The Cloud Architects Podcast

It's ALWAYS DNS! We've all fallen victim to DNS at some point in our careers. In this episode we are once again joined by Robby Pedrica as we discuss DNS architecture and security - we've been deploying DNS the same way for a long time and perhaps it's time we look at our deployments and consider if they could be more secure. We discuss DNS in large enterprise environments and why monitoring DNS t...

Same product, new name - RIP Azure AD/long live Entra ID! In this episode we're joined by long-time friend of the show Michael Van Horenbeeck to discuss the recent Entra related announcements and Microsoft's expansion into Security Service Edge (SSE) with two new products – Microsoft Entra Internet Access and Microsoft Entra Private Access. We've all heard the TLAs PIM, PAW, and talk of Tier0 conf...

In this episode we're joined by long-time friend Robby Pedrica as we talk about Open-source software. We asked Robby about Open-source technologies in the enterprise and discussed the history, ins and outs of using Open-source projects in your environment. Robby Pedrica is a IT & Network Security Consultant and Owner of XStore. Robby has been in the IT industry for 33 years, and has focused on the...

What is insider risk and how does it differ from an insider threat? Did you know that these are not always bad actors or malicious acts? We were curios about insider risk management, insider threat detection and everything that goes along with it, so we asked Zach Luze to unpack this vast topic for us. Zach Luze is the Microsoft Cloud and Data Security Advisory Lead at Kudelski Security. Zach is a...

If you were to open your Twitter/LinkedIn/Mastodon feed at the moment, it is undoubtedly filled with AI posts - while some of these might be interesting or even somewhat useful, the majority likely include the words "RIP" and some profession or job function. There is so much AI FUD around right now and we wanted to find out if the hype was worth listening to. Is Skynet going to take over and put u...

In this episode we geek out about home automation, Azure and training cognitive services to recognize llamas. Wait.. sound weird? Maybe, but we had a blast talking to MVP Lars Klint about life on his farm in the high country of Victoria in Australia and how he uses technology to automate (and amuse) Be sure to check out the following links: * Follow the Llama Drama here (https://llamacam.com.au) *...

Exchange Server 2013 officially reached its end of support on April 11, 2023. What exactly does end of support mean? What should you do if your organization still relies on Exchange 2013 for email? In this episode I'm joined by Microsoft MVP Jeff Guillet, and we attempt to answer these questions and more. We also discuss the recent Microsoft announcement to throttle and block email from persistent...

We're Back! Happy 2023 to all - and yes, I realize that it's February. We often talk on this podcast about cyber readiness and the important of having a plan but, felt it would be important to unpack that a talk about what is means in practical terms. In this episode we welcome back our friend Fran Donoso to explain what cyber readiness entails and provide some great advice to help you and your or...

A CISO, or chief information security officer, is a senior-level executive who oversees an organization's information, cyber, and technology security. We recently had a fun conversation with our friend and CISO Sachin Surajbali about what is means to be a CISO. Sachin gave us a glimpse into a day in the life of a CISO, how to delicately balance all the technical and non-technical aspects of the ro...

We recently had a great time talking to fellow Microsoft MVP Tom Arbuthnot about all things Microsoft Teams - covered some of the great community work Tom is involved with and discussed Teams call quality, meeting etiquette and how work from home has brought about a massive increase in meetings for many of us. Warren also gives some interesting financial advice *(Not intended to be taken as real f...

We love Exchange Server! No, really - I've personally been working with Exchange Server in some form or fashion since Exchange Server 5.5 in the late '90s and in some circles that makes me a late bloomer. It is difficult to ignore what seems like an endless list of day-zero vulnerabilities that have plagued our old friend over the last 12 - 18 months. These vulnerabilities have seen security resea...

We apologize for the poor audio at the beginning of this episode - we're not sure what happened, but it does improve as the episode progresses. What is DevOps? The answer will often differ depending on who you ask. In this episode we asked Prashanth from Chef that question. He shares some great insights with us, including how DevOps practices can be used in an infrastructure and IT operations cont...

