Storage

City of York picks Barracuda Networks for data protection

York Council needed to refresh its backup service to bring new security protections after it went ‘all-in’ on Microsoft Office 365 Continue Reading

Cloud storage APIs: What are they and what can be done with them?

We look at the kinds of application programming interfaces (APIs) available to expose cloud storage to applications, from SME-targeted solutions to higher-end hooks Continue Reading

European ‘chat control’ plans in the name of ‘child safety’ threaten end-to-end encryption

Proposals by European Commission to search for illegal material could mean the end of private messaging and emails Continue Reading

Opera house shuns cloud for Nutanix and Rubrik hyper-converged infrastructure

The Royal Opera House considered moving all its infrastructure to the cloud, but a hybrid setup with Nutanix and Rubrik hyper-converged infrastructure came in 35% cheaper Continue Reading

CW APAC: Career guide to cloud computing

In this handbook, Computer Weekly looks at the skills required for cloud professionals to succeed in an evolving industry, the risk to jobs posed by automation and the disciplines being taught at Future Tech Academy Continue Reading

Vast Data will offer containerised storage software, but not yet

Vast Data sticking to its plan to provide no-tier “universal storage” via QLC flash and a 3D Xpoint read/write buffer that uses a containerised control plane Continue Reading

UK taskforce calls for cutting GDPR protections

The UK’s Taskforce on Innovation, Growth and Regulatory Reform has recommended scrapping safeguards against automated decision-making contained in the General Data Protection Regulation Continue Reading

Storage performance metrics: Five key areas to look at

We look at the essentials in storage performance metrics: capacity, throughput and read/write capability, IOPS and latency, and hardware longevity measured by failure rates Continue Reading

Databricks taps groundswell in lakehouse adoption

Databricks has been expanding its footprint across the Asia-Pacific region amid growing interest among traditional enterprises and digital native companies in the data lakehouse architecture Continue Reading

The Security Interviews: How to build a government model to ‘hack for good’

Kyle Hanslovan started Huntress to give back after a career in the intelligence sector. After US authorities took action to help people hit by the Microsoft Exchange attacks, we discussed how governments can ‘hack for good’ Continue Reading

Europe’s proposed AI regulation falls short on protecting rights

The European Commission’s proposal for artificial intelligence regulation focuses on creating a risk-based, market-led approach replete with self-assessments, transparency procedures and technical standards, but critics warn it falls short of being able to protect people’s fundamental rights and mitigating the technology’s worst abuses Continue Reading

How the pandemic changed backup

The Covid-19 pandemic forced big changes in how people work – we look at impacts on backup, including increased reliance on the cloud, plus security and compliance vulnerabilities and ransomware Continue Reading

CW Europe: Amsterdam reins back datacentre developments over environmental concern

The construction of datacentres in the Netherlands’ Amsterdam region has accelerated at such a pace that their demands for electricity are causing concern, prompting city authorities and datacentre operators to open a dialogue about sustainable datacentre industry expansion. Also in this issue, find out the state of play in the adoption of open banking across Europe. Continue Reading

Alibaba Cloud sets foot in the Philippines

Alibaba Cloud will open its first datacentre in the Philippines by the end of this year ahead of global rivals, as it expands its footprint in Southeast Asia Continue Reading

Cohesity brings DataProtect backup-as-a-service to Europe via AWS

Scale-out backup appliance pioneer adds backup-as-a-service from a virtual machine on customer premises Continue Reading

NHS Digital delays data collection plans until September

NHS Digital has postponed its proposed collection of GP data for two months, to allow more time for the public to understand the process and opt out if wanted Continue Reading

National data guardian calls for dialogue on NHS Digital GP plans

The UK’s national data guardian says it is important the public has clarity on how their confidential medical information will be used and kept secure under NHS data-sharing plans Continue Reading

The jobseekers turning to cyber crime in the pandemic

In this week’s Computer Weekly, security researchers say people left unemployed by the pandemic are turning to cyber crime – we find out why. We examine the confluence of distributed cloud and edge computing technologies. And controversial uses of facial recognition technology come under further scrutiny. Read the issue now. Continue Reading

EU privacy chief investigates use of US cloud services

Use of Amazon and Microsoft’s cloud services by public sector bodies in the European Union is being scrutinised by the bloc’s privacy watchdog Continue Reading

