Networks Unlimited Africa
Fixing Your Cybersecurity Issues 1 Next-Gen Firewall at a Time
Stefan van de Giessen, General Manager: Cybersecurity at Networks Unlimited Africa When did you last check your firewalls as a barrier to entry against cybercriminals? And, perhaps more importantly: does your organisation still rely on a legacy firewall, or has it upgraded to a next-generation firewall (NGFW)? And have you considered the ‘Broken window’ principle when looking at your internal cybersecurity posture, in order to have a positive effect on your business processes? These questions are posed by Stefan van de Giessen: General Manager: Cybersecurity at Networks Unlimited Africa, who says, “The broken window theory rests on the idea that a neighbourhood or community that appears to be orderly and well-kept will be less susceptible to crime. Conversely, one that has many broken wind...
Combined Rubrik and IDC Report Addresses Data Sprawl in the Modern Enterprise
Image sourced from Gerd Altmann, Pixabay Data sprawl – referring to the fact that valuable data is now commonly spread across multiple physical locations and different repository types – is one of the most critical IT issues that a modern organisation will have to manage. Not only does this expanse of data create issues for an organisation around its effective use, it can also negatively affect its security measures. This is according to a recent report from IDC, the global market intelligence firm, and cloud data management company Rubrik, which commissioned the IDC White Paper study and which involved just over 800 respondents in North America, Western Europe and the Asia/Pacific region. The white paper reveals that: Companies are not leveraging data to its fullest extent, causing ...
Tintri Drives Intelligent Infrastructure so You Can Get Ready to ‘Let Go of the Wheel’
The concept of self-driving cars is controversial and tends to polarise opinion. At the heart of it is the idea that a car will be capable of the same split-second decision-making as a human – or even better – with the ultimate goal of creating accident-free roads. For a vehicle to be autonomous, it needs to be continuously aware of its surroundings: firstly, by identifying and classifying information, and then by acting on the information through the computer control of the vehicle. And for this to happen, artificial intelligence (AI) is required, it is a critical technology in the goal of realising autonomous driving. “One of the main premises of self-driving cars is the idea that autonomy equals safety,” says Michael Donaldson, Tintri Product Manager at value-added distributor Net...
In the Eye of the Storm: New Record is Set by Ten Million DDoS Attacks in One Year
Not all record-breaking numbers are feats or achievements towards which we all aspire. For example, in 2006, American teenager Matt Suter was destined to become the holder of the record for the ‘farthest distance thrown by a tornado and survived’, when he was flung, in an unconscious state, for a distance of almost 400 metres (398.37 metres) by an F2 tornado (meaning wind speeds of 181 to 253 kilometres per hour), yet later regained consciousness almost without a scratch. “We’ve recently had a very thought-provoking record-breaking number released for 2020 in the cybersecurity arena, and it’s not pretty,” says Risna Steenkamp, General Manager: ESM Division at value-added distributor Networks Unlimited. “Distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks have crossed the 10 million mark dur...
How the ‘Broken Window’ Theory Affects Cybersecurity Matters
Stefan van de Giessen, General Manager: Cybersecurity at Networks Unlimited Africa Here at Networks Unlimited Africa, we are applying the ‘broken window’ principle when looking at our internal cybersecurity posture and how it affects business processes. The term ‘Broken window’ comes from George Kelling, a criminologist, who wrote in 1982 that, “social psychologists and police officers tend to agree that if a window in a building is broken and is left unrepaired, all the rest of the windows will soon be broken… vandalism can occur anywhere once communal barriers…are lowered by actions that seem to signal that ‘no one cares’.” This theory had also been the subject of experiments previously (1969) by a professor at Stanford University, Philip Zimbardo. Zimbardo arranged to have a car w...
Backup the Physical Servers on your Network with Free Altaro Software
Risna Steenkamp, General Manager: ESM Division at Networks Unlimited Africa Companies and organisations with virtualised server environments often have physical machines too, and these also need data protection. Altaro has reacted to this need with the introduction of Altaro Physical Server Backup, a server backup software solution – with the added bonus that it’s free. Altaro is a leader in backup solutions for MSPs, IT resellers and IT departments, with its solutions distributed throughout Africa by value-added distributor Networks Unlimited Africa. Risna Steenkamp, General Manager: ESM Division at Networks Unlimited Africa, explains: “Businesses with virtual environments that have one or more physical machines or legacy servers that have not been virtualised can use Altaro P...
