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As the novel coronavirus known as COVID-19 continues to spread around the globe and throughout the U.S., companies everywhere are hurrying to take or follow containment protocols. Chief among them is the effort to stop people from gathering together, which includes steps to immediately cancel conferences and events, and to push more workers to work from home. And while those efforts are important in containing the highly contagious disease, they also open the doors to a sharp rise in cyberattacks.

Sungard AS’ Asher de Metz

We asked Asher de Metz, security consulting senior manager at Sungard Availability Services, to explain this correlation between disease containment and risk spread so that MSSPs will know what to look for, advise on – and possibly lock down – to protect their clients from a new cyberattack outbreak.

Channel Futures: What are the increased security risks when people start working from home?

Asher de Metz: The main security risks occur when technology is removed from a place that it can be controlled. Taking laptops home opens up risks of physical theft, so companies need to ensure that laptops are encrypted. It also means that remote access needs to be opened up, but this access should be controlled with limited rights, and multifactor authentication should also be utilized.

The most common mistake employees make during this transition is a lack of preparedness. As such, network access is opened up quickly without thought to security, leaving the company open and vulnerable to attack.

CF: Are some technologies riskier than others for remote workers?

ADM: Yes, remote workers are most at risk when using solutions that aren’t owned and centrally controlled by the company. One example of this may be when employees do not have a laptop assigned to them and they have to use their own personal computer to login to a VPN for work.

The personal computer may not have the right security in place with up-to-date security patches, AV or may already be infected, which can open up the company to a breach since it’s connected to the main network via VPN.

To mitigate this, organizations should provide company laptops to employees. Additionally, the VPN needs to be setup to ensure that connections can only be made from systems with a baseline security level. The system should then be placed into a space that is segmented, controlled and monitored so that it only has the minimum amount of access necessary to complete the employee’s job.

CF: Are there any best practices to manage a situation like the coronavirus?

ADM: From a cybersecurity perspective for remote workers, organizations must ensure that business continuity plans that include cybersecurity rules are in place. It is important that the plans limit access, and that all employees are trained to know how to act and use the technology in case of an emergency.

CF: What are the threats of someone tapping into a video conference launched or participated in by home workers?

ADM: All video conferencing should be encrypted, setup with MFA and be controlled from a central IT source. This will reduce the threat of it being hacked and eavesdropping on calls, which is critical if proprietary information is being shared on conference lines.

CompTIA, the trade association for the IT industry, has three new executive council members for its Emerging Technology Community.

Launched in 2018, the community focuses on trends such as artificial intelligence, the internet of things, and 5G wireless technology. The community analyzes these technology markets and helps companies parse how to use these technologies to drive revenue, reduce cost or bring efficiency to their operations.

“It is the role of CompTIA to digest these technologies and educate around their business use case,” said Maddy Martin, head of growth and education at Smith.ai and vice chair of the council. “We focus on the technologies that will move the needle and identify skill sets that will be needed [by the workforce] in the future.”

Three executives join the council: Jeff Benedetti, vice president for sale and marketing, Skout Cybersecurity; Matt Dukowski, senior manager, product management, SYNNEX Canada; and James Saldanha, client executive, Tech Data Canada.

Diversity of perspective and industry was key to the council’s additions.

“They all come to the table with a different perspective,” said Steven Ostrowski, CompTIA’s director of media relations. “That is the driving factor behind how we try and populate these different communities.”

Returning council members include Ted Cole, vice president of channels and strategic partners, GPS Insight; Paul Cronin, CEO, Apogee IT Services; Steven Estabrooks, general manager, Captec Americas; Frank Raimondi, chief consultant, Strategic Channel Concepts; John Rice, president, Think Channel; and Dave Sobel, host of the Business of Tech podcast.

The council produces whitepapers on these technologies, with case studies on company uses. And in just the past few months, the council has also used its research capabilities to craft an online assessment tool for companies that want to understand how to deploy them in their environment.

The Emerging Technology Innovation Assessment tool “helps companies gauge readiness to use some of the new technologies,” Ostrowski said. “You’ve got all this in perspective as to what it means for a business: ‘Can I make money with it? Can I make my business better?’ — not just taking about it at the professorial level. It comes down to the dollars and cents of operating your business.”

Aruba Networks claims that it has delivered the “first and only” family of wireless LAN access points certified as compatible with the new Wi-Fi 6 standard, also known as 802.11ax.

