Comments on: Datacenter Security: A Cautionary Tale

By: Security Theatre « Hartley Security

Security Theatre « Hartley Security — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 22:56:14 +0000

[...] factor (token, PIN and biometric) security system by breaking down a fire door and using a crowbar. [full story here] I am sure the customers at this data center felt very safe as they walked in through the front door [...]

By: Now in the Playground: Scrobbling Timelines | Social Trend Life

Now in the Playground: Scrobbling Timelines | Social Trend Life — Tue, 11 May 2010 23:10:45 +0000

[...] hammered by millions of users every single day, and to complicate things even further they’re spread across three different datacentres. Since Laurie is currently our longest-serving sysadmin, he’s already shed substantial [...]

By: James Legg

James Legg — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 19:20:16 +0000

I’ve heard stories of break-ins at the facility I work at, it’s not a data center in the tradditional sense but we have a lot of expenive kit anway. At once point when we moved locations the police required that we only moved during daylight hours and that the truck had a police escort. These days we have large metal doors and all the windows have been covered in amour plating. It’s is pretty worrying how organised (and well informed) computer thieves are.

By: stuart

stuart — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 23:40:58 +0000

The datacenter where I work (not London but UK) could be susceptible to this type of robbery – and it’s likely that this and other similar recent thefts have persuaded management to consider it a threat.

The plan – a milatary style defensive wall around the entire complex!

By: gnarg

gnarg — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 22:46:17 +0000

Cisco 65xx = ridiculously expensive switches, or very expensive routers w/fancy extra functions. Yes.

By: Network Security Blog » Your datacenter may not be secure enough

Network Security Blog » Your datacenter may not be secure enough — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 15:12:18 +0000

[...] Just imagine it: your web site is down, you can’t reach the server, you can’t reach the router, the guys at the datacenter aren’t answering the phone, what the heck is going on? You get in your car and drive down to the datacenter and as you drive up you notice all the police cars in the parking lot. Walking into your datacenter, you learn that thieves have broken in over night and made off with you’re hardware as well as that of half a dozen companies in the same datacenter. Sound too ridiculous to be true? Last.FM found out last week that steel doors aren’t enough to keep determined criminals from breaking into your datacenter. [...]

By: Russ

Russ — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 09:52:21 +0000

@A Lol Cat: (Sorry, you got caught in my spam queue)

On the whole, the “extra-secure” datacenters in the UK don’t have the power available for our needs. They also charge an extortionate markup. If we paid for a year’s worth of our hosting there I think it might end up cheaper to get all of our kit stolen ;).

I know we share several of our datacenters with major banks. On the whole, the security provisions of the major London facilities are pretty similar.

By: Russ

Russ — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 09:07:46 +0000

@heri: We were a bit surprised, as the fire door they managed to break down was pretty solid.

@Anon: They do have 24/7 security, but it usually consists of one or two guys. It took them a short while to notice the alarm and respond. (Alarms for all Level3 sites are monitored centrally from their NOC in the US)

@muriithi: As Jon says, you can basically operate them as a slightly cheaper version of the 7600, although “cheap” is very relative…

By: Jon

Jon — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 06:04:51 +0000

muriithi: These days you can run a Cat6500 in native IOS mode and do all the routing you need so long as you don’t need non-ethernet line cards or service provider features
(that stuff is restricted to the 7600. Same chassis just licensed and branded as a router).

By: muriithi

muriithi — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 03:37:43 +0000

I thought Cisco 6500 series were switches not routers? I believe they can also do layer 3 in hybrid mode.