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C2 Spring 2021Security

Introducing the Hewlett Packard Enterprise Communications Technology Group

by Phil Mottram
written by Phil Mottram

HPE’s newly formed Communications Technology Group has been created to help telcos and enterprises take advantage of the huge 5G market opportunity

Today at our special event “Realize the Full Potential of Open RAN & 5G”, we’re telling the story of how we’re helping customers to unlock the true value of 5G, accelerate innovation with Open RAN (radio access network) and ignite new revenue at the telco edge. We will be joined by an impressive collection of industry leaders who will discuss how an open, cloud-native telco network provides the agility to address the digital transformation needs of the next generation of customers.

The telecoms industry is in the midst of an unprecedented technological transformation. 5G promises to revolutionize the telecoms landscape, but this journey is still in its early stages. The shift from previous generation networks built on proprietary systems to open, cloud-native platforms utilizing commercial off-the-shelf infrastructure along with modular software components from multiple vendors is the biggest challenge facing the industry today.

For this transformation to succeed, telcos need to be able to call upon an ecosystem of trusted partners to reduce the risk of deploying open, multivendor 5G networks. This is why we have established the HPE Communications Technology Group (CTG).

I am proud to lead this new organization that brings together HPE’s unique IP across telco infrastructure, software and services. HPE CTG offers one of the broadest telco portfolios in the market, and has been created to help telcos and enterprises take advantage of the huge 5G market opportunity.

The CTG organization has been formed by combining our industry-leading Telco Infrastructure team and our unique Communications & Media Solutions (CMS) software portfolio. By working more closely together to develop pan-HPE solutions and sales opportunities, HPE is targeting the CTG organization for growth. We are carrying great momentum into this new org, with the CMS business alone generating more than $500m of revenue in FY20 and seeing orders grow by 18% and revenue increase by 6% sequentially in Q4 FY20.

HPE continues a legacy of more than 30 years of experience designing, building and tuning telco-grade infrastructure and software. We serve more than 300 telco customers across 160 countries and a monumental 850 million mobile devices worldwide are connected to HPE software. CTG comprises more than 5000 professionals dedicated to the telecoms market, delivering consultancy, integration, installation and support services.

HPE aims to become the transformation catalyst for the 5G economy. CTG’s founding principle is to drive innovation from edge to cloud through secure, open solutions. We are collaborating with customers and partners to build open 5G solutions that deliver efficiency, reduce risk and complexity, and futureproof the network across the telco core, the radio access network and the telco edge.

Today, I am excited to announce the HPE Open RAN Solution Stack, featuring the new HPE ProLiant DL110 Gen10 Plus server, the industry’s first Open RAN workload optimized server. Designed to enable the commercial deployment of Open RAN at scale in global 5G networks, the HPE Open RAN Solution Stack includes HPE’s telco optimized infrastructure, RAN specific infrastructure blueprints, and orchestration and automation software.

Another solution that is foundational to HPE CTG is the HPE 5G Core Stack that was unveiled in March last year. Today, Orange will appear at our virtual event to talk about its work with HPE to trial a 5G Core.

The HPE CTG portfolio plays an important role in advancing HPE’s edge-to-cloud platform as-a-service strategy and uniquely brings together both enterprise and telco solutions that can bridge from the enterprise edge, across the telco network into multiple clouds:

 

      • Open, cloud-native, flexible solutions built from the ground up with a secure design, so telcos can roll out 5G services faster, integrating them with existing network infrastructure
      • Flexible, modular aaS solutions that help future-proof your business using cloud economics, allowing you to scale to stay ahead of demand
      • Pre-integrated stacks and blueprints reducing risk, time to test, integrate and deploy new capabilities
      • Automation and Operations leadership, HPE named a leader in the 2019 Gartner Magic Quadrant for Operations Support Systems
      • Secure, resilient carrier-grade IT infrastructure, leveraging HPE’s scale and experience in enterprise into the telco network
      • A platform to ignite new service offerings built to serve enterprise customer needs
      • The ability to facilitate trusted ID sharing across devices, networks and services, for improved customer experiences and seamless cellular to Wi-Fi roaming with Aruba Air Pass
      • Enterprise connectivity with the Aruba EdgeConnect SD-WAN Edge platform employing physical or virtual appliances, Aruba SD-Branch, managed Wi-Fi and NaaS
      • AI/ML based solutions that simplify and automate network operations with AIOps, saving time and resources
      • HPE takes an active role in telecom standards organizations, from 3GPP/ETSI, GSMA, TMF to DMTF but also open source projects such as ORAN and LF Networking. HPE is also a member of the newly created Next G Alliance that will focus on 6G

I am confident that with such a solid foundation and common purpose, we will strengthen our thought leadership in the telecoms sector and are set on a path for innovation and growth.

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SecurityWinter 2020

Confronting Inaction in the CyberSecurity Industry

by Steve Tcherchian
written by Steve Tcherchian

2020 was another troubling year in the cybersecurity world. We saw a repeat of 2019’s data breaches on a larger scale. Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, Nintendo, WaWa, and many more fell victim to some sort of compromise. Hardly a week went by where we weren’t reading about a new mega-breach or ransomware attack. One unidentified agency even exposed an 800-gigabyte database of over 200 million personal user records. No one was off-limits. It’s to the point where we’ve become numb to the news of security breaches; we shrug it off and move on. But as consumers, we should be concerned with the lackluster cybersecurity practices these companies have in place. It’s clearly not protecting our data.

According to IBM, the average time to detect and respond to a data breach in 2020 is 280 days. This year’s global pandemic has made every industry a huge target with healthcare and the public sector leading the pack. On average, these industries spent over 320 days to detect and contain a cyberattack and cost tens of millions of dollars in some cases.

Billions are spent on security each year, so why is this still an issue?

How Passwords Will Change Your Business Strategy

One of the most critical security risks to any organization are passwords, especially default passwords and passwords to privileged accounts, which have elevated access to perform administrative functions. These can be administrator accounts, service accounts, database connection accounts, application accounts and others. Most of these accounts were set up ages ago when an application or system was initially deployed. They have multiple integration points and because of the risk of “breaking something,” the passwords for these accounts are rarely rotated, likely shared and often improperly stored.

Privileged account abuse is the most common way for hackers to compromise a system. Proper credential storage and accountability is paramount to risk mitigation. Relying on manual methods is resource-intensive, error-prone and leaves gaps.

According to a Varonis report, nearly 40% of all users sampled have passwords that have never been rotated! These passwords have a higher likelihood of showing up in online password dumps and being used to infiltrate networks. Simply put – they’re a cyber criminal’s best friend. This is how hackers walk in right through the front door. Not because they’re clever, rather because we make it too easy for them.

Click here to continue reading… Confronting Inaction in the CyberSecurity Industry

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Editors' PicksSecurityStorageWinter 2020

A Workplace Paradigm Shift: Building Resilience in Our Workforce and Systems with HPE GreenLake

by John Sroka
written by John Sroka

When the coronavirus pandemic forced everyone out of offices, IT teams scrambled to obtain the necessary hardware and additional software licenses necessary to support entirely remote operations. At the same time, they had to match users’ present and future needs with the appropriate infrastructure. That, combined with many other unknowns, compounded the stress and urgency to keep business running smoothly around the world.

If we’re being honest, many organizations struggled to adapt to the recent shift to remote work because they simply weren’t prepared for such a major upheaval. Duane Morris was not one of those companies.

Duane Morris LLP is a law firm founded in Philadelphia in 1904, and more than 100 years later, the firm employs more than 800 attorneys in offices across the United States, Europe, and Asia. I’ve been the CIO since joining the firm almost 20 years ago. I’m responsible for all the enterprise technology, including data, network admin, security, training, help desk, development, videoconferencing, and telecommunications, among other things.

About eight months ago, my team and I began discussing ways to upgrade our existing infrastructure. We wanted to modernize it and enhance our compute capabilities by expanding our current hyperconverged platform to enable more remote work. Little did we know how important that would become in the months ahead.

 

Simplifying and Optimizing Our Multi-Vendor Partnerships

We’ve been using Citrix for more than 20 years. But three years ago, as part of our negotiation with VMware to renew our enterprise agreement, we included enterprise-wide Horizon View licenses. We considered using virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) as an enterprise platform for our desktops, but made the decision not to go that route. However, it really stood out as a robust remote access platform.

We ended up using both Citrix and Horizon View as our remote access platforms. Two remote access platforms give people a choice and also create a level of redundancy—and it was a complete lifesaver when we went into lockdown. We basically had a Horizon View license for everyone across the firm.

We next moved to our data center storage options. Our data center has always been primarily Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE), and 90% of our servers are currently HPE. Our relationship with HPE goes all the way back to the EVA platform; we currently have the HPE 3PAR platform and the new HPE Primera, which we just acquired through the HPE GreenLake program.

HPE GreenLake is an ultra-scalable cloud-like experience for all applications and data wherever they reside, competing against the public cloud and traditional in-house purchasing models. With HPE GreenLake, you don’t have that initial large capital outlay. Instead, you’re paying for what you need, with extra capacity layered on top that you only pay for in the event you need it. The platform is fully managed by HPE, including updates, and at the end of the contract, you can upgrade that platform to the latest and greatest if desired.