The certification means that the Wi-Fi Alliance, the independent organization that governs wireless networking protocols, has tested all Aruba Wi-Fi 6 WLAN products for compliance with the standard. Wi-Fi 6 network equipment and endpoints that are certified should interoperate together, based on a certification program announced in September. The latest high-end laptops and smartphones – including Apple’s iPhone 11, and Samsung’s Note 10 and the new Galaxy 20 line – now support Wi-Fi 6.

“Aruba leads the industry with the official certification of all the Aruba 500, 510, 530, and 550 Series Wi-Fi 6 access points,” Aruba senior product marketing manager Dave Chen noted in a blog. “Undergoing certification is our commitment to customers that Aruba wireless networks can interoperate with Wi-Fi 6 client devices with no technical impact to your business.”

Aruba, however, didn’t actually launch any new Wi-Fi 6 equipment this week, as the company’s March 5 announcement implied. Rather, the gear certified by the Wi-Fi Alliance applied to Aruba WLAN equipment already shipping for some time, a company spokeswoman confirmed. Some of the WLAN equipment certified this week is relatively new, such as the Aruba 500 series, which the company released in November. Aruba never formally announced the product, according to the spokeswoman.

Effectively, Aruba claims to be the only supplier that can say all of its Wi-Fi 6 products are now certified as interoperable after going through testing by the Wi-Fi Alliance, which may matter to partners that want to assure customers that the gear they’re offering is compatible. Overall, Wi-Fi 6 still only accounts for a minority of wireless LAN products available today. The list of Wi-Fi 6-certfied infrastructure and endpoints started to grow incrementally in January.

As of today, Cisco has the most Wi-Fi 6 certified network products, nine, whereas Aruba has eight, according to a tracker maintained by the Wi-Fi Alliance. Meraki, a Cisco subsidiary that provides network equipment to small and midsize enterprises, also has a portfolio of Wi-Fi 6 gear, with three new models launched last month. As of this week, the Wi-Fi Alliance hasn’t included the new Meraki gear on its list of certified products.

The Wi-Fi Alliance this week also certified gear from Alpha Networks and EnGenius Technologies. Other WLAN suppliers that have successfully undergone Wi-Fi 6 certification include Linksys, Mercury and ZTE.

Certification is important to make sure handsets and access points are interoperable, said Neil Anderson, senior director of network solutions at World Wide Technology, which offers Wi-Fi 6 equipment from several suppliers.

“I think for Wi-Fi 6, the certifying body has taken an additional step to ensure that the OEMs not only comply with the protocols at Layer 1 and 2 but also implement the functionality that is unique to Wi-Fi 6 — like beamforming and wake time,” Anderson said. “This will allow Wi-Fi 6 to get to a fully functional state a lot faster than Wi-Fi 5, which let OEMs roll out capabilities in stages.”

After close consultation with our partners in the industry and as the situation has changed rapidly, we have made the difficult decision to postpone Channel Partners Conference & Expo 2020. 

With the rapidly developing circumstances and in light of corporate travel considerations continuing to escalate, we’ve worked as quickly as possible to explore our options.

Having spent the past year preparing for the event with our advisory boards, speakers, exhibitors and event partners, we’re genuinely disappointed not to be able to host you this coming week, but the experience and safety of our community and everyone involved in the event continues to be our top priority.

Channel Partners Conference & Expo in Las Vegas, March 9-12, 2020, is officially postponed, with the intention to announce a new date shortly. Exhibitors and attendees will be contacted with further information regarding booth contracts and registrations. 

As always, we would like to thank everyone who helps to make the event possible and recognize that our event does not happen without your support. We appreciate the open discussions and encouragement. The conversations we’ve had over the last several days have proven how lucky we all are to be part of this supportive, tight-knit industry. As everyone has been reminding us, great things happen when the community comes together and connects at Channel Partners events. 

The difficult but prudent decision to cancel tech events over health concerns about the spreading coronavirus, both here and abroad, has swept across the industry.

This began, most notably, when large vendors such as Amazon, Cisco, Facebook and Intel, to name a few, pulled the plug on their attendance, in early February, at Mobile World Congress (MWC), Barcelona, scheduled for later that month. MWC event organizers ultimately cancelled the conference.

Since that time, tech industry events that draw tens of thousands of attendees, sponsors and exhibitors are being cancelled with some vendors promising to reschedule; others will create a virtual experience to deliver some of the originally planned content.

This wave of postponements and cancellations certainly has impacted the Channel Partners/Channel Futures family, as we last week officially postponed our Channel Partners Conference & Expo, originally slated for March 9-12. Stay tuned for updates on when, where, and in what form, it will return.

