Managed.IT - issue 52

Hackathons drive corporate innovation Last year saw a 40% rise in hackathons as large corporations increasingly use them to meet innovation objectives. Analysis by online hackathon community Hackathon.com shows that in 2018 there were 5,636 hackathons globally, up from 4,480 in 2017. Of these, 64% were public hackathons, which enable companies to tap into the expertise of the wider developer and start-up ecosystem. John Karp, co-founder of Hackathon.com, said: “2018 was the year of hackathons and we’re expecting 2019 to be no different. Hackathons are increasingly becoming a critical part of the modern enterprise. Many will adopt them to identify and recruit top talent, increase employee engagement or simply to drive innovation and improve company branding.” www.hackathon.com BULLETIN 8 MANAGED.IT 01732 759725 Poor asset valuations put data security at risk Inaccurate valuations of business information assets by IT security departments could lead to inadequate investment in data security, warn Ponemon Institute and data management company DocAuthority. Research by the two companies suggests that IT security departments are undervaluing documents like R&D and financial reports by more than 50%, while excessively prioritising less sensitive PII-related data. For example, IT security departments estimate the financial impact of a leaked financial report to be $131,570, compared to an estimate of $303,182 by the finance department. In contrast, they put a value of $94,148 on monthly salary lists, compared to $57,477 by HR. Doctor Larry Ponemon, chairman and founder of the Ponemon Institute, said: “Typically, the security and protection of business data is considered to be the responsibility of the IT security department. Yet it’s clear from this research that IT security does not have the vitally important context required to understand the true value of that data and, in turn, create an effective strategy for defending it. Rather than being relegated to IT, data and its protection should be the concern of the business as a whole.” www.docauthority.com Wellington goes into cyber- battle with LogRhythm Independent boarding school Wellington College has chosen LogRhythm’s NextGen SIEM Platform to boost its cyber security. The platform combines user and entity behaviour analytics (UEBA), network traffic and behaviour analytics (NTBA) and security orchestration, automation and response (SOAR) in a single end-to-end solution. Tony Whelton, IT director at Wellington College, selected the LogRhythm solution for its enhanced functionality, seamless reporting features and advanced analytics. He said: “Our students and staff are constantly accessing our network on-the-go as they roam the campus, which can make it much more challenging to identify and locate threats. LogRhythm’s platform is able to correlate data from multiple sources to reveal what is infected, where and when. For example, we are now able to merge data picked up from our firewall with WiFi data to get the exact location of a malware-infected device.” He added: “What’s really useful is that this data is analysed and stored on one single dashboard, making it much easier for our IT department to create and share reports.” www.logrhythm.com in brief... Men in IT earn 30% more Men in the IT industry earn up to 30% more than women in the same roles reveals research by accountants SJD. Analysis of the salaries of more than 1,000 contractors shows that women with job titles such as SQL Developer or IT Architect earn almost a third less than men doing the same job. www.sjdaccountancy.com At a loss with analytics The skills shortage is preventing businesses from maximising the opportunities presented by data analytics, with 40% of senior leaders surveyed by Infosys for its Endless Possibilities with Data report complaining of a lack of analytics skills in their organisation. Nearly half (44%) say their organisation struggles to integrate multiple data sets from a variety of sources and 43% say their teams lack understanding of analytics techniques. www.infosys.com File searches a waste of time M-Files warns that rapid data growth and a proliferation of storage systems and network drives are making it harder for office workers to find the files they need. In a survey of 1,500 office workers for the company’s 2019 Intelligent Information Management Benchmark Report , 96% said they had difficulty finding the most recent version of a document; 83% admitted to recreating existing documents because they couldn’t find them on their network; and 45% said they find searching for information challenging and time-consuming. www.m-files.com Businesses struggle with application security demands In its 2018 Application Protect Report , F5 Labs warns that businesses across the world are struggling to understand, optimise and protect their rapidly expanding application environments. More than one third (38%) of businesses surveyed have ‘no confidence’ that they are aware of all the applications in use in their organisation. Almost half disagree or strongly disagree that their organisation has adequate resources to detect application vulnerabilities (46%) or sufficient remediation capabilities (49%). www.f5.com/labs Sponsored by DocAuthority. Independently conducted by Ponemon Institute LLC Publication Date: November 2018 Ponemon Institute©ResearchReport Understanding the Value of Information Assets