“We know UK businesses are ready to do more than just talk about this issue because it’s on the agenda of every CIO we speak to,” explains James Rigby, MD of SCC. “The consumerisation of IT is already happening in the workplace and it’s happening in every company right now. There are many fundamental questions that organisations have to consider. For example, do they know how many staff-owned smart phones, iPads and laptops are already on their networks and do they know what they’re doing on them? These are big questions and there are compelling reasons as to why it is necessary to know the answers.”

The consumerisation of IT, which is the process that brings personal productivity and social networking elements – both hardware and software – into the workplace environment, is a hot topic. The most recent available Gartner research says it is an issue that needs to be understood so business IT can cope with the demands placed on its networks today and in the future. As consumer technologies increasingly penetrate the workplace, organisations must have a strategy that copes with consumer email and communication services like instant messaging (IM) and voice over IP (VoIP); blogs, social networks and other web 2.0 services; unmanaged mobile devices; network management and remote connectivity.

The generation currently entering the workforce now regard such technologies as part of everyday life and as a result SCC is working with major brands to create an opportunity from this challenge. The company reports that forward thinking companies are exploring ways to meet the issue head on by subsidising employee laptops – wrapping business and productivity benefits together with a desirable staff benefits package.

Meanwhile, the company points out that the major issues driving the IT industry today are part of a bigger consumerisation picture. Whether considering virtualisation, Desktop as a Service, cloud computing, VDI, Windows 7 or collaboration – each represents aspects of the consumerisation of IT and all need to be wrapped into an organisation’s vision for its business strategy.

An overwhelming 96 percent of the respondents to Fortify Software’s poll at this year’s DEF CON 2010 hacker conference said they believed the cloud would open up more hacking opportunities for them. This is being driven, says Barmak Meftah, chief products officer with Fortify specialist, by the belief that cloud vendors are not doing enough to address the security issues of their services.

“89 percent of respondents said they believed this was the case and, when you analyse this overwhelming response in the light of the fact that 45 percent of hackers said they had already tried to exploit vulnerabilities in the cloud, you begin to see the scale of the problem,” he said. “While only 12 percent said they hacked cloud systems for financial gain, that still means a sizeable headache for any IT manager planning to migrate their IT resources into the cloud.”.

According to Meftah, when you factor in the prediction from numerous analysts that at the start of 2010 twenty percent of businesses would have their IT resources in the cloud within four years you begin to appreciate the potential scale and complexity of the security issues involved.

“In the many predictions,” explained Meftah, “twenty percent of organisations would own no appreciable IT assets, but would instead rely on cloud computing resources – the same resources that 45 percent of the DEF CON 2010 attendees in the survey cheerfully admitted to already having tried to hack.”

Breaking down the survey responses, 21 percent believe that Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) cloud systems are viewed as being the most vulnerable, with 33 percent of the hackers having discovered public DNS vulnerabilities, followed by log files (16 percent) and communication profiles (12 percent) in their cloud travels.

“More than anything, this research confirms our ongoing observations that cloud vendors – as well as the IT software industry as a whole – need to redouble their governance and security assurance strategies when developing solutions, whether cloud-based or not, as all IT systems will eventually have to support a cloud resource,” he added. “It is of great concern to us that the message about software assurance has still to get through to everyone in the software development community, and the DEF CON survey results strengthen our resolve to get this message across to as large an audience as possible.”

www.fortify.com

This year’s A level results show that the number of students studying ICT and computing courses is down for the sixth year running, despite there being an overall skills shortage across the UK of skilled IT professionals. Davin Yap CEO of software company comments: “If this worrying trend continues we won’t have any choice but to look oversees to fill the shortfall.

The UK more than holds its own on the IT world stage and the quality of our technology graduates is very high but a lack of fresh blood will just make a scarce resource even scarcer,” he said. “The Government needs to recognise the value of the UK industry as a major export resource and encourage students to study more useful subjects such as technology as opposed to ‘basket weaving’ courses which are of little value to the wider economy.”

And as number of GCSE ICT students drops again, the need for the addition of information security topics has been raised by IT professionals. Fears have been expressed by the Royal Society that ICT GCSE lessons are ‘too boring’.