IBM pushes back against US government data requests

Technology giant IBM says the US government has ‘no jurisdiction’ to request data from its European entities Continue Reading

India’s public cloud spending on a roll

Software as a service made up the lion’s share of overall public cloud spending in India last year, followed by cloud-based infrastructure and platforms as organisations look to build digital agility amid the pandemic Continue Reading

Campaigners plan legal action over NHS data sharing

Privacy coalition aims to force NHS Digital to push back its plans to scrape medical information on millions of patients into a central database Continue Reading

NHS Digital’s GP data-scraping plan must be publicised and delayed

The UK government must launch a national awareness campaign and delay this month’s planned GP data slurp, say privacy consultants Ben Rapp and Sara Newman Continue Reading

UK immigration exemption in Data Protection Act found unlawful

Court of Appeal rules immigration exemption unlawful, but further hearings will follow to decide what remedies must be put in place Continue Reading

BCS: Lack of communication over NHS GPDPR ‘astonishing’

The Chartered Institute for IT has warned that millions of people are not being properly informed of NHS Digital plans to harvest their data Continue Reading

Tories fined over email data protection breaches

The Conservative Party broke the law by failing to properly keep records of who had unsubscribed from its mailing list Continue Reading

SA-based MSP shuns HCI for Nebulon cloud-defined storage

SYSDBA needed to refresh its HPE 3PAR arrays, and so looked at hyper-converged but decided on cloud-defined storage from Nebulon that marries local storage with a cloud control plane Continue Reading

Exagrid pays $2.6m to Conti ransomware attackers

Backup appliance specialist hit by Conti ransomware in May with cyber criminals downloading employee and customer data, confidential contracts and source code Continue Reading

An opportunity to redesign computer architectures

Over the last 70 years business computers have evolved a standard model of computing based around a central processing unit (CPU), main memory (RAM) and data storage. In effect, data is fetched ... Continue Reading

Privacy experts concerned over NHS data collection plans

Security and data privacy experts warn NHS Digital that its data collection plans could increase risk and cause a public backlash Continue Reading

Loss of 150,000 police records made worse by management failures

The loss of 150,000 records from a number of national policing systems was caused by a human coding error, but made worse by process and management failures Continue Reading

CW Nordics: Denmark takes a top-down approach to gender equality in tech entrepreneurship

Tech Nordic Advocates has adopted a new approach to closing the gender gap in Danish technology startups, looking to emulate Canada’s top-down approach. Also in this issue, find out the state of play with the adoption of open banking in Europe. Continue Reading

Veeam bolsters portfolio to cover emerging workloads

The groundswell in containerisation and open-source hypervisors is behind Veeam’s recent move to enable backup and recovery of emerging workloads Continue Reading

More data stolen in January 2021 than in all of 2017, says report

The volume of data being stolen through breaches is growing steadily and shows no sign of slowing, according to a report from Imperva Continue Reading

Valence brings storage virtualisation for the cloud era

Startup 22dot6 launches Valence, software-defined storage that throws a virtualisation layer over any backend storage via multiple nodes that split metadata and storage services Continue Reading

Oil and gas firm halves backup licence cost with Hycu move

Summit E&P made a strategic move to Nutanix hyper-converged and away from NetApp and VMware and wanted backup that could handle virtual machines and physical servers Continue Reading

Threat of group GDPR legal action haunts CISOs

The vast majority of security leaders questioned for a new report say they are concerned about the possibility of group legal settlements against them following a serious data breach Continue Reading

Where to run containers? Bare metal vs virtual machines

We look at the key differences between running containers in virtualised environments and on bare metal servers and focus in on the main trade-offs and decision points Continue Reading

Industry reflects on three years of GDPR

Looking back on 12 tumultuous months, we assess how GDPR has weathered the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic and Brexit, and consider what the coming year may hold for data protection Continue Reading

Making data an asset, not a threat

In this week’s Computer Weekly, we examine the latest developments in the UK government’s National Data Strategy and what it means for the economy. Our latest buyer’s guide explains the emerging technologies around computational storage. And we look at the advances in customer experience management during the pandemic. Read the issue now. Continue Reading

How Bureau Veritas migrated 85% of its applications to the AWS cloud

In six years, France-based services giant BV has migrated 115 applications to the AWS cloud, mostly using in-house expertise. We talk to the company’s IT director Continue Reading

