Category: Feature
Hilti Studies Façade Fires in Real Life Condition in Partnership with UL
Brij Bhushan Singh Fire Protection Codes & Approvals Consultant, Hilti With increasing urbanization and changing architectural trends, innumerable buildings and skyscrapers with glass facades are adding to our city skylines, and hence it becomes imperative to understand the challenges posed by such infrastructure. To be aware of the hazards associated with façade fires, Hilti has partnered with UL LLC to study the spread of fire in real life conditions at Indian Institute of Technology, Gandhinagar. In India, as per the National Building Code 2016 under clause 3.4.10.2 (b) – “All gaps between floor slabs and façade assembly shall be sealed at all levels by approved fire-resistant sealant material of equal fire rating as that of the floor slab to prevent fire and smoke propagation from one floor to another.” One of the key questions to be asked here is what kind of test should be performed to evaluate the performance of such firestop system that ensures that it would work in Indian scenario as well. To address this question, UL and IIT Gandhinagar built a set up to explore through a series of planned tests to identify what works and what does not. The test set up The test setup consisted of a three storey building constructed of steel frame structure, and total three fire compartments were made at each floor. The deck slab of each floor was made as a concrete steel deck. All the steel columns in the test set up were protected by the traditional practice of protecting the steel – i.e., with masonry cover. Towards the fire load, most of the contents were made of realistic furnishings (sofa, bed, carpets, chairs etc). Later some fuel was added to match the occupancy calorific value close to that for the residential and commercial occupancies recommended as per NBC. This was done by adding a wooden crib. Test sequence For the firestop evaluations, UL and IIT, Gandhinagar carried out multiple research tests in the following sequence. Test A: With non-rated firestop – Internal spread Firestop was provided in the form of 12mm thick plywood planks. Initial ventilation was provided at the ground floor (GF) by opening the external door. Ventilation factor was increases as fire caused façade material to fail. Spandrel was purposefully made of concrete to force the fire to go from inside only and have full impact on firestop installed. Test A: Conclusion In the case of non-approved usage of firestop like wooden plate at the edge of the slab, the fire reached the first floor from the ground floor in 6 mins and finally reached the top floor of the building in 17 mins. Hence the usage of such unapproved systems like (wooden plates, steel plate etc.) will be a high threat to the life safety of occupants of the building. Test B: With tested and approved Hilti firestop – Internal spread UL approved firestop from Hilti was installed. Initial ventilation was provided at GF by opening the door. Ventilation factor was increased as fire caused façade material to fail. Spandrel was purposefully made by concrete to force the fire to go from inside only and have full impact on firestop installed. Test A & Test B: Conclusion I n the case of usage of approved system like ASTM E2307 tested systems, the firestop systems held its place and contained the fire in the ground floor. It did also not let the heat spread to the upper floors more than 80˚C for the entire duration of the test in such a real life building test scenario. The provisions of ASTM E2307 are intended to restrict the interior vertical passage of flame and hot gases from one floor to another. Its use is recommended by many building codes to evaluate the fire resistance rating of the perimeter fire barriers. As per International Building Code 2015, Clause 715.4: “Exterior curtain wall/ floor intersections – where fire resistance rated floor or floor/ ceiling assemblies are required – voids created at the intersection of the exterior curtain wall assemblies and such floor assemblies shall be sealed with an approved system to prevent the interior spread of fire. Such systems shall be securely installed and tested in accordance with ASTM E2307 to provide F rating for the time period not less than the fire resistance rating of the floor assembly.” ASTM E2307 test Test sequence Cycling test: In ASTM test, before subjecting the firestop sample for fire tests, the test method requires joint systems with movement capabilities to be cycled through the intended range of movement prior to the fire test. The movement cycling is intended to demonstrate the compatibility between the individual components of the joint system and the supporting construction. Fire test: Throughout the fire test observations are made about the fire and hot gases on the unexposed side of the perimeter fire barrier or any adjacent supporting construction. Conclusion We believe such exploratory study along with UL LLC’s and under IIT Gandhinagar’s supervision will be able to guide the industry to use only tested systems which perform and save lives such as movement capable fire rated perimeter firestop systems tested per ASTM E 2307 standard. Avoiding or compromising the edge of the slab opening with no systems or untested system means compromising with the safety of people. Perimeter fire barriers are one of the systems required by the building codes and it’s an effective fire and smoke resistance compartmentation methodology. The test at IIT from Hilti and UL is only an effort to drive scientifically driven and appropriately tested systems in India to ensure safety at the highest level.