Symantec’s Tony Osborn believes that this pattern can be ended by putting a greater focus on teaching students about cybercrime and information security. “Students today have grown-up surrounded by computers. By the time they reach GCSE level they are already skilled enough on a computer to do most jobs. If we are going to extend their interest in ICT we need to find topics that make the subject appeal to them, as well as teach them. Information security should be included within the curriculum. As a volunteer speaker for the charity, ChildNet, I have been into many classrooms and taught students of the dangers that surround them online. Talking to them about topics such as poisoned Facebook applications, dirty music downloads and credit card phishing attacks gains their interest far more than the more bland aspects of ICT ever will.”

In addition, there is a responsibility on parents to increase their knowledge of internet threats as children are often far more knowledgeable than parents in these areas. Osborn concludes: “Students too often look at ICT without realising there is a fun and rewarding side to it. We should be aiming to make them aware of information security both to educate them about the risks and to urge the next generation of cyber security experts to step forward.”

“The real theme of our time seems to be ‘doing more with less’ and clearly IT is the key to this process. The VitAL Focus Groups aim to equip its delegates with the tools to cut costs while improving their service levels,” comments VitAL editor Matt Bailey. “While June 2011 is nearly a year away, I suspect we can safely assume that the economic situation, while unpredictably fluid and dynamic in many respects, will still be forcing companies to drive out cost.”

Key expert industry suppliers are supporting the event including Pink Elephant, Infravision, Kepner Tragoe, Cherwell Software and Wardown Consulting.

The VitAL Focus Groups will consist of fifteen syndicate rooms, each a forum to discuss a specialist subject for IT managers. With some of the industry’s leading minds on hand to help facilitate and steer each session, we predict that they will quickly become a ‘must-attend’ event for anyone serious about IT in the modern environment.

In addition there will be networking opportunities available as well as a small exhibition area where delegates can interact with their peers and source the latest products and services.

The VitAL Focus Groups are open to all professionals within the IT industry although complimentary places are limited to 120 and are offered to managers, directors, and board executives on a first come first served basis.

www.vitalfocusgroups.com

With spending cuts still firmly on the agenda, application modernisation was the preferred method of reducing outgoings, with almost two thirds (63 percent) of the UK’s respondents saying that it offered the best way of reducing IT costs. More than 80 percent also said that modernisation is important to their current IT strategy, with 86 percent either currently working on a modernisation project or having completed one in the last two years.

Among those that had completed modernisation projects, 70 percent claimed it had enabled them to reduce their overall IT operating costs, 63 percent had been able to support future business growth through modernisation, 60 percent said it has increased the speed of their operations or reaction time, and 55 percent claimed it has improved the agility of their business, ensuring their IT can react to business opportunities more quickly.

The study shows that, despite widespread optimism that the UK’s economy may finally be regaining momentum, budgetary constraints remain a fact of life for most businesses. With half of the companies surveyed still experiencing budget cuts, ‘doing more with less’ and investing in technology projects with a fast, tangible ROI remains the focus for the post-credit crunch CIO.

“Application modernisation has clearly been the unsung trend of the IT industry over the last 12 months, and is set to remain so for the immediate future,” comments Stuart McGill, CTO of the surveys sponsor, Micro Focus. “And with large projects realising tangible savings of millions of pounds in just a few years it is easy to see why. CIOs and IT professionals are being asked to do two things at once: cut even more costs and innovate to meet customer demands. They should remember that the savings they make by migrating their mainframe applications to more modern architectures can actually be reinvested into new projects, so they can in fact achieve both aims at the same time.”

Richard Holway, chairman of analyst firm TechMarketView LLP said, “One of the abiding themes of our research for the last decade has been ‘more for less’ – first in private sector IT and now very much the key topic in the public sector too. Saving money on IT doesn’t have to mean throwing everything away and starting again. Doing things in a more intelligent manner is often a smarter move.”

The chip, a refined version of the ID chips used to track animals, has been programmed to open security doors for him and to unlock his mobile phone automatically. Dr Gasson told BBC News: “With the benefits of this type of technology come risks. We may improve ourselves in some way but much like the improvements with other technologies, mobile phones for example, they become vulnerable to risks, such as security problems and computer viruses.”

