Dominic Carpenter, Author at CACI

Should you invest in blockchain technology?

Posted on: 8 November 2022

Blockchain technology has revolutionised an array of fields including financial services, supply chain, healthcare and the Internet of Things. In the first of a series of blogs exploring blockchain, we look at the key areas to consider before deciding to invest in blockchain – an overview of the technology, its business applications and strategic business values.

What is a blockchain?

A blockchain is a shared, decentralised database that uses Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) to store data in a succession of segments called blocks. After the latest block is filled, it is cryptographically connected to the previous completed block. The data chain created is called a blockchain.

How does it work?

What types of blockchain are there?

Public blockchain
A public blockchain is non-restrictive and permissionless. Any internet user can register on a public blockchain platform and become an authorised processing and storage node. All nodes in the network have equal rights to access, create, and validate the data in the blockchain. Bitcoin and Ethereum are the most well-known public blockchain platforms dealing with cryptocurrency.

Private blockchain
A private blockchain works in a restrictive environment and is governed by one organisation which determines node access, executes the consensus protocol and maintains the shared data. A private blockchain typically runs within an organisation’s network to cope with highly confidential data and is held securely. Audit management and asset control are common use cases of private blockchain.

Hybrid blockchain
A hybrid blockchain combines characteristics of both public and private blockchains to control access to specific private data held on a public blockchain. For instance, property companies use hybrid blockchains to run systems privately but disclose certain transaction information to the public.

Consortium blockchain
Consortium blockchains are a type of private blockchain managed by multiple organisations rather than one entity. Supply chain management, especially for food and medicine, is an ideal application for this type of blockchain – from sourcing to delivery, all parties involved in the supply chain can form a consortium to track the product status.

The advantages of blockchain

Decentralised trust
Users no longer rely on centralised intermediaries to complete transactions. By storing data in a peer-to-peer network, every node has the same data and authority to view all transactions. There is no single point of control.

Enhanced security
Cryptographic hashing, which converts arbitrarily large amounts of data into a short unique string of text, plays a crucial role in blockchain security. A hash value is automatically calculated for each block and consists of the block’s ID number, user ID number, previous block’s hash value, timestamp and other details. Employing hashing in this manner makes it impossible to change any data held in the block, metadata about the block, or its position in the chain without having to recompute that and every subsequent block in the chain.

High level of data integrity
From the verification process to storing transactions, data is verified by a consensus algorithm specific to the blockchain protocol. Any invalid data is rejected, protecting the chain from human error. The integrity and security of blockchains make them immutable, transparent and unimpeachable.

Disadvantages of blockchain

Uncertain legal and regulatory environment
Blockchain technology is still developing and the principles of existing regulations may not accommodate the fundamentals of blockchain. For instance, General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) assumes data is centralised on at least one legal entity, while blockchain decentralises data storage to an anonymous network of nodes. Blockchain technologists should study the regulations thoroughly before implementation.

Novel cyber-attacks
Blockchains are not immune to cyber-attacks and all new technologies have undiscovered vulnerabilities. Attacks such as the following are effective against blockchain:

a 51% attack – where more than half of the nodes computing a chain are influenced by a bad actor
a Sybil attack – where a single entity creates multiple dummy nodes to wield disproportionate voting power
DDOS – where nodes are flooded with connections which block out legitimate traffic

There are no quick solutions to safeguard your systems, blockchain technologists can implement careful plans on system architecture and design to pre-empt cyber-attacks.

High energy consumption and data storage cost
Older blockchains, such as Bitcoin, validate blocks using a Proof of Work consensus algorithm in which all the nodes compete to compute a completed block in exchange for an administrative payment. Only one node can win resulting in all the partial computations being wasted. This amounts to a tremendous waste of electricity. More modern blockchains employ Proof of Stake, which is much more efficient, but migrating from one protocol to the other is extremely complicated. Blockchains ledgers – the data chain – are replicated at least in part to every node. By 2021, the Bitcoin ledger had reached 433GB [1] and the Ethereum ledger close to 1TB [2]. Given node counts in the thousands, even partial replication represents vast duplication across the world.

Considerations before you implement blockchain

Business needs
Before you implement blockchain technology, we strongly advise your team to evaluate existing business models and needs. Businesses that require a high level of data integrity and traceability are more likely to apply this. Investing in blockchain technology is worthwhile if the application transforms your user experience, democratises governance or reduces overall cost; but it is fundamentally a distributed database.

Integration concerns
Given that most organisations rely on legacy systems to run their business, careful technical analysis is essential to ensure that blockchain systems can integrate successfully with the existing estate.

Privacy issues
Logical layers in a blockchain system are the key to complying with privacy regulations. Stakeholders should examine the interactions between different layers – how the data is stored, accessed and transacted in the system.

Cost and revenue analysis
Enormous investments in setting up a blockchain system – such as infrastructure, data storage and maintenance – often create barriers for organisations to get involved. However evaluating its strategic business values can change your mind. Let’s take some examples from The Blockchain 50, named by Forbes [3] :

Allianz streamlines cross-border auto insurance claims in Europe. Processing time for insurance claims has been reduced from several months to minutes and costs have fallen 10%. The quick claim procedure absolutely contributes to a high customer satisfaction level and customer retention. No wonder Allianz has led in the claims category with a satisfaction score of 76.04%, according to Brokerbility’s survey. [4]
Boeing builds a digital aircraft record system to help airlines keep up with required maintenance, saving 25% on maintenance costs, potentially worth up to $3.5 billion (~£2.96 billion) annually.[5]
De Beers has registered over 400,000 gems worth $2 billion (~ £1.6 billion) to provide immutable records of a gem’s origin, to track it along the supply chain and improve jewellery retailers’ confidence in procurement. [6]

Scalability
As more nodes join a blockchain network, latency and convergence can increase. Compare the transaction speed between Bitcoin, the oldest and biggest public blockchain network which can only process 7 transactions per second, and Visa, a centralised electronic payment network which can handle more than 24,000 transactions per second [7].