Banks and Changing Security Technology
ATM skimming is widespread in the US and is spreading across the world. This technique employs a fake device placed over the ATM keyboard which records the bank account information and the PIN number when a debit card is inserted. This technique is also used at PoS venues, gas/ petrol pump stations and alike. These skimming devices have different physical appearances to match the PoS equipment but the underlying technique is the same. The stolen customer bank information is used to make fake cards which are used to commit fraud and empty customers’ bank accounts. Hundreds of these incidents are being reported per month and there is no easy way of catching the culprits. A camera placed in the vicinity, with skimming detection software, can video tape the incident and generate alerts to the proper authorities. Earlier, the magnetic tape was used within the card which is now being eliminated and is replaced by a chip. This has though drastically reduced the number of fraud cases, but in the case of skimming even the chip card is not so useful. Possibilities All these scenarios can be dealt in a blow by implementing actionable video intelligence software. Moreover, if every transaction is trapped with a photo of the person plus a small video clip and relayed back to the bank monitoring system, it can alert the bank authorities immediately. In case the bank uses facial recognition, it introduces another level of barrier to committing a fraud by denying the person access to the account as well as locking the door of the ATM booth. There are several possibilities of using proper software that can most likely mitigate/ eliminate fraud across the banking system. Sometimes an USB stick with malware can be inserted into a computer to infect and create havoc in the system. Skimming is similar because the only point of entry into the secure banking network is the ATM or PoS entity. Banks have their entire network secured, no external access is allowed, plus all point to point communication is encrypted using a 512 bit key AES algorithm. So, the criminals have figured out a weakness in the banking system armor in the form of ATM or PoS, which we believe can be solved by using software. Challenge Given all these, video surveillance in traditional sense needs to be and is going through a fundamental transformation with the ongoing advancements in technologies, and it is inevitable. However, these technological advancements are typically resisted by large institutions such as even banks because of the large capital expenditure involved in the transitioning of these traditional systems to modern, scalable and upgradeable future proof ones. Very often this short sighted view comes at a long term cost where both bank customers and the banking industry suffer. The amount of capital lost by the banks and the forfeited customer trust in the banks cannot be easily measured and restored. Technology trends in video surveillance industry Analog cameras are being replaced by the digital/ IP/ network ones to compete the demand of the day. Unlike a decade ago when each camera had its own proprietary interface, the interface is now standardized that has lifted the monopoly allowing several players to enter the market. NVRs are being replaced by powerful servers which are capable of scaling both by compute as well as storage. This shift was resisted just a decade ago when IT infrastructure personnel resisted moving infrastructure to the cloud. Almost all fortune 500 companies have either moved their IT infrastructure to the cloud or are in the process of doing so today. The fastest and most reliable growth in the video surveillance industry is occurring in the area of video software. Video analytics in relation to simple motion detection, line crossing, unattended object and so on, which are performed by almost all vendors, is quickly becoming a technology of the past. The advancement in hardware technology now allows manifold increase in software performance without impacting the incoming video stream. In the past, software algorithm implementation was limited by the available hardware thereby impacting the incoming video stream where frame loss and jitter would compromise the surveillance system. Customers today are demanding sophisticated features and requirements that were not seen in the past. Increase in the network speeds over the past decade has been exponential, and that in itself lends to several new and exciting possibilities. For example, in a critical video application, more than one compute node could be processing the same video stream and looking for information that a single node possibly cannot perform. Where do all these lead us to – this question needs to be answered. Below are some of the technology advancements and how the banking industry can benefit from them: Actionable video intelligence: Actionable video intelligence is the key phrase that will transform all video applications across all industries. Facial recognition: This technology is applicable inside the ATM booth as well as when a