Barracuda Networks. https://www.barracuda.com The company says it "provides easy, comprehensive and affordable solutions for email protection, application and cloud security, network security and data protection, and is "continually innovating to deliver tomorrow’s security technology, today".

With over 200,000 customers globally and over 5,000 channel partners worldwide, the company has been serving and protecting customers since 2003, and has been doing a very good job of it!

Late last month, Barracuda Network's Sales Engineer Manager for APAC, Mark Lukie, wrote an article published at iTWire entitled: "What will 2021 deliver for cybersecurity in Australia?"

The article, linked above, has the full detail which is worth reading, but in short, Lukie expects an increase in attacks taking advantage of the new reality of distracted workers, the ongoing global pandemic, cost pressures from the worldwide recession, remote access issues, and the accelerated adoption of cloud services that COVID-19 has driven.

He notes that "each of these alone would be cause for concern for cybersecurity professionals, but that "all these macro trends happening simultaneously requires us to have the highest level of vigilance against those who would take advantage of these situations".

There are threats from COVID-19 check-in apps and QR codes that can be faked by malicious actors to steal information, and the security of the information itself in is question. Contact tracing scams are coming, as are scams around COVID-19 vaccines.

Lukie's predictions point to a shortage of key resources to help mitigate security issues, and an increased focus on zero trust to secure distributed enterprises and remote workers. And, with the migration to cloud continuing at full speed, it's important that we all ensure security doesn't take a back seat. You'll find the detail here. 

So, with Mark Lukie having over 18 years’ experience in networking, security, backup/disaster recovery, public cloud platforms, as well as systems integration, it was certainly worth talking to Mark to find out more, with the video interview embedded directly below, followed by a summary of the topics we spoke about.

I started by introducing Mark and welcoming him to the interview, asking him to tell us about Barracuda Networks in 2020, and the short version of Mark's history in the world of tech.

We discussed the security predictions he wrote about for 2021 in more detail, and how humans are still the weakest link in the chain, with security training one of the great ways to ensure that we can all be human firewalls for the organisations we work for.

We then spoke about the future and what the cybersecurity landscape might look like in 2030, along with great advice Mark has received in life, and his final message for iTWire viewers and readers, and for Barracuda Network's current and future customers and partners.

So, if you'd like to know more, please watch the video interview above!