Data protection for heterogeneous IT environments with HPE hyperconverged and Micro Focus

Hyper-Converged Infrastructure

Article | October 10, 2023

The success of 5G technology is a function of both the infrastructure that supports it and the ecosystems that enable it. Today, the definitive focus in the 5G space is on enterprise use cases, ranging from dedicated private 5G networks to accessing edge compute infrastructure and public or private clouds from the public 5G network. As a result, vendor-neutral multitenant data center providers and their rich interconnection capabilities are pivotal in helping make 5G a reality. This is true both in terms of the physical infrastructure needed to support 5G and the ability to effectively connect enterprises to 5G. Industry experts expect 5G to enable emerging applications such as virtual and augmented reality (AR/VR), industrial robotics/controls as part of the industrial internet of things (IIoT), interactive gaming, autonomous driving, and remote medical procedures. These applications need a modern, cloud-based infrastructure to meet requirements around latency, cost, availability and scalability. This infrastructure must be able to provide real-time, high-bandwidth, low-latency access to latency-dependent applications distributed at the edge of the network. How Equinix thinks about network slicing Network slicing refers to the ability to provision and connect functions within a common physical network to provide the resources necessary to deliver service functionality under specific performance constraints (such as latency, throughput, capacity and reliability) and functional constraints (such as security and applications/services). With network slicing, enterprises can use 5G networks and services for a wide variety of use cases on the same infrastructure. Providing continuity of network slices with optimal UPF placement and intelligent interconnection Mobile traffic originates in the mobile network, but it is not contained to the mobile network domain, because it runs between the user app on a device and the server workload on multi-access edge compute (MEC) or on the cloud. Therefore, to preserve intended characteristics, the slice must be extended all the way to where the traffic wants to go. This is why we like to say “the slicing must go on.” The placement of network functions within the slice must be optimized relative to the intended traffic flow, so that performance can be ensured end-to-end. As a result, organizations must place or activate the user plane function (UPF) in optimal locations relative to the end-to-end user plane traffic flow. We expect that hybrid and multicloud connectivity will remain a key requirement for enterprises using 5G access. In this case, hybrid refers to private edge computing resources (what we loosely call “MEC”) located in data centers—such as Equinix International Business Exchange™ (IBX®) data centers—and multicloud refers to accessing multiple cloud providers from 5G devices. To ensure both hybrid and multicloud connectivity, enterprises need to make the UPF part of the multidomain virtual Layer 2/Layer 3 interconnection fabric. Because a slice must span multiple domains, automation of UPF activation, provisioning and virtual interconnection to edge compute and multicloud environments is critical. Implementing network slicing for interconnection of core and edge technology Equinix partnered with Kaloom to develop network slicing for interconnection of core and edge (NICE) technology within our 5G and Edge Technology Development Center (5G ETDC) in Dallas. NICE technology is built using cloud-native network fabric and high-performance 5G UPF from Kaloom. This is a production-ready software solution, running on white boxes built with P4 programmable application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs), allowing for deep network slicing and support for high-performance 5G UPF with extremely fast data transfer rates. With NICE technology in the 5G ETDC, Equinix demonstrates: 5G UPF deployment/activation and traffic breakout at Equinix for multiple slices. Software-defined interconnection between the 5G core and MEC resources from multiple providers. Software-defined interconnection between the 5G core and multiple cloud service providers. Orchestration of provisioning and automation of interconnection across the 5G core, MEC and cloud resources. Architecture of NICE technology in the Equinix 5G ETDC The image above shows (from left to right): The mobile domain with radio access network (RAN), devices (simulated) and mobile backhaul connected to Equinix. The Equinix domain with: Equinix Metal® supporting edge computing servers and a fabric controller from Kaloom. Network slicing fabric providing interconnection and Layer 2/Layer 3 cloud-native networking to dynamically activate UPF instances/interfaces connected with MEC environments and clouds, forming two slices (shown above in blue and red). Equinix Fabric™ and multicloud connectivity. This demonstrates the benefit of having the UPF as a feature of the interconnection fabric, effectively allowing UPF activation as part of the virtual fabric configuration. This ultimately enables high-performance UPF that’s suitable for use cases such as high-speed 5G fixed wireless access. Combining UPF instances and MEC environments into an interconnection fabric makes it possible to create continuity for the slices and influence performance and functionality. Equinix Fabric adds multicloud connectivity to slices, enabling organizations to directly integrate network slicing with their mobile hybrid multicloud architectures. Successful private 5G edge deployments deliver value in several ways. Primarily, they offer immediate access to locally provisioned elastic compute, storage and networking resources that deliver the best user and application experiences. In addition, they help businesses access a rich ecosystem of partners to unlock new technologies at the edge. Secure, reliable connectivity and scalable resources are essential at the edge. A multivendor strategy with best-of-breed components complemented by telemetry, advanced analytics with management and orchestration—as demonstrated with NICE in Equinix data centers—is a most effective way to meet those requirements. With Equinix’s global footprint of secure, well-equipped facilities, customers can maximize benefits.” - Suresh Krishnan, CTO, Kaloom Equinix and its partners are building the future of 5G NICE technology is just one example of how the Equinix 5G and Edge Technology Development Center enables the innovation and development of real-world capabilities that underpin the edge computing and interconnection infrastructure required to successfully implement 5G use cases. A key benefit of the 5G ETDC is the ability to combine cutting-edge innovations from our partners like Kaloom with proven solutions from Equinix that already serve a large ecosystem of customers actively utilizing hybrid multicloud architectures.

