HOME EUROPEAN NEWS EDITOR’S COMMENT THE PROSPECTS FOR CLOUD ACROSS BUSINESS IT ENERGY EFFICIENCY DRIVES DATACENTRE INSTALLATIONS IN ICELAND CAN THE EUROPEAN MOBILE NETWORKS LEARN TO SHARE? CIOS MUST CHANGE THEIR SPOTS TO STAY RELEVANT THE BUSINESSES LOSING DEVICES AND DATA MAP MAKER GETS TO GRIPS WITH BIG DATA CW COMPUTER WEEKLY’S DIGITAL MAGAZINE FOR EUROPEAN IT LEADERS APRIL 2013 ARPINGSTONE Flying easyJet in the cloud THE COMPANIES ACROSS EUROPE TRANSFORMING THEIR BUSINESS WITH MANAGED SERVICES
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european news
editor’s comment
tHe prospects for cloud across
business it
energy efficiency drives datacentre
installations in iceland
can tHe european mobile networks
learn to sHare?
cios must cHange tHeir spots to stay relevant
tHe businesses losing devices
and data
map maker gets to grips
witH big data
CWComputer Weekly’s DIGItAl mAGAzIne for europeAn It leADers AprIl 2013
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Flying easyJet in the cloud
tHe companies across europe transforming tHeir business witH managed services
Almost 40,000 more homes and busi-nesses have been added to Bt’s fibre broadband roll-out in the UK. starting in scotland, the telecoms giant is spend-ing £2.5bn to deploy fibre across the UK, with the goal of reaching two-thirds of the population by spring 2014.
Bank fraud claims more than four million victims in UK
nearly 4.6 million people in the UK have had their personal details stolen and money from their bank accounts used to buy goods or services.
EC unveils ‘grand coalition’ to address IT skills shortage
the european Commission (eC) has launched a “grand coalition for digital jobs” to tackle it skills shortage in the european Union.
Cheap energy lures business to Iceland datacentres
As european businesses are looking to reduce their carbon footprint, many are turning to iceland to build datacentres. in addition to using free air cooling, icelandic datacentres are powered using renewable energy with natural hydro and geothermal energy resources (see case study, p7).
Lufthansa Systems improves datacentre efficiency
Lufthansa systems, the company that provides it services to airlines, has mod-ernised its datacentres to host more avia-tion and industrial applications. it chose Dell’s infrastructure as the base to run Microsoft Windows server 2012.
EC fines Microsoft £485m over browser choice ruling
the eC has fined Microsoft £485m for breaching a competition ruling to give Windows users a choice of browser, as part of its settlement with the eC in 2009.
Iceland touts green credentials to attract technology giants
Despite having the facilities to build a green datacentre, big technology firms such as Apple, Facebook and google have yet to opt for a base in iceland. n
AdditionAl resources
› mobile world congress 2013
› dell tecHnology camp 2013
› cw500 security club
› vdi storage: key steps in preparation
› cw500: key trends for it leaders in 2013
› cloud expo europe 2013
› ltfs tape nas: How to build it
› bett sHow 2013
› computer weekly supplier directory
› all you need know about windows 8
› it security purcHasing intentions 2013
› it priorities survey 2013
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When the european Commission announced its new strategy for “unleashing the potential of cloud computing in europe”
last year, the aim was to speed up and increase the use of cloud computing across the economy.
so how are we doing?Computer Weekly asked it decision-makers
across europe about their it priorities for 2013, finding that businesses are increasingly opting for cloud services, be it internal, external, private, pub-lic or hybrid.
Following the release of the european Cloud Computing strategy, announced by european Com-mission vice-president neelie Kroes, the use of cloud computing in the region does appear to be on the increase, as it departments utilise the cloud to move it resources from capital expenditure to operational expenditure.
But do businesses really understand the true ben-efits? in this issue of CW europe, find out whether businesses are using cloud computing to their full advantage and what can be done if they’re not.
this issue also explores how Advania’s icelandic thor datacentre uses the country’s natural energy resources and free air cooling to maintain a low pUe. the datacentre has a pUe of 1.16, which most european organisations can only dream of. Find out how it reached this figure and discover ways in which you could improve your own pUe.
in addition, find out the winners of the Computer Weekly european User Awards for networking. Five winners have been chosen for showing innovation in networking technology. Congratulations to all of the winners! CW europe will be showcasing full case studies on all of the winning projects soon.
