The largest Canadian-owned and operated cloud and carrier-neutral data center platform providing modern-day data center infrastructure: eStruxture

The newest and most demanding applications require infrastructure that anticipates and supports rapid growth and unpredictable change. eStruxture is the largest Canadian-owned data center provider with locations in Montreal, Toronto, Vancouver, and Calgary. eStruxture’s solutions are designed to give you more: more locations, more capacity, and more connections that enable you to run modern, demanding enterprise applications, and offer your business the control to rapidly scale in response to unpredictable changes in business processes. Headquartered in Montreal, eStruxture provides access to an ecosystem of over 1200 customers that trust and depend on its infrastructure and customer support, including carriers, cloud providers, media content, financial services, and enterprise customers. eStruxture offers colocation, bandwidth, security and support services to customers across Canada in its carrier and cloud-neutral facilities.

Confidentiality, integrity, and availability. These are the three pillars of data center security, from chips to servers to networks. You need to be sure that no unauthorized party will have access to your IT. You need protection against accidents and incidents that could cause the corruption or loss of your information and cyber resources. Yet you must also be certain that your systems will remain available for authorized users, maintenance, and upgrades.

So, why should you prefer a colocation data center to an enterprise data center for your security?

Physical and virtual

First, let’s set the scene for data center security. We can divide it into two domains, the physical and the virtual. By virtual security we mean areas and tools like user ID and access management (IAM) for applications, data encryption, zero trust security policies, and security information and event management (SIEM) and user and entity behavior analytics (UEBA) solutions. These items are independent of location. Whether you choose to implement them for systems that are on your site or in a colocation data center, they will have the same effectiveness.

The real differences between enterprise and colocation data centers are in the robustness of the physical security and the compliance with internationally recognized security directives. Colocation service providers like eStruxture know how vitally important it is to provide the best physical security possible. They have the resources, skills, and experience to ensure continuing protection and compliance that many individual enterprises need, but that few can do by themselves.

From strategy to action

Like other business challenges, physical data center security is not guaranteed simply by writing a big check. It needs to be thought through, end-to-end, for maximum effectiveness. eStruxture’s security strategy is to deter, prevent, and detect any incident that could compromise the key goals of confidentiality, integrity, and availability.

• Deterrence. eStruxture discourages attackers before they even start. When they see how hard it is to penetrate an eStruxture Data Center, they give up and look for other targets.
• Prevention. The breadth and depth of eStruxture’s security systems with multiple, interconnected layers shield its colocation data centers from incidents and accidents.
• Detection. If any actual or suspected intrusion occurs, eStruxture knows via its security systems and move directly to isolate it and counteract it.

The list of security devices and measures to put this strategy into action in eStruxture Data Centers is impressive:

• CCTV/video surveillance on all areas of the site including critical equipment areas and white spaces with 90-day footage retention
• 24x7x365 onsite security staff with site patrols and alarm response
• Mantraps and secure loading docks
• Vehicular impact protection and access-control
• Anti-climb fence around the external perimeter
• Robust external walls to prevent casual break-ins
• Elevator access restrictions
• Motion detectors
• Alarms on doors
• Multi-factor authentication into secure zones
• Access badge readers
• Biometric scanners
• Keypad/PIN Code

Only a few enterprise data centers achieve such a level of physical security. But eStruxture goes further still.

Processes and compliance

Successful data center security depends on high quality security processes and controls. These are proven checks and sequences of steps that are applied systematically to achieve consistently effective levels of security.

eStruxture has standardized on more than 60 operational controls in its process-driven approach to protecting the machines that you run in its colocation data centers. These controls enable robust governance of security, operations, risk management, personnel, and IT best practices. eStruxture undergoes annual review by a third party auditor to maintain alignment with its requirements and your needs as its customer.

Good colocation service providers like eStruxture also satisfy a range of rigorous compliance and security protocols, including:

• SOC 2 Type II according to the latest SSAE18 auditing standards with auditing done by an accredited third party entity. The Service Organization Controls 2 (SOC 2) certification is based on trust services criteria for controls relating to confidentiality, integrity, availability, and privacy of systems.
• Payment Card Industry (PCI) DSS requirements 9 and 12 for locations for storing or processing payment card data. These high-security areas (HSA), for example a server room, have their own access routes and CCTV cameras to monitor activity.
• ISO/IEC 27001:2013 for validated information security management systems (ISMS). To comply with this standard, an entity must methodically apply a risk management process for security relating to people, processes, and IT systems.

Conclusion

For all the reasons above, enterprise data centers are unlikely to achieve the levels of physical security offered by a colocation service provider like eStruxture. A colocation data center has the advantage over individual enterprise data centers because it can attract skilled security personnel, implement and keep up with the latest security technology, and mutualize these resources for the greater good of all customers using the colocation data center.

As a leading provider of colocation data center solutions across Canada, eStruxture delivers best-in-class physical security to safeguard your infrastructure for confidentiality, integrity, and availability.

Meet the leader behind the success of eStruxture

Todd Coleman is the President and CEO of eStruxture. Todd brings more than 25 years of experience in the IT, data center and telecommunications industries. Most recently, Todd was the Chief Operating Officer and co-founder of Cologix. Todd has also held several senior positions at Level 3 Communications, a global telecommunications company, including Senior Vice President of Data Centers, Senior Vice President of Media Operations and President of Level 3 Communications Europe.

“Our customized approach means that you will always get the most efficient combination of space, power, cooling, and connectivity that is guaranteed to meet your unique needs, and support the most sophisticated workloads.”