Prepare a report for VideoDev

Overview

VideoDev Ltd is a video and production development company which works for clients across Australia and New Zealand. The company is considering moving some of its computer infrastructure into the Cloud. The VideoDev Board is contemplating this move as a way to increase the company’s flexibility and responsiveness, as well as to achieve some savings on the cost of maintaining their ICT infrastructure.

VideoDev has engaged you as a consultant to advise them on the use of Cloud Computing in their daily operations. They have some 100 video production, engineering and support staff that work on different projects for clients in Australia and New Zealand.

You were recently engaged to advise on re-factoring their video processing application to use a microservices approach. The VideoDev Board is keen to start to move to this direction as it sees the possibilities that it will open up for VideoDev in the future. They have also decided to start planning to migrate their existing web services from their two on-premise data centres to a public cloud.

The company is considering the following strategic proposal:

  • They plan to retain the Sydney data centre for data storage. This would entail updating their Active Directory and data storage infrastructure, and moving all other infrastructure into the Cloud.  
  • They plan to move all their Web Services into the Cloud in order to provide an increased responsiveness to customer demand as well as an enhanced level of HA (High Availability) in supplying data to their customers and staff.
  • They are considering changing their current web software architecture to take advantage of the flexibility and scalability that can be gained by moving to a Microservices model (this would entail the use of such services as AWS Lambda or Azure Functions, Containers, Data Services, and Cloud Edge capability and monitoring).

The VideoDev Board is contemplating this strategy as a way to increase the company’s flexibility and responsiveness. The Board also expects to achieve significant savings on the cost of maintaining their ICT infrastructure by closing one of their existing data centres. They appreciate that this would entail retraining for their existing ICT staff so that they can manage the new Cloud based infrastructure.

You have also advised the VideoDev Board that their Threat and Risk Assessment (TRA) needs to be updated as a result of these architectural changes. The Board has asked you to update the TRA as a matter of urgency.

The Board is also concerned about how this strategy will affect their BCP (Business Continuity Plan) and their backup and disaster recovery strategies.

the task is to prepare a report for VideoDev that discusses the following:

1. Describe which Cloud architectures you would employ to assist VideoDev to meet the Board’s strategy of moving their web services to a MicroService approach?  

  1. Describe each of the architectures that you would use, along with your reasons for deploying it. (
  2. Describe the benefits and issues that would be the result of your deployment of these architectures.

2. Describe the risks that you see associated with this new MicroServices strategy. You should name and describe each risk that you identify, and then describe a possible control for the risk. This should be presented in a tabular form.

3. Describe the general Information Security steps and controls that you would recommend to the Board to secure these MicroServices. You will need to explain to the Board your reasons for recommending these particular security steps.

4. Discuss briefly what you would recommend should be included in VideoDev’s BCP as a result of their adoption of a Microservices approach.  You will need to consider, as a minimum, the issues of application resilience, backup and disaster recovery. This section should be no more than 2 pages.

5. Discuss the requirements that VideoDev will need to consider in order to conduct remote administration, resource management and SLA management for its proposed MicroService approach. This section should be no more than two to three pages in length. (

6. The VideoDev board wants to know what you recommend as the best migration strategy and process for the migration of their web services to a MicroService approach.

  1. Describe the steps that you would include in the plan to migrate these services
  2. What are the critical points and issues that you see occurring at each of these steps? Explain why you see these points or issues as critical.

7. Assessment Rubric

Question

HD

DI

CR

PS

FL

1. Architectures

Clear and comprehensive description of Cloud architectures needed, benefits and critical points identified & discussed

Detailed description of Cloud architectures needed, most benefits and critical points identified & discussed

Good description of Cloud architectures needed, many benefits and critical points identified & discussed

Adequate description of Cloud architectures needed, some benefits and critical points identified & discussed

Inadequate or incomplete description of Cloud architectures needed, few or no benefits or critical points identified & discussed

2. Risk Assessment

Clear, comprehensive description of Risk Management issues, critical points identified & discussed,

Detailed description of Risk Management issues, many critical points identified & discussed,

Good description of Risk Management issues, many critical points identified & discussed,

Adequate description of Risk Management issues, some critical points identified & discussed,

Inadequate or incomplete description of Risk Management issues, critical points identified & discussed,

3. Information security

Clear, comprehensive assessment of InfoSec issues, critical points identified & discussed,

Detailed assessment of InfoSec issues, most critical points identified & discussed,

Good assessment of InfoSec issues, many critical points identified & discussed,

Adequate assessment of InfoSec issues, some critical points identified & discussed,

Inadequate or incomplete assessment of InfoSec issues, few or no critical points identified & discussed,

4. Changes to BCP

Clear, comprehensive description of backup and DR plan, critical points identified & discussed,

Detailed description of backup and DR plan, critical points identified & discussed,

Good description of backup and DR plan, some critical points identified & discussed,

Adequate description of backup and DR plan, some critical points identified

Inadequate or incomplete description of backup and DR plan, none or few critical points identified

5. MicroService Management

Clear, comprehensive assessment of service management, critical points identified & discussed,

Detailed assessment of service management, most critical points identified & discussed,

Good description of service management, some critical points identified & discussed,

Adequate description of service management, some critical points identified

Incomplete or inadequate description of service management, none or few critical points identified