Scalability is a challenge in setting up a public blockchain, but there are several options to enhance it:

Data Sharding – Data sharding splits an extensive blockchain network into smaller, more easily managed parts called shards. A node does not need to rely on the whole database to verify and process a transaction. Instead, all nodes work in parallel, resulting in more efficient transaction throughput.
Off-chain data storage – Transactions can be completed on the blockchain network, and data is stored in the off-chain environment to reduce the on-chain storage requirements.
Scalable consensus mechanisms – The Proof of Work consensus protocol in Bitcoin provides a high-security mechanism but a long transaction time. Proof of Stake consensus mechanism is a possible solution to speed up transaction time and higher scalability.

Conclusion

To decide whether to invest in blockchain technology, your team should ascertain whether your business needs will be best met by using this approach and explore cost and revenue impact as much as possible. Equally, you should consider the disadvantages of blockchain technology such as potential cyber-attacks, high energy consumption and scalability concerns to decide how to address each of them. Blockchain technology is not the only way to perform full data transparency or traceability – well-managed centralised databases can solve it.

Blockchain technology changes how we trust and solve problems in a traditional database system, like disintermediation and data security enhancement. It can optimise the operation in low-trust environments where users rely on third-party checks.

An insight written by McKinsey Digital [8] analysed the monetary impact in more than 90 use cases; they estimated that approximately 70 per cent of the value at stake in the short term is cost reduction, followed by revenue generation and capital relief. Cost can be taken out by removing intermediaries and administrative efforts on housekeeping, as well as improvements in transparency and fraud control.

Specific industries that capture the most significant revenue from blockchain are Automotive, Healthcare, Property, Public Sector and Technology, Media & Telecommunications. We believe the value of blockchain will enable brand-new business models and revenue streams over time.

This is the first blog in our new series which aims to help you understand the different aspects of blockchain technology. Over the course of the series, we will discuss how blockchain impacts data governance, cybersecurity and cyber-attacks.

How CACI can help

Equipping your systems with blockchain-compatible elements is a key initial step. Our services enable you to ensure that the foundations are correct and our experts can advise you on network design, architecture, service design, business process, data governance and cybersecurity solutions. Get in touch with us today.

Notes:
[1] Blockchain Explorer – Search the Blockchain | BTC | ETH | BCH, statistics as of 23 Oct, 2022
[2] Ethereum Chain Full Sync Data Size (ycharts.com), statistics as of 24 Oct 2022
[3] Forbes Blockchain 50 2022
[4] Allianz tops the ranks in Brokerbility’s insurer partner satisfaction survey (insurancetimes.co.uk)
[5] Boeing supports TrustFlight aircraft maintenance project using blockchain – Ledger Insights – blockchain for enterprise
[6] De Beers group introduces world’s first blockchain-backed diamond source platform at scale – De Beers Group
[7] Small Business Retail | Visa
[8] The strategic business value of the blockchain market | McKinsey

7 Steps to Strong Cloud Security

Posted on: 13 October 2022

Demand for cloud-based offerings has accelerated due to the COVID-19 pandemic, with the importance of flexibility and agility now being realised. Without adapting, businesses risk being left behind, but what are the benefits and how do you know if it’s the right solution for you?

We shared the key advantages of cloud adoption and challenges in cloud security in our previous blogs.

In our final article in this series of blogs, we share the key steps to strengthen your organisations cloud security.

As more businesses adopt cloud technology, primarily to support hybrid working, cybercriminals are focusing their tactics on exploiting vulnerable cloud environments. Last year, a report found that 98% of companies experienced at least one cloud data breach in the past 18 months up from 79% in 2020. Of those surveyed, a shocking 67% reported three or more incidents.

This issue has been exacerbated by soaring global demand for tech talent. According to a recent survey, over 40% of IT decision-makers admitted to their business having a cyber security skills gap.
It’s a vulnerable time for enterprise organisations, and cloud security is the top priority for IT leaders. Here we consider the critical steps you can take now to make your business safer.

1. Understand your shared responsibility model

Defining and establishing the split of security responsibilities between an organisation and its CSP is one of the first steps in creating a successful cloud security strategy. Taking this action will provide more precise direction for your teams and mean that your apps, security, network, and compliance teams all have a say in your security approach. This helps to ensure that your security approach considers all angles.

2. Create a data governance framework

Once you’ve defined responsibilities, it’s time to set the rules. Establishing a clear data governance framework that defines who controls data assets and how data is used will provide a streamlined approach to managing and protecting information. However, setting the rules is one thing; ensuring they’re carefully followed is another – employing content control tools and role-based access controls to enforce this framework will help safeguard company data. Ensure your framework is built on a solid foundation by engaging your senior management early in your policy planning. With their input, influence, and understanding of the importance of cloud security, you’ll be better equipped to ensure compliance across your business.

3. Opt to automate

In an increasingly hostile threat environment, in-house IT teams are under pressure to manage high numbers of security alerts. But it doesn’t have to be this way. Automating security processes such as cybersecurity monitoring, threat intelligence collection, and vendor risk assessments means your team can spend less time analysing every potential threat, reducing admin errors and more time on innovation and growth activities.

