Why simplifying network security is critical

When Dave Nocera worked at AT&T as the chief
infrastructure architect for customer care
technologies, he supported plenty of customers
and oversaw 35 call centers.

Nocera, now president of Verifichi in Edison, N.J.,
simplified network complexity at AT&T by standardizing
presentation servers and application servers, ensuring
that they all “looked alike” so that, if a problem
ever arose, he could simply unplug a faulty server and
plug in a working one.

“Sometimes I use the term minimizing variability,”
said Nocera, whose firm produces data center software.
“In other words, synchronizing similar types of
machines with the same patch levels, OS versions,
application versions. If you need multi-threaded
servers turned on in one place within an organization,
turn it on everywhere. What’s the harm? The reason I
would suggest that is that now you can monitor
exceptions.”