Microsoft first announced the deprecation of Basic Authentication in September 2019 with the intention of starting the retirement process in October 2020. Those plans were subsequently postponed and needless to say it's been a long journey for many organizations to prepare for the inevitable. Sadly though, it seems not everyone received the memo and there are many organizations that still use basi...

In this episode we chat to James "UCMadScientist" Arber. Some of you may know him as the guy who ran Doom on a Sonus/Ribbon SBC 1000 or set fire to a Polycom CX series phone, but James is also extremely knowledgable when it comes to all things Microsoft Teams. We had a lot of fun talking about the current state of Teams, room systems, devices, and the importance of using your dongle. James Arber,...

As an IT professional, governance and compliance have never been the sexiest of concepts. For many of us, these are things that distract us once a year when they require the yearly tick-in-the-box. It is important that we face the reality of the world we live in though and understand that we do have a responsibility of bridging two worlds. In this episode we had the opportunity to sit down with Ru...

We recently had a lot of fun connecting with Koos Goossens to talk about Microsoft Sentinel. Koos has a wealth of knowledge and shared some great tips on getting started with Sentinel, the importance of cost management and why a product != process. Koos Goossens is passionate about all things Microsoft Cloud and Security related. In his current role. he has been focussing on implementing Microsoft...

This episode is all about certifications. I sat my first industry certification exam in the late 1990's and it's safe to say that certifications and the way the industry views them has changed a lot over the years. Are certifications important or even relevant anymore? This can be a very polarizing topic, I recently asked Sly Gittens from Tech Simplified all about it. Sly Gittens is a Partner Tech...

We recently had the pleasure of talking to a long time friend of the show Jay Gundotra. Jay is incredibly passionate about the community and you have most probably seen the ENow Software booth or attended one of their parties at Ignite or some other industry event. We talk about his journey from Exchange Server specialist to Founder and CEO and how everyone has a unique journey. We also get deep a...

In this episode we had the pleasure of talking to Kexin Ye and hearing her inspirational story of personal growth and how she went from selling Fair trade "coffee to fighting to tech". We also talk about chaos engineering, technical debt and the importance of a sound cloud strategy. If you're interested in chaos engineering, here are some additional links you might want to check out: Chaos enginee...

We're back for our first episode of 2022! We had so much fun catching up in-person in Cape Town last month to record this one. In this episode we're joined by fellow MVP Alistair Pugin to talk through some of our predictions for 2022. Will 2022 be the year of spend? We talk about hybrid cloud, organizational maturity, in-person conferences and Exchange "bugs". I tried to find a link to the Microso...

I really miss in-person conferences and I'm sure I'm not the only one. We've always enjoyed being able to connect with new and old friends and peers, not to mention how incredibly enjoyable it is for us to record our episodes in person. In this episode we talk to Microsoft's Laurent Bugnion about conferences and events - we cover everything from imposter syndrome, why in-person events may never be...

Data Security is top of mind for many organizations at the moment with so many of them transitioning to a permanent work from home or hybrid working model. There is however so much more to protecting your data than encrypting it or implementing a DLP tool. In this episode we have a great conversation with Ernie Anderson about Data Security - what it is, where to start, what to consider and why you...

Ever wondered what a SIEM is? How about SOAR? In this episode we have a fantastic conversation with ML who helps us understand what these are, how they are different and even how they can work together. We also cover a few other security-related topics and ML shares some great insights and recommendations. Mari-Louise (ML) is the co-founder and director of Port443 (Pty) Ltd. Focusing on platform b...

If you follow the Microsoft productivity space, you have no doubt seen or heard about the "Autodiscovering the Great Leak" research paper recently published by Amit Serper, a security researcher at Guardicore. The paper details more than five months' research into the Autodiscover service used by Microsoft Exchange. Amit's research was picked up and in many instances misreported by the tech press,...

We've often joked on the show that Microsoft is the world's largest security vendor and when you consider their massive investment in security-related R&D and innovation it really isn't far from the truth. We had a great time sitting down with Microsoft's Stephen Revel recently to talk about the security features and functionality available to customers in Microsoft 365 and hopefully debunk the my...