4. Assess and address your knowledge gaps

Your users can either provide a strong line of defence or open the door to cyber-attacks. Make sure it’s the former by equipping the staff and stakeholders that access your cloud systems with the knowledge and tools they need to conduct safe practices, for example, by providing training on identifying malware and phishing emails.
For more advanced users of your cloud systems, take the time to review capability and experience gaps and consider where upskilling or outsourcing is required to keep your cloud environments safe.

5. Consider adopting a zero-trust model

Based on the principle of ‘Never Trust, Always Verify’, a zero-trust approach removes the assumption of trust from the security architecture by requiring authentication for every action, user, and device. Adopting a zero-trust model means always assuming that there’s a breach and securing all access to systems using multi-factor authentication and least privilege.
In addition to improving resilience and security posture, a zero-trust approach can also benefit businesses by enhancing user experiences via Single Sign-On (SSO) enablement, allowing better collaboration between organisations, and increased visibility of your user devices and services. However, not all organisations can accommodate a zero-trust approach. Incompatibility with legacy systems, cost, disruption, and vendor-lock-in must be balanced with the security advantages of zero-trust adoption.

6. Perform an in-depth cloud security assessment

Ultimately, the best way to bolster your cloud security is to perform a thorough cloud security audit. Having a clear view of your cloud environments, users, security capabilities, and inadequacies will allow you to take the best course of action to protect your business.

7. Bolster your defences

The most crucial principle of cloud security is that it’s an ongoing process and continuous monitoring is key to keeping your cloud secure. However, in an ever-evolving threat environment, IT and infosec professionals are under increasing pressure to stay ahead of cybercriminals’ sophisticated tactics.

A robust threat monitoring solution can help ease this pressure and bolster your security defence. Threat monitoring works by continuously collecting, collating, and evaluating security data from your network sensors, appliances, and endpoint agents to identify patterns indicative of threats. Threat alerts are more accurate with threat monitoring analysing data alongside contextual factors such as IP addresses and URLs. Additionally, traditionally hard-to-detect threats such as unauthorised internal accounts can be identified.

Businesses can employ myriad options for threat monitoring, from data protection platforms with threat monitoring capabilities to a dedicated threat monitoring solution. However, while implementing threat monitoring is a crucial and necessary step to securing your cloud environments, IT leaders must recognise that a robust security program comprises a multi-layered approach utilising technology, tools, people, and processes.

Get your cloud security assessment checklist and the best cloud security strategies in our comprehensive guide to cloud security.

The 9 Biggest Challenges in Cloud Security

Posted on: 10 October 2022

We shared the key advantages of cloud adoption in our previous blog. This time around, we identify the biggest challenges of cloud security.

Cloud adoption has become increasingly important in the last two years, as businesses responded to the Covid-19 pandemic. Yet, a 2020 survey reported that cloud security was the biggest challenge to cloud adoption for 83% of businesses. [1]

As cybercriminals increasingly target cloud environments, the pressure is on for IT leaders to protect their businesses. Here, we explore the most pressing threats to cloud security you should take note of.

1. Limited visibility

The traditionally used tools for gaining complete network visibility are ineffective for cloud environments as cloud-based resources are located outside the corporate network and run on infrastructure the company doesn’t own. Further, most organisations lack a complete view of their cloud footprint. You can’t protect what you can’t see, so having a handle on the entirety of your cloud estate is crucial.

2. Lack of cloud security architecture and strategy

The rush to migrate data and systems to the cloud meant that organisations were operational before thoroughly assessing and mitigating the new threats they’d been exposed to. The result is that robust security systems and strategies are not in place to protect infrastructure.

3. Unclear accountability

Pre-cloud, security was firmly in the hands of security teams. But in public and hybrid cloud settings, responsibility for cloud security is split between cloud service providers and users, with responsibility for security tasks differing depending on the cloud service model and provider. Without a standard shared responsibility model, addressing vulnerabilities effectively is challenging as businesses struggle to grapple with their responsibilities.

In a recent survey of IT leaders, 84% of UK respondents admitted that their organisation struggles to draw a clear line between their responsibility for cloud security and their cloud service provider’s responsibility for security. [2]

4. Misconfigured cloud services

Misconfiguration of cloud services can cause data to be publicly exposed, manipulated, or even deleted. It occurs when a user or admin fails to set up a cloud platform’s security setting properly. For example, keeping default security and access management settings for sensitive data, giving unauthorised individuals access, or leaving confidential data accessible without authorisation are all common misconfigurations. Human error is always a risk, but it can be easily mitigated with the right processes.

5. Data loss

Data loss is one of the most complex risks to predict, so taking steps to protect against it is vital. The most common types of data loss are:

Data alteration – when data is changed and cannot be reverted to the previous state.

Storage outage – access to data is lost due to issues with your cloud service provider.

Loss of authorisation – when information is inaccessible due to a lack of encryption keys or other credentials.

Data deletion – data is accidentally or purposefully erased, and no backups are available to restore information.

While regular back-ups will help avoid data loss, backing up large amounts of company data can be costly and complicated. Nonetheless, 304.7 million ransomware attacks were conducted globally in the first half of 2021, a 151% increase from the previous year.[3] With ransomware attacks surging, businesses can ill afford to avoid the need for regular data backups.

6. Malware

Malware can take many forms, including DoS (denial of service) attacks, hyperjacking, hypervisor infections, and exploiting live migration. Left undetected, malware can rapidly spread through your system and open doors to even more serious threats. That’s why multiple security layers are required to protect your environment.