Why and how to implement NVMe power management

Understand how to use NVMe built-in power management features to conserve energy, manage heat and, in the case of mobile devices, extend operating times. Continue Reading

What digital transformation means for data storage

We survey the key planks of digital transformation and look at the storage technologies emerging to support it, such as NVMe and QLC flash, hyper-converged infrastructure and cloud storage Continue Reading

Computational storage series: Model9 - The cloud + computational storage sweet spot

Software runs on data and data is often regarded as the new oil. So it makes sense to put data as close to where it is being processed as possible, in order to reduce latency for performance-hungry ... Continue Reading

Throwback Thursday: Even data fragmentation has gone virtual

If there’s one thing that our report Storage Anywhere and Everywhere from eight years ago reminds us, it’s that the risks of uncontrolled data growth are nothing new. As our contribution to the bit ... Continue Reading

Reports of stolen Irish health service data being leaked online

Leaking of deeply confidential and personal information on patient healthcare marks a new low for the criminal Conti gang Continue Reading

Flexxon bakes AI into SSDs to fight unknown threats

Singapore-based Flexxon has developed a solid-state drive that uses artificial intelligence to fend off malware and other unknown threats Continue Reading

Microsoft EU Data Boundary dubbed ‘smoke and mirrors’

Data protection experts claim Microsoft’s decision to create an EU Data Boundary is a tacit admission that it routinely transfers and processes the personal data of European citizens outside the bloc Continue Reading

The real-life consequences of ransomware attacks

In this week’s Computer Weekly, after a ransomware attack shut a major US oil pipeline, we examine the real-life consequences for organisations facing similar threats. We ask the experts for their top tips in reducing datacentre running costs. And we hear how data science skills are helping government make better decisions. Read the issue now. Continue Reading

Container-native storage: A definition, and what to ask suppliers

We look at container-native storage – aka cloud-native storage – what defines it, and its benefits as a way of bringing persistent Kubernetes storage to containerised applications Continue Reading

Portworx gets container-native array management for Pure hardware

Container storage player Portworx builds in container-native functionality to allow discovery, provisioning and management from inside Kubernetes cluster, but only on Pure arrays so far Continue Reading

Computational storage: What is it? Why now, what for, who from?

Computational storage is an emerging architecture category, in which compute is put near storage to address I/O bottlenecks resulting from large volumes of data Continue Reading

Chip supply shortages are hitting hard

In this week’s Computer Weekly, a shortage of semiconductors is affecting industries beyond just IT – we examine the implications. We talk to the CIO of pharmacy chain Boots about how tech helped in being an essential retailer during lockdown. And we look at the prospects for young people entering the IT sector post-pandemic. Read the issue now. Continue Reading

APAC career guide on cloud computing

Besides having engineering chops and certifications, aspiring cloud professionals should have curiosity and soft skills to succeed in the evolving cloud computing landscape Continue Reading

Scammers accidentally reveal fake Amazon review data

More than 13 million records relating to an organised fake review scam have been found on an unsecured ElasticSearch database, implicating hundreds of thousands of people in unethical behaviour Continue Reading

Nebulon helps DCI offer high-performance edge hyper-converged

Cambridge-based cloud and colo provider DCI will offer DataQube servers with Nebulon, which marries a cloud control plane with local PCIe-connected flash storage Continue Reading

How KFC put digital on the menu

In this week’s Computer Weekly, we find out how fast-food chain KFC turned to digital to survive the pandemic. Our latest buyer’s guide looks at technologies to improve office productivity for home workers. And we assess the growing problem of electronic waste and how to tackle it. Read the issue now. Continue Reading

G7 countries to cooperate on digital regulation

Digital and technology ministers outline their agenda for how technology can be used to facilitate the post-Covid recovery, signalling closer collaboration in key areas of the digital economy Continue Reading

NHS App to serve as vaccine passport for foreign holidays

Existing NHS App will have vaccine passport functionality added to it, transport secretary confirms Continue Reading

Backup failure: Four key areas where backups go wrong

We look at the key ways that backups can fail – via software issues, hardware problems, trouble in the infrastructure and good old human error – and suggest ways to mitigate them Continue Reading

Scality launches Artesca container-native object storage

Object storage specialist gets on a burgeoning container object storage market with Artesca, which runs from Kubernetes to provide persistent storage for containerised applications Continue Reading