customer enters the bank premises. It triggers the need for an overall banking application that ties together several different aspects of banking operations. Trapping customer transactions at ATM booth: Transmit customer photo to backend bank database every time an ATM transaction occurs. This will help enabling fraud detection possibilities if several such transactions occur in quick succession at different ATM booths. Scamming: Software that detects scamming inside the ATM booth generates an alarm and locks the entry/ exit ATM booth door. Non-booth ATM scenarios: Implement ‘loitering’ and ‘crowd detection’ video analytics algorithms within the vicinity of public ATMs and generate alarms, when necessary. Monitor bank personnel performance and analytics based on customer queue length: This can be implemented as ‘actionable video intelligence’ to provide feedback to bank management. This is a machine learning and artificial intelligence application that gives management feedback that allows a better satisfiable customer experience by observing real time occurring processes. This will eventually lead to a ‘SoP’ (standard operating procedure) which holds all personnel accountable. Monitor inside and outside bank…
Secutech India and Fire & Safety India
India has been one of the fastest growing markets for security and fire protection products in the past five years. Every industry vertical, be it oil & gas, pharmaceuticals, transport, construction, hotels, critical infrastructure, hospitals, retail and banking, and even government sectors are concerned about their premises as well as their personnel safety and security. Secutech and Fire & Safety India 2019, the twin exhibitions highlight solutions for these concerns and apprise the industry on new market developments along with a showcase of innovative products and services available for commercial usage today. “The combination of Secutech India and Fire & Safety India offers a unique platform for the society and industrial community to understand and realign to the fundamental pre-requisites of security, and also to identify trending technologies from international and regional manufacturers, distributors and technology integrators. Leading product manufacturers, system integrators, OEMs and sole dealerships will demonstrate their latest products and services from the security, safety and fire protection domains to end-users from different industry verticals and government organizations at the exhibition“ Manish Gandhi Exhibition Director, Secutech India A total of 30000 visitors, delegates and high profile buyers are expected to come together during the event at Bombay Exhibition Centre, Mumbai to explore new business opportunities, identify new technologies, and explore latest security and fire safety applications. As the most important security and fire safety event in India, Secutech and Fire & Safety India 2019 is an ideal platform that helps advance industry know-how in this fast growing market. The exhibition’s supporting program and allied events specifically boost networking activities between exhibitors and industry end users. Allied events Consultant consortium This is a networking activity specialized for OEMs, product manufacturers and technology developers to unveil and showcase their products and services to a group of consultants comprising MEP, HVAC, façade and architectural consultants, and contractors. System integrators forum This is an interactive activity focusing on OEMs, product manufacturers and technology developers to interact with a hand-picked group of system integrators, value added manufacturers and dealers. Connect The Connect program is a holistic business matchmaking program for the security, fire, safety and automation industry to encourage business interactions. It is a comprehensive sourcing platform which is ideal for suppliers and buyers to network and explore new products. Shield Awards This is India’s first and most prestigious awards for the security and fire safety industry. It is an evening dedicated to recognize the efforts and acknowledge excellence of eminent individuals/ organizations from the security, fire and safety industry. Conclave This is the industry’s most technical knowledge platform for leaders, manufacturers and end users of both security and fire safety domains. The speakers and the panellists comprise the top industry trend-setters from India presenting technological breakthroughs and applications. Fire safety volunteer training A comprehensive theoretical and practical course for those who take up the responsibility for tackling small fires and assisting with staff evacuation, and for those who help formulate company fire procedures. It is a initiative by Maharashtra Fire Services and Fire & Safety India. SMA home pavilion It is a display pavilion at Secutech India showcasing the future of smart home automation technologies in India, and exhibiting innovations that are revolutionizing assisted living in the country. The pavilion will exhibit designed smart home products related to security and building automation.