7. Insider threats

While images of disgruntled employees may spring to mind, malicious intent is not the most common cause of insider threat security incidents. According to a report published in 2021, 56% of incidents were caused by negligent employees. [4]

Worryingly, the frequency of insider-led incidents is on the rise. The number of threats has jumped by 44% since 2020.[5] It’s also getting more expensive to tackle insider threat issues. Costs have risen from $11.45 million in 2020 to $15.38 million in 2022, a 34% increase. [6]

8. Compliance concerns

While some industries are more regulated, you’ll likely need to know where your data is stored, who has access to it, how it’s being processed, and what you’re doing to protect it. This can become more complicated in the cloud. Further, your cloud provider may be required to hold specific compliance credentials.

Failure to follow the regulations can result in substantial legal, financial and reputational repercussions. Therefore, it’s critical to handle your regulatory requirements, ensure good governance is in place, and keep your business compliant.

9. API Vulnerabilities

Cloud applications typically interact via APIs (application programming interfaces). However, insecure external APIs can provide a gateway, allowing threat actors to launch DoS attacks and code injections to access company data.

In 2020, Gartner predicted API attacks would become the most frequent attack vector by 2022. With a reported 681% growth of API attack traffic in 2021,[7] this prediction has already become a reality. Addressing API vulnerabilities will therefore be a chief priority for IT leaders in 2022 and beyond.

Check out our comprehensive guide to cloud security for more

Notes:
[1] 64 Significant Cloud Computing Statistics for 2022: Usage, Adoption & Challenges
[2] Majority of UK firms say cyber threats are outpacing cloud security
[3] Ransomware attacks in 2021 have already surpassed last year
[4] – [6] Insider Threats Are (Still) on the Rise: 2022 Ponemon Report
[7] Attacks abusing programming APIs grew over 600% in 2021

The Top 6 Business Benefits of Cloud Adoption

Posted on: 4 October 2022

In the first blog of our Cloud Security series, we explore the key advantages of cloud adoption.

1. Flexibility

Cloud infrastructure is the key to operational agility, allowing you to scale up or down to suit your bandwidth needs. The pay-as-you-go model offered by most cloud service providers (CSPs) also means that you pay for usage rather than a set monthly fee.

2. Reduced cost

Kind to your cash flow, cloud computing cuts out the high hardware cost. Not to mention the cost-savings of reduced resources, lower energy consumption, and fewer delays.

3. Disaster Recovery

From natural disasters to power outages and software bugs, if your data is backed up in the cloud, it is at a reduced risk of system failure as the servers are typically far from your office locations. You can recover data anywhere to minimise downtime by logging into the internet’s cloud storage portal.

4. Accessibility

We’ve all heard that the office is dead. Workers want the ability to work anytime, anywhere. With cloud (and an internet connection), they can.

5. Greater collaboration

Cloud infrastructure makes collaboration a simple process. The cloud can drastically improve workplace productivity, from online video calls to sharing files and co-authoring documents in real-time. These cloud-native applications are designed to make our lives more efficient through greater collaboration.

6. Strategic value

Ultimately, businesses that have adopted the cloud typically experience greater cost efficiencies, faster speed to market, and enhanced service levels. Adopting the cloud not only reimagines business models and builds resilience but also enables organisations to be agile and innovative, for example, adopt to DevOps methodologies which can prove to be an essential element for businesses looking to get ahead of their competitors.

But what about security? A 2020 survey reported that cloud security was the biggest challenge to cloud adoption for 83% of the business.[1] While the pandemic accelerated cloud adoption, rushed application and the resulting lacklustre security have only intensified security concerns as cybercriminals increasingly target cloud environments.

Check out our comprehensive guide to cloud security for more information.

Note:
[1] 64 Significant Cloud Computing Statistics for 2022: Usage, Adoption & Challenges

How to create a successful M&A IT integration strategy

Posted on: 11 March 2022

From entering new markets to growing market share, mergers and acquisitions (M&As) can bring big business benefits. However, making the decision to acquire or merge is the easy part of the process. What comes next is likely to bring disruption and difficulty. In research reported by the Harvard Business Review, the failure rate of acquisitions is astonishingly high – between 70 and 90 per cent – with integration issues often highlighted as the most likely cause.

While the impact of M&A affects every element of an organisation, the blending of technical assets and resulting patchwork of IT systems can present significant technical challenges for IT leaders. Here, we explore the most common problems and how to navigate them to achieve a smooth and successful IT transition.

Get the full picture

Mapping the route of your IT transition is crucial to keeping your team focused throughout the process. But you need to be clear about your starting point. That’s why conducting a census of the entire IT infrastructure – from hardware and software to network systems, as well as enterprise and corporate platforms – should be the first step in your IT transition.

Gather requirements & identify gaps

Knowing what you’ve got is the first step, knowing what you haven’t is the next. Technology underpins every element of your business, so you should examine each corporate function and business unit through an IT lens. What services impact each function? How will an integration impact them? What opportunities are there to optimise? Finding the answers to these questions will help you to identify and address your most glaring gaps.

Seize opportunities to modernise

M&A provide the opportunity for IT leaders to re-evaluate and update their environments, so it’s important to look at where you can modernise rather than merge. This will ensure you gain maximum value from the process. For example, shifting to cloud infrastructure can enable your in-house team to focus on performance optimisation whilst also achieving cost savings and enhanced security. Similarly, automating routine or manual tasks using AI or machine learning can ease the burden on overwhelmed IT teams.

Implement strong governance

If you’re fusing two IT departments, you need to embed good governance early on. Start by assessing your current GRC (Governance, Risk and Compliance) maturity. A holistic view will enable you to target gaps effectively and ensure greater transparency of your processes. In addition to bringing certainty and consistency across your team, taking this crucial step will also help you to tackle any compliance and security shortfalls that may result from merging with the acquired business.

