Opinion

Opinion

• Big data storage – what went wrong?

  Big data storage seemed a prime opportunity for storage suppliers, but most users run DAS, shunning dedicated systems. Is that set to change?  Continue Reading

• Security Think Tank: ISF’s top security threats for 2014

  What are the top security issues businesses need to address going into 2014?  Continue Reading

• An internet of things vision

  What does a world of connected machines look like? Connecting machines will lead to changed behaviours that then change the applications.  Continue Reading

• Internet of things: Low-cost trade-off

  The office at DoES Liverpool has a DoorBot, which works as a kiosk device, showing webcam views of the office and a list of upcoming events.  Continue Reading

• Smart machines raise challenging questions

  Smart systems like IBM’s Watson, autonomous vehicles and a growing army of robots are quietly making more and more decisions every day.  Continue Reading

• So when do employees start following security rules?

  As security needs are rapidly transformed, when do enterprises feel that they are getting on top of information security?  Continue Reading

• Big data, big legal trouble?

  Big data has a range of practical and commercial benefits to businesses but can be fraught with privacy and legal issues  Continue Reading

• Lessons from electronic medical records programme at Liverpool Heart and Chest Hospital

  Cardiologist Johan Waktare talks about the Liverpool Heart and Chest Hospital NHS Foundation Trust's EMR scheme  Continue Reading

• C’mon guys – don’t bottle up the Public Services Network; release it

  There is a stark choice between a PSN that has a customer-centric approach to security or one with a locked-down security framework  Continue Reading

• Cyberattack: Top ten tips for working with the business and getting the glory

  Businesses are starting to realise that cyberattacks can pose a potential threat to everything they do  Continue Reading

• Entropy and data quality: How to keep your data accurate

  The quality of data held in IT systems will deteriorate unless steps are taken to maintain its accuracy and consistency. We look at what businesses should be doing to control that data quality more effectively  Continue Reading

• Intel x86 and IBM Power CPUs: Which, when, why?

  There are only three processors left in the market for mission-critical applications. Which should you chose ?  Continue Reading

• Why understanding context is the key to biometric success.

  Since Apple launched the double whammy of the iPhone 5S and 5C in September, internet chatter has focussed primarily on the merits and disadvantages of the new home button on the 5S and whether its biometric fingerprint scanner is ultimately secure ...  Continue Reading

• Extending your professional Influence: a guide for IT professionals

  Organisations want people who can bring both breadth and depth of expertise, and collaborate successfully with others  Continue Reading

• Take an issues-driven approach to business intelligence

  Accenture advises CIOs to put business issues ahead of data, know the users, look beyond ERP data, and embed analytics in BI  Continue Reading

• Breaking the medieval software market in local government

  The financial challenges facing local government have never been greater and we need innovation and new ways of delivering public services  Continue Reading

• IT skills shortage still tops the technology agenda

  Many executives in the UK expect to increase investment in IT products and services, but there is an ongoing skills challenge  Continue Reading

• You’ve got flash storage, so why isn’t everything faster?

  To get the most out of flash storage you need storage performance monitoring of the whole stack, from servers to LUNs  Continue Reading

• Security Think Tank: Risk of software procurement cannot be ignored

  How can security professionals ensure security testing becomes part of the procurement process for all business software?  Continue Reading

• Technology, society and morality: the implications for technology leaders

  Technology is evolving at a pace and scale that has never been experienced. Society is struggling to keep up with the social and moral implications  Continue Reading

• IT contractors: why it pays to be careful about tax

  Well-publicised HMRC crackdowns and new legislation mean that old assumptions about what is legal and what isn’t might not hold true  Continue Reading

• Security Think Tank: Security testing a vital part of software procurement

  How can security professionals ensure security testing becomes part of the procurement process for all business software?  Continue Reading

• Cloud storage needs an audit process to stay compliant

  If you use a cloud service, where does your data reside, and do you know if you’re fully compliant with laws and regulations? A cloud compliance audit is what’s required  Continue Reading

• Security Think Tank: Risk-based security will ease software testing challenge

  How can security professionals ensure security testing becomes part of the procurement process for all business software?  Continue Reading

• Security Think Tank: Beef up due diligence

  How can security professionals ensure security testing becomes part of the procurement process for all business software?  Continue Reading

• Security Think Tank: If cost is king, security suffers

  How can security professionals ensure security testing becomes part of the procurement process for all business software?  Continue Reading

