The ITPro Podcast

November has come to a close, and the depths of winter are just around the corner. But that doesn’t mean events in tech are slowing down at all – nor that attackers are taking an early Christmas break. In the past month, we’ve seen a slew of cyber incidents, ranging from high-profile exploits of Microsoft vulnerabilities to a ransomware attack on a supply chain software company integral to high-st...

HPE’s annual European conference took place this week in Barcelona and the company’s focus is still firmly on AI. This is bolstered by its supercomputing credentials – El Capitan, the latest supercomputer to come online in the US, was awarded the title of fastest supercomputer just a day before the conference kicked off. In this episode, Jane sits down with Gerald Kleyn, vice president of customer...

What does it mean to be secure in your sector? While every organization has its own cyber security policies, numerous pieces of legislation also set out minimum requirements for security that firms must reach or else be held accountable through fines. The EU’s Digital Operational Resilience Act – which came into force in 2023 and applies from 17 January 2025 – aims to do just this for financial en...

It's that time of year when the clocks change and the nights draw in, the familiar starts to take on a new aspect as the shadows lengthen, and in the world of IT, trends that have been taken for granted are also starting to take on a new shape.  As countries battle productivity problems, can they replicate the success of Iceland's four-day working week? Elsewhere, developers have started to q...

It’s All Hallows’ Day, and we’ve still got Halloween on the brain. It’s that time of year when we tell the scariest stories we can – and for those in tech, there are none scarier than that of major cybersecurity incidents. In this episode, Rory and Jane talk to Solomon Klappholz , ITPro’s cybersecurity reporter, about some of the spookiest cyber incidents of 2024 and what businesses can learn from...

Every organization has to prepare for the future to the best extent possible, whether that means modernizing one’s infrastructure or adopting cutting-edge technologies like AI. In every sector, leaders are faced with the task of keeping their business up-to-date and competitive by integrating AI workloads within their environment. But getting a project underway and ensuring it delivers sufficient...

This episode was first broadcast 4 August 2023. As the economy has become increasingly dependent on data, companies have sought to make more profit from mining user actions such as through loyalty schemes or social media interactions. But individual rights also have to be respected, and businesses have to follow strict data protection procedures. Privacy-enhancing technologies (PETs) are one metho...

It’s not every day that cybersecurity marketing professionals get to speak to one another, compare notes, and come up with innovative solutions for getting their voices heard. Despite being a cornerstone of the tech industry, cybersecurity is in need of constant marketing on its behalf. Developers need individuals willing to enter the boardroom to advocate for their product and cybersecurity marke...

To fully embrace the benefits of the cloud, businesses have to distribute existing workloads across hybrid and/or multi-cloud environments. While the benefits of this digital transformation are undeniable, it’s not a process without its challenges. This can be particularly true for firms with sprawling environments, perhaps as the result of mergers and acquisitions over the years, or those looking...

When it comes to the companies leading the way in AI development, Salesforce might not be the first name that springs to mind. The veteran CRM provider launched its flagship ‘Einstein’ AI in 2016, which relied on traditional machine learning methods to improve customer experience, but hasn’t sought to go head-to-head with major AI developers. With several years of generative AI hype at its back, t...

How much do you know about open banking? The practice allows companies to share choice information with third parties for the benefit of businesses, but it has yet to be taken up by every bank on the market. NatWest is a frontrunner in this regard. Its Payit service allows businesses to process customer payments quickly and easily, all alongside the ability to securely share customer data with add...

Energy usage in data centers is an increasingly Hot Topic, particularly with AI applications becoming more popular and widely used. While some organizations have talked up their commitment to renewables, such as solar or hydro, others have this month started to discuss a different, perhaps more controversial low carbon path. Elsewhere, a new rebellion against home working is beginning – and this t...

When people talk about the environmental impacts of data centers, normally the discussion focuses on energy usage. It’s something we’ve talked about at several points this year already, with reference to growing efforts to house AI workloads in green data centers that run on renewable energy to reduce their carbon impact. But while we can generate nearly limitless amounts of green energy, there is...

What’s the biggest cybersecurity threat your business faces right now? Hopefully, an answer springs to mind, along with a list of the solutions you have in place to keep attackers at bay. But ask yourself this: do your employees know? And if the worst did happen, how confident are you that your workforce would know exactly how to respond? Cybersecurity education and training is one of the cornerst...

Cybersecurity teams face a constant battle of ensuring their company is shored up in the right places. Facing down increasingly sophisticated and persistent threat actors, there’s every reason to focus on one’s perimeter to shield oneself against external threats. But insider threats – attacks carried out from within an organization’s environment – must also be part of any business’s security stra...

Quantum computing is an exciting field of research that promises to revolutionize computing as we know it. Relying on quantum mechanics to process calculations much faster than conventional physics would allow a normal computer to, quantum computers could drive rapid breakthroughs in fields such as medicine or machine learning. But what are the specific ways in which quantum computing can help bus...

For many, August has been all about getting away on holiday – stepping back from your desk, and putting on your email out of office. But others have spent the past month focused on how to ensure workers work longer hours and physically turn up to do their 9-5 on company soil. Eric Schmidt, former CEO at Google, has got into hot water over his claims that companies should ditch remote work schedule...

We're on summer break for the next two weeks, but we'll be back at the end of the month for the rundown and back at full speed throughout September and beyond. Thanks for listening!

Almost any business these days needs its own network to function – whether it’s for internal comms, interaction with the internet, or for controlling complex environments such as smart factory floors, business networks keep the wheels spinning at an enterprise level. But promises and delivery haven’t always lined up in the networking space, with the likes of 5G and gigabit broadband coming in late...

The IT outage that left passengers stranded, self checkouts non-functional, and IT professionals worldwide with an enormous headache dominated the news in July. The cost for those affected and the companies involved – CrowdStrike and Microsoft – is still being counted. In this episode of the ITPro Podcast, Jane is joined by ITPro’s news editor Ross Kelly to discuss what happened on 19 July, as wel...

While the private sector makes a lucrative target for threat actors, the public sector is also under constant threat of cyber attacks. In October 2023, the British Library was hit by a major ransomware attack and the founder and CEO of the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) Ciaran Martin told the BBC that recent attacks on the UK’s National Health Service were not surprising given its outdated...

When it comes to some of the tech world’s most impressive offerings, high performance computing, also known as supercomputing, often rises to the top of the list. Referring to powerful systems used to crunch the most complex calculations or run incredibly demanding workloads, it’s a rapidly expanding field backed by significant investment. But what is high-performance computing really for? Where d...

Every business will, at some point, be impacted by cyber attacks. Companies task security teams to prepare the first line of defense against cyber attacks, and most have plans in place for the damage they leave behind – be it data loss, encryption by ransomware operators, or large-scale service disruptions. But something that often goes unremarked upon in the wake of cyber attacks is the psycholog...

This classic episode of the ITPro Podcast was first published on 14 July 2023. When you consider the roles that hold influence over business decisions and operations, which come to mind? Doubtless, the CEO and CFO, as well as the COO if you have one. The CMO may also be there – but what about the CIO or CTO? The advent of cloud computing, bring your own device (BYOD), and increasing cyber security...

June has been a month filled with tech conferences. ITPro has covered events including HPE Discover, Splunk .conf24, Snowflake Data Summit, Cisco Live, Pegasystems Inspire, and Pure Accelerate, all held in Las Vegas, amid a busy season for the industry. But throughout the many hours of these events, with tens of thousands of attendees and swathes of product announcements, what have been some of th...