We were in a position to either sign a new maintenance contract with HPE, consider purchasing new HPE equipment (Primera), or go with HPE GreenLake as an alternative to both or consider competing storage platforms. We moved ahead with HPE GreenLake for our primary storage solution, but we also liked the ability to add on to our current hyperconverged platform, HPE SimpliVity, which we were going to build out for enhanced remote compute capabilities. We needed more dedicated resources for compute when building out a VDI environment, and since we use both Citrix and VMware as remote access platforms, we established a plan to build out additional Citrix connections on the new HPE SimpliVity platform.

When I shared this model with our finance department, they were pretty happy with the way it calculated out over the next several years, compared to an upfront capital investment. There were significant savings versus buying it outright.

 

Adapting to the New Workplace Reality: Building Secure Virtual Systems Effectively

Many businesses put their plans on hold when global lockdowns began, but we knew this was the perfect time to move forward with our infrastructure and systems upgrades. This was partially due to the fact that we had already started the processes. We also knew that this setup was exactly what we would need to continue to work effectively, so it made sense technically and economically to continue moving in this direction.

Like everyone else, our staff’s remote access has surged over the past few months. Prior to the lockdown, 450 people was the maximum number of remote workers we’d ever had logged on at the same time. Within a day after all of our offices closed, that number jumped to more than 1,200. There’s no way we could’ve sustained that amount of remote access reliably with our previous infrastructure.

We’ve also experienced a huge increase in web conferencing, which we’re actively supporting. In fact, we recently hosted a firm-wide diversity and inclusion webinar that was attended by more than a thousand people. It was the largest web-based conference that we have ever hosted and it was also the most highly attended meeting that the firm has ever held, virtually or in person. We were really pushing the limits of our technology, not knowing exactly how it was going to work. The good news is that it worked very well.

 

Navigating and Negotiating Our Way to a Bespoke DRaaS Model

For disaster recovery, we’ve been using a co-location model for the last 15 years, which involved renting data center space from a provider while using our own equipment. You’re paying a lot of money for storage to sit there just so you can replicate data. We also needed to make sure that we had sufficient compute resources in the event that those resources were needed. So we were putting both storage and compute resources into the co-location with the hope that we’d never have to use it; it was just there for disaster recovery purposes.

I decided over a year ago that the co-location model didn’t really make sense for Duane Morris anymore. There were now smarter, more cost-effective ways to get the job done, and we began exploring disaster recovery as a service (DRaaS) offerings.

We put this on a slight hold to focus on a merger, and the timing led right into the pandemic lockdown. When our evaluation of solutions resumed, there was a new solution made available by Anexinet and HPE.

Once we’d chosen HPE GreenLake for our primary storage, this opened the door to explore Greenlake as our DRaaS. We liked the fact that with a simple change order, we could expand our existing HPE GreenLake capabilities with the DR offering without going through multiple contracts and agreements. In this model, HPE owned and managed everything, and there were other compelling points.

Typically, what drives down costs in the DRaaS model is the fact that you’re a co-tenant and are therefore sharing the costs. But you can’t be a shared tenant for all resources, because if you’re replicating, you need dedicated disk space to replicate. You also need dedicated resources for compute, because at least some initial setup needs to be there on standby for you to build out a VDI environment.

In the HPE GreenLake model, you can increase your pool or resources for what you need in the event of a disaster, and grow that compute environment as necessary, again, only paying for what you need, when you need it. This allowed us to have a sizable return on investment. On top of that, we would be using all new equipment that was totally dedicated to Duane Morris, so there was no shared tenant as was proposed with the public cloud option. This provided known resources if needed, in the event of a disaster. And everything was managed by HPE under the HPE GreenLake model, which provided a high level of security and the ability to utilize the resources in a production and/or test environment.

During this process, our HPE partner, Anexinet, was instrumental in working with HPE to create this option suited to our business. We’ve been doing business with Anexinet for about 10 years and thanks to their input, Duane Morris is the first customer using HPE GreenLake for disaster recovery.

My role hasn’t changed much over the past two decades, but the technology has changed significantly in that time. As we’ve upgraded, our footprint keeps shrinking considerably. We’ve already gone from several racks of storage down to one, with faster, more reliable, less expensive drives. That’s also why it makes sense to only pay for the space we’re using. It gives us added flexibility and reduces overall costs. In addition, our solution now is almost totally transparent, so it’s less effort to oversee storage and servers.

As data storage increasingly moves to the cloud, our data centers have evolving needs. And while you can certainly expand your resources and scale up, it’s also important that companies like ours are able to scale not only up, but also down, due to newly available cloud storage possibilities. HPE GreenLake gives us that flexibility.

 

Always Preparing for the Next Big Thing

While we always knew that we wanted an infrastructure with extra capacity, we couldn’t have predicted the sudden shift to remote work—we were just building resilient systems that would allow us to adapt quickly whenever the shift occurred. It never hurts to be strategic about your long-term plans. Circumstances like mergers, unexpected disasters, and a remote work paradigm shift can’t always be predicted, although you can always start preparing.

It doesn’t matter if your workers are in-office or remote. You can’t rest on your laurels when it comes to your infrastructure because it has to remain viable to support your people no matter where they are. From switches to compute to storage, everything has to remain current with an eye to what your employees are going to need in the future. This approach is why we were able to finalize our new infrastructure and systems in the middle of a pandemic that has incapacitated companies around the world. Others have lost out on a lot of time and money as they struggle to catch up.

Personally, I think the global percentage of office workers going remote (either part time or full time) is going to increase significantly across all industries. Our working reality has experienced a paradigm shift, forcing us to reevaluate how we all see the future of work. If you want your company to be able to compete in the months and years ahead, it’s not enough just to keep the lights on. You have to continue pressing forward and making investments now, before it’s too late.

The HPE GreenLake model provides us with a cost-effective approach to both scale up and scale down, as it relates to working in the office, working remotely, business continuity, and cloud. We also gained more flexibility and “hands-off” IT, which has allowed my team to focus on the needs of the business—which has been invaluable. This model is going to serve this new workplace reality brilliantly, and is the kind of adaptability and forward thinking that will allow the next generation of 100-year companies to emerge—and existing companies who can take advantage of these offerings to remain competitive.

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C2 Summer 2020DataEditors' PicksSecurity

Why Backups Have Become Ransomware Targets and How to Prevent Getting Robbed

by Cohesity
written by Cohesity

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_empty_space][vc_column_text]Why pay ransom when the underlying problem may be solvable? Here’s what IT teams may not know about modern backup and recovery and how it can help defend against ransomware.

Cybercrime is on the rise and the current global pandemic has only made it worse. As remote work numbers grew from February to April of this year, so did ransomware attacks. In March 2020, ransomware attacks increased 148% over baseline levels from February 2020, according to one report. Financial services organizations were the most heavily targeted during that time, yet no industry is immune.

Global enterprises. Small businesses. Government agencies. Home networks. All are potential ransomware targets today. That’s why defending your data against these cyberattacks must move up in priority as IT teams develop both data and threat protection strategies. It’s no longer enough to assume doing routine backups is sufficient. Rather, a proactive prevention, detection, and response plan is needed.

 

The Source is the Destination

A notorious criminal once said he robbed banks because that’s where the money is. Backups are becoming ransomware targets; attacking them a well-known and often lucrative criminal path.  That’s because organizations are using backups to protect against malicious data encryption. However, backups are now stored online, more than ever—often in public cloud platforms or SaaS services such as Microsoft Office 365. Similarly, many disaster recovery (DR) solutions rely on active/active replication to networked data stores to work. These serve as a backdoor for ransomware attacks as these resources and live data are routinely targeted and breached—to the dismay of victims that discover their encrypted backups and disaster recovery systems have been compromised.

One reaction to this threat is for IT leaders to review their organizational backup policies. In the UK, this includes recently updated guidance from the National Cyber Security Centre. For U.S. government agencies, it means alignment with the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) National Cybersecurity and Communications Integration Center (NCCIC) recommendation. Experts advise offline backups as a best practice when dealing with and seeking to mitigate the threat of ransomware. However, this assumes backups are a last resort—useful only for recovery in case of an attack. Some IT leaders know better. They recognize their backups can not only help them recover from ransomware attacks, but proactively defend against them as well.

 

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Prevention is better than cure.

The best risk mitigation strategy features integrated backup and anti-malware protection as key components of a data management strategy and not as mere afterthoughts. This strategy must then be powered by a robust, modern data management solution that goes well beyond basic backup and restore capabilities. But how do you arrive at the right solution that suits your needs? You could start with asking yourself these three questions:

 

Do you have visibility into your backup data?

Proactive vulnerability scanning is a first-line malware defense, but it can be challenging to scan data and applications in production systems and shared assets (such as NAS appliances) across distributed infrastructure. A simpler approach is to scan backups. This prevents teams from negatively impacting system availability and scanning at scale across multiple endpoints. And the preferred solution should be one that goes beyond simply scanning backups and discarding them if they contain malware. It should send an alert while concurrently taking action to eliminate malware and potential vulnerabilities when they are detected.

 

Can you secure your backup data?

