assessments Archives

Assessments – A Necessary Evil

Assessments are a necessary evil for an IT Department. Egos are hurt, exposure of negligence and complacency are all deliverables of a thorough assessment. But we’re going to look at it in a different way.

An IT Department can be considered the Heroes of an organization because they realized an assessment(s) needed to be done. Preventing a catastrophic breakdown or failure of an organization’s infrastructure or by saving an organization millions of dollars, the IT Team can leverage the C-Suite for that pool table in the breakroom without much resistance.

Limited Bandwidth

We all wear many hats in an organization and can be considered the Jacks of all trades and Masters of none. An individual who’s heading up the IT Department may have a Networking core competency but have little or no knowledge of a Storage competency. And, there’s the chance an individual and only that individual makes up the entire IT Department. This can be the case for SMB companies. Enterprises have a few folks, but even their bandwidth is not what it should be.

Gaps in knowledge ranging from Networking, Compute, Storage, etc. can jeopardize an organizations’ infrastructure. This can cause significant trouble with product outputs. However, being proactive instead of being reactive can help minimize the opportunity for failure or loss to occur.

Available Assessments

Assessment is a very broad term. There can be levels and micro-levels of assessments within an IT Infrastructure.

Here’s a very high-level summary of the types of assessments that are available via Zunesis at the click of the ‘SEND’ button on a product / service inquiry form:
1. IT Infrastructure Assessment – Experts will assess the current IT infrastructure and deliver a report detailing observations regarding hardware, software, and the business processes impacted by the organization’s IT environment. Recommendations and potential solutions should also be part of the final deliverable.
2. Data Management Assessment – Data Management Assessment Service can be used to focus separately on Production Data, Archive Data, Backup/Recovery, or it can encompass all three. Part of the perks of having this information would be to document current data management practices as well as short-term and long-term objectives.
3. Recurring Data Center Assessment & Advisory Service – This is a review of the IT Infrastructure Assessment, but it would occur on a quarterly, bi-annually, or yearly cadence. Benefits include lower support and maintenance costs, greater control over the existing environment and other attributes which lead to high performance without breaking the bank.
4. VMware Assessment Services – Deliverables include documentation on current environment, observations about current VMware use and short-term recommendations and areas of opportunity. This information will provide a clearer picture of the environment’s long-term strategy and cost efficiency.
5. Wireless Site Survey – This assessment should be done by all organizations (i.e., Government agencies, Education, office buildings, etc.). A Network Engineer will import floor plans into a tool and draw walls on the map to give them an idea of what their coverage area will look like. Or if already installed, the site survey will validate a recent wireless network installation.
6. Ransomware Recovery Preparedness & Risk Assessment – There’s no need to elaborate on this assessment. To be blunt, if an organization doesn’t feel this is necessary, then they better be prepared to lose all their data and pay a fortune to get it back. And, there’s a chance an organization may never get their lost data back. People will lose jobs over this if this assessment is not done and done soon.
7. Firewall Assessment – This provides the overall utilization of an organization’s current firewall and their adherence to industry’s best standards through a Network Vulnerability Assessment. Recommendations, best practices, snapshot of existing firewall layout, potential of what the layout can be in the long-term are just some of the attributes a company can glean from this assessment.

Potential Problem Analysis

Now that these assessments have been identified and the importance of each, organizations need to think operationally, tactically and strategically about the consequences and costs of not undergoing these assessments. Potential Problem Analysis consists of identifying the problem before it actually occurs. This type of thinking is true in any infrastructure environment and should be implemented immediately. Band Aide’s and Duct Tape can only go so far.

Again, being proactive rather than reactive, an organization can prevent significant down-times, reduce costs by protecting current hardware, avoid ransomware, avoid closure, save jobs and many other elements which will lead to continued operation time and an increased/valid sense of security.

“Gratitude can transform common days into thanksgiving.”
William Arthur Ward

Things to Be Grateful for This Year

Maybe Thanksgiving isn’t on your radar yet. Or maybe you skipped right over it and are already draping your dog in tinsel. (No judgment here; it’s been a weird year, and we could all use the holiday cheer.) But you’ve got just over a week to plan the perfect Thanksgiving meal. You need to figure out how a table of buttery biscuits and creamy casseroles and socially distanced house guests are going to work.

The stress of the season is upon us just as we have just packed the anxiety away. You’d think we’d be used to the holiday shuffle by now as this happens year after year. The circus juggling act that includes holiday planning, work, kids, and making it look somewhat effortless. Imagine if your job was that of a Systems Administrator on top of everything else life demands of us!

System Admins – Kudos!

I wanted to give thanks to all our dedicated Sys Admins of the IT industry. A system administrator’s job is to ensure computer systems are in good working condition. The job includes software and hardware installations, data recovery, troubleshooting, and software and hardware maintenance.