entries for CW europe’s security, software, data-centre and storage awards are now open. so if you have a project that you think is worth an award for some out-of-the-box thinking, CW europe wants to hear about it. n
Kayleigh Bateman Editor of CW Europe Special projects editor for Computer Weekly
It departments are using cloud comput-ing to move it resources from capital expenditure to operational expenditure on
the balance sheet. But do businesses under-stand all the benefits?
research from Computer Weekly shows it decision-makers increasingly opting for cloud services – whether internal or external – to provide it infrastructure. Cloud computing is especially useful when the business wants to try something new.
in the survey of 330 it decision-makers, 22% said they would be implementing private clouds in 2013, while 27% said they would implement systems on a public cloud. Considering how the adoption of cloud com-puting would affect their it budget in 2013, of the 116 it leaders who responded, 35% said their budgets for cloud were increas-ing. the survey also found 16% said they would be spending more on cloud computing during 2013, although the increase did not
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The cost and flexibilty benefits of cloud – balanced against the inherent risk of distributed data – divides IT leaders across the continent. Cliff Saran reports
The prospects for cloud cover across European business IT departments
CW Europe April 2013 5
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energy efficiency drives datacentre
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tHe businesses losing devices
and data
map maker gets to grips
witH big data
had been a disaster or hadn’t improved cus-tomer satisfaction, there would have been a temptation by the business to turn it off. it is much easier to turn off a cloud solution than to have to tear out all the functionality from the reservation system.”
Cloud-bursting business initiativesAt Channel 5, the it department has used hybrid cloud to support the substantial peaks in traffic it experiences with audience participation, where people interact via the web and social media. Computer Weekly spoke to Clive Malcher, head of product
development and technology at Channel 5, about how cloud computing helps him man-age the it behind reality show Big Brother.
“When people watch something interest-ing on the show, they immediately grab their laptop, tablet or mobile phone and go to one of our it-powered services,” says Malcher.
reflect an increase in their budget related to procuring cloud services.
strikingly, almost a quarter of the it deci-sion-makers polled said their spending on cloud remained flat, suggesting little appetite for it spending.
Computer Weekly spoke to a number of it leaders about the board’s attitude toward the benefits of cloud.
rob Fraser, Cto for cloud services at Microsoft UK, says: “We have been seeing anecdotal evidence that a lot of the most impactful and interesting business transfor-mation projects are being driven by people within business lines who instigate projects predominantly using cloud technology.” Fraser says people in businesses were using software as a service to take strategic initia-tives forward.
Alignment with businessBert Craven, easyJet’s enterprise architect, says: “At easyJet we have very tech-savvy business people and very commercially astute it people. there isn’t a divide.”
Craven says this was important to make big transformational changes, such as when the company decided to start offering allo-cated seating. he says cloud computing reduces the risk of moving fully to a seat allocation system, since the way it has been implemented at easyJet means the airline has not had to make major changes to any of its core systems.
Craven adds: “We delivered it as a pilot and presented it as a trial of allocated seating. if it
cloud computing
cApAcity mAnAgement key to cloud efficiencies
Capacity management is the most underestimated problem of cloud computing, says morgan stanley executive director for It strategy evangelos kotsovinos.
evangelos kotsovinos is leading cloud computing strategy and execution at morgan stanley.“one of the main reasons for using cloud computing services is to get efficiency and cost sav-
ings. And maximum It efficiency on the cloud comes from good capacity planning and manage-ment,” kotsovinos said at the Cloud expo europe 2013 event. But it is still the most overlooked and underestimated aspect of the cloud, he says.
many enterprises move to cloud computing without a detailed capacity management strategy because cloud platform is seen as infinitely elastic, where capacity can be purchased as and when needed. But buying resources on the cloud instantly can be expensive and enterprises can mitigate that cost by planning for capacity in advance and avoiding over- or under-provisioning, according to kotsovinos.
“It Is much easIer to turn off a cloud solutIon than to have to tear out all the functIonalIty from the reservatIon system”Bert craven, easyJet
CW Europe April 2013 6
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energy efficiency drives datacentre
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tHe businesses losing devices
and data
map maker gets to grips
witH big data
cloud computing
Cloud computing is driving business transformation. According to the experts Computer Weekly spoke to, it decision-mak-ers need to work closely with the business to understand where cloud can accelerate, de-risk or simply provide the horsepower for a business initiative.