Backup tapes rarely help IT teams when it comes to fighting malware threats. That’s why companies also take snapshots, most often with automated replication tools. But these can easily be locked up, which is why they are not enough to protect against threats. Best practice ransomware prevention includes a multi-layered, security-first approach towards data management. It balances security and data protection requirements with speed and ease of recovery that are essential for an agile business. It will ensure your backups are stored in an immutable (locked) state that cannot be mounted, modified, or deleted.

 

Can you recover quickly, easily and at scale?

The last-resort line of malware defense is recovery. Yet it can be a complex and lengthy process, especially when an organization has a large hybrid infrastructure, spanning multiple clouds, on-premises data stores, and edge locations. To best combat ransomware, an essential requirement is a solution that supports recovery at scale and considers both rapid Recovery Point Objectives (RPOs) and fast Recovery Time Objectives (RTO). Why? Because without these capabilities, recovery can take days, or longer, potentially leading to business failure.

Of course, there are lots of other factors to consider and answers to find, especially with ransomware attacks becoming ever more ingenious, making it essential to keep data management strategies under constant review. Although there is no silver bullet, the industry is closer than ever to a comprehensive way to proactively defend against and recover from ransomware. The answer lies in deploying a modern backup and recovery solution based on sound data management hygiene while applying multi-layered defenses capable of isolating backups from production data stores.

Why pay the ransom when you can solve the underlying problem? For a more proactive and long-term approach, take a look at the joint Cohesity-HPE data protection solution that not only helps stop your backup and unstructured data from being a ransomware target, but also provides early threat detection, and in the worst-case scenario, recovery of all your primary and backup data—at scale. The bad guys are smart. But you could be smarter with a little help from the data protection experts at Cohesity and HPE.

Learn more about Cohesity and its anti-ransomware solutions, here.

 

Chris Wiborg

Vice President, Product Marketing
Cohesity

Currently responsible for product and solutions marketing at Cohesity, Chris Wiborg draws upon his 20+ years of experience as an IT practitioner and consultant to help drive an understanding of how organizations can derive more business value from disruptive technology innovations.

Over his career he has introduced and accelerated market adoption of a range of solutions, from SaaS-based end user software, to developer-centric open source offerings, to infrastructure that powers organizations of all sizes: whether on-premises or from the cloud.

A frequently requested speaker, recovering Enterprise IT Architect, and graduate of Yale University, Mr. Wiborg holds several technology patents relating to middleware and RFID.

Follow him on Twitter @cwiborg

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C2 Summer 2020CloudDataSecurity

A Resilient Partnership

by Chris Orlando
written by Chris Orlando

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_empty_space][vc_column_text]K2 Insurance Services, is a leading insurance services company, with a specialized portfolio of insurance products. When K2 started to experience significant geographical expansion, it realized that it needed a technology partner that could help the business grow without increasing its exposure to risk. The company wanted a trusted partner to help scale while providing performance, security and reliability.

K2 underwent an extensive process to find their partner, undertaking hundreds of hours of analysis and research before finally choosing ScaleMatrix, an HPE Cloud28+ partner and the provider of variable-density colocation, high-performance cloud, data protection and professional support services. During the evaluation process, K2 looked at the type of technology used, the company roadmap, projected costs, ease of use and its own growth potential within the solution. ScaleMatrix stood out because the company understood the business need behind the technology strategy.

For K2, their partner had to be one that was an extension of their own IT team. This wasn’t going to be a cookie-cutter fit, and ScaleMatrix was prepared to work closely with K2 to ensure that their specialized needs were met. Using ScaleCloud for infrastructure and ScaleDeskop VDI-Desktop-as-a-Service for the user population, K2 built a scalable, stable and secure environment. ScaleCloud provided a powerful hosting platform that made it possible for K2 to control, manage and customize cloud hardware performance, billing models and professional support. ScaleDesktop allowed for K2 to expand its user base, with little to no downtime during the on-boarding process.

For K2, the latter has proven increasingly important during the rapid global move to remote working. It has allowed for them to take extra precautions when offering work-from-home options, as ScaleDesktop enables remote teams and delivers performance and security without overburdening internal IT teams.

Before the migration to ScaleCloud, the K2 infrastructure was already virtualized, which meant there was less to handle when the final moment arrived. K2 conducted multiple failover exercises before the final migration, and the ScaleMatrix team worked closely with the K2 IT department to ensure nothing was overlooked and the process was seamless.

Of course, not everything always goes to plan. During the VDI migration, K2 and ScaleMatrix discovered that the standard VDI Desktop deployment was not going to correctly integrate with the ScaleCloud environment. They had to rapidly collaborate and innovate to come up with a solution that would meet K2’s needs, while still allowing for the VDIs to function successfully in the ScaleDesktop environment.

On the final day, the entire migration process took around two hours to migrate more than 40 servers, 80 VDIs, and 15 deployed applications. The K2 IT team and ScaleMatrix worked side-by-side to ensure that the entire process was a success.

While K2 is still in the early stages of implementation, the company is already seeing the benefits of the solution. It’s helping the company to support its existing business as well as growth. K2 is still working with ScaleMatrix to ensure that its chosen technology solution allows the company to remain focused on delivering specialized insurance products.

K2 believes that relationships with the right people make all the difference and that it’s easy for any vendor, during the sales pitch, to claim to outperform and successfully execute, but ScaleMatrix has been able to deliver exactly what was promised. ScaleMatrix has become an important partner and extension of the K2 IT team and has developed future-proofed colocation and high-performance cloud services solution that delivers a competitive advantage in the ever-changing IT landscape.

ScaleMatrix is an HPE Cloud28+ partner and is featured on the platform’s new business continuity platform, designed specifically to support organizations in changing times that demand business resilience. The dedicated business continuity solutions platform showcases high-performance business continuity solutions powered by HPE partners, and ScaleMatrix is right there, ready to help your organization find its way no matter what the future may hold.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]

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Education and TrainingLeadershipSecuritySpring 2020

“It is a myth that in order to act like a leader you need to act powerful”, with Penny Bauder & Lisa Partridge

by Penny Bauder
written by Penny Bauder

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It is a myth that you must act powerful to gain respect — many people confuse being “the one who is responsible” with being “in power” and that in order to “act like a leader” you need to “act powerful”. Both men and women do this — decibel level and states of constant dissatisfaction don’t generally keep people on their toes in a good way. It breeds anxiety.

I had the pleasure to interview Lisa Partridge. Lisa started working with XYPRO in 1990 in the sales organization and assumed responsibility for the Sales and Marketing function as Vice President in 1997. Instrumental in XYPRO’s growth and leadership position in the HPE NonStop security world, Lisa was promoted to President in 2011 and assumed the role of CEO in 2014 following a management buyout of XYPRO’s founders. Lisa is a seasoned professional with hands on experience in many areas of a running and growing a software development organization, with a focus on employee engagement, customer relationship building and strategic product management decisions.

 

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Can you tell us a story about what brought you to this specific career path?

Like many of life’s journeys, I got into technology indirectly and moved to Los Angeles unexpectedly. When I was a high schooler in Calgary, I had an inspiring teacher who often talked about her traveling experiences and her time in the Student Work Abroad Program (SWAP), which enabled her to live and work in the UK for a couple of years via a special student working holiday maker VISA for commonwealth countries. I couldn’t wait to do the same thing! I applied for the Visa and in 1987 I headed to London! I had the time of my life! Living, working, exploring and learning to be an adult.

That teacher changed the trajectory of my life.

Eventually I landed at a software company that had a European sales distribution relationship with XYPRO Technology in California. Through the training process, I was able to get to know the folks at XYPRO and they invited me to join their company and come to California. Having never imagined living in the States, let alone glamourous Los Angeles, California, I was thrilled. For that opportunity, I am forever grateful.

I started out on the sales side of the organization here at XYPRO, which was a much smaller company at the time. In small companies, everyone pitches in to help in every area and so I learned a lot about what’s involved in running a software company, supporting customers, coming up with product ideas, networking, etc. The market for our solutions was a relatively niche group that uses a particular “big iron” server for very high volume online transaction processing. Our customers are B2B, Fortune 500 companies. Thanks to the vision of XYPRO’s founders, we pivoted our specialty focus to Cybersecurity in the early 1990s and were definitely early players in the space. Other than a small blip in 1994, Our business grew slowly but steadily. I was allowed to be quite autonomous in how I built up the sales organization and distributor network, moving into an officer level role as VP of Sales and later promoted to company President. When the founders realized they wanted to retire, I was approached to gauge my interest in a management buy-out. I was terrified but with a partner I did it. In 2014 that deal was closed and I became the CEO.

The scariest part then and the scariest part now is being ultimately responsible for everything. Responsible to our client base and, most importantly, to the employees who trust their jobs to the decisions I make.

 

Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you began at your company?

As a young and hungry salesperson, I was often looking for ways to distinguish myself and help the company make its numbers. Enterprise software sales often has a long sales cycle, months and sometimes years is not uncommon. Contract negotiations in these cases can drag on and it was easy to dodge communication back in the early days because email just wasn’t used — it barely existed! We communicated over the phone, wrote formal letters, sent faxes etc.

One sale that I felt should have been closed but kept dragging on, frustrated me. I had a good relationship with the customer, I just needed their manager to sign off. I don’t know what possessed me (I had probably just read one of those books about sales and taking decisive action to close the deal) but I decided to just jump on a plane and go there unannounced, with the contract ready for signature. I showed up and did just that! My customer was floored, his manager was so amused by it that he signed the agreement on the spot!

