When designing a storage system for a production or post facility, it is easy to concentrate on capacity and throughput, and think that is all you need. However, a very real issue is data safety and how to guard against it. That is a particular problem in our industry of media production. Once you start considering the issues around data loss, the potential problems start to escalate: a real domino effect.
Securing broadcast synchronization against malicious attack
Synchronization is a fundamental requirement in all content generation and broadcast; used extensively both in SDI / HDI formats and in IP packet based systems. Synchronization signals are typically generated from equipment including sync pulse generators, master sync references, and for the IP format, Precision Timing Protocol (PTP) grandmaster clock generators. Most sync generators encapsulate a very accurate internal clock which is synchronised to an external reference, which for the vast majority of manufacturers is a GPS & GNSS satellite timing signal. Consequently sync generators are connected to an outside GNSS antenna via coaxial cable or fibre optic cable, like those supplied by ViaLite Communications.
How Resilient is Redundancy?
Redundancy has always been a major topic for broadcast operations to ensure that the show goes on despite a defective power supply or other failure. While all eggs were in one basket—i.e. in one place and close to one another—this approach was certainly helpful. Calling such a setup resilient would nevertheless be a stretch.
The Path to Business Resilience and The Cloud. From Sonic Boom & Crispy Chips to Kubernetes & Culture Change.
John O’Loan is CEO at iOMedia Group LNS. After launching Sky News, he assisted in the launch and operations of more than 40 other news, sport and documentary channels around the world. He holds an Executive Masters Degree in Culture Change at HEC Paris and The University of Oxford. In this article, he discusses how companies can best protect themselves from cyber threats.
Mitigating the effects of ransomware on television post-production
Unlike a car crash, a ransomware attack is most likely uninsurable. So, the effects on a major media enterprise, production company or post facility can be totally devastating. Here’s why we should all be concerned, however big or small an organisation.
Protecting Media Assets – Risk and Resilience
The sudden shift to remote working within the media industry saw an incredible turnaround, with workflows being instated quickly to ensure that quality content creation could continue. Existing media tools were adapted to enable workers from around the globe to access content and contribute to production, all whilst the industry came to terms with wider logistical challenges. A quick rollout of infrastructure saw big changes in how the industry managed their assets; suddenly, data that would have been very difficult to access needed to be available to workers from their homes.
Why Your Cybersecurity Resilience Strategy is Not Good Enough
Even with the global cost of online crime reaching $6 trillion by 2021.
Even with 50% more cyber-attacks per week on corporate networks in 2021.
Even with the world’s most influential technology leaders claiming cybercrime to be the greatest threat to every company in the world.
…the fact of the matter is most broadcasters are woefully underprepared when it comes to protecting their businesses from cyber-attacks. And this is a big problem.
Content Protection – more things to consider
The recent IABM report on content security trends in conjunction with our good friends at Axinom made for some interesting reading. As Roger Thornton mentions in his summary article, perhaps the most surprising takeaway is the discrepancy between a stated intention to invest in content, and a far lower priority in investment in content security technology to safeguard against the theft of that content, especially given the financial, operational and potentially creative resources that will be required to produce or acquire it. As Roger summarises, this seems counterintuitive, but budgets are finite and it could be argued that prioritizing content over business processes is where dutiful media providers should concentrate their majority resource.
Zero Trust; the new security paradigm for a multi-connected world
Media companies are connecting across more platforms, services, and networks all the time and securing content or broadcast/streaming data has never been more important… and more difficult.
The Argosy family
Argosy was founded in 1984, originally to supply broadcasters and systems integrators with cables and connectors. Today we are known as infrastructure solutions specialist and have rapidly expanded our portfolio in recent years, with an extensive range of products and services, including racks, power management, conversion devices and KVM technology – and we serve a number of industries alongside broadcast – such as Pro-AV and IT.