Western Digital Rewards Isha Enterprises for Excellent Performance in Purple Achievers Programme
Western Digital has rewarded one of its alliance partners, Isha Enterprises for achieving the highest position in the WD Purple achievers promotion program for the period from 1 October to 30 December 2018. Isha Enterprises is a supplier and system integration company based at Pune dealing in various security and fire products. Rahul Mudha, the owner of Isha Enterprises, was handed over a Hyundai Santro car as the reward under this program by Anand Pandit, Country Manager – IT Channel, Western Digital India. The Purple Achievers promo was an incentive based program in which the partners were assigned targets and there were rewards applicable on achievement. “Western Digital has always been one of our key partners for CCTV storage drive. WD Purple is one of our top selling products. We always look forward to these kinds of promotions from the company. We are happy that we won this quarterly promotion,” said Rahul Mudha. “We always believe in motivating and encouraging our channel partners through these kind of promos and reward them for the loyalty they extend to our company. Isha Enterprises has always been one of our prestigious partners and we look forward to a great association with them. We congratulate them for winning this promo,” said Jaganathan Chelliah, Director – Marketing, Western Digital India.
Skybox threadkit, Formbook Exploit Old Microsoft Vulnerability Shows an Uptick
E-mail messages are frequently sent over untrusted networks that are outside the organization’s security boundary. When these messages lack any appropriate security safeguards, they can be read, copied, and modified at any point. In India alone email marketing has been extensively utilized in the media, IT and telecom, retail/ e-commerce, travel and leisure, and the BFSI industries as the primary source of marketing for business expansion purposes and customer retention and satisfaction. As per the study, in 2016, the worldwide market for email marketing stood at US$4.51 billion. Expanding at a healthy CAGR of 19.60% between 2017 and 2025, this market is likely to touch US$22.16 billion by the end of 2025. E-mail security relies on principles of good planning and management that provide for the security of both the e-mail system and the IT infrastructure. If there is no proper security system the attackers can exploit the email to gain control over organization and access confidential information. According to a research, a file-hosting service registered within the last week is being used to spread information and stealing malware in another FormBook campaign, currently attacking retail and hospitality businesses both within and outside of the US. Recently, in a blog researchers wrote, “As with many information stealing and credential harvesting malware, FormBook’s infection chain starts with a phishing E-mail containing a malicious attachment, which is generally an office document or a PDF file.” The vulnerability was first discovered and patched by Microsoft in July 2017 now is being exploited again by ThreadKit (an exploit kit popular among low-skilled attackers) via the Formbook malware (a data stealer and form grabber). This serves as a timely reminder about how important it is to install update patches when they’re released. The origins of the vulnerability can be found all the way back in July 2017 when Microsoft published CVE-2017- 8570, a high-severity code execution vulnerability in Office. Although Microsoft released a patch the same month, the vulnerability was still exploited in the wild. The first reported exploit came one month later, with a subsequent instance from ThreadKit following in March 2018. And now a third exploit has been spotted, one and a half years after the vulnerability was first published. How does the exploit by formbook work? The exploit works by emailing a Word document to the user. The email address and the subject appear to be authentic – they contain details that look real and often mimic the addresses and the verbiage of genuine companies. This social engineering method helps establish trust with the user, leaving them with few reservations about opening the attached file. If the user is fooled by the email and then clicks the attachment, the RTF file opens and closes almost immediately. While this looks like Word has simply collapsed, what’s actually happening is that it’s downloading and extracting a ZIP file. Another fake Word document, containing the source code for a phishing HTML page and the malware payload, is stashed within this ZIP file. The user is unaware that this is happening. All they see is the original Word document appearing on their screen. For all intents and purposes, they believe that Word crashed and then rebooted. They have little idea that they’re now harbouring a malicious stowaway that’s ingesting their confidential data. How to protect yourself against the formbook malware? Thankfully, the effects of this exploit, and others like it, can be avoided by installing patches when they’re released. But for many operations teams, a patch from summer 2017 – for a non-critical vulnerability – doesn’t just jump to the front of the to-do list. In organizations where threat intelligence isn’t regularly incorporated in patch prioritization, this vulnerability will likely remain unpatched. Skybox first alerted customers to the exploitability of the vulnerability in August 2017, raising the remediation priority to ‘urgent,’ and further, how threat-centric vulnerability management approach prioritizes vulnerabilities by exploitability and exposure in the e-book.
