Ep. 45 Network Management to Improve Federal Cybersecurity

January 31, 2023

Technology changes so rapidly that, sometimes, people who are involved in federal technology may not realize how well-known companies are innovating to respond to the new threat landscape.

F5 is well known to the federal community; they started in the mid-1990s beginning with application delivery controllers. Even at its inception, the founders of F5 demonstrated an advanced understanding of traffic patterns and security with its load balancers.

In 2017, Francois Locoh-Donou started to steer the company into new waters. Because of their knowledge of networking, they had a good basis for understanding cybersecurity threats. They aggressively moved into the area of threat intelligence and web application firewalls. Their products were so well received in the commercial world that today, almost all of the Fortune 50 use F5.

During today’s interview, Peter Kersten, Regional Vice President of F5, shows how F5 innovation can assist federal agencies to hit their goals. One key is to focus on the API and not the data. After all, the federal government has petabytes of critical data.

"We've been calling this adaptive applications. And we're working to use layer seven telemetry, along with artificial intelligence and machine learning to enhance application deployments and maintenance"

Peter Kersten, F5 Networks Tweet

Peter Kersten explains that the gateway to secure data is to protect access through the network. That is why F5 has tools like BIG-IP and NGINX. As a general rule, the BIG-IP offering looks at traditional network security and NGINX has a focus on microservices. He explains how they apply to federal data challenges in the discussion.

If you are considering F5 are using F5 and not taking advantage of all its horsepower, you may want to consider attending the Public Sector Symposium taking place at the Ritz-Carlton at Tyson’s Corner. The two-day conference includes sessions that give you continuing education credits as well as unpacking the power of the F5 approach to security.

If you enjoyed this article, you may want to listen to Ep. 38, In a Town Full of Secrets, the Best Kept Secret of All.