This was over 20 years ago now and that customer is with another firm now but we still run in the same circles and whenever the topic comes up about how long we’ve known he each, he still tells the story with great delight!

 

Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?

I’m not sure that I found any of my mistakes funny. They usually ended up costing us money and I tried not to make them twice, that’s for sure.

 

What do you think makes your company stand out? Can you share a story?

I believe what makes XYPRO stand out is our attitude/approach. We are a company that cares and it’s very important to us that our employees know that and that our customers know that. We don’t do everything perfectly but we genuinely try to right any wrongs and always get better.

As a result of this attitude we have enviable employee engagement. Our expectations of performance are high but we also make genuine, honest efforts to have a positive, supportive, innovative workplace. From employee benefits like paid parental leave and ½ day summer Fridays to career path opportunities, leadership and mindfulness training and free onsite yoga. We know happy employees work hard and support the cause. The result is a blue chip customer base with near 100% customer retention rates.

We all use the same credit cards, banks, cellphones, online shopping portals, gift cards, POS devices that you do. We’re building security solutions to protect all of ‘you’ and that means all of ‘us’. Approach every decision from that perspective and it’s easy to care enough to make sure the job is done well.

 

Are you working on any exciting new projects now? How do you think that will help people?

Cybersecurity is an industry that is moving so fast because those with malicious intent are smart and have the time and the resources to keep trying new ways to steal data, money or just create chaos. Security professionals like us have to be right 100% of the time but the criminals only have to be right once and they’re in! Companies like XYPRO are constantly researching, investing, catching up and anticipating methods and finding ways to, at a minimum, reduce the risk. BYOD, IoT, VPN, ISO, PCI are all acronyms over which those responsible for the security of an organization, lose sleep.

Our newest project is a product called XYGATE SecurityOne®. This is a next-generation risk management and security analytics platform that actively detects “Indicators of Compromise” and alerts on suspicious activity in real time. Our patented contextualization technology gathers data from multiple, disparate sources and uses specialized security intelligence algorithms to correlate, contextualize and analyze events to display a detailed security incident picture in real time. Those responsible for monitoring security at some of the largest banks and credit card companies in the world can detect security events and stop them in their tracks, before they become a breach.

When I first started with XYPRO, we were early participants in information security. It wasn’t a requirement, there were no compliance regulations in place — security was a “nice to have”. Those clients that came onboard back then were early adopters and visionaries who foresaw, as XYPRO’s founders did, the importance of security and protecting the data of their customers, which is all of us.

Now, security is a requirement. The seriousness with which a company approaches protecting their customers data has a direct impact on their business and on public opinion. A security breach is more damaging than a network going down for other reasons (like a hardware failure or a software bug). A security breach requires that you notify your customers that their personal information may have been stolen. A preventable security breach can mean the end of someone’s career and potentially put a company completely out of business.

Security innovations that lead to products like XYPRO’s SecurityOne are there to protect your personal information, your money, your identity.

 

Ok super. Thank you for all that. Let’s now shift to the main focus of our interview. Are you currently satisfied with the status quo regarding women in STEM? What specific changes do you think are needed to change the status quo?

Luckily the status quo is no longer the status quo. Things are moving at a rapid rate — Girls Who Code, Women in STEM, Women in Tech — these are all organizations focused on encouraging technical education, networking, internships, mentoring and more. Opportunities to be exposed to Science, Technology, Engineering & Math, where it hasn’t been previously encouraged, opening up doors that were historically open only a crack. It’s a great start. It’s still not an equal representation for women but it will get even better over time. My 13 year old son has asked “why are there special computer classes for girls?” This is progress as he doesn’t know a world where it’s odd for the girls to be scientists, coders, CEOs ; I know at XYPRO we get more applications from women than ever before. Our internship program, which started about 10 years ago is a great indicator — the first intern we ever hired was a woman in her 40s who had gone back to school to learn a new skill after raising her kids. It was the start of a very successful program at XYPRO from which we do the majority of our full-time recruiting in all the disciplines related to a software development company.

 

In your opinion, what are the biggest challenges faced by women in STEM or Tech that aren’t typically faced by their male counterparts? What would you suggest to address this?

Honestly the biggest challenges I faced that was specifically about my gender was navigating the heavily lopsided ratio of men to women in work-related social situations and the world of technology “events”.

The learning came about in situations like Friday after work drinks, tech conferences, trade shows, big tent events where the business and social was mixed and the lines get blurred. There is a lot of drinking and partying at these events. In these situations, everyone’s job is to network with coworkers and clients. Sometimes the problem is being left out of a work social event because the organizers didn’t think to include the only woman, or the plans are something they think a woman wouldn’t enjoy (sometimes they’re right). When there’s alcohol involved, inevitably someone “crosses the line”. Back in the day, it was very common to find myself one of maybe 30 women in a group of 500 men at a conference, for example. I was young — in my early 20s and inexperienced. I am happy to say that nothing terrible happened because I frequently had people looking out for me and running interference, but I was embarrassed more than a few times. A woman often feels shame for not being better prepared and allowing herself to get into uncomfortable or even sometimes, dangerous situations and I am very grateful for good friends that kept their eyes on me. Men generally don’t have to worry about things like that.

Men also rarely have to cope with the isolation of being left out of a group social activity because they’re the only man.

These experiences greatly influence how I keep an eye out for young women that may be participating in similar trade events and definitely how we handle social events internally at XYPRO. Responsibility and professionalism are an example that has to be set from the top.

 

What are the “myths” that you would like to dispel about being a woman in STEM or Tech. Can you explain what you mean?

You must act powerful to gain respect — many people confuse being “the one who is responsible” with being “in power” and that in order to “act like a leader” you need to “act powerful”. Both men and women do this — decibel level and states of constant dissatisfaction don’t generally keep people on their toes in a good way. It breeds anxiety.

 

What are your “5 Leadership Lessons I Learned From My Experience as a Woman in STEM or Tech” and why?

1. You’re a leader — decide what kind. Practice being the type of leader you had or wanted. When you fall short, apologize if that’s warranted and try to do better.

Make your instructions clear and your expectations high. Be there to help them and reward them with more opportunities to learn and shine. People will work very hard for you if they know you aren’t just waiting for them to screw up. Similarly, if someone isn’t pulling their weight, you have to tell them. Give them a chance to do better, but if they’re not cut out for the environment or the task, be honest and don’t prolong the agony. Finally, don’t take credit for other people’s achievements — it’s far better to make it known that someone awesome on your team came up with the idea that saved the day. That type of honesty is good for everyone.

2. Try to listen more than talk. This one is so hard for me. In order to make the best decisions, sometimes you need to let your team work through finding the solution themselves. As a woman CEO in technology who didn’t study technology, I sometimes feel I need to show my value, prove that I deserve to be at the head of the table — so I want people to know I have an answer right away. I can end up regretting that and wish I’d let everyone else speak up first — the best solution could have remained unsaid out of respect for me as the boss. I personally really appreciate straight talk and welcome people coming up to me and professionally pointing out a potential flaw in a plan or an idea that didn’t get discussed. I recognize that speaking up is not easy for everyone and they may hold back if it appears I’ve endorsed or made a decision already.

In group meetings, I’ll write in the corner of my notebook “don’t talk” just to remind myself. Some of the best ideas can be revealed that way.

3. Pay attention to the type of employee you tend to hire. Are you really making sure to diversify your team? Is there representation from different genders, cultures, orientations? It really does make a difference. You’re limiting the creativity and problem solving by hiring the same type of employee over and over. You may be saying to yourself: “I want to hire the best! Male or female.” and that’s true, I completely agree — but what is your definition of “the best”? It’s important to search beyond the familiar — that’s where ingenuity and collaboration can really blossom. And don’t forget that time when someone gave you a chance.

4. Pay it back. If personal gain and recognition is your motivator, I think you’ll find little support from those around you. Make your team the reason you do what you do. Someone gave you a chance, make sure there are opportunities for others to capitalize on such a chance.

5. Support yourself. The isolation of leadership can be difficult. When you start out as part of the workforce and then advance up the ladder you’ll have to learn to limit what you share and with whom. You lose camaraderie, sounding boards and sometimes friends. It’s important to find and maintain, supportive, trusting relationships. Find interests outside of work and seek out external advisors, networking groups or leadership coaches. I am a member of Vistage and it’s literally been invaluable for me as a person and for the decisions I’ve made for the company.

 

What advice would you give to other female leaders to help their team to thrive?

I think I was lucky to be working for a company in the early 90’s that was really just getting started in a new space, not quite a startup and certainly nothing like the startup culture we have now. That environment gave me the freedom to learn via experience. I took advantage of a real opportunity to grow and that’s what anyone wants, really. Opportunity.

In technology, there are more jobs than there are qualified candidates, so companies like mine spend a lot of resources recruiting, ensuring employee benefits are progressive and competitive and that the company culture and work environment are positive. Employee engagement and retention of the best contributors is the goal. A team that is thriving is productive — So my advice for women who aspire to a career in tech is the same advice I’d give anyone: Get the right education and experience under your belt, but even more importantly — do your best work.

