Understanding the End of Support

On October 10th, 2023, Microsoft will officially end support for Windows Server 2012 and Windows Server 2012 R2. The operating systems will no longer receive security updates, bug fixes, or technical assistance from Microsoft. Even though the software will continue to function, your business and stakeholders should be planning for a migration. Using an unsupported operating system poses significant risks to the organization and can cripple your business if exposed.

Security Vulnerabilities

Are you the type of technology user that keeps all your various software and applications up to date? Or do you have a red bubble on your app store indicating you have 36 apps in need of an update? The most pressing concern when using an unsupported operating system is the increased risk of security vulnerabilities. Security updates are regularly released for various types of technology stacks to address vulnerabilities.

Without regular security updates, organizations are more susceptible to cyber-attacks, malware infections, and data breaches. Hackers often narrow in on unsupported systems since they know they will not receive the necessary patches to fix exposed vulnerabilities. It’s estimated that unpatched vulnerabilities are responsible for 60% of all data breaches. A highly publicized example was the WannaCry attack that targeted vulnerabilities in older Windows systems.

Compliance, Regulatory, and Insurance Requirements

Many industries have strict compliance and regulatory requirements that businesses must adhere to. Using an unsupported operating system can jeopardize compliance efforts and make it difficult to meet industry standards. Organizations should evaluate their specific compliance needs and consider upgrading to a supported operating system to maintain regulatory compliance.

Additionally, many cyber insurance policies include exclusions for coverage for security incidents arising due to unsupported or unpatched software. If your organization faces a cybersecurity incident due to exploitation of a vulnerability in Windows Server 2012, your claim may be denied.

Curious to learn more on the topic of cyber insurance? Tangent over to one of our latest webinars and learn more about insuring your protection.

Lack of Technical Support

The end of support also means the end of technical assistance from Microsoft. If businesses encounter any issues or need help troubleshooting problems, they will no longer have access to official Microsoft support channels. This lack of technical support can lead to increased downtime and potential disruptions to business operations.

What to Do Next

If your organization is running Windows Server 2012 or Windows Server 2012 R2, now is the time to start making a plan to ensure your organization remains secure.

Ideal scenarios include:

Migrating to Azure

In addition to the overall benefits of migrating to the cloud, Microsoft is offering three years of free extended security updates when migrating your Windows Server 2012 workloads to Azure.

Upgrading Your Server

If your organization is not ready to move to the cloud, upgrading your server to Windows Server 2019 is another way to ensure you receive the latest release for security, performance, and innovation.

The end of support for Windows Server 2012 poses significant risks for businesses. Upgrading to newer, support infrastructure is crucial to maintain security, comply with industry regulations, and benefit from improved performance and reliability. By working with an MSP, organizations can receive support in planning and migrating to a newer system and reduce risk for their organization.

The post Windows Server 2012 End Of Life: What You Need to Know appeared first on Dataprise.

The Importance of Business Resiliency

Resiliency has become a critical focus for organizations as they navigate a world filled with potential risks and disruptions. Whether it’s a natural disaster or a cyber attack, organizations must be prepared to respond swiftly and effectively to minimize the impact on their operations. The ability to bounce back quickly and maintain essential functions is crucial for businesses of all sizes.

According to a survey conducted by Uptime Institute, more than two-thirds of organizations experienced some form of outage in the past three years. These outages can have severe consequences, including financial losses, reputational damage, and customer dissatisfaction. Therefore, ensuring resiliency through effective infrastructure management is paramount.

Understanding Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery

Before delving into the role of infrastructure management, let’s first clarify the concepts of business continuity and disaster recovery. Business continuity (BC) focuses on maintaining essential functions during and after a disruptive event, while disaster recovery (DR) specifically deals with the recovery of IT systems and data after a disaster.

BCDR encompasses a holistic approach that goes beyond IT considerations. It includes crisis management, employee safety, alternative work locations, and more. By combining BC and DR practices, organizations can minimize the effects of outages and disruptions, reduce the risk of data loss, and improve overall operations while decreasing the chance of emergencies.

Components of Infrastructure Management

Infrastructure management plays a crucial role in supporting business continuity and disaster recovery efforts. It encompasses various components that work together to ensure the availability and reliability of IT services. Let’s explore the key components of infrastructure management and their importance in supporting resiliency.

Hardware

Incorporate hardware redundancy by having backup hardware that can take over the functions of the primary hardware in case of failure. For example, redundant servers can be implemented to ensure uninterrupted service in the event of a primary server failure. Have redundant storage devices to safeguard against data loss.

