A tailored approach to cybersecurity: ITPS

As businesses increasingly rely on digital technologies, robust and secure IT services are imperative for smooth operations.

For Chester-le-Street-based ITPS, providing a tailored, personalised solution is equally as important.

“We’re big fans of finding the right type of solution for the problem,” says Mark Richardson, ITPS’ director of consulting.

He says: “The way we envisage protecting our clients is through a pragmatic, measured approach that gives them the right amount of security for their needs.

“We won’t offer a platinum-plated, expensive security capability to an organisation that doesn’t need it.

“Security is a complex topic – we tailor our approach to security for the needs and wants of that business, and we do so on a sliding scale of maturity.

“We align our approach to industry standard frameworks, making it easy to understand and measure against.

“Think of it as bronze, silver, gold and platinum levels of security.”

After spending six years at global IT consultancy Capgemini, where he was chief technology officer and chief architect, Mark joined ITPS in July.

Alongside a background in complex systems integration – tackling some of the biggest IT challenges out there – Mark has a decade of experience deploying large-scale cloud solutions for international private and public sector organisations.

Businesses of all sizes are increasingly turning to cloud solutions for greater scalability, efficiency and cost savings.

Globally, the cloud computing market is expected to exceed $1 trillion by 2028, showing interest in cloud adoption is continuing to surge.

Despite the rapid growth of the industry, though, ITPS remains committed to offering tailored services that meet the unique needs of each client, ensuring the personal touch is never lost.

Mark says: “Cloud means a lot of different things, depending on who you’re talking to.

“Everyone knows by now that ‘cloud’ is just a term for someone else’s computer – whether it is in a private datacentre such as our ITPS hosting location in the UK, a hyperscaler such as Azure, AWS or Google, or in a software-as-aservice provider’s own datacentre.

“For ITPS, when we think about cloud, it’s all about choosing the right cloud, or combinations of cloud, for a client’s organisation.

“There is no one cloud that is necessarily right for everybody.

“That might mean putting customers’ IT workloads into one single cloud, or it might be multi-cloud, leveraging the best combination of solutions for a client’s needs.”

The complexities of technical jargon can often be difficult to grasp. Buzz words, information overload and the rapid pace of technological change can make it difficult for businesses to clearly identify their actual IT support needs.

For Mark and ITPS, bridging this gap is essential, to ensure business leaders not only understand the IT landscape but can then make informed decisions that align with their goals.

He says: “Since IT can be complex and confusing, we explain technology capabilities to our clients in easy to understand business language.

“We start off with what the organisation wants to achieve and how we can mitigate the risks it faces.

“Our clients care about the outcome their organisation is providing – that is where their time and energy should be focused – so we take the complexity out, allowing clients to do what they do best without worrying about their IT.”

When it comes to protecting your business, even the most straightforward security practices can have a huge impact.

Understanding common vulnerabilities and covering the basics are essential processes in ensuring businesses remain secure.

Mark says: “Some of the most common vulnerabilities are things like simple passwords.

“Believe it or not, there are still a lot of people who use their pet’s name or a family members’ name.

“We recommend things like multi-factor authentication as an extra layer of protection, in case your username and password is leaked, as well as proactive threat monitoring, alerting and automated remediation.

“Those are some of the basics and don’t require a lot of complex implementation and management from a technology perspective.

“Doing the basics well goes a very long way to mitigating a lot of risk.”

Looking to the future, Mark and ITPS believe it’s crucial to continue matching products and services with the changing needs of businesses.

He says: “My short-term priorities are making sure our products and capabilities are aligned to client needs, because those are always evolving.

“The longer term priority is going to be consistently making sure we continue to do that, so we stay aligned to client’s needs and keep up with market trends.

“One of the things my team is focused on is making sure we have a technology roadmap for every client, so we can see where they are going over the next five years, helping grow their cloud security capability at a rate that’s right for their organisation and affordable too.

“It’s not just about being a responsive or reactive partner – it’s about being a proactive, forward-thinking and innovative partner.”

www.itps.co.uk

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