By Andy Butcher, UK Research and Education Sales Manager,  Axians

Malware and processing muscle to rent is swelling hacker armouries

Distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks have severe consequences for their victims, causing considerable operational disruption and undermining trust in the organisation amongst customers, end users and business partners.

http://www.cbronline.com/news/enterprise-it/it-network/legacy-systems-continue-slow-digital-strategies/

SD-WAN may provide the low cost, low maintenance branch office router solution that enterprises and service providers have long craved.

Access to BT’s dark fibre network will open new commercial possibilities for communication service providers

After sustained pressure from the UK telecoms regulator Ofcom BT has agreed to open up its dark fibre network to rival communications service providers (CSPs) from October 1st 2017. The new product - Dark Fibre Access (DFA) - should allow companies which want to lease BT’s network to deliver a wider range of higher speed network services to business and consumer customers under their own brand.

The government’s latest National Cyber Security Strategy (NCSS) proposal makes a big play for the inclusion of academic institutions in the education and training of next generation data security professionals. But for the five year plan to deliver, universities and colleges may have to get their own house in order first by upgrading their existing cyber security network infrastructure.

Interview: Andy Butcher, Sales Manager for Research and Education, Axians

Andy Butcher is the Axians Sales Manager responsible for the UK Research and Education market, and is focused on helping universities deliver carrier-grade network services and business efficiency to their academic stakeholders and students.

Q: How long have you been working in the higher education sector?

I have worked with the education sector since the later 1990s. My first major sale was to University College London where I won a contract selling computers. My background in building, surveying and dealing with specifications and tenders meant I fitted quite well into the market and I have mostly worked in HE since.

Ken O’Kelly has been a key consultant in Juniper Networks; UK and Ireland security business for the past four and a half years. He previously held various roles (latterly as a security architect) during a 14 year stint with Imtech ICT.

Ken tells Axians about Juniper’s latest software defined security network (SDSN) solution and how it will make life easier for  IT departments tasked with controlling network access for thousands of users.

Q: What is Juniper’s software defined security network (SDSN)?

SDSN is all about changing how you build the network. Traditionally organisations have tended to build security into the perimeter and everything outside that perimeter is untrusted and everything inside it is trusted. That is a bit of a challenge these days given that we all take our laptops and smartphones outside of that trusted barrier when we go home, where malware can infect them and vulnerabilities can be compromised. We then bring the device back inside the network perimeter and now it is trusted again and that gives any threat carte blanche to get around the network.

Since becoming multi-site SureVoIP have seen high growth rates and have begun the process to deliver plans for expansion and be connected to the SS7 network. At the same time SureVoIP wanted to enhance its network and provide additional services to their customers. The company needed strong technical capabilities for lab testing, training, support with a solution that would have high network resiliency and a seamless connection between the two locations.

Juniper Networks announced its 2016 Juniper Partner Award winners, spotlighting the outstanding achievements and commitment from the company’s top channel partners in the areas of sales, customer service excellence, technology expertise and service specialisations.