Software

Establish software redundancy measures by having backup software that can take over the functions of the primary software in case of failure. For example, redundant databases can be utilized to ensure the uninterrupted availability of critical data. Employ redundant applications to maintain essential functions in the event of software failure.

Network

Maintain business continuity by having backup networks that can take over the functions of the primary network in case of failure. For example, establish redundant wide area network (WAN) connections for alternative connectivity options. Deploy redundant local area network (LAN) connections for uninterrupted communication within the organization.

Steps for Ensuring Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery

To ensure that infrastructure management effectively supports business continuity and disaster recovery efforts, organizations should follow a comprehensive plan. This plan should encompass the following steps:

1. Identify Critical IT Services: Organizations should identify the IT services that are essential for maintaining business operations. This includes identifying critical applications, data, and communication channels.
2. Assess Risks: Organizations should assess the risks that could lead to disruptions of IT services. This includes evaluating potential natural disasters, cyberattacks, power outages, equipment failures, and other disruptive events.
3. Develop a Business Continuity Plan: Organizations should develop a business continuity plan that outlines the steps to maintain essential IT services during and after a disaster. This plan should include procedures for backup and recovery, redundancy, and communication.
4. Implement Redundancy: Organizations should implement hardware, software, network, and facility redundancy to ensure the availability of IT services in case of failure. This may involve deploying backup servers, redundant storage devices, alternative network connections, and backup facilities.
5. Test and Refine the Plan: Organizations should regularly test the business continuity plan to ensure its effectiveness. Testing can help identify any weaknesses or gaps in the plan and allows for refinement and improvement. The plan should be updated based on the results of testing and any changes in the IT infrastructure.

Achieving Business Resiliency

Remember, ensuring business continuity and disaster recovery is an ongoing process that requires continual improvement and adaptation to changing circumstances. By staying vigilant and proactive, organizations can navigate the challenges of today’s business landscape with confidence.

To achieve resiliency, organizations should follow a comprehensive plan that includes identifying critical IT services, assessing risks, developing a business continuity plan, implementing redundancy, and regularly testing and refining the plan. By prioritizing infrastructure management and investing in resiliency, organizations can bounce back quickly from disruptions and safeguard their operations, reputation, and customer satisfaction.

Not sure where to start? Dataprise can help.

Dataprise offers a variety of solutions to help your organization maintain business continuity, including managed cybersecurity, disaster recovery, and infrastructure management. We also specialize in a variety of industries, from law firms to non-profit IT services, our experts can help your organization gain the competitive advantage. Interested in winning with IaaS? Contact us for a strategy session on migrating to IaaS.

The post The Role of Infrastructure Management in Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery appeared first on Dataprise.

The post Client Testimonial: Time Out Group appeared first on Dataprise.

Watch this short series on IT Automation to learn more about how businesses can benefit from automating IT processes, the ROI of implementing automation, and even how automation can protect your business from cybersecurity threats.

The post Tech Talk: IT Automation Pt. 1 appeared first on Dataprise.

A 95-person law firm in Washington, DC was taking on a growing number of document-intensive cases.

The firm needed a robust document management solution to organize and archive critical documents for client cases, and wanted to determine whether their existing network infrastructure would support the new application.

Additionally, most of their hardware was out of warranty, the network had insufficient bandwidth and storage capacity, and servers were running operating systems no longer supported by the manufacturer.

The Dataprise Solution

Dataprise conducted an assessment of the network and determined that the existing infrastructure was not adequate to support such a modern document management system. We designed a network upgrade plan based on the firm’s primary objectives – build a new IT infrastructure powerful enough to support the latest document management systems, while providing the necessary data security demanded by legal regulations.

Using a combination of virtual server technology and Dataprise cloud-based services, we were able to provide a comprehensive solution that would support the firm’s changing IT needs – not just for the short term, but for many years to come.

Here is a quick synopsis of technologies used:

• Server Virtualization provided a newer, flexible server infrastructure that allowed them to add, remove, and customize servers as needed
• A Storage Area Network (SAN) provided scalable storage to support the virtual servers and more robust capacity for the growing document library
• Dataprise provides Office 365’s powerful email and collaboration services, as well as secure email archiving to comply with their email retention requirements

The new network design and subsequent overhaul enhanced their operational productivity by creating a highly adaptable (and now reliable) foundation to work on. The virtual servers provided the ideal framework for supporting the latest document management systems; dramatically improving service capabilities for the internal staff, and in turn – their staff are now able to provide drastically improved service to their clients.

What’s Happening Today?