When your team members get restless, worried they’re not taking advantage of every opportunity or that they’re falling behind their peers, I really encourage you to be straight with them. Meg Whitman, the former CEO of Hewlett-Packard said it best when asked what advice she’d give her younger self: “Do the job you have now and do it well. I don’t think it matters how small or how big the task is, if you can do it just a little bit better than what is expected, you will be noticed and rewarded”.

 

What advice would you give to other female leaders about the best way to manage a large team?

Delegate and have a system for reporting status and progress. Assign responsibilities to people and make sure they know that you expect them to be responsible for the results — then give them the resources for success. Be there for questions and make sure they know it’s safe to ask. When they need support, provide it. When they’re successful, you’re successful.

Just as important as providing opportunities to be successful is recognizing when someone isn’t right for a role. It’s best to be honest and decisive as early as possible. Things only get worse over time.

 

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story about that?

Without a doubt it’s the founders of XYPRO Technology, Dale & Sheila Blommendahl. Without them, I literally wouldn’t be where I am today. I wouldn’t have ended up working at and eventually running XYPRO. Without them, I wouldn’t have moved to California, met my husband and had my son.

 

How have you used your success to bring goodness to the world?

I feel very lucky to have been able to use my position to provide the types of benefits that support working parents or those caring for relatives. I feel strongly that people shouldn’t have to worry about healthcare. Without getting into whose responsibility I think it should be, I feel privileged to have achieved a level of financial success where we can provide that for our employees along with dental and vision. Our employee benefits include time off for volunteerism, jury duty, helping out at your child’s school — things that provide the employees the chance to give to their community directly and indirectly.

 

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

I have two. The first is from a book I read by comedian, writer, actor, producer Amy Poehler. Her book, “Yes, Please” had a great impact on my decision making abilities. I used to spend a lot of time worrying what people would think of the decisions I made. Realizing that is not actually accomplishing anything was a dose of straight talk that I needed at the time. I use this quote all the time. I’ve put it in company presentations and taped it to my computer monitor.

“You do it because the doing of it is the thing. The doing is the thing. The talking and worrying and thinking is not the thing.”

― Amy Poehler, Yes Please

My other favorite is by motivational speaker, Simon Sinek. I am a great admirer of his “servant leadership” philosophy. When speaking to impatient, young employees, I remind them:

“Some people get to the top of the mountain quickly and some people take their time getting to the top of the mountain. Don’t forget that you must actually climb the mountain.”

— Simon Sinek

 

We are very blessed that very prominent leaders read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US with whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch with, and why? He or she might just see this if we tag them.

I feel compelled to choose a woman, given the subject matter of this article but to be honest, I’d love a sit down with Simon Sinek. I so respect his thought process and admire his position on how you treat people and that you can always keep trying to do the right thing, even if you’re not successful 100% of the time.

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Editors' PicksEducation and TrainingLeadershipSecurityWinter 2019

How Cookies and Rockets Changed My Life – Girl Scouts and STEM

by Sylvia Acevedo
written by Sylvia Acevedo

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I was named CEO of Girl Scouts of the USA in 2017. It’s truly an honor to lead this organization that made such an impact on my life and on the lives of 50 million alums across the country and the world. In 2018, research showed that less than one percent of Silicon Valley leadership was Latina. So how did I get to be one of those leaders? What in my life prepared me with the courage and confidence to take on leadership roles and thrive?

Portrait of Brownie Girl Scout Sylvia Acevedo

All my grandparents are from Mexico. I grew up in poverty on a dirt street in Las Cruces, New Mexico, where my family struggled paycheck to paycheck.  We had to live with another family during a particularly difficult time financially, and the area we lived in was so poor and the hygiene was so bad that the last meningitis epidemic that swept America ran through our neighborhood. So how did that person become the person I am today?

The answer is that thanks to organizations like Girl Scouts and the volunteers who helped me discover a love of space and astronomy, I had the fundamental tools and skills to be successful. A person like me wasn’t supposed to grow up to be a rocket scientist, work at NASA, go to Stanford, or build a career in tech. But I am someone who did all of that.

Sylvia moving to the next level of Girl Scouts at the Bridging ceremony.

So before I go into how girls—and specifically Girl Scouts—are truly the hope for our collective STEM future, I want to share with you my Girl Scouting experience and how it really laid the foundation for my success as a STEM professional, a rocket scientist, an engineer, and a tech entrepreneur. My Girl Scout story shows what can happen when a curious young girl is given the opportunity to find her voice, cultivate her passions, and discover powers she didn’t know she had.

I like to say my first years were spent in the shadow of Mount Rushmore, since I was born at Ellsworth Air Force Base, where my father was stationed during his tour of duty as an Army officer. It was such a special place and being close to such an iconic American symbol instilled in me a strong element of patriotism that runs really deep. Growing up, I loved running around outside, riding my bike with the wind in my face, playing on the swing and monkey bars. My favorite television shows were about girls who had adventures, who did the same things as boys. But I didn’t know any girls like that in real life. Girl Scouts is where I finally met them.

 

Sylvia with her Girl Scout troop

It was at Girl Scouts that I learned about teamwork and getting along with different types of people.

I learned to be creative, enterprising, and persistent. I came out of my shell and built self-confidence and resilience. It’s where I first discovered my passion for space and astronomy, when my troop leader noticed my fascination with the night sky on a troop camping trip and pointed out the stars and constellations to me. She later encouraged me to earn my science badge, which I did by building and launching an Estes Rocket, after much trial and error. It was such a challenge figuring out how to overcome gravity’s pull. After many tries, I finally, successfully launched the rocket into the New Mexico sky. I felt such a sense of accomplishment.

I took away something so powerful from that experience: I can do science! I can do math! It was because of the interest I’d sparked at Girl Scouts that I started taking science and math electives in school. I went on to study engineering and realize my dream of becoming a rocket scientist and have the incredible experience of working at NASA, where I was doing interesting, challenging work—serious math and physics. Girl Scouts was a real turning point for me, but it wasn’t until I was older that I understood why.

The first program I worked on at NASA was called the Solar Polar Solar Probe (renamed the Parker Solar Probe). My job was to help figure out the payload and testing equipment that would be carried on a spacecraft going to the sun. I also worked on the Voyager 2 mission, which at the time was passing by Jupiter and its moons Io and Europa. This was a long-range program, which continues to this day, sending automated spacecraft to outer planets to record data and send it back to Earth. There were incredible images coming back from Jupiter and its moons that we had never seen before. It was an amazing time to be at NASA.

After the Voyager 2 had gone by Jupiter, I realized that it was going to take years before it went to the next planet, and the next project I was on was going to take decades. At that point, I realized that I was ready to go get my master’s at Stanford, and once I had that, I had the background to pursue a career in Silicon Valley.

It was the confidence I developed as a young Girl Scout that enabled me to do something that not a lot of girls were doing at the time—study engineering. That’s why Girl Scouts was such a game changer for me and continues to be a game changer for girls today. It was my inflection point. I can honestly say that I wouldn’t be where I am today if not for Girl Scouts. The interesting thing is that it was only about twelve years ago that I pieced together how transformative the Girl Scout experience was for me.

I got a call from somebody in the archives department at Stanford University. They were doing a study to find out how it was that I was one of the first Hispanics (male or female) to have gotten their graduate engineering degree from Stanford. She asked if my parents were rich ranchers or college professors. She asked how I knew about Stanford since they had not recruited in my part of the country. And she wondered how I was prepared for such a rigorous course of study. How did I have the academic background to not only get into Stanford, but to excel?

This conversation led to a kind of “a-ha” moment for me when it became clear why I was able to succeed: it all went back to my foundational experience as a Girl Scout, because while I didn’t have a lot of advantages in life, Girl Scouts was the one big advantage I did have. My Girl Scout experience exposed me to new subjects and encouraged me to explore the world around me. It taught me how to be prepared so I could create my own opportunities. And it taught me to persevere—to create a plan, to regroup when things go off-course, to learn from failure, and to try again. My pursuit of engineering and rocket science is a direct result of my Girl Scout experience.

That perseverance and resilience really served me well as I moved through my career. When I was starting out at NASA in the late seventies there weren’t many women there. And when I got my master’s and made the jump to Silicon Valley, there were even fewer women! At so many moments in my career I’ve found myself faced with—and then breaking through—these artificial barriers that had been erected by those on the inside.

I’ve thought a lot over the years about how a more diverse work culture would have broadened the opportunities available to me and others—and would have improved the actual outcomes of the work. Inclusion is a core principle of a thriving organization. It is essential to build an inclusive workforce, as many of the toughest problems are solved today by teams that include gender, ethnic, and thought diversity.

And it isn’t just good for companies—it’s a national imperative. It is key to America’s competitive strength and our national defense and protection. The more perspectives we have, the fewer blind spots there are—and the quicker corrections can be made. In short, more diverse voices at the table lead to results that are better for more people.

Because we all know there are blind spots in tech! Think about the Apple Health app. It’s great, it helps us keep track of our sleep patterns, our heart rate, and our activity level. But for women, who represent half the population, there’s one thing it didn’t do when it launched, which was to track something fundamental to our health: our menstrual cycle. That was certainly a bug not a feature, and it happened because there were no women in that room when the app was developed. And how about the Wii weight tracker that didn’t even include pregnancy as an option for why the user might be gaining weight? That’s an easy thing to code!

