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So far tlgadmin has created 185 blog entries.

HIPAA IS Leading Concern FOR CIOs

IPswitch conducted a recent survey of 100,000 end users who were asked about their most challenging compliance issues. According to the survey, compliance with the Health Information Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) was the clear winner for the top spot. Of the 100,000, 38.2% chose HIPAA and second place came in at 29.3% held by Sarbanes Oxley Act (SOX). The next closest competitor for IT concern was compliance with the Federal Information Security Management Act (FISMA) at a mere 9.2.

HIPAA IS Leading Concern FOR CIOs2011-04-01T04:21:00-07:00

Beware Of How You Answer Audit Or Assessment Questions

If you are regulated under any of the myriad government and industry regulations from ITAR, FIPS, CLETS and PCI, to HIPAA and Red flags, the process of responding to security, integrity, and availability verification is not a simple exercise. It is more than answering questions in the positive. Polices, procedures and declarations of compliance are contracts with your company, partners, clients and government regulatory bodies. What do I mean?

Beware Of How You Answer Audit Or Assessment Questions2011-04-01T04:20:00-07:00

What Can We Learn From The Disaster In Japan?

Disasters are a horrible thing. We can only hope to never have our lives and loved ones involved first hand. But disasters do happen and almost all of us will experience the pain and misery ourselves at different points in our lives. The key is to mitigate the loss and pain through careful preparation. During a disaster our first concern will be for the safety and protection of those closest to us. Once that is secured, we will all begin the transition back to normal life and work.

I have had many tell me that in a disaster they are not going to care about their servers and the PCs at the office. That is true however, at some point, normal life must return. So how do you do that? You must have a disaster recovery plan in place. It must have several components:

What Can We Learn From The Disaster In Japan?2011-03-15T00:58:00-07:00

1.7 Million Patient Records In Massive Data Heist At NYC Hospitals

All I can say is “WOW!” I wonder how much this is going to cost the hospitals. How much damage is done to their reputation? What kind of government settlement, oversight and years of scrutiny will this cost the hospitals when the regulatory agencies are done negotiating with them on penalties and remediation?

Here is the gist of the story:

Thieves made off with the personal health records of an estimated 1.7 million New Yorkers' when they stole backup tapes from four Bronx hospitals In December. According to statement issued by the 14-hospital system on Feb. 11, computer backup tapes were stolen containg the records. The report came just days after the New York City Health and Hospitals Corporation began notifying victims Feb. 9. While it took HHC nearly two months before reporting the data breach, it was well within the 60-day period required by New York state law.

1.7 Million Patient Records In Massive Data Heist At NYC Hospitals2019-04-09T00:25:53-07:00

What Are Your RTO And RPO?

I just had a meeting with one of Alvaka's IT consultants regarding the development of a disaster recovery and business continuity plan for a financial services client of hers. A year ago the client had a very nearly disastrous weather related IT event that could have slammed the whole company beyond imagination. During a heavy downpour a major leak opened up on the roof and dumped significant amounts of water right onto the client’s primary server rack. The servers were so flooded that during the recovery process the techs actually had to de-rack the servers and tilt them over in order to pour out the water. Full disaster was averted when

What Are Your RTO And RPO?2018-05-07T08:51:30-07:00

Warning – Know Thy Back-Up

Know what you are backing up and know what you need to back-up.
They are not always the same thing.

During the course of writing this series of blogs on backup and disaster recovery I thought I would throw in a few anecdotal stories along the way. I just got out of a meeting with one of my key managers. We were talking about a long time client and a huge backup problem that was just uncovered.

Warning – Know Thy Back-Up2011-01-28T01:54:00-08:00

Why The Interest In The VCIO?

We are winding down 2010. As I look back at the recent months to assess the trends for 2011, one thing stands out most prominently. That one thing is the VCIO or the Virtual Chief Information Officer. While I don’t particularly like that term, it is perhaps the most intuitive description for someone who serves in a part-time contract role as the CIO for small to mid-size businesses.

From my vantage point, I see three primary drivers behind the increased demand for IT experts serving in the role. Those three drivers are...

Why The Interest In The VCIO?2020-04-08T23:29:02-07:00

Business Continuity Planning Made Easy

I am flying back from a small, private and exclusive invitation-only conference in Chicago. This conference is only open to industry's most esteemed and established IT service providers. The private technology briefings, at this semi-annual event, provide the best updates on cool new stuff that solves real business problems.

Business Continuity Planning Made Easy2020-01-06T20:32:02-08:00

Is 24×7 IT Availability Really Required?

This is a question posed to me by, Aaron Goldberg of Ziff Davis Publishing and Eric Lundquist of Ziff Davis Publishing, during an IBM sponsored webinar this morning.

The fundamental questions focused around two areas, starting with, "Do Information Technology (IT) shops need to staff and prep for 24x7 operations?" In a polling question, 81% said, “Yes” they do need to do that. The subsequent discussion revolved around what options IT shops have to do that since they normally don’t have the budget, nor the human resources, required to do server monitoring and application monitoring combined with after hours staffing and remediation of issues. One solution to avoid building your own, was to contract with a firm that can provide augmented support 16x5 or 1

Is 24×7 IT Availability Really Required?2020-04-08T23:29:49-07:00

Are You An IT Hostage?

If you are a business owner, CEO, CFO or otherwise ultimately responsible for Information Technology (IT) in your organization, here are a few questions that you may have asked yourself at some point. If my IT staff or service provider were to suddenly fall off the map or just not show up, for whatever reason, would my company be left in a ditch?

 
Are You An IT Hostage?2020-04-08T23:30:33-07:00