ISE Magazine, August 2019

ISE ICT SOLUTIONS EDUCATION 74 NETWORK AUTOMIZATION Moving Forward The Secret Sauce The advantages of CLA are quite evident and its clearly not just a nice to have In fact according to a recent Light Reading article network operators need to be moving faster or find themselves left behind In a nutshell they need to automate or die Why do CSPs need to automate Complementing our surveys findings the article points to 5G and IoT as the main drivers that will compel CSPs to embrace CLA Our survey shows that its clear CSPs understand the need for CLA even today But it does beg the question if CSPs consider CLA highly beneficial even imperative why arent they deploying it more widely To find out we asked them to rate their strongest obstacles to implementing CLA See Figure 3 For almost half of those surveyed its about a lack of skill set or understanding of the technology CSPs want the benefits of CLA But they dont want to grapple with the disruptive changes that introducing new skill sets and workflows would no doubt entail That would explain why almost two thirds of CSP respondents prefer to get their CLA tools and guidance from a third party rather than seeking an in house solution Some software solutions leverage technologies like Machine Learning ML and Artificial Intelligence AI that learn to identify unknown problems and solve them automatically based on anomalous behavior learned patterns and applied models and policies that adjust on the fly when confronted with new data An instructive example of this approach would be the ability to identify zero day DDoS attacks by benchmarking normal traffic and building up a knowledge base of learned variants of normal behavior New unknown attack patterns and traffic anomalies could then be identified and mitigated based on learned intelligence concerning normal and abnormal traffic Furthermore in a world of weaponized IoT ML could detect unknown anomalous device behavior and AI could implement throttling or quarantine policies to limit potential damage See Figure 4 Another example relates to video traffic encryption Identifying and evaluating video traffic quality has become extremely challenging With YouTube Netflix and others encrypting their traffic CSPs can no longer take the network based approach of measuring KPIs for these applications Traditional monitoring tools cannot identify encrypted traffic and cannot decipher embedded encrypted measurements What is needed are innovative solutions that leverage ML to detect encrypted video and utilize AI to infer KQIs and deduce from them the end users experiences CLA will then take this customer centric approach one step further by automatically tweaking relevant network parameters to ensure sustained optimal QoE n Resources The survey methodology sampled an audience made up of 100 senior management C suite respondents e g CTO Head of Engineering Operations in Tier 1 2 and 3 companies working in Engineering Operations and Security departments The survey was conducted during November 2018 Frost Sullivan Closed Look Automation A strategic Imperative for Todays CSPs and Optimize QoE with Automated Intelligence Allot Congestion Management QoE Assurance through Automated QoE DDoS Mitigation https www allot com resources SOL_ CONGESTION_ MANAGEMENT 1 pdf neXt Curve Contextually Aware Mobile Security as a Service The Democratization of 5G Everything Crossing the 5G IoT Connectivity Chasm https next curve com Light Reading Heavy Reading Its Simple Automate or Die https www lightreading com automation heavy reading its simple automate or die d d id 737647 Networkworld A Primer on Closed Loop Automation Inform Closed Loop Implementation TelecomTV The Automation Journey Towards 5G Networks https www allot com blog six ddos lessons learnt https www adweek com digital the shift from 4g to 5g will change just about everything http www gridinfocom com ai machine learning will transform telecom sector 2020 https www huawei com en about huawei publications communicate 60 hw_ 093296 https www lightreading com automation 8 things we didnt know about telecom automation until last week a d id 742117 https www sdxcentral com networking nfv c_ action nav_ bar https www statista com statistics 471264 iot number of connected devices worldwide https www wired com story mirai botnet minecraft scam brought down the internet Itai Weissman VP New Markets and Innovation at Allot is a telecom industry veteran and a driver of the Companys product management vision for over a decade Itai is now focusing on leveraging his vast knowledge of IoT Networking and 5G Technologies to further develop solutions which enable CSPs to harness the massive opportunity presented by 5G and IoT technologies Follow Itai on Twitter @ ItaiWeissman Allot is a provider of innovative network intelligence and security solutions that empower communications service providers CSPs and enterprises worldwide to enhance the value they bring to their customers With over 20 years of proven success their solutions turn network application usage and security data into actionable intelligence that make our customers networks smarter and their users more secure For more information please visit https www allot com Follow Allot on Twitter @ allot_ ltd and on LinkedIn https www linkedin com company allot communications