Hyper-Converged Infrastructure

Article | October 3, 2023

The rollout of 5G networks coupled with edge compute introduces new security concerns for both the network and the enterprise. Security at the edge presents a unique set of security challenges that differ from those faced by traditional data centers. Today new concerns emerge from the combination of distributed architectures and a disaggregated network, creating new challenges for service providers. Many mission critical applications enabled by 5G connectivity, such as smart factories, are better off hosted at the edge because it's more economical and delivers better Quality of Service (QoS). However, applications must also be secured; communication service providers need to ensure that applications operate in an environment that is both safe and provides isolation. This means that secure designs and protocols are in place to pre-empt threats, avoid incidents and minimize response time when incidents do occur. As enterprises adopt private 5G networks to drive their Industry 4.0 strategies, these new enterprise 5G trends demand a new approach to security. Companies must find ways to reduce their exposure to cyberattacks that could potentially disrupt mission critical services, compromise industrial assets and threaten the safety of their workforce. Cybersecurity readiness is essential to ensure private network investments are not devalued. The 5G network architecture, particularly at the edge, introduces new levels of service decomposition now evolving beyond the virtual machine and into the space of orchestrated containers. Such disaggregation requires the operation of a layered technology stack, from the physical infrastructure to resource abstraction, container enablement and orchestration, all of which present attack surfaces which require addressing from a security perspective. So how can CSPs protect their network and services from complex and rapidly growing threats? Addressing vulnerability points of the network layer by layer As networks grow and the number of connected nodes at the edge multiply, so do the vulnerability points. The distributed nature of the 5G edge increases vulnerability threats, just by having network infrastructure scattered across tens of thousands of sites. The arrival of the Internet of Things (IoT) further complicates the picture: with a greater number of connected and mobile devices, potentially creating new network bridging connection points, questions around network security have become more relevant. As the integrity of the physical site cannot be guaranteed in the same way as a supervised data center, additional security measures need to be taken to protect the infrastructure. Transport and application control layers also need to be secured, to enable forms of "isolation" preventing a breach from propagating to other layers and components. Each layer requires specific security measures to ensure overall network security: use of Trusted Platform Modules (TPM) chipsets on motherboards, UEFI Secure OS boot process, secure connections in the control plane and more. These measures all contribute to and are integral part of an end-to-end network security design and strategy. Open RAN for a more secure solution The latest developments in open RAN and the collaborative standards-setting process related to open interfaces and supply chain diversification are enhancing the security of 5G networks. This is happening for two reasons. First, traditional networks are built using vendor proprietary technology – a limited number of vendors dominate the telco equipment market and create vendor lock-in for service providers that forces them to also rely on vendors' proprietary security solutions. This in turn prevents the adoption of "best-of-breed" solutions and slows innovation and speed of response, potentially amplifying the impact of a security breach. Second, open RAN standardization initiatives employ a set of open-source standards-based components. This has a positive effect on security as the design embedded in components is openly visible and understood; vendors can then contribute to such open-source projects where tighter security requirements need to be addressed. Aside from the inherent security of the open-source components, open RAN defines a number of open interfaces which can be individually assessed in their security aspects. The openness intrinsically present in open RAN means that service components can be seamlessly upgraded or swapped to facilitate the introduction of more stringent security characteristics, or they can simultaneously swiftly address identified vulnerabilities. Securing network components with AI Monitoring the status of myriad network components, particularly spotting a security attack taking place among a multitude of cooperating application functions, requires resources that transcend the capabilities of a finite team of human operators. This is where advances in AI technology can help to augment the abilities of operations teams. AI massively scales the ability to monitor any number of KPIs, learn their characteristic behavior and identify anomalies – this makes it the ideal companion in the secure operation of the 5G edge. The self-learning aspect of AI supports not just the identification of known incident patterns but also the ability to learn about new, unknown and unanticipated threats. Security by design Security needs to be integral to the design of the network architecture and its services. The adoption of open standards caters to the definition of security best practices in both the design and operation of the new 5G network edge. The analytics capabilities embedded in edge hyperconverged infrastructure components provide the platform on which to build an effective monitoring and troubleshooting toolkit, ensuring the secure operation of the intelligent edge.

Hyper-Converged Infrastructure, Application Infrastructure

Article | July 19, 2023

DApps (sometimes called Dapps) are from the blockchain universe and so, logically, the apps part stands for application (obviously) and the D part stands for decentralised (only obvious once you know that we’re talking distributed immutable language here). According to the guides section at blockgeeks, DApps are open source in terms of code base, incentivised (in terms of who validates it) and essentially decentralised so that all records of the application’s operation must be stored on a public and decentralised blockchain to avoid pitfalls of centralisation. So then, Cartesi is a DApp infrastructure that runs an operating system (OS) on top of blockchains. The company has now launched a more complete ‘platform-level’ offering, which is described as a layer-2 solution

Article | June 1, 2021

There is an exciting convergence in the networking industry around open source, and the energy is palpable. At LF Networking, we have a unique perspective as the largest open source initiative in the networking space with the broadest set of projects that make up the diverse and evolving open source networking stack. LF Networking provides platforms and building blocks across the networking industry that enable rapid interoperability, deployment, and adoption and is the nexus for 5G innovation and integration. LF Networking has now tapped confluence on industry efforts to structure a new initiative to develop 5G Super Blueprints for the ecosystem. Major integrations between the building blocks are now underway–between ONAP and ORAN, Akraino and Magma, Anuket and Kubernetes, and more.