Leaky Azure storage account puts software developer IP at risk

Source code for multiple products was left exposed in an unsecured Microsoft Azure cloud storage account, say researchers, but attributing responsibility for the error has proved difficult Continue Reading

Wipro and Google Cloud deepen partnership

Wipro earns application development specialisation from Google Cloud following an earlier move to migrate SAP workloads to Google Cloud Platform Continue Reading

Justice at last in Post Office IT scandal

In this week’s Computer Weekly, 12 years after we broke the story, victims of the Post Office IT scandal finally have their criminal convictions overturned. We take a virtual tour of a Microsoft datacentre and meet a server called ‘Mega-Godzilla Beast’. And we find out how technology is transforming Nationwide Building Society. Read the issue now. Continue Reading

Five reasons to look at hyper-converged infrastructure

HCI promises easy setup, purchasing flexibility, low procurement and operation costs, reliability and all in one box – but there are challenges too Continue Reading

How AWS is supporting Asia’s battle with Covid-19

Public sector organisations and startups across the region have been tapping AWS cloud services to speed up and enable a range of pandemic-related initiatives Continue Reading

Winemaker racks Pure all-NVMe all-flash for rapid SAP response

Concha Y Toro also pocketed a 35% saving in storage costs following a move from as-a-service storage provision to Pure Storage FlashArray//X all-flash hardware Continue Reading

Shop and go – will Amazon’s cashless ‘just walk out’ store work?

In this week’s Computer Weekly, Amazon has opened its first ‘just walk out’ grocery store in the UK, but is it the right time to hit the high street? We examine the human and technical issues around email security. And we analyse Microsoft’s $19bn purchase of voice recognition supplier Nuance. Read the issue now. Continue Reading

Online storage startup GoodCloud seeks to shake up file sync and share market for charities

Third-sector-focused online storage startup GoodCloud has set its sights on disrupting the file sync and share market by making the technology far more accessible for charities and their volunteers Continue Reading

Ireland’s DPC launches probe into Facebook leak

The Irish Data Protection Commission has launched an ‘own volition’ inquiry into the leak of data from 500 million Facebook profiles Continue Reading

CW Middle East: Qatari regulator launches platform to help combat money laundering

The Qatar Financial Markets Authority is using a digital platform to enable financial services professionals to assess their knowledge of anti-money laundering and combating the financing of terrorism. Also in this issue, read how the Covid-19 pandemic has changed the IT spending patterns among enterprises in Saudi Arabia. Continue Reading

Cloud archiving: A perfect use case, but beware costs and egress issues

The advantages of cloud archiving are ease of use and being well-suited to potential latency issues, but IT teams need to be aware of costs and issues around moving data from and between clouds Continue Reading

AET gets Ctera to smooth hybrid cloud access to big files

Remote locations with unreliable WAN connections needed to share large files, which was a real headache until US engineering firm got Ctera edge filers with Azure cloud as a tier Continue Reading

8 best practices for SAN deployment within SMBs

SMBs face a number of challenges when planning and performing a SAN implementation. Get out in front of an often intricate process with these best practices. Continue Reading

Ctera KubeFiler to bring Kubernetes storage to its cloud gateways

KubeFiler uses the container storage interface to allow Kubernetes to access persistent storage as if it were from a local NAS device, and while keeping existing access profiles Continue Reading

What has a year of home working meant for the DPO?

Byron Shirley of The Compliance Space explores how the role of the data protection officer has changed in the past 12 months Continue Reading

VMware to ease hybrid cloud deployments

VMware is combining VMware Cloud Foundation and its Tanzu portfolio into a single software stack to simplify hybrid and multicloud deployment and management Continue Reading

Where now for storage? Hitachi, IBM and Pure Storage

Part II: Storage supplier strategy in the cloud era: Hitachi, IBM and Pure Storage. We snapshot the big six hardware makers, as they take things to the cloud and as-a-service models Continue Reading

Facebook data leak could be outside scope of GDPR

Regulators may be unable to do much about leaked data on 533 million Facebook users, as it seems to have been stolen before GDPR came into force Continue Reading

Where now for storage? Dell EMC, NetApp and HPE

Part I: Storage supplier strategy in the cloud era: Dell EMC, NetApp and HPE. We snapshot the big six hardware makers, as they take things to the cloud and as-a-service models Continue Reading