 

Some effects of the lack of diversity in tech are more insidious.

A recent New York Times piece called “What Women Know About the Internet” lays out what happens when you have a tech workforce that is only 25 percent female coupled with a shortage of female digital policymakers. As the article states, “the internet was not designed for women.” For male readers, this story might have been eye opening. Not for women. We all know it’s true.

Several studies have found that women worry more about privacy risks online than men. They are more likely to keep their profiles private and delete unwanted contacts to avoid making themselves a target. Women know very well what can happen, for example, on social media platforms like Twitter.

The author herself talked about the harassment leveled against her via tweet and DM that apparently never violated Twitter’s terms of service. She ended up tightening her privacy settings, she stopped sharing personal updates, and she deleted photos of her children. The fact that a platform like Twitter enables targeted harassment of women like this with no action taken against the harasser means it is the woman’s problem to solve. This serious issue could have been mitigated with more women holding positions of power in tech and sitting in those rooms where impactful decisions are made about digital privacy.

Here’s another example of troubling tech: just this past spring, Google and Apple were criticized strongly for offering a Saudi Arabian smartphone app that allows husbands to track their wives. Tracking is legal there, and the country’s “male guardianship system” requires women to obtain male approval for certain actions. Google said it would not remove the app.

These examples are exactly why we need more women with decision-making power in tech, and it makes me believe more strongly in the critical need for girls to be not just users of technology, but active creators, designers, and developers. A more inclusive community at sites like Twitter and companies like Google and Apple—and in the tech industry more broadly—would help clean up of some of the more poisonous corners of internet culture for women.

This is where Girl Scouts comes in as a force for good. Because of the huge need for more gender balance in tech, it’s critical that we cultivate a diverse talent pool and that we encourage girls from a young age to embrace STEM and all the opportunities available. I’m so excited to be in a position to ensure that the next generation of the female workforce doesn’t face the same artificial barriers that I faced, and that the future female tech workforce enters an industry that is more welcoming to them.

So, what is Girl Scouts doing to ensure more STEM opportunities are available to more girls? Our core mission is to build girls of courage, confidence, and character, who make the world a better place—and we take that mission seriously. We’re the experts in engaging girls in fun, relevant programs in STEM, the outdoors, life skills, and entrepreneurialism. Therefore, it only makes sense for us to take on the task of preparing girls for careers in tech fields.

 

What’s New

Want to change the world?

This past summer we launched exciting new programming that includes 42 new badges in everything from coding to app development, cybersecurity, game design, and outdoor high adventure. Since we launched our first round of cybersecurity badges in fall 2018, girls have earned nearly 87,000 badges. That comes out to about 9,500 badges a month! This year, girls have earned nearly 700,000 outdoor badges and nearly 700,000 STEM badges. Just incredible numbers! The fact is, girls want the STEM programming we are offering. They’re engaged, they’re inspired, and they’re having a great time learning these new skills.

And our outcomes for girls in the STEM space are amazing. A recent report by the Girl Scout Research Institute, Decoding the Digital Girl, finds that Girl Scouts stand out from their non–Girl Scout peers—both boys and girls—as digital leaders. For this report, which surveyed nearly 2,900 girls and boys ages 5–17, as well as their parents, the working definition of a “digital leader” incorporates not only what a person knows but how they use their knowledge. True digital leaders have more than knowledge, confidence, and capability; they also embrace new opportunities, love to learn new things, help others build expertise and confidence through tech, and look critically at the information they consume online.

The report finds that Girl Scouts are more likely to be digital leaders than boys and non-Girl Scout girls—64 percent of Girl Scouts, compared to 50 percent of boys and 43 percent of non–Girl Scout girls. In particular, Girl Scouts stand out with regard to their ability to problem solve and find reliable information online, discover new talents and interests through technology, and take action by using technology to create.

This is our country’s tech pipeline. We are filling in gaps to expose girls in communities across America to STEM, robotics, and cybersecurity.

But we want to do more with our amazing scale and reach, which is why we announced the STEM Pledge, our bold initiative to add 2.5 million girls to the pipeline by 2025. The STEM Pledge will benefit councils locally by building a STEM ecosystem that will help them deliver more girls in STEM and keep them engaged over time. These ecosystems will be fueled by collaborative partnerships with universities, corporations and others. It will also include Girl Scouts STEM Centers of Excellence, STEM Mobile Units, and training for volunteers to deliver national STEM programming to girls across the country and STEM strategists at each of our 111 councils that cover every zip code. By offering all girls high-quality, progressive STEM programs in three key STEM areas—engineering, computer science, and the outdoors—we can increase girls’ interest, confidence, and competence in STEM content, as well as their understanding of STEM’s value to society.

I’m so excited about the prospects for this initiative and what it can offer our country’s girls. They can learn to think like a programmer, to understand their technology devices in a way that enables them to be not just the users but the creators and the inventors of the next generations of devices, as well as the designers, the entrepreneurs, the lawyers, and the marketers.

And girls are already doing amazing things in the STEM space. Girl Scouts in Texas are building custom drones and using them to deliver Girl Scout Cookie boxes. They are learning about drone assembly and delivery and they even flew through an obstacle course with and without First-Person View. This is our tech talent pipeline.

High school Girl Scouts in Eastern Massachusetts were challenged to use what they learned in our computer programming curriculum to create a project that would make a sustainable improvement in their communities. They developed an app concept that would provide freshmen at their school with key information and maps to help them navigate the school and acclimate more quickly. This is our tech talent pipeline.

A Girl Scout robotics team from Eastern Oklahoma, the Supergirls, invented a battery-operated page-turner for people with arthritis, who are paralyzed, and who don’t have arms, when they were just six years old. They’ve gone on to design additional unique inventions, including a “smart trashcan” that’s prompted via motion sensor to ask whether an article is truly trash or can be recycled, and a water-saving shower head that slows to a trickle while a person shampoos her hair, keeping the water warm for when it’s time to rinse. This is our tech talent pipeline.

I want to invite you to join us in fueling this pipeline with more girls, from more communities across the country. Become a member, volunteer your time, and make a real impact. Invest in Girl Scouts so we can continue to deliver a strong, diverse STEM workforce in the 21st century. Encourage your companies to partner with us to support the development of more STEM programming.

Although we develop our programs so that volunteers without a STEM background can deliver them, we also need STEM volunteers with subject matter expertise—for example to help girls earn our incredible new Girl Scout badges in cybersecurity, coding, and space science. Episodic volunteers can also augment our program by providing real-world examples or adding additional content. And they are also role models for girls. It’s so important for girls to learn from those who are working in STEM professions. Mentors are indispensable—and they don’t all have to be women either.

I invite everyone to become a Girl Scout STEM volunteer.

Visit girlscouts.org, find your local council, and let them know you want to help build tomorrow’s STEM leaders.

The future of STEM is Girl Scouts. Join us! Together we will make the world a better place.

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CloudSecurityWinter 2019

Partnering for your success: HPE Mission Critical Solutions strengthens partnerships in 2019

by Diana Cortes
written by Diana Cortes

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Advancing on the journey started a few years ago, Hewlett Packard Enterprise has continued to transform during 2019. This journey has included both spin-offs and acquisitions; the HPE Next  program – a transformational initiative to improve and modernize business operations and better customer and partner experiences; a substantial organizational transformation in the field, moving from large regions to focused geographies; and more. But amidst all the changes, there are three elements at the core of the company that have remained intact: our focus on innovation, on customer needs and, last but not least, on partnering.

Collaborating with others has been a core tenet of the HPE way throughout the company´s history. Unlike some of our competitors, HPE doesn’t seek to lock customers into all-HPE stacks, but rather to offer solutions that are delivered “better together” through collaborating with other actors in the market.

We in HPE Mission Critical Solutions are fully aligned with this strategy. Partnering is one of our core values. This year we have established new partnerships, and strengthened existing ones to ensure our customers’ needs are met with the best solutions the market can offer. Following are some of the partnership highlights of the year.

 

Teaming up to strengthen cyber-security

With security threats on the rise, it is no surprise that increasing the focus on preventing damaging cyberattacks is top of mind for CIOs and IT teams the world over. Data breaches and security incidents cause millions of dollars in revenue losses every year and, more importantly, and often more costly, loss of customer trust and reputation. Security continues to be among the areas of highest IT spending and aligned to this trend, solution providers continue to increase their investment in innovation focused on cybersecurity solutions. This year, HPE established a new partnership in this space with Trovares, a graph analytics company.

 

Accelerating cyber-threat detection with Trovares and HPE Superdome Flex

As part of our Memory Driven Computing initiative, we announced a “sandbox” development environment last year. Customer development teams are able to experiment right along with the Hewlett Packard Labs team to solve big data problems with memory-driven computing techniques. The “sandbox” is powered by HPE Superdome Flex combined with Software-Defined Scalable Memory, a new system enhancement under development. As a result of our Memory Driven Computing journey, we came into contact with software innovators Trovares, and now we are partnering with them to deliver a cybersecurity solution aimed at accelerating threat detection to prevent fraud, starting with a focus on financial institutions.

Trovares offers a cutting-edge graph analytics tool which returns search queries hundreds of times faster than conventional graph tools. This single-user analytics tool provides large graph search capabilities for data scientists and business analysts. With rapid ingest rates and the ability to execute complex queries driven by Python scripts, Trovares xGT provides unprecedented performance and scalability, especially when processing very large data.