William Fellows, vice-president at 451 research, says: “organisations are using cloud computing to rethink their it strategy and use it as a strategic weapon.” n
“so we see huge traffic spikes during the show around an eviction or when a juicy bit of gossip comes out. We’ve seen spikes of over 1,000% that occur over a few minutes.”
Empowering innovationDoug Clark, head of iBM’s UK cloud com-puting division, says businesses can be transformed through cloud computing. As an example, Clark says: “sunderland City Council wanted to use cloud computing to support start-ups.”
the council’s old datacentre provides infra-structure as a service (iaas), available as a cloud service for start-ups.
“the council has become a managed service provider for the local community. By putting the start-ups in one environment, people are talking to each other and sharing ideas,” he says.
research from analyst Forrester, commis-sioned by Microsoft, found business and it have different agendas when it comes to cloud computing.
the analyst company found that, while it projects focused on private cloud projects including infrastructure or desktop virtuali-sation, business-led cloud projects turned out to be more driven by requirements for speed, easy access for business users and improved collaboration.
Cliff Saran is the managing editor (technology) of Computer Weekly
europeAn government moves to privAte clouds
over half of local and central governments across europe are using or planning to use private clouds hosted by third parties. meanwhile, 56% of local governments and 42% of central gov-ernments use or will use internally hosted private clouds.
the IDC Government Insights annual research surveyed government organisations in france, Germany, Italy, spain and the uk. It revealed the main driver for these organisations to invest in cloud computing is cost efficiencies. the analyst company says organisations should ensure that multiple departments use cloud if they are truly to benefit.
“IDC research suggests internally hosted private clouds will not deliver relatively significant benefits to more traditional datacentre consolidation and virtualisation, unless they are run as multi-agency community resources,” says silvia piai, research manager the IDC programme.
IDC expects governments to increasingly move to the public cloud to reap the full benefits.“As the market matures and europe progresses and unleashes its full cloud potential, IDC
expects public and hybrid cloud to gradually take over private cloud,” says piai.uk government cloud computing – known as G-Cloud – promotes government-wide adoption
of cloud computing. the initiative focuses on cloud computing’s capability for economic growth and capitalises on cloud’s cost savings and flexibility to create a more efficient, accessible means of delivering public services.
“sunderland cIty councIl Is a managed servIce provIder for the communIty. By puttIng start-ups In one place, people are talkIng to each other and sharIng Ideas”doug clark, IBm
CW Europe April 2013 7
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The energy-efficiency argument for putting your datacentre in Iceland
When Advania Data Centres wanted to build an environmentally friendly and cost-effective it
facility, it chose iceland for its cool ambient temperature and geothermal energy.
today, Advania’s icelandic datacentre has a power usage effectiveness (pUe) figure of 1.16, a rating most european organisations can only dream of.
scandinavian it services company Advania got into the datacentre business when it bought thor Data Center in reykjavík in 2011.
the datacentre site contains two modu-lar datacentre containers, but has room to accommodate four more. Unlike traditional datacentres – which come with their own array of complexities, customisations and considerations – a modular datacentre is a pre-configured datacentre-in-a-box that can be transported and set up anywhere in the world with cooling facilities and a network.
With Visa and opera software as its big-gest public clients, more than 44 million users go through Advania’s icelandic data-centre every day.
Keeping down power requirementsone datacentre container is exclusively for one of its customers, opera software. “opera wanted an individual, private, cloud-like set-up and it runs a lot of CpU-intensive applications, so we have one entire modu-lar datacentre dedicated to opera,” says Benedikt grondal, chief technology officer of the Advania thor datacentre.
the power requirements for the facility dedicated to opera are higher too, he says. the opera datacentre processes about 20tbit of data per second and needs 14Kwh of cooling capacity.
the other container is used to serve other customers, including Visa, UK academic institutions such as the hertford regional College and some local companies. this facility requires 8Kwh of cooling power.
the company’s datacentre facility uses outside air for cooling and draws on iceland’s geothermal energy to power the servers and other equipment.
half of a datacentre’s power is used for cooling. “With free air cooling, we cut our
Advania’s datacentre near Reykjavik uses Iceland’s natural energy resources and free air cooling to make effective use of power, says Archana Venkatraman
Geothermal power plant in keflavik, near reykjavík
CW Europe April 2013 8
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map maker gets to grips
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power use by half, saving a lot of money,” says Advania’s Kolbeinn einarsson.
some experts maintain datacentre opera-tors overcool their infrastructure, which makes the datacentre less efficient. Advania keeps the temperature at around 20-21°C, rather than sub-20°C.
the thor datacentre site also uses indirect free air cooling. “We have heat exchangers and air filters that help us control the humid-ity and the air quality,” says grondal. purer air and controlled humidity also ensure longev-ity of the servers, he adds.
even if air is at a temperature suitable for cooling, it must be treated to ensure it has the right humidity and filtered to catch particles that could cause problems. A high moisture level can lead to some metals in the server units deteriorating, while air that is too dry can lead to issues with static electricity.