Bosch Limited Security Division Contributes the most in Business Beyond Mobility
Bosch Limited, a leading supplier of technology and services, posted total revenue from operations of INR 3,096 crores in Quarter 3 of FY 2018-19, registering 0.8 percent increase over the same period of the previous year on a comparable basis. The Profit before Tax (PBT) stood at INR 490 crores, registering a growth of 15.8 percent over the same period of previous year on account of improved operational efficiency, favorable product mix and higher investment income which was partially offset by negative exchange rate on material cost. The Net Profit after Tax (PAT) stood at INR 335 crores, an increase of 19.3 percent over the same period of previous year. For the period from April to December, 2018, Bosch Limited posted a total revenue from operations of INR 9,509 crores, an increase of 11.4 percent over the same period of previous year. PBT stood at INR 1,780 crores and PAT stood at INR 1,186 crores, an increase of 26.6 percent over same period previous year. “The result of this quarter has to be viewed in the context of particularly weak market conditions in the overall automotive sector. Bosch Limited has always been committed to deliver best-in-class automotive solutions. We are helping our customers to meet the challenge of manufacturing only vehicles compliant with BS VI emission standards from April 2020 as per the ruling of the Supreme Court. Bosch has recently also showcased its business beyond mobility offerings that are fast embracing digital platforms and IoT Services. Having said that, the focus on strategic topics and operational efficiencies will continue,” said Soumitra Bhattacharya, Managing Director, Bosch Limited. Snapshot of business divisions’ performance in Quarter 3 Bosch Limited’s Mobility Solutions turnover marginally decreased by 0.6 percent in Quarter 3 of FY 2018- 19. Mobility division exports have increased by 6.5 percent and it is offset by lower domestic mobility sales of 1.1 percent. Within the mobility solutions business, the Powertrain solutions division declined by 2.7 percent mainly due to weak automotive market and Automotive Aftermarket division grew by 5.8 percent. Bosch’s business beyond Mobility divisions registered a growth of 6.9 percent. The growth in this segment is mainly driven by security systems which grew by 16.9 percent and solar energy division which also showed a double digit growth, partly offset by reduction in thermal technology division. For the period from April to December, 2018, total turnover showed a growth of 11.9 percent. Sales of the mobility solutions sector increased by 10.5 percent on the buoyant automotive market during first half of 2018-19 whereas business beyond mobility solutions witnessed a strong double-digit growth of 20.5 percent. Pursuant to the approval of the Shareholders for buyback of equity shares of the Company, the letter of offer for buyback of up to 10,27,100 equity shares of the face value of Rs. 10 each of the Company on a proportionate basis by way of a tender offer through the Stock Exchange mechanism for cash at a price of Rs. 21,000 per equity share for an aggregate amount of up to Rs. 2,156 crores was sent to the eligible shareholders. The buyback period opened on February 06, 2019 and shall close on February 20, 2019.