The combination of Trovares software with the powerful and scalable Superdome Flex significantly accelerates threat detection compared to running in a clustered environment. The access to a large pool of shared memory, from 768GB to 48TB, and single-system compute resources, from 4 to 32 sockets, means customers can:

  • Reduce time of exposure to cyber security threats through faster threat detection: We ran several tests and have seen up to 1000X faster threat detection than with clustered systems. In one example the threat detection scan went from over 4 hours to 14 seconds, 1000x faster, and a vulnerability assessment scan went from taking 5+ hours to 45 seconds, so about 400x faster. As already mentioned, in the world of cybercrime threats are constant and growing. Sometimes they are difficult to detect, as they might appear like normal network traffic. Therefore, to detect them, systems have to scan large amounts of data rapidly. Time to detection is paramount, so the benefit of the Trovares and Superdome Flex combination is clear.
  • Scan more data, faster: By loading datasets for analysis by Trovares xGT on a Superdome Flex scale-up large in-memory system, we can load larger data sets in-memory allowing more data to be scanned faster versus traditional systems. This means we can mitigate the data growth challenges by offering near linear and unparalleled compute scalability.
  • Gain and expand insights into cyber threats through larger and more complex query capabilities: Access to a large pool of compute resources in a single system with Superdome Flex, combined with the speed and scale of Trovares xGT for large datasets, means customers can now execute even more complex and advanced queries that allow them to search for more complex and sophisticated threat patterns.

We are excited about this partnership and the potential Trovares offers – not only in the area of cyber-security but also other application areas in healthcare, telecommunications, government and more. If you would like to learn more about this solution, listen to this short podcast.

 

Delivering on hybrid cloud strategy

Across industries and geographies, enterprises continue to advance their cloud strategies. Many have come to the realization that there is no single approach that can guarantee the benefits of “moving to the cloud.” Cloud adoption patterns continue to evolve.

In HPE, we advocate a hybrid cloud strategy, where the workload requirements drive the deployment model, rather than a one size fits all approach. For customers deploying mission-critical workloads, the public cloud option comes often with concerns about control and security. As data breaches, security incidents and outages gain publicity, customers have started to carefully weigh potential benefits against the potential costs of deploying their critical workloads in the public cloud. In fact, several analysts report that upwards of 80% of organizations have started to repatriate some workloads from the public cloud to private cloud models – whether hosted or on-premise – after the benefits they expected didn’t materialize, or because of concerns with control and security.

This doesn’t mean that public cloud adoption is decreasing, but customers are now carefully selecting the deployment model based on workload requirements. To meet the demands of our Mission Critical customers in this area, we have advanced key partnerships this year with two of the leading global consulting services companies:

Accenture Hybrid Cloud Platforms: Bringing the best of public cloud to reinvent private

Building upon 25+ years of strong, strategic partnership, HPE and Accenture are bringing hybrid cloud solutions to the market. The Accenture Hybrid Cloud (AHC) Platform is a fully managed cloud offering powered by HPE that delivers the benefits of both private and public clouds through a hybrid model. Customers can achieve greater speed, easier consumption, seamless scale and support for elastic workloads, as well as ensure regulatory compliance and achieve enhanced performance and security.

Each Accenture Hybrid Cloud Platform is tailored to the unique needs of the particular customer, and application workloads are deployed in two different models

  • The Core Private Cloud model is designed to host general-purpose infrastructure as a service (IaaS) workloads that easily lend themselves to virtualization and cloud operations. This small form factor enables you to run workloads in a secure multitenant environment.
  • The Enhanced Private Cloud model provides a dedicated physical platform for purpose‑built applications, platform as a service (PaaS), and large scale-up workloads. The solution also boosts security, compliance, regulatory, and data sovereignty protections. For customers running critical applications, the Enhanced Private Cloud model is the better fit and we have optimized solutions for SAP and Oracle workloads running on powerful, scalable HPE Superdome Flex.

AHC for SAP
AHC is application-optimized to run SAP environments and wrapped in HPE GreenLake providing consumption-based pricing. SAP clients can scale from small vHANA environments to 24 TB physical HANA deployments, powered by HPE Superdome Flex that enables seamless growth with business demands. We also offer push-button automated SAP DevSecOps, and SAP ERP Central Component and Business Warehouse pre-integrated on AHC.

AHC for Oracle
Together with Accenture, we have identified the challenges enterprises face that have prevented them from moving Oracle workloads to the public cloud. To address them, we have built upon our joint deep Oracle expertise to deliver an optimized multicloud Oracle solution in a managed private cloud environment. The solution helps customers reduce their Oracle licensing costs and fully supports SAP deployments with Oracle databases.

Housing AHC
As for solution housing, customers can choose a managed solution at an existing data center, or a hosted and managed solution within Accenture’s network of data centers. And the Accenture Hybrid Cloud Platforms can be consumed like public cloud in an as-a-service model enabled by HPE GreenLake Flex Capacity.

In summary, Accenture Hybrid Cloud, powered by HPE, gives you the personalized, flexible, and comprehensive service you need to support your hybrid cloud environment and advance your cloud strategy. If you are more interested in learning about this joint solution you can download this infographic or read this brief.

 

Deloitte’s Davenport Managed Hybrid Cloud

For over 20 years, we have combined Deloitte Consulting LLP’s deep industry knowledge with HPE’s innovative technologies to deliver solutions that improve business outcomes. In recent years, we have seen our joint clients grapple with the right cloud path, especially when it comes to mission-critical workloads. To address these challenges, we collaborated to develop Deloitte’s managed hybrid cloud solution.

This managed service offering brings Deloitte’s cloud practice’s end-to-end capabilities together with reliable HPE solutions to help customers rapidly innovate and transform the enterprise on a hybrid platform. Deloitte’s managed hybrid cloud solution is powered by HPE GreenLake to bring a flexible, pay-per-use consumption model. One of the top workloads we address with Deloitte’s managed hybrid cloud is SAP, and specifically the transformation to S4/HANA.

 

Accelerating SAP S/4 transformation

Many businesses have leveraged SAP HANA for years and are now starting to evolve their ERP environments to SAP® S/4HANA. These projects can truly transform the enterprise—but are also resource-intensive and require stakeholder alignment on key decisions. Additionally, because S/4HANA runs mission-critical workloads, the solution demands best-in-class security and reliability.

When it comes to deploying S/4HANA, customers often want the flexibility of cloud, but require the control and security offered by on-prem legacy solutions. Deloitte’s managed hybrid cloud solution offers the flexibility and control of a managed service model, and can help companies leverage the benefits of both cloud-based and on-prem environments.

Powering Deloitte’s managed hybrid cloud solution is HPE’s flagship mission-critical platform, HPE Superdome Flex, which delivers the high service levels, scalability and performance that S4/HANA workloads demand. Throughout the development process, we infused Deloitte’s deep expertise from implementing technology solutions across industries from life sciences and healthcare, technology, media and entertainment, energy, consumer and industrial products and more. In addition, Deloitte offers end-to-end HPE capabilities across the journey to enterprise cloud, change management, training, onboarding and financials. Together, HPE and Deloitte are well suited to deliver S/4HANA transformation projects for clients.

We in HPE Mission Critical Solutions are excited to jointly deliver Deloitte’s managed hybrid cloud solution so that you can accelerate your S4/HANA transformation and unlock the benefits of a hybrid approach. If you are interested in learning more about our alliance relationship with Deloitte and more key benefits of this solution please visit: www.hpe.com/partners/Deloitte.

 

Looking forward to 2020

These are only three examples of the multiple partnerships we develop and strengthen every day. Going into 2020 we will continue to focus on the innovation that matters to you, and on partnering with best-in-class providers that can augment our value with theirs to deliver “better together” solutions to meet your needs.

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SecurityWinter 2019

XYPRO’s 2020 Cybersecurity Predictions – Add 2 Factor Authentication and Machine Learning to Your Plans!

by Steve Tcherchian
written by Steve Tcherchian

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As 2020 approaches, it’s time to discuss cybersecurity predictions that will impact the industry in the upcoming year. As a CISSP and Chief Information Security Officer for XYPRO, I thought long and hard about what I could say that would be impactful and hasn’t been said before – that’s a tall order! The reality is, what we predicted would be important in 2019, 2018 and even 2017 – is still applicable. A lot of what we predicted back then was never properly addressed and remains a risk today – credential theft and attacks targeting privileged user logins are more prevalent than ever. Currently, the best way to combat these types of attacks is to use 2 factor authentication.

Use it for everything. There is no simpler way to state it – but this is still not being done. Risk will continue to increase in 2020. I cover this and other cybersecurity predictions for 2020 in the list below.

Machine Learning (ML) and Artificial Intelligence (AI) Will be Key to Combating Threats – We’ve all heard security vendors discuss ML and AI as features within their products for years. Up until recently, this wasn’t much more than a marketing gimmick. We have not begun to scratch the surface of the capabilities of ML and AI to combat threats. There is a lot of skepticism that has existed for years, but in 2020 we will have no choice. The amount of data being generated is increasing exponentially and the only way to keep up and identify threats is to allow machines to churn through data and trust they will detect the right concerns – then take appropriate action to combat the threat. We are going to see a lot of research, funding and effort invested in these methods. We need to get comfortable with the technology so it can be adopted on a wider scale and evolve. We have no choice. It’s the only way to monitor security going forward.