Clean up your data

Managing data migration can be a complex process during a merger and acquisition. It’s likely that data will be scattered across various systems, services, and applications. Duplicate data may also be an issue. This makes it difficult to gain an updated single customer view, limiting your ability to track sales and marketing effectiveness. The lack of visibility can also have a negative impact on customer experience. For example, having two disparate CRM systems may result in two sales representatives contacting a single customer, causing frustration and portraying your organisation as disorganised. There’s also a significant financial and reputational risk if data from the merged business isn’t managed securely. With all this in mind, it’s clear that developing an effective strategy and management process should be a key step in planning your IT transition.

Lead with communication

Change can be scary, and uncertainty is the enemy of productivity. That’s why communication is key to a successful merger and acquisition. Ensuring a frequent flow of information can help to combat this. However, IT leaders should also be mindful of creating opportunities for employees to share ideas and concerns.

If you are merging two IT departments, it is important to understand the cultural differences of the two businesses and where issues may arise. This will help you to develop an effective strategy for bringing the two teams together. While championing collaboration and knowledge sharing will go a long way to helping you achieve the goal of the M&A process – a better, stronger, more cohesive business.

How we can help

From assessing your existing IT infrastructure to cloud migration, data management and driving efficiencies through automation, we can support you at every step of your IT transition.

Transitioning your IT following M&A? Contact our expert team today.

Eight crucial steps for Telcos to get TSR ready

Posted on: 1 February 2022

Following the introduction of the Telecommunications (Security) Act into UK law in late 2021, all telecommunications providers will soon need to comply with ‘one of the toughest telecoms security regimes in the world’ or risk financial penalties up to £10m.

With the clock counting down for Telcos to enter a new era of security, we consider the critical steps for providers to prepare for the regulatory road ahead.

1. Identify your gaps

Understanding your current state is the first step in achieving a successful transformation. A full audit of your security strategies, plans, policies, and effectiveness will expose your weaknesses and gaps, enabling you to take the right actions to protect your business and ensure compliance.

2. Prioritise your most pressing threats

While gathering data can provide better visibility of your network, taking reactive action to lower your risk isn’t the most efficient approach. Establishing levels of prioritisation will ensure your resources are being used to reduce risk in the right areas.

3. Get the right people in place

From gap analysis to operating model design, programme delivery, and reshoring, it’s likely you’ll need more people in place and new competencies developed. Getting the right partnerships and people now is key to getting ahead.

4. Incorporate legacy issues into your planning

Today’s telecommunications industry is built on multi-generational networks, and legacy systems continue to underpin critical infrastructure. While extracting these systems is not going to happen overnight, dealing with your legacy infrastructure should be an integral part of planning your implementation of the new Telecoms Security Framework.

5. Implement transparent designs

Failing to disclose evidence of a breach could result in a £10m fine, so built in transparency and traceability are key to your programme. Consider the likely information requests that are to come to ensure your design changes enable clear tracking and reporting.

6. Embed a security-first focus

Mitigating the risks facing the UK’s critical national infrastructure is the driving force behind the TSRs, and telecommunications providers will need to ensure that this mindset is embedded in the everyday. Buy-in from the business is core to any cultural shift, so align your leadership with a shared, cross-functional vision and get some early delivery going to build gradual momentum.

7. Prepare for more legislation

In November 2021, the Government announced The Product Security and Telecommunications Infrastructure Bill (the PSTI) to ensure consumers’ connected and connectable devices comply with tougher cybersecurity standards. As cybersecurity evolves, so will the threats to organisations, and telecommunications providers must be prepared for more regulatory oversight.

8. Embrace the benefits of built-in security

Ultimately, security that is built in rather than bolted on will enable providers to offer better protection and performance for customers, as well as foster trust with greater transparency. While the industry may not have been seeking the Telecoms Security Act, its passing prompt action to remove the constraints of old and reimagine and reshape to seize the opportunities of a new era.

For more information about TSR, download The impact and opportunities of the Telecoms Security Requirements report.

7 key things you need to know about the Telecoms (Security) Act

Posted on: 27 January 2022

The introduction of The Telecommunications (Security) Act into UK law late last year marked the arrival of a new era of security for the telecommunications sector, where everyone – from executive to employee – is responsible for protecting the UK’s critical network infrastructure against cyber attacks.

However, embedding a security conscious culture from top to bottom requires significant resource and expertise to steer towards success. With the clock already counting down, telecommunications providers are under pressure to begin their TSR compliance journey whilst ensuring that existing change programmes stay on track. Here, we consider the key considerations for communications leaders to ensure successful navigation and utilisation of the obstacles and opportunities that lie ahead.

Clear visibility is critical

Protecting your network, applications and data has never been more critical. However, blind spots, missing data, and the risk of dropped packets make management and protection of these challenging, not to mention the scale and complexity of many providers’ hybrid network infrastructure. Nonetheless, providers must ensure they are able to monitor security across the entirety of their network and can act quickly when issues arise.

Security and service quality will need to be carefully balanced

Whilst enhancing security is the ultimate goal of the Act, this cannot be at the cost of network performance. Outages themselves can put providers in breach of the regulations.

Security scanners are a key line of defence for network security, helping to identify known vulnerabilities which can be exploited if the correct mitigation steps aren’t followed, so ensuring you have a robust vulnerability management process is critical. Incorporating the right vulnerability scanning tools and following the required change management processes to correctly implement tools will help to secure your network whilst minimising any potential performance impact to your existing infrastructure or service outages.