The law firm has continued its growth. Dataprise currently manages a mixture of over 25 physical and virtual servers, and provides 24×7 network monitoring. Today, we have truly become their trusted IT partner – their Virtual CIO – and help them make not only technology decisions but better business decisions so they can win with IT.

The post Law Firm Receives a Powerful IT Upgrade Aligned with Its Business Objectives appeared first on Dataprise.

Despite the similar-sounding names for both terms, however, the two are not interchangeable.

These are three of the most important differences between data lakes and data warehouses, as well as how businesses use the two to organize their big data.

Data Warehouses Vs. Data Lakes

1. The Structure of Stored Data
2. The Purpose of Stored Data
3. The Security of Stored Data

1. The Structure of Stored Data

A data warehouse stores data much like an actual warehouse. After important information is ingested into the warehouse, the data will be extracted, cleaned, and made consistent with other types of data in the system.

This consistency and organization will make the data much more accessible to conventional analysis approaches that will be used by business analysts and professionals in similar roles.

This organization can make data harder to access or use, however, especially if you need to use many different types of data at the same time.

Data engineers, data scientists, and machine learning developers often prefer data lakes, in part due to the lack of pre-existing structure and data pre-processing.

With a data lake, the data scientist or ML expert does not have to hunt around for the information they want to use, or for applications with interesting associated data. Instead, all the data is accessible all the time.

If they need to structure their data for an ML algorithm or similar application, they can use an approach like schema-on-read that will structure the data as it is used.

Many businesses are also beginning to use the emerging data lakehouse architecture for storage.

The lakehouse combines elements of the warehouse and lake approach to data storage and structure. Lakehouses use various approaches to provide a combination of structure and data availability, potentially making the storage solution useful for both conventional and advanced analytic approaches.

Data warehouses, lakes, and lakehouses may be operated by the business that owns them, or by companies that offer data storage solutions, due to the high potential cost of maintaining in-house data storage.

2. The Purpose of Stored Data

The same organization may maintain both data warehouses and data lakes, but it’s likely that these two data solutions will be used for vastly different purposes.

Data warehouses are most useful in non-big data analytics and business reporting. Data in the warehouse is normalized and consistent, making it easy for a business analyst to quickly compare distinct data points — like the sales numbers for different products, the function of those products, and their target audience.

The information in data lakes is not processed for a specific purpose, and a combination of structured, unstructured, and raw data may be present. This combination of information makes the data useful for the training of AI models or big data analysis.

Businesses that are investing in advanced predictive capabilities often maintain data lakes because they’re necessary for these analytic technologies.

For key decision-makers, both types of data storage can be invaluable. More and more often, CFOs and similar executives are writing about the value of real-time data when it comes to making highly informed decisions.

Data warehouses aren’t well-suited to real-time analytics, but the structure and organization they provide may still be essential for a business’s overall analytics strategy.

3. The Security of Stored Data

Data security is a major concern across the business world. Cyber-attacks are becoming both more frequent and more expensive, making data security a top priority for businesses that store large amounts of information.

Data lakes are often less secure than data warehouses simply due to how lakes are used. In most cases, many different users, applications, and third parties will require access to the data lake.

The different data flows that lakes and warehouses use can also affect security. Data lakes typically use the ELT (Extract, Load, Transfer) workload, while data warehouses typically use ETL (Extract, Transfer, Load).

ETL loads data first into a staging server before the target system, while ELT loads data directly into the target system.

Transferring the data before it is loaded is often necessary when storing available raw, unprocessed data would create security concerns.

For the most part, however, potential security issues won’t play a major role in whether or not a business chooses to maintain a data lake. If a business has determined it needs a data lake for some purpose, it’s likely that a data warehouse won’t be a suitable substitute. Instead, the potential security issues with data lakes will inform the business’s cybersecurity strategy.

How Businesses Use a Data Warehouse vs. Data Lake

Both data warehouses and data lakes play valuable roles in data storage and analytics. Warehouses provide structure to data that is useful for certain, more conventional approaches to analysis.

Data lakes contain large amounts of unstructured data, making them useful for big data analysis and AI.

One company may rely on both data warehouses and data lakes to effectively analyze available information.

Maintaining your business requires optimizing your IT infrastructure. It’s critical to have a thorough and resilient strategy for data storage solutions in order to truly maximize your managed IT infrastructure. Managed Data Storage Solutions are ideal for growing companies or those with a widely dispersed staff who need to access data from multiple locations or time zones.

The post Three Differences Between Data Warehouses and Data Lakes appeared first on Dataprise.