Ozone Makes Strategic Investment in TrulySafe
Ozone Enterprise Group, an Everstone Capital funded company forayed into the fast growing security and surveillance industry in India last year by acquiring Wallcam, a company engaged in the manufacturing and sale of security and surveillance equipment including CCTV solutions. The security, surveillance and IoT industry are very dynamic, and are going through a rapid technology transformation. Both the industries are inter-connected in many ways, CCTV solution is just another connected device in the overall IoT mesh. The differentiating factor for any player in the industry will be the solution or the software. Taking this thought process forward, we have been actively exploring options for either acquiring or investing in an IT development company, and we finally narrowed down on TrulySafe. Going by the credentials of TrulySafe, and the work they have done in the domain, we are excited about this investment, and we are all geared up to make the most of the market opportunity. We will soon be seen as one of the prominent players in the market – Alok Aggarwal Founder & Managing Director, Ozone Enterprise Group Continuing with its plans to provide high-tech security and surveillance and IoT solutions to its customers, the group made a strategic investment in ‘TrulySafe,’ a company engaged in providing security solutions including software and hardware to leading OEMs in Europe and USA. Owing to its expertise in the field of security and surveillance, R&D and IT team, TrulySafe has successfully pioneered many industry first solutions. Leveraging on this strategic investment in TrulySafe, Ozone intents to : Build a robust CCTV platform which will be 100% based in India and curb the security threat of our data going to other countries that we keep hearing about. Provide new, innovative, predictive, preventive and user friendly interface backed with state-of-the-art video analytics engine to our users making safety and security a walk of life. Integrate security and IoT (Internet of Things) on a single platform and offer one-stop-shop solution to the users including smart homes, smart offices, smart buildings, smart schools, smart cities etc. Sumanyu Vashistha, CEO & Founder, TrulySafe commented, “Electronic security industry is majorly driven by one or two technology providers globally and we saw this as a potential opportunity to build end-to-end platforms ourselves four years back. Based on the genesis of IoT we have developed a robust product ecosystem of software, video analytics, cloud services and hardware which not only provide advance security solutions and integration capability to our systems installers partners but gives air tight security to the user who today is compromising with an ordinary CCTV camera recording. We are extremely thrilled with the investment we have got from Ozone, it will help us grow our R&D and sales operations. We see this as a strategic partnership as Ozone brings expertise to setup global operations efficiently and achieve potential growth.” Ozone is a young dynamic organisation having a diversified presence in architectural hardware, safes and vaults, locks, fire & safety doors and urban furniture. The brand’s solution centric approach has enabled them to grow from a start-up to becoming India’s most popular architectural hardware solution provider, which has been able to prove its worth in international markets. The company has a global presence across 15 countries, 4 R&D centres in Israel, Korea, China & India and 4 state-of-theart factories in India & China. Ozone offers internationally certified products and solutions through its product portfolio of more than 3000 SKUs across various product categories. Ozone today ranks amongst the top 3 players in India in architectural hardware, and amongst the leading players in safes and vaults and fire and safety doors. Ozone has strong presence internationally with offices in India, Canada, Australia, Dubai and distributor’s network in Poland & Saudi Arabia.
Former IBM Security Executive Joins Cyberbit
Cyberbit Ltd., the market leading provider of cyber-range training and simulation platforms, and of integrated detection and response products across IT and OT Networks has appointed Rakesh Kharwal as the Managing Director, India/ South Asia and ASEAN. Mr. Kharwal, the former Country Manager for IBM Security Software, India/ South Asia, will take the helm of Cyberbit’s rapidly expanding operations in the region. Cyberbit has proven technology that perfectly addresses several leading cybersecurity issues like bridging the cyber skill gap through the industry leading simulated learning platforms, monitoring threats across both IT & OT networks, or helping organizations improve their detection and response with better security orchestration and automation. This product/ market fit and the stellar reputation of Cyberbit represent great potential for fast growth. – Rakesh Kharwal Managing Director, India/ South Asia and ASEAN at Cyberbit Rakesh has a track record spanning over 25 years in the IT industry with over 15 years in the cybersecurity space with stints at Microsoft, McAfee, and most recently at IBM Security Software where he was instrumental in helping governments and corporates improve their cyber security posture with better orchestration and automation of their security detection and response capabilities. Mr. Kharwal will take the reigns of already established sales, marketing and support teams serving customers across India and Southeast Asia. “We extend a warm welcome to Rakesh and are excited to have such an excellent leader to drive strategic engagements to improve the cyber security posture of all sectors in this important region,” said Adi Dar, CEO, Cyberbit, “India is a key focus market for Cyberbit and our commitment to the Indian market motivated the decision to establish APAC headquarters in Delhi-NCR.” India is deeply affected by the huge global cyber skill shortage and predicted to have a shortfall of 1M skilled cybersecurity professionals by 2025, according to a DSCI report. As the global leader in simulated cyber learning platforms, Cyberbit will contribute to the ‘Skill India’ campaign by aiding enterprises in training thousands of cybersecurity professionals.