• Security Think Tank: How to ensure vendors act efficiently

  How can security professionals ensure security testing becomes part of the procurement process for all business software?  Continue Reading

• Security Think Tank: Security pros need to be plugged into procurement

  How can security professionals ensure security testing becomes part of the procurement process for all business software?  Continue Reading

• Security Think Tank: Procurement and security are uneasy bedfellows

  How can security professionals ensure security testing becomes part of the procurement process for all business software?  Continue Reading

• 451 survey finds enterprise flash storage adoption real, and growing

  Flash storage is an established and growing part of enterprise datacentres. A survey from 451 Research shows hybrid flash leads the way over PCIe flash and all-flash adoption  Continue Reading

• EU Data Protection Regulation: fines up to €100m proposed

  The proposed EU Data Protection Regulation will require a significant review of existing security and data protection measures, policies and procedures  Continue Reading

• IT may not have to worry about mobile device backup

  Analyst Charles Brett offers some advice for IT departments on backing up data from mobile devices, tablets and smartphones,  Continue Reading

• Has your project got stuck PCI syndrome?

  With version 3.0 of PCI-DSS set to be published on 7 November, here are some reasons why PCI projects get stuck and how to unstick them  Continue Reading

• Byte Night 2013 - Thanks a million

  Bye Night, the annual IT industry charity fundraising event, has hit its target of £1m for this year's sleep-out  Continue Reading

• Security Think Tank: Cyber insurance no substitute good security practices

  How can IT security best use the new financial and insurance products available to IT to improve data protection without increasing cost?  Continue Reading

• Array-based or vSphere Replication for VMware SRM?

  What’s the best replication method for VMware Site Recovery Manager (SRM)? GlassHouse Technologies’ Paul Grimwood runs the rule over array-based replication and vSphere Replication  Continue Reading

• Security Think Tank: When cyber insurance is right and when it is not

  How can IT security best use the new financial and insurance products available to IT to improve data protection without increasing cost?  Continue Reading

• Outsourcing: The soft underbelly of cyber risks

  Controls imposed on suppliers that are not the same as those imposed internally is a soft underbelly that can expose a business to cyber risk  Continue Reading

• Who owns your LinkedIn account?

  It is common for employees to use personal social networking accounts for work, but who actually owns those accounts?  Continue Reading

• Security Think Tank: Data insurance will not fix broken systems

  How can IT security best use the new financial and insurance products available to IT to improve data protection without increasing cost?  Continue Reading

• Security Think Tank: Cyber insurance is a two-way street

  How can IT security best use the new financial and insurance products available to IT to improve data protection without increasing cost?  Continue Reading

• Security Think Tank: Cyber insurance – buyers beware

  How can IT security best use the new financial and insurance products available to IT to improve data protection without increasing cost?  Continue Reading

• BYOD: data protection and information security issues

  Allowing employees to use their own devices to access company data raises data protection issues that a business must answer  Continue Reading

• Do not overlook the weak link in IT security

  To err is to be human. To remember this is vital. Particularly if you are in charge of IT security  Continue Reading

• Information security in the cloud: Time to switch to panic mode?

  Some people already argue that there is no longer any security in the cloud at all. Is it time to switch to panic mode?  Continue Reading

• The feminisation of the IT department

  How can you improve the quality of relationships between individuals working in IT and colleagues in business?  Continue Reading

• Forrester: Modern app development requires a modern set of metrics

  IT executives responsible for application development have a great opportunity to develop apps that improve customer experience or help businesses sell more  Continue Reading

• Is it time to move from data protection to information management?

  Data can be the most valuable asset of a business, and most organisations take steps to protect it – but unfortunately with variable success  Continue Reading

• Byte Night 2013: Tonight's the night

  The IT industry's annual charity sleep-out aims to raise £1m from this year's event, which takes place today  Continue Reading

• Privacy concerns in the digital world

  Considering the full spectrum of privacy, people need to ask themselves if they are comfortable with all their characteristics in the public domain  Continue Reading

• Design applications to get the right data

  The right data helps enterprises make better decisions. Getting it, however, requires a fundamental shift in how applications are built  Continue Reading

• Laying the iOS 6 Foundation

  The main purpose of Apple's purchase of NeXT in the 1990s was to obtain the operating system that was to become today's OS X and iOS  Continue Reading

• The best storage for VDI environments? RAM, of course

  RAM it in! VDI storage needs IOPS, but what’s the best way to get it? Not HDD or SSD, but RAM and caching software, says GlassHouse Technologies’ Jamie McGinty  Continue Reading

• Nirvanix failure – a blow to the cloud storage model?