ProLabs and the ‘New 5G Backhaul Economy’
Marcel Fouché, Networking and Storage General Manager at Networks Unlimited Africa As we navigate our way through the COVID-19 pandemic, we are finding that economic and social survival is tied to the ability to work and play at a distance. If ever there was a time for a revolutionary new internet technology to take hold, now would seem to be that time. So says Raymond Hagen, Americas Product Manager at ProLabs, a global leader in optical networking infrastructure. He notes in a recent blog entry that: “Visionaries may state that 5G will offer access to new applications like artificial intelligence and smart city infrastructure that could define the next industrial revolution. Companies and countries failing to act now will find themselves left behind global and regional powers that a...
The Growing Role of SASE for Enterprises during 2021, and other top SD-WAN Predictions from Silver Peak
Marcel Fouché, Networking and Storage General Manager at Networks Unlimited Africa Silver Peak, the global SD-WAN leader that was recently acquired by Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company, now has an even greater ability to help enterprises successfully transform their wide area network (WAN) and security architectures, and advance their digital transformation. This includes the ability for enterprises and their employees to connect to business applications from anywhere in a safe and secure manner. This is according to Silver Peak founder David Hughes, who writes in a blog entry that, “With so many exciting advancements in WAN edge technologies, including the acceleration of IoT adoption, advancements in automation and AI along with new transport technologies emerging, we’re contin...
DDoS ‘Tax’ Adds to an Organisation’s Attack Burden, says NETSCOUT
Risna Steenkamp, General Manager: ESM Division at Networks Unlimited Africa Did you ever think about the ‘tax’ you pay as an organisation in the event of a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack? In a nutshell, DDoS attacks by threat actors don’t only have a negative effect on businesses and their customers – they also take up quantities of internet bandwidth without paying for it. This means that the cost of this traffic falls on the shoulders of every business that does pay for the internet service. This is according to the NETSCOUT ‘2020 1H Threat Intelligence Report’, in which NETSCOUT, a leading global provider of service assurance, security and business analytics, introduces its DDoS Attack Coefficient. The figure summarises the amount of DDoS traffic going through regional netw...
Networks Unlimited Africa brings Festive Season Cheer to Tembisa school
There is no doubt that it has been difficult for many local companies to survive in 2020. Imagine then how much more challenging it must have been for worthy causes like The Love Trust and its beneficiary, Nokuphila School in Tembisa, Midrand? This is the question asked by Anton Jacobsz, CEO at Networks Unlimited Africa, a leading value-added distributor within the Sub-Saharan African market. He explains, “The Love Trust is a South African non-profit educational organisation which has, to date, reached over 20,000 primary and secondary beneficiaries in disadvantaged communities. Because the lockdown period has made it even harder for non-profit organisations to stay afloat, our company has made a point of continuing to offer our support to this worthwhile organisation. A team from Ne...
ProStream Boosts its Enterprise Portfolio through New Hitachi Vantara Partnership
Marcel Fouché, Networking and Storage General Manager at Networks Unlimited Africa Enterprise systems solutions expert ProStream has announced that it has become a member of the Hitachi Vantara Partner Program in order to strengthen its range of offerings. Hitachi Vantara offers storage solutions for enterprises and mid-sized organisations, as well as hardware, software, data analytics and consultation services for many areas of information technology (IT) and businesses. “Networks Unlimited became a proud distributor of Hitachi Vantara within sub-Saharan Africa during 2019,” says Marcel Fouché, Networking and Storage General Manager at value-added distributor Networks Unlimited Africa. “We pride ourselves on building supportive working relationships with our systems integrators and ...
Cyber Hygiene for System Health and Online Security
Organisations in the COVID-19 pandemic era have been forced to look at their security hygiene best practices in order to minimise risk, data leakage and non-compliance, while still allowing for operational flexibility and efficiency. Employees have increasingly been both allowed and encouraged to use their own devices to remotely connect to the corporate network. As a result, connectivity and digital resources at the office as well as the home have become more intertwined, meaning that minimising risk has become more critical than ever. Cyber hygiene refers to the practices and steps that companies need to take to maintain system health and improve online security. In my opinion, cyber hygiene has not changed significantly over the past year or two, but has just become more relevant to ap...