Renewable energyBut why did Advania choose iceland among the other locations at a similar latitude for its datacentres?
“We could have chosen sweden, which also offers free air cooling and meets most of our needs, but iceland was the only one offering us renewable energy with hydro and geothermal energy,” says einarsson.
Using electricity generated from renewable sources in iceland to power the datacentre brings down costs because it is cheaper than electricity produced elsewhere in europe.
“the energy prices in iceland were another big factor that tilted us in favour of iceland,” says einarsson, pointing to the option to lock energy prices for 15 years in iceland.
“on the contrary, power prices in europe are constantly rising by about 20% every year. if we were to build the same datacentre in the UK, it would have cost 30-50% more and it wouldn’t be as green as it is now.”
Efficiency metricsWhile the datacentre has a pUe of 1.16, effi-ciency could be further improved if it were to re-organise the way its space is used.
individual containers have a lower pUe, but the overall datacentre is still not full to capacity, so much cooling is wasted on empty space. When Advania adds more datacentre containers, the pUe will come down even further, grondal says.
pUe, created by the members of the green grid, is a metric used to determine the energy efficiency of a datacentre. it is calcu-lated by dividing the total energy used across the whole of a datacentre by the amount of energy used to power the it equipment.
the Uptime institute estimates that most facilities could achieve 1.6 pUe using the most efficient equipment and best practices. But the industry average pUe of datacentres in the UK is around 2 to 2.2.
Advania’s icelandic datacentre is a tier 3 datacentre. the tiered system, developed by the Uptime institute, offers firms a way to measure return on investment and perfor-mance. the standards comprise a four-tiered scale, with tier 4 being the most robust.
“it is so efficient that we call it tier 3+,” says einarsson. n
casE study
verne globAl expAnds icelAnd dAtAcentre operAtion
Verne Global, a wholesale supplier of datacentre space, plans to expand its facility in keflavik, Iceland, with 500m2 of uk-made modular datacentres to meet growing demand for storage.
the facility will not use water cooling or mechanical cooling equipment, such as compressors. Instead, it will use power from Iceland’s renewable energy sources and free air cooling technol-ogy to minimise carbon emissions.
the datacentre will be the world’s first dual-sourced, 100% renewably powered datacentre, according to Verne Global, as it will use Iceland’s natural geothermal and hydroelectric power.
the datacentre, which will be assembled onsite at Verne’s 45-acre campus in keflavik, will go live in the third quarter of 2013. the modular facility is being prefabricated and tested in north england at Colt technologies’ facility.
Archana Venkatraman is the datacentre editor of Computer Weekly
CW Europe April 2013 9
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tHe businesses losing devices
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map maker gets to grips
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mobilE nEtworking
The mobile industry is a competitive bat-tlefield, with no love lost between competitors doing all they can to win market share and
revenues. But mobile provid-ers face a bigger enemy than one another in the current economic climate and the argument is beginning to surface that col-laboration could be their only means of survival. the issue of operators sharing resources was one of the hottest topics at Mobile World Congress (MWC), the annual mobile and telecoms indus-try trade show held in Barcelona.
gabrielle gauthey, vice-president of public affairs for Alcatel-Lucent, makes a strong argument for collaboration to help combat the squeeze companies are feeling on their profits due to both political and technical pressures.
“the world is changing so quickly,” gauthey says. “We have shifted from using traditional, voice-centric networks to very high bandwidth, intensive applications, with smartphones, ipads and the increasing consumerisation of video-hungry applications.
“Mobile users in the developed world are running similar applications now on their mobile devices as they used to on fixed networks, and forecasts suggest global mobile traffic will increase by a factor of between 15 and 20 in the next five years.
“Connectivity is what people want and what countries need. “But there is a problem, as we are facing challenging times. it is paradoxical that, at
a time when heavy investment is needed, there is scarcity. scarcity in spectrum in the future, scarcity in capital expenditure, planning capacity of operators and environmental challenges as well.”