  Cloud storage firm Nirvanix has given customers a deadline to retrieve their data. Are the reasons for its failure specific to Nirvanix or a real blow to cloud storage overall?  Continue Reading

• What ever happened to the paper-free office ?

  Its taken longer than we thought to achieve paper free offices. Doug Miles explains why.  Continue Reading

• How wearable gadgets will impact the IT department

  The Chancellor George Osborne was spotted recently wearing a bio-monitoring wristband, suggesting wearable tech really has gone mainstream. Despite it being a useful and efficient product, it is limited when compared to the capabilities that such ...  Continue Reading

• The intellectual property challenges from 3D printing

  Designers, owners and those that carry out 3D printing need to be aware of the way in which intellectual property rights will be created and protected  Continue Reading

• How to make IT professionals more effective and happy in their jobs

  The majority of UK-based IT professionals are happy at work as concerns over job security recede, research from Comptia reveals.  Continue Reading

• Security Think Tank: Consumer cloud is fine for business, if....

  How can businesses use free or low-cost cloud storage services aimed at consumers, but ensure their data is safe and secure?  Continue Reading

• The accessibility challenge for 'digital by default' public services

  Is the Government Digital Service spending its £50m budget for 'assisted digital' in the right way?  Continue Reading

• Security Think Tank: Firms must take responsibility for security in the cloud

  How can businesses make use of free or low-cost cloud storage services aimed at consumers, but ensure that their data is safe and secure?  Continue Reading

• Risk assessment for APTs

  The prevalence and continued success of so-called advanced persistent threats (APTs) often represents a failure of risk management calculations  Continue Reading

• Security Think Tank: Four steps to using public cloud storage

  How can businesses make use of free or low-cost cloud storage services aimed at consumers, but ensure that their data is safe and secure?  Continue Reading

• Operational security: The headache of IT security health checks

  When starting an enterprise project, state that the testing will take three months, that it will be staggered around the go-live date, and not everything will be completely fixed before go-live  Continue Reading

• Security Think Tank: In the cloud, low or no cost means little or no control

  How can businesses use free or low-cost cloud storage services aimed at consumers, but ensure that their data is safe and secure?  Continue Reading

• Security Think Tank: How to keep data secure when resident or used by cloud applications

  How can businesses make use of free or low cost cloud storage services and ensure data is safe and secure?  Continue Reading

• Gartner: Benefits of mobile collaboration

  The rapid adoption of smart devices, both in the workplace and outside, has raised expectations about accessibility and user experience  Continue Reading

• Cloud storage creeps up the enterprise agenda

  Research from 451 Group sees private cloud storage ranked second most common storage project and public cloud in fourth  Continue Reading

• The politics of software asset management

  A software asset manager's tips on convincing people they really don'y have to run the software they insist is essential.  Continue Reading

• One step ahead - the importance of staying in control of your organisation’s BYOD policy

  As every CIO is probably no doubt sick of hearing by now, ‘the era of Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) is here’. Employees now expect to be connected 24/7 to allow greater flexibility and productivity, and companies now need to judge how they can best ...  Continue Reading

• Google, privacy and data protection: One step beyond (the law)?

  A hearing in the High Court has seen Google challenge the applicability of English Law to its operations in the UK, which run off servers based in California  Continue Reading

• The power of a million What is £1 million worth?

  What is £1 million worth? At present it will get you an 86th of Welsh footballer Gareth Bale. That is approximately an ear lobe.  Continue Reading

• IT security: could you be the key?

  Traditional strong authentication methods are useful to business, but must start thinking about how we can extend this to users  Continue Reading

• Is the smart meter programme really doomed? Don’t panic...