Auditing abilities are a new superpower

Demonstrating compliance with the new legislation may pose a significant challenge to providers, particularly as they attempt to flow down security standards and audit requirements into the supply chain. However, implementation of robust auditing processes to identify and eliminate weaknesses and vulnerabilities are a must for keeping providers on the right side of the regulations.

Knowledge is power

With any significant legislature change comes a period of uncertainty as businesses adapt to change, so getting to grips with the new regulation changes ahead of the game is key. Many providers have already begun the search for talent with the technical skills and experience to deliver their TSR programmes; however, with the jobs market at boiling point, some providers may find utilising external partnerships provides a more practical route to successful delivery as well as a means to upskill and educate internal teams.

You’ll be tested

In 2019, OFCOM took over TBEST – the intelligence-led penetration testing scheme – from DCMS and has been working with select providers on implementation of the scheme. Whether through TBEST or not, providers will be expected to carry out tests that are as close to ‘real life’ attacks as possible. The difficulty will be in satisfying the requirement that “the manner in which the tests are to be carried out is not made known to the persons involved in identifying and responding to security compromises.”[1] Providers may need to work with an independent vendor to ensure compliant testing.

Costs are still unclear

While the costs for complying with the new regulations are still undermined, an earlier impact assessment of the proposed legislation carried out by the government indicated that initial costs are likely to be hefty: “Feedback from bilateral discussions with Tier 1 operators have indicated that the costs of implementing the NCSC TSR would be significant. The scale of these costs is likely to differ by size of operator and could be of the scale of over £10 million in one off costs.”[2].

Culture may challenge change

Technology will, of course, be at the forefront of communications leaders’ minds, yet the cultural changes required to successfully embed a security-first mindset are of equal importance and must be considered in equal measure. Change is never easy, particularly when there is a fixed deadline in place; however, delivery that is well-designed and meticulously planned is key. Ultimately, the onus will be on leaders to craft a clear vision – achieving network security that is intrinsic by design – as well as mapping out the road to get there.

Looking for more information about TSR? Download The impact and opportunities of the Telecoms Security Requirements report.

[1] The Electronic Communications (Security Measures) Regulations 2021 [draft]

[2] The Telecommunications Security Bill 2020: The Telecoms Security legislation

Reporting-ms Performance Issues – Solution Overview

Posted on: 13 January 2022

The Problem

Picture the scene; a new application has been carefully developed and nurtured into existence. It has been thoroughly tested in a small test environment, and the team are awaiting its first deployment to a multi-pod environment with bated breath. The big day comes and…. the CTF tests immediately highlight severe issues with the application, cue tears.

Naturally, this was not the fanfare of success the team had been hoping for. That being said, there was nothing for it but to dive into everyone’s favourite debugging tool… Kibana.

Checking the logs in Kibana confirmed the team’s worst fears. Audit messages were being processed by the app far too slowly.

• Figure 1 below shows audit events taking up to 16.5s to be processed. This process time should (under normal circumstances) be under 0.1s per message.
• Pods were seen to be idle (while under load) for up to a minute at a time.

Background

Performance problems are never fun. The scope tends to be extremely wide and there is no nice clean stack trace to give you a helping hand. They often require multiple iterations to fully solve and more time investigating and debugging than implementing a fix.

In order to know where to begin when looking at the performance of an application, it’s important to understand the full flow of information throughout the app so that any critical areas/bottlenecks could be identified.

• In this scenario the diagram shown in Figure 2 represents the key processes taking place in the app. The producer of the messages (audit events) fires them onto a Broker (a Kafka queue), from which they are consumed by the application (reporting-ms) and stored in a database.

Each of these areas could be to blame for the slow processing times and so it was important that each was investigated in turn to ensure the appropriate solution could be designed.

The steps decided for the investigation were therefore:

Investigate audit-enquiry performance
- This app is the producer of the messages for the CTF tests – if this application takes too long to put the messages onto the broker, it would increase the time taken for a full set to be processed and committed.
Investigate pod performance
- These pods allocate resource to reporting-ms – if the app is not allocated enough memory/CPU then it would cause performance issues,and explain the issue of idle pods under load.
Investigate database load
- As this is Aurora based, we have a separate instance for reading/writing. It is important to understand whether these are resource bound to ensure adequate performance takes place.
Investigate application (reporting-ms) performance
- The application parses the incoming messages and prepares them for storage in the database. If there are inefficiencies in the code this could also decrease performance.

The investigation

Audit-enquiry
- 100s of audit messages could be added per second meaning this was ruled out as the cause of the issues.
Pod Resource Allocation
- Looking at metrics in Grafana it was possible to see that the pods never hit more than 60% of their allocated CPU/memory thresholds, meaning they were not resource bound.
Database load
- As seen in Figure 3, it is possible to see that the database was hitting 90% or more CPU usage during the CTF tests, indicating the issue lay in the area between reporting-ms and the database.

As mentioned above, no stack trace was available for the team to rely on. No exceptions were being fired and other than slow processing times all seemed to be well with the application. The only way forward was to create our own set of logging to try and peel back the layers of pain and decipher what area required a quick amputation.

The first iteration of this logging did not go well. The key processes had been identified, each one surrounded by a simple timer, and a flashy new set of logs were being seen in the console output. Unfortunately, 99% of the time was appearing under one of these processes, and database reads/writes were seemingly instantaneous. This, as one of the team more eloquently described at the time, did not seem right (rephrased for your viewing), especially considering the extreme CPU usage seen above. Once again, the tool shed had to be reopened, spades retrieved, and more digging into the problem begun.