As the UK starts to see signs of recovery, 64 percent of businesses and organisations admitted they will be investing in IT to help drive business forward. Just six percent said they would take a ‘wait and see’ approach to the recovery. The research also revealed that due to the demand for more flexible solutions to solve the skills shortage resulting from the recession, IT managed services are becoming a growth area.

“Our survey showed that businesses are understandably being cautious with regards to investing in recruitment, despite the fact that we’re coming out of recession,” comments Alastair Kitching, chief operating officer at Esteem Systems. “However, 95 percent of the businesses we questioned believe it’s vitally important to continue to invest in IT solutions, with 61 percent identifying managed services as a preferred approach. Businesses are clearly putting IT at the heart of their plan for recovery, and managed systems are increasingly being seen as the best vehicle to deliver that recovery in IT. This is because the current climate may still be too unstable to commit to recruiting more staff, and there is also a real need to relieve the pressure on overstretched IT departments.”

GAC UK, part of the GAC Group, a global shipping, logistics and marine services provider, participated in the survey and said managed services was the right solution because it provided the skills they needed at the time. A spokesman says, “One of the bonuses of using managed services is that certain skill sets are more readily available to me at the time I need them, rather than employing a number of IT staff direct.”

Kitching concludes, “Skills that have been lost due to the cuts made over the past 12 to 18 months are more easily replaced by buying-in that expertise. It may be that businesses still fear a double dip recession could be around the corner and feel that a managed service is a more flexible solution at this time.”

The coalition says it will take steps to open up government procurement and reduce costs; publish government ICT contracts online; create a level playing field for open-source software and will enable large ICT projects to be split into smaller components.

Although the previous Labour administration had set out an aim to encourage the use of open source software and methods in government projects, it reportedly gained little traction. Last year it said that open source should be on an equal footing with proprietary systems and that ‘procurement decisions will be made on the basis on the best value for money solution to the business requirement, taking account of total lifetime cost of ownership of the solution, including exit and transition costs, after ensuring that solutions fulfil minimum and essential capability, security, scalability, transferability, support and manageability requirements.’ It also added that the government ‘will, wherever possible, avoid becoming locked in to proprietary software’.

The coalition also stressed its commitment to rolling out ‘superfast’ broadband to all areas: “We will introduce measures to ensure the rapid roll-out of superfast broadband access across the country. We will ensure that BT and other infrastructure providers allow the use of their assets to introduce superfast broadband in remote areas at the same time as in more populated areas. If necessary, we will consider using part of the TV licence fee that is supporting digital switch over to fund broadband in areas that the market alone will not reach.”

Half of the IT security professionals also admitted to hacking, with 73 percent of these respondents doing so to test the strength of their own network’s defences, 13 percent for fun or out of curiosity, and three percent targeting their efforts at the competition.

The survey also unearthed that, amongst the 300 IT security professionals interviewed (with the majority taken from companies employing 1,000 plus employees), 31 percent admitted to being victims of hacking. Interestingly, with 29 percent replyed ‘don’t know’. The majority of respondents cited the application layer to be the hackers’ main target.

57 percent of the IT security profession also confer that the best way to check that their software applications are free of vulnerabilities and secure is to combine all available techniques and solutions, including code and static analysis, web application firewalls, application scanners and pen testing. Only 5 percent of the survey respondents we spoke to said their organisations didn’t employ technology for software security.

The European Code of Conduct for Data Centres, which has been in place since the start of this year, has the support of ninety-six business participants and endorsers, it standardises the measurement of power consumption, utility and efficiency in the data centre and encourages best practice across the sector.

“As we plan the first data centres under the new Code of Conduct we’re looking at new ways of doing things – this is ‘data centre 2.0’, a leap forward in the way we use power and the efficiencies we deliver,” comments Alex Rabbetts, managing director of Migration Solutions. “The greener data centre is the key issue for the industry today. It is vital that we have our own house in order so we are ready to play a significant role in the development of the growing number of environmental ‘smart society’ projects, incorporating smart  grid, smart cities and smart transportation projects, all of which rely on data processing and data centres for their success.”