For example, a hospital has its own software that produces data daily to run their operations. A system administrator is responsible for its installation and maintenance. He or she also ensures that the software is correctly configured. So, a system admin typically deals with the computing resources in the infrastructure, hardware inventories, software license, and capacity planning. WOW, and they probably already have their holiday shopping done!

If you are a small business and blessed to have a systems admin on your team, thank them for keeping the daily operations flowing. If your sysadmin needs some time off, an extra hand on a special project or the business is growing, and the thought of hiring another admin is on your mind, check out what we here at Zunesis can do to offer additional support for them.

Zunesis IT Assessment Services

Zunesis helps provides your organization with the information you need to understand your environment, make informed decisions, and set strategies through our assessment services.

They include the following:

Data Management Assessment – Can be used to focus separately on Production Data, Archive Data, Backup/Recovery, or it can encompass all three.

Recurring Data Center Advisory Services – RDCAS is designed to help clients maintain their HPE infrastructure.

VMware Assessment – Operational Analysis can provide you with the information needed to improve your virtual environment or fast track your IT project.

Wireless Site Survey – Whether you are looking to upgrade your wireless network or validate a recent installation, a professional site survey will give your engineers the data they need to minimize the support calls.

Ransomware Recovery Preparedness Assessment – This IT Risk Assessment, a Zunesis engineer will review and analyze your site to provide observations and recommendations to better prepare your organization for future data attacks.

Firewall Assessment – We will discover the overall utilization of an organization’s current firewall and their adherence to industry’s best standards through a Network Vulnerability Assessment.

When gratitude is elusive and anxiety and stress are taking center stage, I offer more wisdom by one my favorite writers and inspirational maxims.

“Before you act, listen.

Before you react, think.

Before you spend, earn.

Before you criticize, wait.

Before you pray, forgive.

Before you quit, try.”

~ William Arthur Ward

Security- Top Priority in Today’s World

Security is a hot button in today’s world. Now that the number of remote workers has gone up significantly due to the health crisis, the rise of ransomware attacks has followed closely behind. Remote work environments increase the number of targets for hackers. Phishing attempts are up more than 600% in the last 6 months, exploiting new vulnerabilities in the workforce.

Multiple devices in multiple locations create new opportunities for cyberattacks. With a remote workforce, the chance for unexpected risks increases dramatically. One of those reasons being, employees use “work-arounds” and personal devices when accessing or sharing private data and documents.

There are many avenues to take when considering a heightened and more secure environment. Often, the enterprise infrastructure is not top of mind. Many solutions are available to tighten up an enterprise infrastructure to ensure a more secure environment. These projects are just as imperative when it comes to protecting your company as others.

A number of Zunesis clients have shifted focus from other high priority projects to firewall implementations. This is in an attempt to mitigate the increased security risks.

Firewall

A firewall is a network security system that monitors and controls incoming and outgoing network-traffic. It is based on predetermined security rules. It typically establishes a barrier between a trusted internal network and untrusted external network, such as the Internet.

Depending on the enterprise, a firewall solution can look very different from one company to the next. All entities should be aware of their needs and choose accordingly.

Identifying and deploying a firewall solution specific to the needs of your company is a great place to start. How else can we tighten up an enterprise infrastructure to aid in the security of company information during these cyber wars?

Zunesis Services – Risk Mitigation

Zunesis has assessments available to aid in the risk mitigation of your organization.

Firewall/Network Assessment

Often times, organizations understand the importance of a firewall, and may have even purchased a firewall solution. But, organizations frequently fail to configure said solution correctly or are not using it to its full capability. Zunesis has created an assessment to help your organization with your network security firewall needs.

The Zunesis Firewall Assessment will discover the overall utilization of an organization’s current firewall and their adherence to industry’s best standards. Components of change management and administrative access to the firewall(s) will be examined. Additional focus is made to examine the strength of the existing firewall access control lists (ACLs). Recommendations will be made on how to streamline the firewall rules or leverage additional features to make them more secure.

Ransomware Readiness and Recovery Assessment:

There will be an estimated $6 trillion in damages to business by 2021 from ransomware. The advantage of being prepared, is that you can manage problems quickly and more efficiently by already having a solution ready when a problem ensues. The importance of preparation is that it is a time saver – and time is money!

Intelligent Data Protection is a comprehensive approach to data protection and copy data management. It focuses on how an organization protects and uses its data (now and in the future). Is your organization prepared? What is your backup policy? What is your Disaster Recovery plan?

Zunesis has developed an assessment that documents the readiness of an organization to recover data that may have been impacted by a Ransomware attack. Through review and analysis, a Zunesis engineer will provide observations and recommendations to better prepare your organization for future data attacks.