Bank BJB Syariah taps DevOps

Indonesia’s Bank Jabar Banten Syariah is adopting DevOps and microservices to speed up delivery of applications Continue Reading

How Lenovo is tackling HCI workloads

Lenovo has teamed up with AMD to address mission-critical workloads such as in-memory databases as APAC organisations look beyond VDI in their hyperconverged infrastructure deployments Continue Reading

What to expect from 2021's data storage conference lineup

In the coming months, data storage conferences are plentiful. This roundup details dates, sessions and topic areas, from event hosts such as SNIA, Dell and Pure Storage. Continue Reading

The ticking timebomb of IR35

In this week’s Computer Weekly, we reveal that IT contractors are seeking a multimillion-pound payout after confusion over the forthcoming IR35 tax reforms. Many firms are building data lakes to improve their analytics – we examine the storage implications. And we talk to the CIO at the London School of Economics. Read the issue now. Continue Reading

Data warehouse storage: Has cloud made on-premise obsolete?

There once was no alternative to building a data warehouse on-premise, but with cloud providers targeting analytics, building data warehouses on-site is looking obsolete Continue Reading

Backup survey: UK councils’ downtimes five times longer than average

Backup product supplier Veeam’s freedom of information request finds councils’ average downtime is seven hours and that backup and disaster recovery testing is not done frequently Continue Reading

CW Innovation Awards: Flybuys cranks up cloud for service efficiency

Australia’s biggest loyalty platform takes 12-month journey towards the cloud, slashing time to deliver customised offers to less than 45 minutes, among other outcomes Continue Reading

How can ransomware attack cloud storage?

A ransomware attack on cloud storage can have catastrophic effects. Cloud storage is still online, which means it is susceptible to some cyberattacks, so users must be careful. Continue Reading

Backup appliances the hot topic for Pas-de-Calais fire brigade

With requirements for strict, long-duration backup and archiving, French fire brigade set out to replace optical media with a StorageCraft appliance and disaster-proof storage Continue Reading

The 3-2-1 backup rule: Has cloud made it obsolete?

The 3-2-1 backup rule was made for small-scale use in the pre-cloud era when tape still ruled. Is it relevant in the 2020s, or can we repurpose its fundamental principles? Continue Reading

China’s cloud infrastructure spending hits record growth

Public cloud infrastructure spending in China grew a record 62% in the last quarter of 2020 due to rapid economic recovery and focus on digital transformation Continue Reading

Bharti Airtel taps OpenStack to modernise telco network

India’s Bharti Airtel turns to OpenStack to ready its network for emerging technologies such as 5G and edge computing Continue Reading

IWM uses StorCycle to free capacity for all-flash SAN upgrade

Imperial War Museums set to embark on unstructured data archiving project that will archive cold data to tape and free up capacity for a move to IntelliFlash all-flash SAN Continue Reading

QLC flash storage: What it costs and its best use cases

QLC flash brings high capacities at costs coming down close to spinning disk. So what are the use cases for QLC solid state, which make best use of its relatively low endurance Continue Reading

Survey: Backup failures hit a high as pandemic working hits home

Veeam survey finds distributed working plus operations that span on-prem and the cloud the background to high numbers of failures in backup and restore, with 40% of SLAs not met Continue Reading

Digital Green Certificate proposed for travel in Europe

Digital Green Certificates will supposedly help re-establish freedom of movement within the European Union Continue Reading

7 signs a small business should shift from NAS to SAN

Take a deep dive into seven reasons, including performance issues and scalability demands, an SMB would want to ditch NAS in favor of entry-level SAN. Continue Reading

Containers play a key role in post-pandemic IT architectures

In this week’s Computer Weekly, our latest buyer’s guide examines the key role that container technology will play in post-pandemic IT architectures. The UK government is under fire for its opaque approach to gigabit broadband strategy. And we assess the storage options for the growing volumes of unstructured data. Read the issue now. Continue Reading

Government calls for input into Covid-19 vaccine passports

Evidence gathering exercise will inform the development of the UK’s proposed Covid-19 vaccine passport scheme Continue Reading

ST Engineering teams up with Google Cloud

Singapore’s ST Engineering and Google Cloud will explore offering secure cloud services for organisations in regulated industries Continue Reading