Fortinet Secures the Path to 5G With Security Architecture and Solutions
Fortinet has recently announced extensive capabilities for securing the path to 5G with its expansive breadth and depth of solutions for mobile core networks and cloud infrastructures including its virtual SPU technology and advanced security and high-performance systems. With the promise for faster connection speeds, massive connectivity scale, and new revenue opportunities, 5G will have a profound impact on mobility and digital transformation. Fortinet is uniquely positioned to offer its customers advanced security and high-performance systems that deliver carrier class functionality, rapid scalability, deep visibility, and granular control to secure mobile core, edge clouds and IoT infrastructures. 5G brings both opportunity and risk The advent of 5G will extend a digital connection to almost every facet of lives. In many of the somewhat futuristic sounding new use cases such as autonomous vehicles, AR/ VR immersive experiences, smart cities, ultralow latency, bandwidth and speed, delivery has been the missing puzzle piece. For years now, the mobile interconnection of all these things seemed inevitable, yet the massive density of connections, all with adequate speed, latency and related services, had so far remained unachievable in all but limited proof-of-concept testing. “With 5G, mobile infrastructure’s end-to-end innovation will continue to transform into a platform and catalyst for value creation and service innovation. Throughout this transformation, Fortinet’s proven security architecture and solutions provide advanced security for multiple LTE, LTE-A, and 5G use cases to help secure mobile infrastructures from radio access network (RAN) to the telco cloud, and offers customers carrier-grade performance and capacity with cloud-grade scalability, visibility and control” – Rajesh Maurya Regional Vice President, India & SAARC, Fortinet With 5G and the impending orders-of-magnitude advances in bandwidth, connection and use case possibilities, there is opportunity for end-to-end innovation as the mobile infrastructure is transformed into a platform and a catalyst for value creation and service innovation. More than ever, mobile network providers will become secure business enablers. For example, service providers will have new revenue generating opportunities in IoT such as manufacturing automation, industrial telemetry, emergency response systems, robotic surgery, 4K UHD video streaming, and more. However, these innovations will also bring a corresponding increase in the potential havoc wrought by denial of service, advanced threats and other forms of cyberattack on the core network infrastructure itself. Security is an imperative to protect and operate evolving 4G and new 5G mobile networks. These new service use cases need capabilities beyond a stateful firewall, with capacity and reliability to meet service level agreement (SLA) goals for uptime and quality of experience. Fortinet 5G breadth and depth capabilities Fortinet offers strategic security solutions specifically designed to address the unique challenges facing operators as they migrate their core networks to deliver 4.5G and 5G mobile services. It offers the ability to build a security framework that helps optimize cost of launching and operating new services and revenue opportunities, mitigate advanced threats, and achieve service level goals. Service providers can realize this by utilizing Fortinet advanced security and high-performance systems that also give mobile carriers improved visibility through comprehensive and correlated analytics, the ability to thwart complex external and internal security threats impacting network infrastructure and services at massive scale. The Fortinet security platform offers 5G service providers: Advanced protection for mobile core network and telco cloud: Powered by Fortinet’s virtual SPU technology, FortiGate virtual network functions (VNFs) deliver significant increase in application security performance through innovative security processing optimizations and the latest packet processing acceleration technologies. The VNFs also have a small footprint, boot within seconds, and require less storage, enabling service providers to protect their virtual networks and cloud platform cost effectively. Further, the 5G-ready FortiGate 7000 next-generation firewall series with SPU acceleration provides carrier security features and functions with industry-leading SSL inspection and application security performance for total inline protection. Together, these Fortinet solutions deliver industry’s best scale and capacity to protect 5G infrastructures from sophisticated application layer attacks and massive volumes of DoS attacks originating from outside or inside the mobile core or telco network. Agility with security: Fortinet offers broad ecosystem integrations with leading NFV and SDN vendors for virtual infrastructure. To ensure end-to-end security with innovative 5G services such as network slicing and multi-access edge computing (MEC), VNFs must be delivered dynamically, instantiated quickly and available wherever needed on the network. For efficient and agile deployment and utilization of these security resources, Fortinet delivers integrations with NFV platform providers like Lenovo, NFV orchestration (MANO) systems from Amdocs, Ericsson, Ciena, UBiqube, NoviFlow, and SDN controllers like VMware NSX, Nokia Nuage, and Cisco ACI, and NoviFlow. Deep visibility and control for IoT services on edge clouds: Massive scale IoT devices are generally based on lightweight operating systems, which offer minimal security features, therefore they are vulnerable to hijacking and botnet attacks. To remove business risks, the data from these endpoints and the devices themselves require complete protection. Further, service providers offering IoT services via a cloud platform need to ensure multi-tenant isolation, VM and/ or container security and web application protection. Fortinet FortiGate NGFW VNF and FortiWeb WAF VNF protect the edge cloud platform. FortiSIEM provides complete visibility through correlated security analytics and complete visibility to track IoT devices while FortiGate has the ability to learn and profile all connected devices, and apply granular control on different classes of IoT.