The cause of our logging woes turned out to be an @Transactional annotation that surrounded our audit-message processing. This processing prevented the actual commits to the database from taking place on the areas indicated in the code itself. With this in mind, the second iteration of logging was released, and a much more insightful set of metrics could be seen in the console log. The output of these metrics can be seen below in Figure 4.

Reporting-ms
- The statistics mentioned above were added to track performance time of key processes inside the app. As seen in Figure 4, the database retrieval time was almost 90% of the total processing time, further validating our theory that this was the cause of the issue.
- By turning on Hibernate’s ‘show-sql’ feature it was possible to see that 20+ select queries were run per processed message. The cause of this was eager loading on the entities (all information linked to the incoming message was being retrieved from the database).

The solution/results

With the investigation complete and the root cause revealed, the team eagerly set upon implementing a solution.

The resolution in this scenario was to add a lazy-load implementation to the entities within reporting-ms and cache any of the key lookup tables that weren’t too large/unlikely to change. By adding this strategy, the number of select queries run against the database per message were reduced from 20+ to 5 or less.

A day or two later and application_v2 was ready for deployment. Thankfully (for the sake of our mental well-being), the CTF results returned a much more positive outlook this time! More in-depth results of this implementation can be seen in some of the below screenshots of database CPU usage and average audit message processing times. In particular, the 90% reduction in processing time was brilliant to see and the team were delighted with the corresponding time saves and improvements in the test runs.

Find out more about our secure application development capabilities.

Oceans of Data – An Online Hack

Posted on: 29 November 2021

Back in October 2021, CACI took part in the Northumbrian Waters Innovation Festival. One of the events we participated in was the Oceans of Data hack sponsored by Sia Partners – Chris, Ian, Matt and Myself (Paul) all attended remotely representing CACI. The data hack wasn’t scheduled to start until the Tuesday, but a kick-off event was being held on the Monday morning, the highlight of which was an impromptu workout session run by none other than Mr Motivator himself; it was high energy fun and exhausting! If you want to see just how exhausting… watch this.

Taking the rest of the day to recover from that, we got hold of the data sets being provided for the data hack under an NDA and set about our challenge. For the Oceans of Data challenge, we were asked how can we leverage insights from our ocean of operational data to make our services even more reliable and resilient?

“Data introduction: In 2019, NWG invested in Cloud technology to capture and store the vast volumes of data generated by our 30+ SCADA systems – now creating almost 45 million data records per day. While great progress has been made to extract value from this data, we are confident that much more insight can be generated about the performance of our assets, their rate of deterioration and the way they respond to changing operational conditions”.

The data provided was broken down into two broadly distinct sets of data:

Work Order information out of their Asset Management System (Maximo).
Sensor data from their extant SCADA networks across several sewage treatment plants. There was also some supplementary information provided, including an asset classification hierarchy that Northumbrian Water have crafted and a series of SCADA Mimics (high level process flows).

The stated objective of the data hack was to provide a path to holistic analysis of the data, particularly, correlating sensor data to work order data providing a history of activity leading up to corrective work orders. This historic information could then be used in predictive modelling of future failure; thereby turning all the reactive maintenance activity (which is relatively time consuming and costly) into scheduled maintenance activity (which is planned, less disruptive and much cheaper).

Day 1

The hack consisted of presentations by Northumbrian Water around the operating of sewage treatment plants, to provide us with a basic understanding of the business, forming the teams for the hack and a first pass at data analysis; working out what could and could not be done in the rest of the time available.

The event had an amazing mix of people attending, ranging from data scientists and machine learning (ML) experts to software engineering expertise. My team consisted of software engineering specialists, which worked well for our chosen idea as our teams abundant Java and React experience proved invaluable. Along with the experts attending, we could also call on our own ML and data scientists within CACI if we needed any advice.

Having dived into the data, Team CACI decided to play to our strengths and develop something, focusing on the data sets in isolation and hopefully providing Northumbrian Water with a new way of interpreting their data.

Day 2

We spent the day preparing the data into machine readable formats and finalising the approach for the application and then actually building it. We chose to provide a heatmap analysis of the two datasets, with Work Orders being visualised across the asset classification hierarchy and Sensor data being visualised across the SCADA Mimics (high level process flow diagrams) that had been made available.

Day 3

Day 3 was focused on refining the application – bug fixing, visual styling, cutting bits we had no time for (such is the way of the hackathon!) – and creating the presentation, which included the demo that we would show the judging panel.

Unfortunately, we ran out of time on the sensor data visualisation, so that hit the cutting room floor. This allowed us to focus on bug fixing the application and making it look more like the asset classification hierarchy we had been shown – making it relatable to Northumbrian Water.

The afternoon of Day 3 was spent presenting the solutions from all the teams and being judged. As the presentations progressed (Team CACI had opted to go last) a common theme arose: correlating the two data sets was very difficult and to do it with any degree of accuracy/success would require more data.

We were the only team who had made a working proof of concept, while others had focused on presentations. Our interactive website that the judges could play with was well received. The fact that we had used Northumbrian Water’s own asset classification hierarchy was positively acknowledged and provoked quite a bit of interest. We were then subjected to some questioning by the judging panel before they retired to select the category winners.

I am delighted to announce that we won the Best Data Visualisation category:

The CACI data hackathon team really impressed the judges with their solution, a prototype data visualisation to help direct our maintenance teams toward our most problematic assets, structured to represent our asset hierarchy in clear format to enable rapid insights. We enjoyed working with the team who remained enthusiastic despite the challenging task we’d set for them! Thank you and well done.

