AT&T and IBM Alliance will mean a more Secure Cloud

By Jim Lundy

In a recent post, I asked if your Cloud Vendors were ready to support your enterprise. This week Tech Titans AT&T and IBM responded and announced a joint initiative that signals a response to the growing global cyber security threat. I’ve written about Advanced Persistent Threats (APTs) and Cyber espionage in the past and one of the conclusions regarding APTs is that one of few the ways for an enterprise to protect itself is to have a separate physical network for certain critical systems.  AT&T and IBM, by partnering to offer a Virtual Private Network and Cloud Service, don’t go quite that far, but overall, this is a step in the right direction to start to protect data and information and systems from cyber attacks and cyber-theft.

Cyber Security attacks by governments are becoming more of a commonplace thing these days. We still don’t know the full extent of how many and how often they are occurring, but they are happening much more frequently. The US Federal Government warned of escalating attacks just this week, as reported in the Wall Street Journal.

These attacks are no laughing matter and they are so serious that very few people even talk about them. The attacks are targeting Technology firms, Banks, Governments, Power Companies, and any valuable information that companies use to run their businesses.  While many will argue that even VPNs can be defeated (and they can), AT&T and IBM did not disclose all of the tools they will be leveraging to make this Service secure.

We expect to see more alliances between technology providers to respond to the growing threats from Cyber Attacks. This also isn’t just a Cloud issue. It is relatively easy for a foreign entity to gain entry to your network if it is attached to the internet in any way.

Take a step back from the daily operational issues and look at your most critical information. Where is it stored? How are you protecting it? Do computers attached to the internet have access to that information? Start thinking about a private network that isn’t attached to the internet. The military has them and so do an increasing number of governments and enterprises.