Can the European mobile networks learn to share?Mobile operators are not known for playing nicely with each other, but sharing networks and backhaul may be the only option for survival, writes Jennifer Scott
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mobilE nEtworking
there can be no doubt the backhaul of a mobile network comprises the operator’s biggest expense. the investment in the hardware and software needed to run the heav-ily used system – ensuring some of the highest levels of uptime and availability of any industry – costs big money, as does keeping everything updated after installation.
gauthey believes this is one of the main areas where mobile providers should be look-ing to share costs, without losing their identities.
“there are increasing capital investments needed and pressure on margins for opera-tors,” she says.
“today, the telecoms industry has to consider even more urgently new ways to go, new ways of investing and new business models.”
gauthey is encouraging the established european networks to look at the emerging markets which are just building up their infra-structure and realise the pressure of adding too many cooks to their technological broth.
“some governments want to foster network sharing, or even build wholesale networks, where operators will rent network capacity in models similar to mobile virtual network operators,” she says.
“this can ensure truly national infrastructure with good coverage, even of rural areas, rather than duplication of infrastructure when networks run parallel in densely populated areas but refuse to go to the rural ones without government subsidy.”
perhaps surprisingly, the operator perspective seems to align with a lot of what gauthey says. eduardo Duato, Cto of orange spain, says the challenging economic times and the particular way the european market has shaped itself over the years means things need to change.
“if there is something we have to do, it is to be cheaper and much more efficient,” he says. “projections for revenues in the european market do not look that good. We have lost nearly 30% of the market value, while in north America operators have increased their value by 25%.”
Duato explains the number of operators in europe dwarfed those of other regions and made it harder to make money.
“We have a situation which is structural – but a reality – and that is the fragmentation,” he says. “if you go to the market in north America there are not so many networks. in europe, we may think we have 40 main networks but the end result is that we have an average of 12 million subscribers per network.”
“Compare that with Asia-specific operators, which have double the size, or in north America where they have five times the size per network. these are volumes that are of the essence.”
Regulatory concerns over network sharingDuato says there is a pressing need for investment across europe which has been neglected in recent years, which left the once-dominant industry at the back of the pack.
“ten years ago western europe was at the forefront of the mobile network,” he says. “this is an example that glory is fleeting though and we have ended up being far, far behind with Lte and fixed connectivity.
“We have lost the tenacity and it is time to do something.”Duato supports the idea of sharing networks but his issue isn’t sitting nicely with other
operators; it is overcoming the hurdles put in place by regulators across europe.“once we have the network size from sharing and new network software, the hurdle
“once we have the network sIze from sharIng and new network software, the hurdle Is the regulator”eduardo duato, orange
CW Europe April 2013 11
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is the regulator,” he says. “there is the european regulator and the initial regulator, you have units within that and in separate countries.
“this holds up so much as it is really difficult to convince everyone that sharing is the best thing. We need more co-operation between the regulatory authorities. At times, we have got contradictory information from regulators and this makes it difficult for the operator. We spend a lot of time dealing with it.”
some authorities are concerned that allowing operators to share networks could erode competition, with countries ending up with just one overarching network and damaging choice for consumers.
Duato thinks this is the wrong focus though and sharing networks would just build a stronger technological base and provide a bet-ter service to the customer.
“We would like the regulators in europe to promote us to close the gaps we have with competitors rather than discussing how many operators we have to have,” he says. “it is much better we concentrate on helping the operators roll out. We will certainly benefit, as will both the customers and the industry.”
Progress towards network sharingnicolas ott, managing director of mobile, gov-ernment and enterprise for Arqiva, agrees there were issues but says network sharing is already being embraced by the industry and would be the golden ticket to a stronger mobile market.
“there is already radio access network shar-ing across the world and outsourcing is com-mon practice, with shared backhaul commonly used,” he says.
“the world is not perfect and these solutions are complex to operate. the regulators in some countries are not very positive about agreeing this, with some countries even nervous considering maybe there would end up being one unique brand for all the operators in one country.
“however, the world is definitely changing. the capital constraints are growing more important because investment needs are getting bigger. At the same time, the spectrum auctions are taking place all over the world and most have what they want, which man-ages to pacify the debate and allow us to have more constructive discussions.”
there are already examples of both companies outsourcing their networks or teaming up to share the costly matters of backhaul. three UK has signed a deal with huawei to manage its infrastructure, while the merger of orange and t-Mobile to form ee showed the cost savings achievable from merging network hardware.
however, despite the industry’s finest making the right noises about the proposals at MWC, there remains an air of distrust between the rivals. Mobile might seem on the cutting edge of technology when it comes to the gadgetry, but when it comes to the backroom and years of network capacity and reach being the name of the game, there is a clear struggle to change this mindset.