  The UK's £11bn smart meter roll-out has been heavily criticised - but is it really the disaster in the making that it has been portrayed?  Continue Reading

• Match disk type to VMs to boost VMware storage performance

  All too often storage is the bottleneck in VMware performance. That can be solved by matching underlying VMware storage to the needs of the application and workload  Continue Reading

• Security Think Tank: Physical security should be replicated in cyber world

  The rapid rise in cyber espionage highlights the need to rethink data security strategies to improve protection of intellectual property. But what is the best way of doing that?  Continue Reading

• Enterprise IT skills must keep pace with game-changing technologies

  Virtually all of the most important technologies emerging for businesses require new IT learning, thinking and behaviour  Continue Reading

• Security Think Tank: Five steps to protect IP from cyber espionage

  The rapid rise in cyber espionage highlights the need to rethink data security strategies to improve protection of intellectual property. But what is the best way of doing that?  Continue Reading

• Security Think Tank: IP protection is as weak as the weakest link – fix the supply chain security

  The rapid rise in cyber espionage highlights the need to rethink data security strategies to improve protection of intellectual property. But what is the best way of doing that?  Continue Reading

• Security Think Tank: Follow an information-led, risk-based process to protect IP

  The rapid rise in cyber espionage highlights the need to rethink data security strategies to improve protection of intellectual property. But what is the best way of doing that?  Continue Reading

• When to use flash SSD instead of SAS or SATA?

  When to use flash SSDs instead of SAS or SATA spinning disk is all down to application requirements, says David Boyle, senior consultant at GlassHouse Technologies (UK)  Continue Reading

• Security Think Tank: Identify and protect the crown jewels

  The rapid rise in cyber espionage highlights the need to rethink data security strategies to improve protection of intellectual property. But what is the best way of doing that?  Continue Reading

• Four key questions in disaster recovery planning

  The answers to four key questions will tell you if your organisation’s disaster recovery planning is up to the job  Continue Reading

• BI: From specialist capability to mass-market availability

  Pringle & Company analyst advocates business-led business intelligence (BI). Three barriers must go: complexity, excessive cost, undue duration  Continue Reading

• Security Think Tank: Your sensitive information is at risk

  The rapid rise in cyber espionage highlights the need to rethink data security strategies to improve protection of intellectual property. But what is the best way of doing that?  Continue Reading

• The Death Of Cloud Has Been Greatly Exaggerated

  Revelations about the extent of US and UK government surveillance on the internet will not mean the death of cloud computing, but companies will change their approach.  Continue Reading

• Forrester: Three Best Practice Tips For Business Intelligence Success

  Martha Bennett gives three essential tips to help you ensure your BI project is a success.  Continue Reading

• How to appoint a new outsourcing supplier

  Outsourcing can come with its own security risks if not managed appropriately, making due diligence and clear contractual arrangements key  Continue Reading

• How to handle a software audit

  Software audits are an irritating and time consuming part of life. To survive one unscathed you'll need a thorough understanding of your licensing requirements.  Continue Reading

• The dangers of internet cafés

  Businesses need clear computer use policies and need to ensure staff are properly trained in data protection, writes Garry Mackay  Continue Reading

• The data fragmentation challenge

  Few organisations have policies to guide where data should and should not be stored. The result: data fragmentation  Continue Reading

• Avoiding the mistakes of NPfIT in new NHS IT contracts

  What are the contracting experiences of NHS Trusts who have started their own IT procurement, and how can mistakes of the past be avoided?  Continue Reading

• Whiteboard it – the power of graph databases

  Graph databases map relationships between entities in a network. They won’t replace conventional relational databases, but for harnessing the value of interconnectedness they mark a breakthrough  Continue Reading

• Near field communication (NFC): Latest shockwave of the technological invasion

  By Vedak Coskun, co-author of "Professional NFC Application Development for Android"  Continue Reading

• Forrester: Best practice tips for business intelligence success

  Recognising the importance of data and analytics is one thing; putting in place the right processes and tools is a different matter  Continue Reading

• A lesson in understanding your customers

  Allowing small businesses to benefit from the latest technology without the need for specialist skills is important to the economy - but some vendors forget this  Continue Reading

• Is it time for object storage to shine?

  Object storage is a great fit for very large, unstructured datasets, and with big data and cloud use cases. So, what is holding up adoption of this promising technology?  Continue Reading

• The ideology of hacking

  Business leaders need to be educated on the true threats their firms face and IT security professionals have to arm their executives with that information  Continue Reading

• How to lead when change is the new normal

  Business leaders need to think about the impact of ubiquitous technology on their future employees and the vastly different expectations they will have  Continue Reading

• Mobile IT could be more disruptive than anticipated

  Vanson Bourne's latest research reveals mobile IT could be more disruptive than CIOs and senior management anticipate  Continue Reading