Attacks on the Edge will Increase – the proliferation of IoT devices, sensors, endpoints and a remote workforce is fulfilling our need for faster information in a mobile method. Edge computing enables us to generate and analyze data for decision making faster than ever before. Research firm IDC estimates at least 40% of IoT-created data is now stored, processed and analyzed close to or at the edge of the network. As we become more reliant on this data and the value it provides, we can’t lose sight of the security concerns that come along with it. Protecting the integrity of data at the source becomes vital. As attacks on edge devices and sensors become commonplace, we’ll see more focus on the security protections necessary to ensure the integrity of the data.

The Cloud Continues to be a Blessing and a Curse – as companies migrate their critical workloads and storage to the cloud, protections offered from the data center dissolve as the perimeter disappears. Aside from all the benefits, scalability and flexibility the cloud provides, it also introduces a new set of security challenges for CIOs and CISOs who are responsible for creating secure environments and keeping company and customer data safe. New technology requires new skill sets and there is a shortage of resources who truly understand how to build secure cloud environments. This risk is compounded by adversaries with unlimited resources at their disposal and the strategy that a hacker needs to only be right once, but a company protecting their data in the cloud needs to be right 100% of the time. We’re going to see a lot more breaches similar to the CapitalOne breach as the technology, knowledge and resource gaps widen between hackers and companies who are trying to keep their data safe.

Data Privacy Legislation will Continue to Strengthen – Government agencies have started to take notice how consumer data is collected, used and protected. We saw this with the adoption of GDPR in 2018. California has adopted its own version of GDPR called CCPA. Other states and municipalities are also adopting their own versions of consumer data privacy laws.

As this becomes normal, this also creates a fragmented set of local privacy legislation that will make it onerous to conduct business. At some point we will likely see the federal government provide overarching legislation. But in the meantime, as governments get more involved, these types of laws will continue to evolve and strengthen to punish those who are misusing and misrepresenting the usage of consumer data. Is the threat of punishment an effective deterrent?

Election Fraud and Foreign Government Interference is Real – The aftermath of the 2016 elections shined a spotlight on our need for better cybersecurity regulations and controls for the entire U.S. Election System.

Specifically, when the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)

revealed that some state and local election jurisdictions had been the targets of Russian cyberattacks, this jeopardized one of the key tenets of our democracy – free and fair elections.

In January 2017, the United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) federally designated the election infrastructure used in federal elections as a component of the U.S critical infrastructure. Critical Infrastructure (CI) refers to systems and assets for which “incapacity or destruction would have a debilitating impact on security, national economic security, national public health or safety, or any combination”. Other CI sections include the U.S. energy infrastructure, the Emergency and Financial Services sectors, Food and Agriculture, Transportation Systems, Water and Wastewater, and others.

This federal designation allows DHS to provide security assistance and brings the election infrastructure under a 2015 United Nations agreement stating that “nations should not conduct or support cyber-activity that intentionally damages or impairs the operation of CI in providing services to the public” as well as other benefits and controls from the designations.

Naturally, this designation provoked some concern by state and local officials with regards to federal overreach and autonomy of states to secure their own elections. Some of those concerns have since been mitigated by the federal government’s ability to provide cyber-security funding, assistance, and relief. This will be at the forefront of discussions and controversy heading into the 2020 elections

 

Password Attacks Will Continue

One of the largest security risks to any organization is the misuse, compromise or sharing of privileged accounts. Privileged accounts provide elevated access for the purpose of performing administrative type functions. They can be administrator accounts, service accounts, firecall or emergency accounts, database connection accounts and applications. Most of these accounts were set up years ago when an application or system was deployed. They typically have multiple integration points. Because of the risk of “breaking something”, the passwords for these accounts are rarely rotated, likely shared and undoubtedly they are improperly stored/protected.

According to the Varonis 2018 Global Data Risk Report – 65 percent of companies have over 500 accounts with passwords that are never rotated. These accounts have a higher risk of showing up in online password dumps with valid passwords. Privileged and service accounts with non-expiring passwords are a cyber criminal’s best friend. Ensuring these passwords are stored properly, changed regularly, meet complexity and compliance requirements and are audited can be overwhelming to implement and manage.

We have seen too many breaches lately targeting privileged accounts and we’ll see these types of attacks increase in 2020. Passwords are archaic. One true way to combat this risk is introducing a second factor for authentication. A second factor does add a layer of complexity to the authentication process but provides immense value in terms of addressing the risk. We’ve heard for years that 2-factor authentication should be turned on for everything, yet it’s rarely implemented. Until we shift our mindset and sacrifice a little bit of convenience for a massive amount of security – attacks on privileged credentials will continue and increase in 2020.

 

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DataFall 2019Security

5 Tips to Prevent Ransomware Attacks on Backups

by Raj Dutt
written by Raj Dutt

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Backup and recovery solutions are designed to protect your organization, but sophisticated malware like Locky and Crypto-ransomware are now targeting your backup data. Not surprising, considering the rise in frequency and breadth of ransomware attacks. The first ransomware payment—circa 1989—set the stage for hackers everywhere to begin locking up the data of unsuspecting targets and holding it until owners paid to get it back.

Ransomware Key Facts

    • Every 14 seconds, ransomware attacks
    • 700% growth since 2016
    • 35% of attackers get paid
    • $2B in financial losses
    • $11B in financial, productivity, and downtime losses!

Now analysts predict a ransomware attack on businesses will happen every 14 seconds—at a cost of billions to global organizations. That’s why it’s important to keep these five considerations in mind when you’re strategizing how best to prevent, detect, and rapidly respond to a ransomware attack on your backups.

 

1. Ransomware Attacks Make Backups a Liability

Cyber criminals are now aggressively targeting shadow copies backup data—to gain full control, or worse, destroy what has long-been considered your insurance policy to business continuity. Their more sophisticated attacks enter a primary environment from an endpoint and head straight for your backups—where 80 percent of enterprise data is now stored—deleting or compromising everything there before taking over the production environment.

What’s needed to prevent ransomware attacking your backup is a multi-layered defense. Original backup jobs should be kept in an immutable state, and never made accessible to prevent being mounted by an external system. Also, multi-factor authentication (MFA) and write once read many (WORM) capabilities for the snapshot are must-have features.

 

2. Expanding Attack Surfaces Expose Backups to Ransomware Attacks

IDC estimates 175 zettabytes of data will exist by 2025. This exploding data growth  and mass data fragmentation—the growing proliferation of backup data across different sprawling silos—have combined to widen your organization’s attack surface. As a result, your backup data has become more accessible to cybercriminals.

Preventing ransomware from succeeding in the first place starts with reducing your enterprise attack surface and knowing what data you have and where it is located. A unified solution for connecting infrastructure, workloads, and backup locations arms your organization against ransomware by eliminating mass data fragmentation.

 

3. Attacks on Backups Made Easier by Intermittent Monitoring

Cyber threats don’t always originate from outside of an organization; they can be launched internally, too. Imagine a disgruntled employee trying to modify or delete a large set of data. Relying exclusively on backup data-ingest change rates to detect such behaviors is insufficient, hence your organization must be able to detect an attack in real time.

What’s needed is a solution that can continuously monitor and detect smaller change rates by analyzing files and audit logs – even when you’re not paying close attention. The right backup solution will protect your organization from cyber attacks every second of every day.

 

4. Public Cloud Entry Points for Ransomware’s Criminals

The cloud is quickly becoming a point of entry for cyber attacks, which is putting your backup data at risk. In fact, McAfee estimates one in four public cloud users have experienced data theft! The bottom line is this: data in the cloud is not immune to ransomware. The public cloud may be cost-effective for backups, but it also means decreased data visibility.

Staying ahead of ransomware requires a backup and recovery solution that offers a single dashboard. Being able to see, manage, and take action fast on your backup data – whether residing on-premises or across public clouds – will help your organization protect itself from ransomware attacks.

 

5. Long Backup and Recovery Cycles Add to Ransomware Pain

If your enterprise relies on legacy backup that require synthetic fulls and falls victim to a ransomware attack, your IT team can spend days (even weeks!) in recovery mode. A recent Ponemon Institute report puts the average cost of a single ransomware attack at $5 million due primarily to productivity loss, systems downtime, and theft of information.

What’s needed is a backup and recovery solution that responds fast to ransomware attacks and lets you quickly locate and delete the infected files across your global data footprint – including the public clouds. Also needed is instant mass restore capabilities, which enable recovery of hundreds of virtual machines instantly, at scale, and to any point in time.

 

Prevent, Detect, and Respond Fast to Ransomware Threats

Organizations like yours want to experience zero data loss from cyber attacks and they want to have the confidence to refuse demands for a ransomware payment. Protect your data with a comprehensive approach to preventing, detecting, and rapidly responding to ransomware attacks.

Download the Defend Your Data ebook and learn more about defending your data.

 

Ransomware writers are aware that backups are an effective defense and are modifying their malware to track down and eliminate the backups.

— CSO Magazine, How to protect backups from ransomware

 

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