Northumbrian Waters

Takeaways from the Event

There were a few takeaways from the data hack and the event as a whole:

With preparation, virtual events of this kind can really work, congratulations to Northumbrian Water for putting on such a successful event.
As ever, time is your enemy, the teams only had about 16 working hours available to us to produce something and everybody made the absolute most out of the time allowed.
Finally, this was a team effort, but massive thanks to Chris, Ian and Matt who did all the hard work, I just presented it at the end. Not forgetting Ryan who nominated us, and the Critical National Infrastructure team, for selecting the event.

For more information on the event and our proof of concept expertise, or our wider CACI capabilities, contact us at cni@caci.co.uk.

How to spot a failing outsourced relationship

Posted on: 8 November 2021

A relationship breakdown is never easy, not least when it’s with your IT outsourcing partner. But what makes a seemingly good relationship go bad, and can you spot the signs of impending IT outsourcing failure before it’s too late? To get some insight from both sides of the relationship, we asked Backbone Connect Co-founder and Director, David McLeod, as well as our own CACI Network Services Sales Director, Liam Delaney, to share their outsourcing experiences, reveal the red flags to watch, and the secret to maintaining a successful relationship with an IT outsourcing partner. Here’s what they told us…

1. Communication has broken down

One of the earliest warning signs that your relationship with your IT outsourcing partner is flagging is that the frequency of your communication has dropped. “There’s always a honeymoon period with any new outsourcing relationship – the energy levels are high, and contact is constant,” explains David. “The issues arise when that contact becomes less routine and conversations turn forced and fractious,” he continues.

“Confusion about how a team should communicate with their outsourcing partner can also lead to protracted conversations and frustrations from both sides of the relationship if they’re not clearly defined at the outset,” says Liam. Further, changes over time can significantly contribute to communication barriers. “Through the duration of any long-term outsourcing relationship, team members leave, and a legacy starts to develop, which limits the potential of your outsourcing partnership,” says David. Liam agrees, “Whenever there’s a major personnel change on either side of the partnership, it’s time to review the service and make sure that it’s still meeting your needs.”

2. The vision has become (or already was) blurry

While both David and Liam agree that a successful IT outsourcing relationship is one that evolves over time, Liam highlights the necessity of starting the relationship with clear expectations. “You can’t outsource a problem that you can’t define,” he warns. “Outsourcing partnerships can bring a wealth of expertise and experience into your team as well as achieve cost savings, but you need to be clear on what success you’re looking to achieve.” If the goals aren’t clear, it can be difficult for an outsourcing provider to take effective action.

David also advocates working with outsourcing partners whose cultural values align with your business to ensure longevity in the relationship. “Your business’s culture is the one constant, unchangeable thing, so it should be one of the key measures you use when considering any potential outsourcing provider.” He adds, “Put simply, if you’re wearing t-shirts, and they arrive in business suits, you’re likely to have a problem.”

3. Fingers are being pointed

“When something goes wrong and blame is being thrown around, you stop being on the same team and your pathway forward becomes blocked,” says David. Liam agrees, “A good outsourcing provider is one that acts as an extension of your team, always looking to add value and deliver positive outcomes, especially when tackling an unexpected challenge.”

While it’s important to understand why a problem has occurred, both David and Liam agree that maintaining open, honest and constant communication can ensure both sides of an outsourcing relationship resolve conflicts and challenges together, although David notes that “when you seem to have a stream of issues, a stigma can become attached to the outside party, making it difficult for that partnership to continue effectively if it’s not addressed.”

Liam says that establishing a communications flow which facilitates continuous feedback is one way to avoid minor problems becoming bigger issues, although he also acknowledges the value in a proactive vendor – “At CACI, we’re always trying to anticipate our clients’ potential roadblocks and challenges, so we’re providing solutions before something becomes a problem.”

4. Your contract has become a constraint

A contract provides both parties in an outsourcing relationship the benefit of structure and protection, but it can become a barrier to progress when projects pivot in a new direction. Working with a vendor that can be flexible and offer an element of elasticity in their approach can help to avoid partners becoming stuck in a bind.

However, the size of an outsourcing provider can also impact on how agile a partner can afford to be, warns David. “Smaller organisations are typically more agile than bigger providers, but they can be highly volatile as they grow and evolve, which can lead to issues later. On the flip side, a very large outsourcing provider may not be able to offer the personal, value-add partnership that you’re looking for.”

Liam also advises that businesses pay attention to the finer details when firming up their outsourcing requirement. “It’s important to consider the unexpected and unusual use case scenarios. You can’t capture everything, but having awareness and alerting your vendor of the potential changes and challenges ahead means they can be prepared to act and adapt, preventing your project from coming to a standstill.”

5. You’re not growing together

“A clear sign that your outsourced relationship isn’t working is when you start to feel anchored,” says David. An outsourced relationship that continues to evolve and enhance your business as it grows is one that is truly valuable according to our experts. One way to form a relationship that adds long-term value is to select an outsourcing partner that has a wider capability offering. “I’m always thinking about the longevity of a relationship, looking beyond the initial requirement, and thinking about what else we can do to add value to our clients,” says Liam.

Nonetheless, capability isn’t the only thing to look out for. As Liam explains, having a future-focused mindset is also critical to a long-standing relationship. “I believe that the most successful partnerships are the ones where the provider brings both vision and value. They’re not just focused on what the client currently does, but they’re looking at what else they can be doing to improve.”

However, both our experts noted that, like any relationship, an outsourcing relationship requires investment and trust to realise its full potential. “It’s all about building and nurturing a partnership,” says Liam. David agrees and adds, “Trust is critical, and it’s not established overnight. Take the time to get the basics right – once you’ve got that with the right partner, you can achieve much bigger things.”

Looking for an outsourcing partner to help with your network operations? Contact our expert team today.