Stories by Puneet Kukreja

Data breach readiness a board dialogue: “Not if but when”

When Target was breached a little over 24 months ago, it was called the biggest data breach to date. Then there were breaches at Home Depot and JP Morgan Chase followed by Anthem and the landmark event of 2014/2015 with the Sony data breach, an event that prompted the United States to issue sanctions against North Korea. Cyber security suddenly became a topic of discussion at board level and senior executives across industries started to ask questions on whether their organisations were prepared for a cyber-incident.

Puneet Kukreja | 21 Jul | Read more

Is your Board Cyber Ready?

Over the last few years the topic of cyber security has gone mainstream. It’s now being actively discussed in boardrooms. The years 2012-2014 will go down in history as a period when many major corporations were breached, with the Sony Pictures hack becoming a landmark moment—nation-state actors got involved and executive orders authorising political sanctions were issued.

Puneet Kukreja | 26 Mar | Read more

Rise of the elastic perimeter

Over the centuries, humans have built walls to keep intruders at bay. The Romans and Chinese were particularly adept at constructing extensive barricades: the Romans built Hadrian’s Wall in northern England and the Antonine Wall across what is now the Central Belt of Scotland, while the Chinese first started construction of would become the Great Wall of China in the 7th century BC.

Puneet Kukreja | 11 Dec | Read more

The big data privacy conundrum

SINTEF (Norwegian: Stiftelsen for industriell og teknisk forskning), headquartered in Trondheim, Norway, is the largest independent research organisation in Scandinavian states that found a full 90 per cent of all the data in the world has been generated over the last two years. This is attributed to the rise of social media and cloud computing. IBM further quantified this by stating that we create 2.5 quintillion bytes of data – so much that 90 per cent of the data in the world today has been created in the last two years alone.

Puneet Kukreja | 02 Apr | Read more

Privacy in the era of big data and cloud

Privacy is simply defined as a state in which one is not observed or disturbed by other people. Taking this definition further is Article 12 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which states: “No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks.”

Puneet Kukreja | 18 Dec | Read more

Establishing a Cloud Broker Model – Part 2

In 1973 Peter Drucker in his book “Management Tasks and Responsibilities” defined strategic planning as: <i>“The continuous process of making present entrepreneurial (risk-taking) decisions systematically and with the greatest knowledge of their futurity..."

Puneet Kukreja | 04 Jun | Read more

Establishing a Cloud Broker Model – Part 1

Information Security, IT Security, Technology Security, IT Risk and Security and IT Risk Services are all names that organisations use to define a functional unit within their enterprise that is responsible for the security, integrity and operational assurance of their information assets and operating environment.

Puneet Kukreja | 15 Mar | Read more

Think cloud, think Patriot Act

In theory at least, there is the promise of saving money, faster turnaround time, no lengthy requirements gathering, purchasing of equipment, following project management life-cycle, no architects getting in the way debating good design, lengthy hardware and software procurement cycles just basic business requirements and a PO, in other words Credit Card IT. Sounds familiar, sounds easy, excellent.

Puneet Kukreja | 17 Oct | Read more

Think cloud – think strategy – think "Sun Tzu"

The steady rise of cloud over the last few years across the software, infrastructure and platform domains has forced most technology business leaders to stop and take note. The voracity with which the perceived value and adoption of cloud computing and cloud Services has grown should be viewed and actioned as a strategic initiative and not a tactical undertaking with short term goals and limited benefits. To move things along and provide context I turn to Sun Tzu's "The Art of War", that helps identify strategy elements required by executives and senior management grappling with the challenge of cloud.

Puneet Kukreja | 31 Aug | Read more

Cloud contracts – the Devil is in the detail

Cloud computing today is no longer a buzzword associated with universities or advanced technology organisations at the bleeding edge of innovation. It is now a mainstream sourcing model that most organisations are looking to as part of their broader IT strategy.

Puneet Kukreja | 30 May | Read more

Cloud governance – manage the cloud challenge

The word governance derives from the Greek verb κυβερνάω [kubernáo], which means to steer, and was used for the first time in a metaphorical sense by Plato (according to Wikipedia). Wikipedia further expands on the term, rightly calling it “the act of governing”. Governance relates to decisions that define expectations, grant power, or verify performance.

Puneet Kukreja | 30 Apr | Read more

Embracing the Cloud – A Decision Framework

With major restrictions and inherent limitations in most IT environments, it’s become an attractive option for businesses. Concerns such as spending restrictions; immature capacity management; uncertain demand forecasting; duplication of capability; slow delivery of infrastructure and slow business application delivery all lead businesses to look wistfully at cloud computing.

Puneet Kukreja | 19 Mar | Read more