Recurring Data Center Assessment Services:

If limited resources within your company’s IT department is problematic, maintenance details are often the first thing to slip through the cracks. It is important to stay on top of firmware updates, device OS updates and other customer advisories.

Through RDCAS, we ensure that the most current software and firmware updates are installed across your environment. We work closely with your organization to determine the frequency of your infrastructure review.

The review is limited to the following HPE infrastructure devices including: blades and rack mount servers, HPE Storage, HPE Fibre Channel Switches, HPE Synergy Frame and HPE SimpliVity Hyper-converged platform.

What does the future hold for security innovation and advancements?

The future for security in today’s organizations will still remain a high priority. Here are a few predictions from IT experts.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) will be a core component of cybersecurity systems
Cyber warfare threats will be a focus
The number of hackers will rise
Developing cybersecurity talent becomes essential
Legacy technology will continue to be an issue

Zunesis’ commitment is to help moderate problems and issues that arise within the industry. Our goal is to make the lives of our clients better. With risks and threats to businesses on the rise, Zunesis is dedicated to helping our clients prepare for the worst, plan for the best, and manage the present.

Downtime Prep

So that we ‘don’t let the cure be worse than the problem,’ it’s time to prep your organization’s infrastructure. When the time comes (and it will) to put that proverbial, “We’re Open” sign in the window, you will want to be prepared. We’re all hopeful this tragedy will take the shape of a ‘V’ in economic recovery. Regardless, an organization needs to be fully operational immediately.

There are several options / assessments that should be considered depending on the size of the organization:

NO CONTACT: A LOT OF THESE SERVICES CAN BE DONE BY REMOTE LOGIN

In a normal world, many organizations don’t have the time or resources to tend to the above-mentioned assessments. It’s quite possible some organizations aren’t very familiar with their environment and take it for granted. It’s very possible an organization is about to face something catastrophic with their IT environment and not even know it.

THIS IS THE TIME

Therefore, an organization needs to be ready when that bell rings in the rematch fight against the economy. Not being prepared is like showing up to a gunfight with a knife. It’s going to be hard enough already but putting in the time now to prepare for the Nation’s comeback will provide dividends.

Our Engineers will do everything possible so that an organization can be a recipient of those forthcoming dividends. In fact, they will go the extra mile every single time. Just a few days ago, I was on a call with a client and our Engineers. They were troubleshooting several issues (REMOTELY) with the client’s Backup and their Exchange. Over three hours later and well past 6PM, they found the needle in the haystack.
After checking with the client, the next day, it was really awesome to see the following reply,

“Everything is great. Backups and exchange sync worked perfectly.”

These guys are good!

While I painted the picture of rainbows and butterflies, we do realize budget is a concern. If an organization does decide to conduct one or more of the listed assessments, there are costs involved. Believe it or not, the cost to conduct some of these assessments can be significantly lower than NOT doing an assessment which could result in a complete rebuild of the organization’s infrastructure.

In some cases, this service could be provided to the client at no cost to them. That’s the tease for this blog. We currently have four or five clients who are taking advantage of this opportunity. Now is the time to prepare for the future. Downtime equals prep-time. We’re one tough country and practice the belief of:

It’s not how hard we fall; it’s how quickly we get back up and fight the fight.

Until next time, stay safe and healthy. We’re all in this together and together is the only way we will win!

Downtime Prep

Anyone else feel like we’re living the movie version of Groundhog Day. Only, there’s really nothing comical about our reality right now. This is a surreal time, but there are opportunities to take advantage of the downtime.
So that we ‘don’t let the cure be worse than the problem,’ it’s time to prep your organization’s infrastructure. When the time comes (and it will) to put that proverbial, “We’re Open” sign in the window, you will want to be prepared. We’re all hopeful this tragedy will take the shape of a ‘V’ in economic recovery. Regardless, an organization needs to be fully operational immediately.

There are several options / assessments that should be considered depending on the size of the organization:

NO CONTACT: A LOT OF THESE SERVICES CAN BE DONE BY REMOTE LOGIN

THIS IS THE TIME

“Everything is great. Backups and exchange sync worked perfectly.”

These guys are good!

While I painted the picture of rainbows and butterflies, we do realize budget is a concern. If an organization does decide to conduct one or more of the listed assessments, there are costs involved. Believe it or not, the cost to conduct some of these assessments can be significantly lower than NOT doing an assessment which could result in a complete rebuild of the organization’s infrastructure.
In some cases, this service could be provided to the client at no cost to them. That’s the tease for this blog. We currently have four or five clients who are taking advantage of this opportunity. Now is the time to prepare for the future. Downtime equals prep-time. We’re one tough country and practice the belief of:

It’s not how hard we fall; it’s how quickly we get back up and fight the fight.

Until next time, stay safe and healthy. We’re all in this together and together is the only way we will win!