When it comes to the task of backing up data, many people wonder where to start. Questions arise relating to the data’s value and if it needs to be stored in a place that is easily reached but costly. On the flip side, those doing backups must ask themselves how often the particular data in question needs to be utilized. If it is not something that is needed daily, storage on a tape drive may become a consideration.

At any rate, administrators and clients alike must understand that the location of data storage is incredibly important and directly relates to the efficiency of the whole system. One of the issues that sometimes arises is when non-valuable data takes over space on precious primary storage. Not only is this highly coveted place being occupied in a manner that is not wise, but storing this kind of data there makes the overall backup operations inefficient.

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Businesses today face having to deal with huge quantities of documents and data. Gaining meaningful insights from this pool of information can therefore be a major challenge.

Enterprise search specialist Lucidworks is aiming to make sense of things by using the IBM Watson Developer Cloud platform for its Fusion application framework to help developers create enterprise discovery applications so companies can better understand their data.

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Microsoft's new Azure-hosted, combined CRM and ERP service, Dynamics 365 will begin its rollout on November 1 and the company will show off some of the features of its new service in a live-streamed event this week.

In July, the company announced its plans for Dynamics 365 and began to inform its reseller partners regarding what the service would offer. At that time it was revealed that Dynamics 365 would be a combination and redesign of the capabilities of Dynamics CRM, Dynamics AX and Project Madeira which is now known to be a new small-business software as a service based on the Microsoft Dynamics NAV platform.

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Businesses in Europe that have sent at least one of their core business areas to the cloud now have a "huge" competitive advantage over their peers, according to a new report by Frost & Sullivan. The company says businesses that have adopted a cloud-based approach for either accounting, customer relationship management (CRM) or enterprise resource planning (ERP) are reaping the benefits of their (r)evolutionary approach. The report is based on a poll of 600 senior IT decision makers from a cross section of industries throughout Europe.

"For businesses in Europe, cost savings are not the main driver for moving to cloud business applications. Our research shows that they increasingly see cloud as a solution to the challenges of industry transformation, competition and as a means to facilitate global expansion", says Alexander Michael, director of Consulting at Frost & Sullivan.

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The GDPR is drawing ever closer, but organizations which will be directly affected by it still don't know how to approach the new regulation, a new study by Dell shows. Ever since it was unveiled that the General Data Protection Regulation will come into effect in May 2018, surveys have been done to see if companies are preparing themselves for it, and if they will be ready to comply with it in time.

Never have these reports shown positive or encouraging results, and the new one by Dell is no different. Still, organizations aren't even close to being prepared. More than 80 percent say they know close to nothing about GDPR. Less than a third are ready for GDPR today. Almost 70 percent of IT and business professionals say they are not, and that they don't know if their companies are ready.

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Echoing the findings we reported earlier that companies leave cloud protection to third-parties, a new study from cloud security company Netskope reveals most companies don't scan their cloud services for malware either.

The study conducted with the Ponemon Institute shows 48 percent of companies surveyed don't inspect the cloud for malware and 12 percent are unsure if they do or not. Of those that do inspect 57 percent of respondents say they found malware.

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Businesses are increasingly moving their systems to the cloud, but 62 percent rely on the cloud provider to back up applications running on their platform.

New research from secure cloud services company CTERA Networks reveals that 67 percent of organizations deploy more than 25 percent of their applications in the cloud, and 37 percent plan to grow their cloud use by at least 25 percent, if not more. In addition, 54 percent of organizations are embracing a hybrid cloud strategy that uses both on-premises and cloud services.

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A lack of visibility into an organization's use of cloud providers can lead to unauthorized access to data, improper handling and storage of data and unauthorized data removal. As a result, organizations are left exposed and vulnerable to a data breach.

This is among the findings of a new report from the Blancco Technology Group. Based on a survey of almost 300 IT professionals around the world it finds that 26 percent of organizations are either 'not confident' or only 'somewhat confident' about their IT teams' knowledge of the use of all cloud storage providers.

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As more and more systems move to the cloud, so we’re becoming increasingly used to accessing all systems on an as-a-service model. Networking is no exception to this and by using software-defined networking businesses can break away from the restrictions imposed by old, inflexible static network architecture.

SDN allows companies to master the complex nature of their networks and have a single point of control. At the same time it opens up the possibility of automating network management to allow it to cope with fluctuations in traffic and demand.

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For a long time, the contact center was nothing more than a place where customer complaints went to die. An agent’s objective was to simply note the issue and try to resolve it as quickly as possible, and metrics were nothing more than call duration and first call resolution. However, technology has changed the role of the contact center, and analytics are evolving the department into a hub of rich customer insights. Every day, agents interact with hundreds, if not thousands, of customers, and they’re hearing what they want, don’t want, or need -- right from customers’ mouths!

By feeding this information into analytics technology, contact centers can integrate into every touch point along the customer journey and fundamentally change the customer experience.

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Considering it only came into existence in 2013, Docker has experienced a monumental rise in both the consumer and business markets. From such humble beginnings, (the earliest version of the technology was developed by founder Solomon Hykes in his mother’s basement), Docker has managed to secure a number of high-profile partners and in 2015 received a valuation in excess of $1 billion. But what exactly is Docker?

According to the company itself, "Docker allows you to package an application with all of its dependencies into a standardized unit for software development". The way in which Docker does this is through a software feature known as a container.

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Almost nine in ten (88 percent) IT professionals say that their organization invested in some form of intelligent solutions, be it smart business apps, whole systems or bots. The information was presented in a new research report from Ipswitch.

The report also says that more than three quarters (78 percent) can’t fully grasp the challenges and threats of deploying such systems themselves. For more than two thirds (78 percent), it is challenging (58 percent say it is a challenge, and 19 percent say it is "extremely hard" to do). However, businesses aren’t giving up, as more than a third (35 percent) see it as crucial to stay ahead of the competition.

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Marketers must target women if they are looking to succeed and make profits in the mobile sector, according to a new report.

The Mobile App Engagement Index from performance based marketing platform Liftoff analyzed 7.3 million app installs across five sectors to unearth key app trends from the first half of this year. It finds that female customers are not only more likely to make a purchase in both mobile e-commerce and gaming apps, they are also less expensive to acquire compared to their male counterparts.

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A new report released by data protection company Thales and the Ponemon Institute shows that the use of cloud services and the IoT has led to greater dependence on public key infrastructures (PKIs) in today's businesses.

The survey of more than 5,000 companies across 11 countries shows that PKIs -- used to create, distribute, store, and revoke digital certificates and manage public-key encryption -- are increasingly relied on to support applications.

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You may not have heard of Workplace by Facebook, and that could be for one of two reasons. Firstly, it used to be known as Facebook at Work but, more importantly, it has been in closed beta for nearly two years.

Today, Facebook announces that Workplace is now available all over the world, giving enterprise users a way to stay connected with co-workers. Promising "the best of Facebook plus new features", Workplace can be used by any company or organization that feels a personalized, internal social network with messaging capabilities could be beneficial.

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