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Adventures of a Network Monitoring Newbie: The Final Network Security Frontier

Network Management

Friday, 11 January 2019

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The last part of everything is always hard, they say. I suppose it has to do with having to let go. And, in my case, with deciding what to write about or what's the best way to end the series.

Lately I've been reading a lot about cybersecurity, and how it affects everybody, on a personal and a professional level. That's how the idea for this last episode came to me - network security (also the last frontier between you and cyberattacks) and where do our products fit in that scenario.

It's also about me finally graduating from a newbie to a full-time network monitoring "guru". Just kidding, I'm not an expert in the field, but I'm not a newbie anymore either.

Before going further, let's make a list (don't you just love lists) with what I (and hopefully some of you also) have learned along the way:

What is a network TAP and where it fits in your network - checked (see here)
What is network tapping and what packet capture products you need for a highly effective network monitoring - checked (check it here)
Why security is critical for your network and how our monitoring devices (like network TAPs, Bypass TAPs or NPBs) can keep you and your data safe - we'll be going through these today

So, how come cybersecurity has made the news so often these days?

Try and picture this, in 2016 hackers used 100,000 internet-connected devices to bring down Twitter, Spotify, and PayPal. They managed to infect simple household appliances, such as digital video recorders and fridges, to attack a large network infrastructure provider and create chaos. None of the consumers knew that their own appliances were being used in this way.

In other words, these means security has become everyone's problem. Every aspect of your personal and professional data is at risk. According to a study, the average company handles a bombardment of 200,000 security events per day. 200,000!!! Don't worry, you are not the only one freaking out right now.

In light of all the above (if you want to know more, just google for cybersecurity), every company, no matter the size, should make their network and information systems' security a priority.

What should a security strategy include? Mechanisms that detect, respond to, investigate and report a breach quickly.

Where do our monitoring devices fit into this world of network security, you ask? Well, our network TAPs provide full visibility, and you can't have network security without visibility, right? We like to say that visibility is security.

That's why it has to be the starting point for every network security strategy. Figuring out what devices you need for a better insight into your network it will definitely help you maximize your security defenses and prevention strategy.

And an end-to-end infrastructure for network, application, and security visibility includes tools like our monitoring solutions (Network TAPs, Bypass TAPs, Network Packet Brokers). All these devices, in turn, help your security tools (be it a firewall or an intrusion detection system) get not only all the data but also the actionable one.

Implementing a monitoring visibility platform like the one above will definitely boost your network protection and give your security tools maximum efficiency.

What's even more amazing for your cybersecurity is that our experts designed a few years ago a range of innovative packet capture devices you can use both in a data center and in any other location. I've already talked about them in my previous episodes, that's why today I'm only going to say a few words, in case you missed my old articles. We called them ProfiShark series and they are special network TAPs for network engineers to use anytime, anywhere.

How does a ProfiShark exactly work? Well, after you connect it to a laptop or a desktop PC with a free USB 3.0 port, you get a powerful packet capture tool ready to use everywhere without depending on a power source. Is that easy! No wonder it has become our best selling product worldwide.

This all-in-one packet capture tool won't drop any packets or experience time delay. It's perfect for capturing and transferring all the data for your packet analyzer (like Wireshark or our own ProfiSight) to receive and decode the packet's raw data. But more about its functionalities navigate to the library page of our website to read network experts stories about it.

To make things even quicker and easier for you, we also released our first network traffic analyzer software, ProfiSight, that gives you an overview of what is happening over your network. This means you have the highest level of visibility possible, something that's truly essential for an efficient network security (from troubleshooting to performance diagnostics analysis).

When you combine ProfiShark with ProfiSight you have access to everything that's passing through your traffic and, therefore, a better chance to secure your network.

Coming back to the cybersecurity talk, it's true that there seems to be no end to the ways hackers can access your business and customer data to use it in malicious ways. But with each new type of cyberattack we find new defenses mechanisms capable of protecting us and our network against it.

We can never know for sure what cyber criminals and cybersecurity have in store for us. What we definitely know is that putting in place a high-performance visibility platform like the one I just talked about is definitely the right thing to start with.

Well, there you have it. Network security is vital for your data and employees' safety. And it's up to the monitoring and security tools you choose to give you a great start.

I cannot end the article without saying that it has been such an inspirational ride for me, learning about network monitoring devices and understanding how they can impact your network performance and security. And I hope through the "Newbie Adventures" articles I helped some of you see in a different light the complex world of network monitoring and tapping.

Until next time, keep on smiling and don't forget "It All Starts with Visibility"!

Thank you to Ana Dumbravesu from ProfiTap for the article.