IBM Think 2020, a client and developer conference, and PartnerWorld, for business partners, are being recreated as a global, digital-first event, May 5-7, the same dates that were planned for the now canceled, physical event in San Francisco. 

Late last week, Dell Technologies canceled is annual Las Vegas event, Dell Technologies World 2020, May 4-7, and will be posting updates about a virtual event soon.

“The core of what we set out to accomplish together is still important, which is why we will deliver keynotes, select breakout sessions and live chats with experts as a virtual experience,” the vendor posted on the event website. 

Red Hat cancelled its physical event (April 27-29) and is offering a virtual experience April 28-29. 

Other cancelled events: Aruba Atmosphere 2020 (March 22-27); Cisco Partner Connection Week (March 23-26); Cisco Live (May 31-June 4); F5 Agility 2020; Google Cloud Next (April 6-8); ImpartnerCon 2020; Ingram Micro Cloud Summit 2020; (May 12-14); MSPAlliance’s MSPWorld conference (March 15-17); Synnex Spring Varnex and the Red, White & Your (March 29-April 1). 

There are many conferences of interest to partners that are still scheduled as planned. That said, the coronavirus situation is fluid and event planners are monitoring the situation, so attendees are advised to check status updates for cancelations. 

Here’s what we know: 

HPE Discover 2020, scheduled for June 23-25, in Las Vegas, is still scheduled, as is HPE Partner Growth Summit 2020, which runs June 22-24, during the Discover event. VMworld, scheduled for Aug. 31-Sept. 3, in San Francisco, is also still being held as scheduled. 

Others conferences still on the books through the end of May: Build IT 2020, May 17-19, Jersey City, N.J.; Citrix Synergy, May 19-21, Orlando, Florida; Enterprise Connect, March 30-April 2, Orlando; Kasaya Connect IT, May 4-7, Las Vegas; SapphireNow, May 12-14, Orlando; SuiteWorld for Oracle NetSuite, April 20-23, Las Vegas; ServiceNow Knowledge 2020, May 3-7, Orlando; TBI’s Big Event, May 14, Chicago; VeeamOn 2020, May 4-6, Las Vegas; ZertoCon, May 18-20, Hollywood, Florida.

Hyperconverged infrastructure vendor Nutanix has launched a pilot project in EMEA to test the sale of its new cloud bundles, which are combinations of the company’s flagship software designed to make it easier for small-to-medium-size business (SMBs) to use its products.

The Nutanix cloud bundles will be offered for sale through its distributors and channel partners in EMEA and will allow SMBs to deploy a unified management bundle for VMs and containers, files, computing resources, storage and networks, according to the company.

Nutanix’s Cyril Vanagt

“We are simplifying our offering for our channel partners to more easily and quickly propose a solution for customers,” Cyril Vanagt, the senior director of channel sales in EMEA for Nutanix, told Channel Futures. “Instead of having to give quotes on many products separately, we have created nine bundles for them to sell.”

The nine bundles come in three sizes for small, medium and large requirements, as well as in basic, standard and advanced packages, resulting in nine available configurations, said Vanagt. The basic package includes the company’s AOS enterprise cloud operating system, the AHV hypervisor, and Nutanix Prism end-to-end management. The standard package adds the company’s enterprise file storage solution, Nutanix Files, as well as administration automation features from Prism Pro. The advanced package includes all those components, as well as network security and microsegmentation functionality from Nutanix Flow.

“They are all software-only bundles that are compatible with any hardware we support today,” including from HPE, Fujitsu, Lenovo and others,” he said. “We are repackaging them in a simple way for our channel partners and customers.”

The cloud computing offerings are part of a wider focus Nutanix is planning for SMBs and come as an answer to market needs that partners have been sharing with the company, said Vanagt.

“They wanted to work in a more autonomous way, and we heard this mainly in EMEA,” he said.

The pilot program, which will continue for six months through the end of July in EMEA, will then be evaluated for its success by the company to see if it should be continued there and even expanded to other parts of the world, including North America, said Vanagt.

“It came about from strong requests from many partners in the EMEA region to be able to quote prices faster and to promote simpler packaging for our customers,” he said. “I am very confident in the success of this program because it came from requests from our partners.”

Nutanix is continuing to work with partners and distributors to train their staffs to sell and deploy the bundles, as well as provide lead generation and marketing help to boost sales. The bundles will only be available to new customers in EMEA.

Dan Olds, principal analyst with Gabriel Consulting Group, said the SMB-aimed bundles are a good idea for the company.