2019 Data Privacy Benchmark Study
Organizations worldwide that invested in maturing their data privacy practices are now realizing tangible business benefits from these investments, according to Cisco’s 2019 Data Privacy Benchmark Study. The Study validates the link between good privacy practice and business benefits as respondents report shorter sales delays as well as fewer and less costly data breaches. The European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation, which focused on increasing protection for EU residents’ privacy and personal data, became enforceable in May 2018. Organizations worldwide have been working steadily towards getting ready for GDPR. Within Cisco’s 2019 Data Privacy Benchmark Study, 59 percent of organizations reported meeting all or most requirements, 29 percent expect to do so within a year, and 9 percent will take more than a year. “This past year, privacy and data protection importance increased dramatically. Data is the new currency, and as the market shifts, we see organizations realizing real business benefits from their investments in protecting their data,” said Michelle Dennedy, Chief Privacy Officer, Cisco, “At Cisco, we absolutely believe in both protecting our customers and driving business success by maximizing the value of data and minimizing risk.” Customers are increasingly concerned that the products and services they deploy provide appropriate privacy protections. Those organizations that invested in data privacy to meet GDPR experienced shorter delays due to privacy concerns in selling to existing customers – 3.4 weeks vs. 5.4 weeks for the least GDPR ready organizations. Overall the average sales delay was 3.9 weeks in selling to existing customers, down from 7.8 weeks reported a year ago. GDPR-ready organizations cited a lower incidence of data breaches, fewer records impacted in security incidents, and shorter system downtimes. They also were much less likely to have a significant financial loss from a data breach. Beyond this, 75 percent of respondents cited that they are realizing multiple broader benefits from their privacy investments, which include greater agility and innovation resulting from having appropriate data controls, gaining competitive advantage, and improved operational efficiency from having data organized and catalogued. More than 3,200 global security and privacy professionals in 18 countries across major industries responded to the Cisco survey about their organizations’ privacy practices. Key findings include: 87 percent of companies are experiencing delays in their sales cycle due to customers’ or prospects’ privacy concerns, up from 66 percent last year. This is likely due to the increased privacy awareness brought on by GDPR and the frequent data breaches in the news. Sales delays by country varied from 2.2 to 5.5 weeks, with Italy, Turkey and Russia at the lower end of the range, and Spain, Brazil and Canada at the higher end. Longer sales delays can be attributed to areas where privacy requirements are high or in transition. Delayed sales can cause revenue shortfalls related to compensation, funding, and investor relations. Delayed sales also can become lost sales if a potential customer buys from a competitor or decides not to buy at all. Top reasons cited for sales delays included investigating customer requests for privacy needs, translating privacy information into customer languages, educating customers about an organization’s privacy practices, or redesigning products to meet customer privacy needs. By country, GDPR-readiness varied from 42 percent to 75 percent. Spain, Italy, UK and France were at the top of the range, while China, Japan and Australia were on the lower end. Only 37 percent of GDPR-ready companies experienced a data breach costing more than $500,000, compared with 64 percent of the least GDPR-ready companies.