But, when companies from all sides are standing on stages discussing the topic and big names are getting behind the idea, it seems inevitable european mobile operators will need to learn to share, not just to compete in the modern mobile era, but to survive. n
Jennifer Scott is the networking editor of Computer Weekly
“there Is already radIo access network sharIng across the world and outsourcIng and shared Backhaul Is common practIce”nIcolas ott, arqIva
mobilE nEtworking
CW Europe April 2013 12
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The Cio has an evolving role and changes in technology and budgets – which are encouraging business departments to demand and use it without consulting the it department – mean the Cio’s role is shifting towards governance.
While chief financial officers (CFos) are exerting more influence on it ser-vices contracts as cost-cutting remains the main driver, chief marketing directors are beginning to exert greater influence on it budgets because software, such as customer relationship management (CrM), is becoming critical to customer retention.
then there is the rise of the digital expert, whose specialist knowledge may exceed that of the Cio. it leaders need to understand and manage the changes that come with digital technologies or face being replaced.
According to research from Forrester, CFos are becoming increasingly influential over it services spending in europe. over 40% of respondents in europe and north America believe CFos will gain more influence over the next year, compared with the 35% who said the same thing a year ago. some 44% say Cios would have more influence over it spending over the next 12 months, comprising a slight decrease on the previous year.
The rise of digital technologiesA recent report from local government it organisation, the society of it managers (socitm), says a lack of understanding of digital technologies and their use in business might lead to it leaders losing control.
“By remaining passive against a background of profound change in the operating environment, iCt managers risk being excluded from key decisions affecting themselves
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Will CIOs lose relevance – or just change their spots?The CIO is a role evolving across Europe and changes in technology and budgets mean the job is shifting towards governance. Karl Flinders reports
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map maker gets to grips
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and colleagues, especially those about service redesign and iCt provisioning to support revised, or wholly new, business processes,” says the socitm report.
Dave Aron, analyst at gartner, says Cios need to:n ensure they are not spending all their time attending to existing it assets and spend time
hunting for new digital opportunities and threats to the business. these will often come from social, mobile, cloud and big data analytics.
n ensure their activities are appropriately balanced between back office and internal opera-tions; and front office and customer experience.
n Make sure that there is a backpath from it strategy to business strategy, that new infor-mational/digital capabilities are considered in creating business strategy.
n When looking at it-enabled innovation, avoid getting trapped into thinking business pro-cess improvement is the only way. that way of thinking is often too incremental. Many new digital innovations are in products, customer experiences and business models, as opposed to business processes.
Marketing managers get a slice of the IT budgetCios may also be forced to share it budgets with marketing departments, according to consultancy KpMg. the company recently revealed chief marketing officers are control-ling more it budget as CrM becomes critical to customer retention. Mac scott, associate director of KpMg’s Cio advisory, says the convergence of marketing and it means market-ing professionals will gradually hold more influence on it budgets.
“simply because marketing and it teams depend on quality data, slick processes and stable software, chief marketing officers and Cios will increasingly need to form strate-gic partnerships,” says KpMg.
A senior employee at a large it services supplier confirms this trend, saying it is the marketing people who are engaging with technologies such as social media, mobile apps for customers and website work.
Carving out a role for the CIOnick Kirkland, Ceo at it director group Cio Connect, says there are three big trends changing the role of the Cio: “enterprise it groups are los-ing control of corporate it spending and are get-ting pigeonholed in legacy systems; the business units are bypassing it; and employees are buying their own devices,” he says.
“this leads us down the route of asking what the Cio is doing.”
Kirkland says the Cio of today should be going to the business offering them support. “the Cio should go to business colleagues asking, ‘how can i help?’ and not, ‘i want to control your it.” he says the Cio role will be diverse with no “one size fits all” as different kinds of business will require different types of Cio.
Yann L’huillier, global Cio at finance firm tradition, says Cios have a critical role and need to ensure they work closely with the business to prevent silos developing.
he says Cios must ensure they are not working in a vacuum to make sure there is proper governance for the it being used. “it is nothing without the business and Cios need to work with the business all the time,” he says.
technology such as cloud computing has led to departments bypassing it and the Cio has a more important role to ensure there is governance.
