue reading
I’m not anti-social; I’m just not user friendly.
I read a great article recently pinning cloud solutions versus on-premise to see what the experts anticipate will be the new widely adopted service model. As someone who comes from the on-premise security business, and being in the midst of figuring out the best way to transition traditional solutions to cloud delivered ones, this is a very important argument. After all, just about every organization has used the on-premise model for security, so why is cloud a better decision moving forward? Continue reading
Tinder Stratus 