“This new Nutanix set of offerings gives their channel partners a much needed solution for smaller enterprise customers who are looking to have the same IT options and capabilities as their larger competitors,” said Olds. “To compete effectively, smaller businesses need to have access to more sophisticated IT infrastructures and functionality. This increases the value of their data because it is easier to manage and analyze and also reduces their time to implement new solutions to better acquire and service their customers.”

For EMEA partners who will offer the new bundles, they need to also focus on the business value of these products when talking to their customers, said Olds.

Gabriel Consulting’s Dan Olds

“This will allow them to convince a customer who is thinking, ‘if it’s not broke, don’t fix it,’ by showing them that the opportunities for higher business profitability and gaining more customers outweigh the cost and effort of moving to a new type of enterprise infrastructure,” Olds said.

Another analyst. Laurie McCabe of the SMB Group, agreed.

“Nutanix cloud bundles align with what we are hearing from SMBs — they’re dealing with more complexity and data in the business so they need more comprehensive solutions,” said McCabe. “But they have to be affordable, and easy to set up and use. These types of bundles help address help these needs.”

Nutanix is also making the new offerings easy for its partners, which is a good move, said McCabe.

“It looks like Nutanix focused on making it very channel-friendly too, which is very important in this market because most SMBs rely on the channel to help them to figure out which solutions will best satisfy their requirements. But it can still be very confusing for SMBs — so hopefully Nutanix will also provide its partners with content and resources to help them better educate prospects on the business benefits that these solutions provide.”

Google Cloud has a series of new announcements that point to new sales opportunities for the indirect channel.

The deals – with AT&T, Vodafone, Italy’s Wind Tre and two back-office providers – likely will have a trickle-down effect for managed service providers, independent software vendors, VARs, agents and other partners.

In other words, the telco collaborations do not appear to yield immediate benefit to the indirect channel; right now, they focus on helping service providers themselves achieve digital transformation.

Down the road, however, Google Cloud and AT&T, in specific, will allow ISVs, developers, solution providers and similar entities to build platforms for their enterprise customers, much like creating apps for end users via Google Play. Channel Partners was still waiting for more insight from Google Cloud at the time of publication.

The thrust of the various deals comes down to this: monetizing 5G for business while bringing cloud capabilities to the network edge, where computing takes place at or near the source of the data. (Or, as The Verge so aptly assesses the “edge” buzzword, “It means the cloud is coming to you.”)

Thus, to that point, AT&T in particular will pair its network with Google Cloud’s expertise, relying on the new Anthos for Telecom platform. Anthos, as many channel partners know, hosts applications that can run on existing on-premise hardware and in the public cloud; enterprises then choose the optimal environment on a case-by-case basis.

With Anthos for Telecom and other Google Cloud tools, AT&T will bring its apps to the network edge. This will reduce data costs and latency, and increase security, Eyal Manor, vice president of engineering for Anthos and developer products and tools at Google Cloud, told SiliconANGLE.

Google’s Eyal Manor

“The goal is to push the latest, most modern application development tools to run anywhere,” Manor said. “There’s a lot of rigid legacy infrastructure at the edge, and that slows down innovation.”

Combining cloud computing with 5G should eradicate those rigidities and “help enterprises address real business challenges,” Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian said in a March 5 blog.

But first, the telecom providers themselves must embrace digital transformation; hence, Google Cloud’s newly announced partnerships and the new service it is calling the “Global Mobile Edge Cloud.” GMEC will feature a portfolio and marketplace of 5G solutions built with telcos; an open cloud platform for developing the applications; and a global distributed edge for deploying said solutions.

So far, Google Cloud and AT&T are testing all this in three key verticals: retail, manufacturing and transportation. As they refine the process and results, it’s easy to see how partners will pick up the work, crafting apps and services on behalf of their enterprise customers.

“Combining 5G with Google Cloud’s edge compute technologies can unlock the cloud’s true potential,” Mo Katibeh, executive vice president and chief marketing officer at AT&T Business, said. “This work is bringing us closer to a reality where cloud and edge technologies give businesses the tools to create a whole new world of experiences for their customers.”

Consider, too, that Google Cloud is helping telcos focus on data and analytics through artificial intelligence and machine learning.

“Not only are we able to gain analytics capabilities across … products and services, but also we arrive at …

Data storage company Western Digital’s search for a new CEO, announced in October, has come to an end with the appointment of David Goeckeler, Cisco’s executive vice president and general manager, networking and security business. He’ll replace Stephen D. Milligan, who is retiring.