“it and computing is now more understandable and departments can bypass the Cio,” says L’huillier. “A lack of governance will lead to silos.” n
“It Is nothIng wIthout the BusIness” yann l’huIllIer,
tradItIon
Karl Flinders is the services editor of Computer Weekly
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map maker gets to grips
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risk managEmEnt
Half of companies have lost a portable computing device with important data on it that had security implications for more than 20% of those firms, a survey has
revealed. Further, 57% of employees believe bring your own device (BYoD) practices put their per-sonal data at risk as well, according to the research from data governance software company Varonis.
Despite these concerns, the study also revealed
The businesses losing devices and breaching valuable dataBYOD schemes may bring productivity benefits but data security and employee health issues are causing concern in European firms. Warwick Ashford reports
mobility brings many
benefits to the
business but companies
must mitigate the risk of data leaks
with ByoD policies
“connectIng to work around the clock Is the ‘new normal’”davId gIBson, varonIs
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Ksto
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86% of employees use their personal devices for work at all hours of the day, with 44% admitting to doing so during meals.
Additionally, 20% of respondents consider themselves “borderline workaholic”, 15% take their devices on holiday and 7% claim their work and home lives are one.
But the study also found a productivity drain associated with companies that allow BYoD practices. nearly a quarter of respondents say they spend more time than they care to admit doing things unrelated to work during work hours.
According to the findings, almost three-quarters of employees are now allowed to access company data from their personal devices.
this growing trend to work remotely is likely to have an impact on data leaks, as mobile devices continue to have major security implications, according to the report.
BYOD reduces security breachesthe study found BYoD policies did reduce secu-rity incidents, but only by 5%. the most popular method to secure mobile devices is password pro-tection (57%), followed by 35% who wipe devices remotely and 24% who use encryption.
“Being connected to work around the clock appears to be accepted as the ‘new normal’,” says David gibson, vice-president of strategy at Varonis.
“While organisations are capturing the many ben-efits of BYoD - and the willingness of the workforce to embrace this style of working – companies must protect themselves,” he says.
gibson says all firms that allow BYoD should:n Develop a BYoD policy that lets people know what is and is not allowed;n Make sure controls are appropriate to the risks – if the data is valuable, organisations
need to control where it resides and who has access to it, and be able to audit use and spot abuse;
n Monitor the effects of frequent interruptions and “always-on” habits to watch for signs of impaired productivity or health.
“only by limiting the potential damage – both to organisations and employees – can organ-isations make the most of a trend that will continue to leap forward, whether businesses allow it to or not,” he says. n
“organIsatIons may feel the BenefIts of Byod, But companIes need to protect themselves”davId gIBson, varonIs
hAckers stArt sending phishing emAils in pAirs
phishing emails are now being deployed in pairs to create the illusion of authenticity, says secu-rity awareness training firm phishme.
phishing emails try to trick the recipient into doing something risky by disguising malicious attachments or links in seemingly genuine content. In this new type of phishing email campaign, attackers typically send out a benign email that contains nothing harmful and does not ask for any information or response from the recipient. It could be a friendly introduction such as, “Hello, we met at XX Conference last week, I have a report I’d like you to review, I will send it over shortly,” says Aaron Higbee, co-founder and Cto of phishme.
“An hour or so later, the report arrives, just as promised,” Higbee says. this tactic is aimed at improving the odds that even a fairly security-savvy employee would be tricked into opening the malicious attachment that could launch an information-stealing trojan.
Warwick Ashford is the security editor of Computer Weekly.
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databasE softwarE
Two centuries is a long time to stay in business. ordnance survey has been creat-ing maps since before Wellington’s victory at Waterloo. While its legacy is one to be proud of, the nature of its market has changed, and so the company – like the iron Duke on that Belgian battlefield – has had to adapt its strategy.
While the company’s brand is known for its quality paper maps, the business demand now is for accurate, accessible, digital spatial data.
spatial data processing uses vast quantities of processing power. not only is this a big data challenge, it has similarly weighty implications for the economy. Mapping informa-tion is vital to government and businesses.
ordnance survey has all but completed a five-year it improvement programme to enhance its operations. that programme – with oracle as the main it partner – has already transformed those operations into an enterprise grid computing system that pulls 17 databases into one oracle spatial database management platform.
the platform supports all geospatial data types and models. the system combines open source Linux with oracle’s grid computing architecture, which makes it possible to co-ordinate large numbers of low-cost servers and corresponding storage so they oper-ate like one large computer.
