Azure Payment HSM achieves PCI PIN certification offering customers secure digital payments solutions in the cloud

By Dustin Ward

This blog post has been co-authored by Darius Ryals, General Manager of Partner Promises and Azure Chief Information Security Officer. Today we’re announcing Azure Payment HSM has achieved Payment Card Industry Personal Identification Number (PCI PIN) making Azure the first hyperscale cloud service provider to obtain this certification. Financial technology has rapidly disrupted the payments industry…

Azure private MEC—A thriving partner ecosystem

By Dustin Ward

In June of 2021, Microsoft introduced Azure private multi-access edge compute (MEC), a solution that enables operators and system integrators (SI’s) to deliver high performance, low latency connectivity, together with IoT applications at the edge, helping to deliver the next wave of digital transformation. This is made possible because Azure private MEC combines network functions,…

Dive deep into NAT gateway’s SNAT port behavior

By Dustin Ward

In our last blog, we examined a scenario on how network address translation (NAT) gateway mitigates connection failures happening at the same destination endpoint with its randomized source network address translation (SNAT) port selection and reuse timers. In addition to handling these scenarios, NAT gateway’s unique SNAT port allocation is beneficial to dynamic, scaling workloads…

Announcing Microsoft Dev Box Preview

By Dustin Ward

Many IT organizations must choose between giving developers the flexibility they need to be productive and keeping developer workstations managed and secure. Supply chain challenges have led to developers waiting weeks or months to get the hardware they need, forcing them to use aging hardware or unsecured personal devices. At the same time, hybrid work…

Security for next generation telecommunication networks

By Dustin Ward

Almost two years ago, the National Defense Science Board invited me to participate in the Summer Study 2020 Panel, “Protecting the Global Information Infrastructure.” They requested that I brief them on the evolution of the global communications infrastructure connecting all nations. The U.S., like other nations, both cooperates and competes in the commercial telecom market,…