Western Digital’s David Goeckeler

Goeckeler, a 17-year Cisco veteran, was in charge of the company’s $34 billion global networking and security business and a team of more than 25,000 engineers. He was responsible for security strategy and market acceleration, including development operations for Cisco’s technology portfolio and strategic acquisitions. Cisco has named Todd Nightingale, formerly senior vice president and general manager of Cisco Meraki, as his successor, earning the new title of senior vice president and general manager, enterprise networking and cloud.

“David is a transformative leader with an exceptional track record of driving highly profitable, core businesses at scale while innovating successful business strategies that expanded into new markets and generated new revenue sources,” said Matthew Massengill, chairman of the board for Western Digital. “With experience as a software engineer as well as running large semiconductor development projects, his breadth of technology expertise, business acumen and history of building and operating world-class organizations make him the right person to lead Western Digital in a world increasingly driven by applications and data.”

Cisco’s Todd Nightingale

A nearly $20.7 billion company, Western Digital earlier this week announced new WD Gold NVMe SSDs to help small and medium enterprises (SMEs) transition to NVMe. This latest addition to the vendor’s WD Gold family of products will be available in four capacities to channel partners and end customers early next q8arter, the company said.

“The industry is facing an exciting inflection point where customers of every size, vertical and geography are deploying business infrastructure that is software-driven, enabled by data and powered by the cloud. This megatrend has only just now reached an initial stage of adoption and will drive a massive wave of new opportunity,” said Goeckeler. “In this IT landscape, the explosive growth of connected devices will continue fueling an ever-increasing demand for access to data. With large-scale hard disk drive and semiconductor memory franchises, Western Digital is strongly positioned to capitalize on this emerging opportunity and push the boundaries of both software and physical hardware innovation within an extremely important layer of the technology stack.”

Cisco, as reported by the Silicon Valley Business Journal, held an internal meeting on Thursday, announcing the next phase of strategy for the company, including executive leadership changes and a new engineering team structure.

U.S. companies will add nearly 550,000 new jobs in computer and IT through 2028, a rate higher than the average for all occupations, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Of those jobs, the bureau predicts a 32% growth rate for information security analysts. Women are emerging as cybersecurity experts, with the expectation of a much larger influx of women entering the field.

Women are ascending into senior or leadership positions within their companies, often through different pathways, according to the results of the Women in Cybersecurity Survey to be presented by SANS Institute in two webcasts later this month.

Some 41% of respondents credited being in the right place at the right time for their rise into senior or leadership positions. That means they had to make themselves visible to decision-makers. Others credited having varied experiences (38%) or pursuing certifications (34%) with their rise into a senior or leadership positions, both of which are within the control of the individual.

Mentorships are often part of the process of growing into leadership positions and continuing to grow once taking on such a role; however, only 7% of women in cybersecurity have been mentored by another woman, with 37% mentored by both men and women, and 31% by men alone, which leaves 25% who have never benefited from being mentored.

SANS Institute’s Heather Mahalik

Most survey respondents have done just that, with just 26% not participating in a mentorship relationship. Interestingly, the majority (57%) report mentoring both men and women, a positive sign for growing the leadership role of women in cybersecurity.

To find out more about the growing influence of women in cybersecurity, we spoke with Heather Mahalik, SANS analyst and survey author.

Channel Futures: Why is it important for more women to obtain leadership roles in cybersecurity?

Heather Mahalik: Why not? We have been in the field for quite some time and are gaining traction, so obtaining a leadership role fits the bill. Women taking more leadership roles also promotes attention to younger women who want to enter the field and have career goals to climb the so-called corporate ladder. It’s important to show that leadership in cybersecurity is gender neutral.

CF: How important is mentoring in attracting and opening more doors for women in cybersecurity?

HM: Mentoring is important to everyone. Meeting and knowing the right people can really open doors for you and someone entering the field. I have mentored many people in my life and made introductions for them that have really launched their careers. We need more mentors. Please reach out to someone new to cybersecurity and help pave the way for them.

CF: Are there fewer barriers to women becoming cybersecurity leaders? If so, how?

HM: I would say yes. In my opinion, most companies realize that your work is what matters, not your gender. I know many women who run companies and who have started their own. The days of “she is a woman and doesn’t deserve this” are over.

CF: How does getting more women involved help in the fight against cybercriminals?

HM: Bottom line — we need people, women and men included. There is always a shortage of women in cybersecurity and the focus often goes to why. We are trying to push the message to any woman wanting to get involved, learn and have a career that matters. Cybersecurity is important and there are so many facets and specialties one can dive into. I took the plunge into digital forensics 18 years ago and have never looked back.

Women can have a big impact in their organizations regardless of …