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Ordnance Survey gets to grips with geospatial big dataThe map-maker pulled 17 databases into one Oracle geospatial database management platform and is now enjoying the benefits. Marc Hobbell reports
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Availability and scalabilityordnance survey’s upgrade of operations has been driven by the growing and enduring business challenge to deliver accurate, up-to-date geographic data to customers. And that demands a database that is continuously available to service the company’s products. Clustering technology in the ordnance survey grid architecture enables the company to ramp up the system at any time without costly hardware upgrades.
Long-term cost of ownership is also an important issue. As ordnance survey can never predict how many customers or orders it is going to have, it needs flexibility to accom-modate almost any volume of requests. Capacity is an ongoing concern, so scalability is always a crucial consideration.
so ordnance survey has created a single data-base with the flexibility to collect almost anything it wants for the design of new products. the database acts as a hub where ordnance survey can choose the components and items needed to create, launch and maintain new products. At the same time it streamlines the company’s main-tenance of data quality, which keeps customers happy and future-proofs the business.
Linked data technologyAs ordnance survey approaches the end of the transformation of its operations, it is preparing its data to exploit the myriad interconnections that can exist between physical entities in what has been described as the “internet of things”.
this web of interconnections between disparate objects and ideas is made possible through linked data technology.
Linked data assigns a unique tag – a three-fact, uniform resource identifier known as a triple – to each thing of interest. For example, population data can be linked to socio-economic statistics for a given town.
publication of this type of linked data has grown
business And suppliers collAborAte on big dAtA
Businesses are to collaborate to work out how to exploit the rapidly growing volume of data generated by social media, mobile devices and the internet of things.
Businesses and It suppliers – working in a forum established by independent technology consortium the open Group – aim to identify the best practices that will help business integrate data into real-time decision-making.
“We have all this data out there. We have to think how you bring this data in, manage it, and turn it into something that businesses can make decisions on in real time,” says Dave lounsbury, Cto of the open Group.
the forum aims to help organisations manage and share high volume, high velocity data, and to find practical ways of visualising it and analysing it.
“external forces like social networks, and networks of sensors have created an influx of data. We need to break it down and analyse it from a business perspective, and find out what ques-tions business people need to be asking,” says lounsbury.
“we have all thIs data out there. we have to thInk how you BrIng thIs data In, manage It, and turn It Into somethIng that BusIness can make decIsIons on In real tIme”dave lounsBury,
the open group
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into a Linked Data Web, currently estimated to include more than 30 billion triples, with some 20% of those having geographic content.
this capacity to identify everything and make it possible to interact with that identifying data, has immense potential. And the significant percentage of geographic data content means the opportunities for exploiting spatial information are substantial.
Data management challengesordnance survey’s story of a journey from a parti-tioned and complicated operation to a unified system is one that should resonate with many industries. energy companies, for example, are looking at embarking on a similar journey. they are at the start of a data revolution that will test severely their data management systems.
the smart metering programme will put advanced metering into every home and business in the UK.
it will also create commercial opportunities for energy suppliers. But it will generate data in quantities and at rates that energy companies have never before encountered. however, by upgrading their data management technology and skills, they can exploit this data to their advantage and to the benefit of their customers.
the first data management challenge for utilities will come with the logistics and plan-ning involved in installing the smart meters. the challenge will then continue with the tor-rents of information generated by smart metering, once it is fully established.
Conventionally, utilities analyse data in batches. smart metering will enable them to do so in real time and generate volumes of data unprecedented in the sector. With that will come a data handling and storage challenge. And there will be the major security risk that comes with any project that generates masses of data which are moved around.
Many of ordnance survey’s data management experi-ences are replicable in the power and gas industries today, as well as public sector organisations. in most instances, these organisations have not unlocked the value of the data that they hold – often in silos – such as customer contacts, street works, asset management and so on. geographic information and locational data can better equip them to meet these challenges.
the chief reward for ordnance survey from its data management practice review has been most aparent in the increase in value of consistent and accurate data arising from seamless and flexible access to all categories of data. Ultimately, the gain to the busi-ness lies in its greater capacity to meet customers’ needs and emerging demands. n
databasE softwarE
the chIef reward for ordnance
survey has Been the Increased
value of consIstent and accurate data
from seamless and flexIBle access to
all categorIes
Marc Hobbell is Ordnance Survey’s head of public sector, energy and infrastructure
