Author: Jim Fister

Data gravity has pulled computing to the Edge and enabled significant advances in hybrid cloud deployments. The ability to run analytics from the datacenter to the Edge, where the data is generated and lives, also creates new use cases for nearly every industry and company. However, this movement of compute to the Edge is not the only pattern to have emerged. How might other use cases impact your storage strategy?

That’s the topic of our next SNIA Cloud Storage Technologies Initiative (CSTI) live webcast on August 25, 2021 “Extending Storage to the Edge – How It Should Affect Your Storage Strategy” where our experts, Erin Farr, Senior Technical Staff Member, IBM Storage CTO Innovation Team and Vincent Hsu, IBM Fellow, VP & CTO for Storage will join us for an interactive session that will cover:

• Emerging patterns of data movement and the use cases that drive them
• Cloud Bursting
• Federated Learning across the Edge and Hybrid Cloud
• Considerations for distributed cloud storage architectures to match these emerging patterns

Read More

Recently, the SNIA Cloud Storage Technologies Initiative (CSTI) I hosted a lively panel discussion “What is Confidential Computing and Why Should I Care?” It was the first in a 3-part series of Confidential Computing security discussions. You can learn about the series here.  The webcast featured three experts who are working to define the Confidential Computing architecture, Mike Bursell of the Enarx Project, David Kaplan at AMD, and Ronald Perez from Intel.

This session served as an introduction to the concept of Confidential Computing and examined the technology and its initial uses. The audience asked several interesting questions. We’re answering some of the more basic questions here, as well as some that did not get addressed directly during the live event.

Q. What is Confidential Computing?  How does it complement existing security efforts, such as the Trusted Platform Model (TPM)? Read More

The need for improved data security and privacy seems to grow bigger every day. The continuous attacks and bad actors from hackers and rogue governments are increasing the demand from businesses and consumers alike to make stronger data protection a top priority. In the midst of this need, Confidential Computing has emerged as a solution for stronger data security and is gaining traction from a variety of start-ups and established companies. Read More

While data security in the enterprise has never been for the faint of heart, the move to a more contiguous enterprise/cloud workflow as well as the increase in Edge data processing has significantly impacted the work (and the blood pressure) of security professionals. In the “arms race” of security, new defensive tactics are always needed. One significant approach is Confidential Computing: a technology that can isolate data and execution in a secure space on a system, which takes the concept of security to new levels. This SNIA Cloud Storage Technologies Initiative (CSTI) webcast “What is Confidential Computing and Why Should I Care?” will provide an introduction and explanation of Confidential Computing and will feature a panel of industry architects responsible for defining Confidential Compute. It will be a lively conversation on topics including: Read More

Recently, the SNIA Cloud Storage Technologies Initiative (CSTI) hosted a live webcast “Cloud Analytics Drives Airplanes-as-a-Service” with Ben Howard, CTO of KinectAir. It was a fascinating discussion on how analytics is making this new commercial airline business take off.

Ben has a history of innovation with multiple companies working on new flight technology, analytics, and artificial intelligence. In this session, he provided several insights from his experiences on how analytics can have a significant impact on every business. Aside from analytics, services such as business cards can also be incorporated.

In the course of the conversation, we covered several questions, all of which were answered in the webcast. Here’s a preview of the questions along with some brief answers. Take an hour of your time to listen to the entire presentation, we think you’ll enjoy it.

Q: What’s different about capturing data for Machine Learning? Read More

Earlier this month, the SNIA Cloud Storage Technologies Initiative (CSTI) hosted an intriguing discussion on the Ethics of Artificial Intelligence (AI). Our expert, Rob Enderle, Founder of The Enderle Group, and Eric Hibbard, Chair of the SNIA Security Technical Work Group, shared their experiences and insights on what it takes to keep AI ethical. If you missed the live event, it Is available on-demand along with the presentation slides at the SNIA Educational Library.

As promised during the live event, our experts have provided written answers to the questions from this session, many of which we did not have time to get to.

Q. The webcast cited a few areas where AI as an attacker could make a potential cyber breach worse, are there also some areas where AI as a defender could make cybersecurity or general welfare more dangerous for humans? Read More

On-demand flying through an app sounds like something for only the rich and famous, yet the use of cloud analytics is making flexible flying a reality at start-up airline, KinectAir.  On April 7, 2021, The CTO of KinectAir, Ben Howard, will join the SNIA Cloud Storage Technologies Initiative (CSTI) for a fascinating discussion on first-hand experiences of leveraging cloud analytics methods to bring new business models to life that are competitive and profitable.

And since start-up companies may not have legacy data and analytics to consider, we’ll also explore what established businesses using traditional analytics methods can learn from this use case. Join us on April 7th for our live webcast “Adapting Cloud Analytics for Practical Business Use” for views from both start-up and established companies on how to revisit the analytics decision process with a discussion on: Read More

Artificial Intelligence (AI) technologies are possibly the most substantive and meaningful change to modern business. The ability to process large amounts of data with varying degrees of structure and form enables giant leaps in insight to drive revenue and profit. Likewise, governments and society have significant opportunity for improvement of the lives of the populace through AI. However, with the power that AI brings comes the risks of any technology innovation.

The SNIA Cloud Storage Technologies Initiative (CSTI) will explore some of the ethical issues that can arise from AI at our live webcast on March 16, 2021 “The Ethics of Artificial Intelligence.” Our expert speakers, Rob Enderle, President and Principal Analyst at The Enderle Group and Eric Hibbard, Chair of the SNIA Security Technical Work Group, will join me for an interactive discussion on: Read More

There is a new wave of cognitive services based on video and image analytics, leveraging the latest in machine learning and deep learning. In a recent SNIA Cloud Storage Technologies Initiative (CSTI) webcast “How Video Analytics is Changing the Way We Store Video,” we looked at some of the benefits and factors driving this adoption, as well as explored compelling projects and required components for a successful video-based cognitive service. This included some great work being done in the open source community.

In the course of the presentation, there were several discussion points and questions that arose. Our SNIA presenters, Glyn Bowden from HPE and Kevin Cone from Intel provide the answers. Read More

Internet of Payments (IoP) enables payment processing over many kinds of IoT devices and has also led to the emergence of the micro-transaction. It’s an area of rapid growth.

Recently, the SNIA Cloud Storage Technologies Initiative (CSTI) hosted a live webcast Technology Implications of Internet of Payments. The talk was hosted by me, with Glyn Bowden from HPE and Richard George from HLPS providing expert insight.

In the course of the conversation, several comments and questions arose, and they are summarized here. Feel free to view the entire discussion and provide us with feedback on the talk. We are also always interested on topics you’d like to see us cover in the future.

Q. When considering digitization of assets, currency is not locked to a solid standard. That is, they are not based on specific physical assets. Many new digital currencies are therefore unstable. But the proposition here is that they would be more secure because they’re locked to real physical value. Is that correct? Read More