Once upon a time, we relied on mainframe computers. These monoliths filled chilly rooms and stored all our data. When called upon, the data was transmitted from the mainframe to our device – which, at the time was a stationary computer terminal on a desk, hard-wired to the mainframe. The mainframe provided (and still does provide in many cases) data storage with scalability, availability and agility.
However, in the world of 21st Century technology, the cloud is the new mainframe. It is a virtual server in a data center that you download as an app to use. You move your data from your device – often a phone or tablet to the cloud and back again. In many ways, we have come full circle with our data networks. But there are differences, especially when it comes to security.
Mainframes are hard-wired and typically on-site. They have a level of physical security due to of access control. But they have other security advantages, too. Mainframes, because they are an older technology get less attention from attackers. They are sometimes perceived as a low-value target, despite the fact that they process lots of highly valuable data. Mainframes are also very different technologically from other computing platforms which means a cybercriminal would have to invest time and effort learning new ways of hacking in order to attack a mainframe: the hardware, software and programming languages as well as mainframe data formats are all different from what a modern cybercriminal would be accustomed to.
For most smaller businesses, the cloud is a more practical, effective and efficient means of data storage but using “the cloud” requires bandwidth to transfer data. Keeping data secure through encryption needs even bigger bandwidth. Experts say that one of the challenges of encryption is that it is underutilized, despite its proven effectiveness in bolstering data security. Increasingly, though, more small and medium-sized businesses are placing a premium on security and demanding greater security measures from cloud providers. Encryption drives costs for cloud storage due to the additional bandwidth required to encrypt data before transferring it to the cloud.
The need for additional bandwidth is unsurprising, but are you set up to provide this additional bandwidth? It is crucial to build your network infrastructure so that it supports the speed of the data network. This is where single mode fiber is a key player in the equation. As we have previously discussed, the cost of single-mode fiber has dropped to the point where the difference between it and multi-mode fiber is negligible, so the benefits that single-mode fiber offers in speed may outweigh any slight cost difference. If you use cloud storage or it is part of your long-range plan and you are designing a network for a new facility or looking at an upgrade for your current facility, you should be considering single-mode fiber. KTS would be happy to evaluate your data network and guide you to the best and most cost-effective options to meet your data network needs.
