Intelligent CIO Middle East Issue 10 | Page 29

DCA the challenge is twofold; firstly digging for this treasure is both time consuming and a nightmare to locate; these gems are often buried in obscure Standards or documents which are often overlooked and forgotten. The other challenge is not having a clue if what you have found actually is of any value or applies to your business/ data needs. Wouldn’t it be nice if you had that map and guide to help you pinpoint the right solution? The groups next task will be to provide this map so it will be far easier to locate what you are looking for and far quicker to see what security posture you should either adopt or be looking for in a potential service provider. If you have any questions of seek advice then the DCA Trade Association is here to support you - www. datacentrealliance.org. ABOUT Group (outgoing chairman) and Peter Jackson - Jacksons Fencing (Vice Chair) for their support over the past 12 months. We look forward to supporting the group and its new Chair in the year ahead. From previous discussions the group is keen to assist with fully understanding and mapping out the landscape when it comes to existing direct and indirect advice and guidance. ISO27001 has been in existence for quite some time now, however the general feeling of the group is that it remains far too general and does not go far enough from a physical security www.intelligentcio.com prospective, leaving quite a few gaps that need to be filled to provide a full picture. Other security related international Standards such as ISO 50001 are seeing wider adoptions and Europe now has EN50600 data centre Standard published by CENELEC which includes a security systems section this has helped to provide more missing pieces to the jigsaw although how all these pieces fit together still remains a challenge. A great deal of this existing material is based on years of collective experience and offers very sound advice, however Steve Hone is the co-founder of Data Centre Alliance and sits on the management team as Operations Director. Having been in the IT Industry since the heady days of the ‘.com boom’ and has been lucky enough to work for and with some great people and organisations on critical IT projects over the years. In 2007 he co-founded Colofinder. co.uk, an independent data centre search and selection consultancy providing specialist advice and guidance on the colocation market globally. Prior to getting into IT and Data Centres Steve was an Electrical and Mechanical Chartered Engineer in the MOD before eventually moving into the commercial world of Sales and Management. INTELLIGENTCIO 29