Today's network environments are too complex to track by purely manual efforts. With digital twin technology, IT teams can build a virtual model of the production network and use it to validate configurations, simulate changes, and streamline management.

The use of digital twins – digital representations of physical objects or systems – is on the rise. Enterprises can use digital twins to replicate their IT environments, including infrastructure, network equipment, and Internet of Things (IoT) devices, and then run simulations to test the impact of changes and to optimize performance. They can be used to validate the current state of a network, for example, and test configuration changes, firmware updates, or adjustments to security policies.

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In the fast-paced world of cybersecurity, Security Operations (SecOps) teams face an ever-evolving landscape of threats and challenges. As a professional in the NetOps, SecOps, or CloudOps field, you understand the critical importance of staying ahead of cyber adversaries and safeguarding your network infrastructure. That's where Forward Networks steps in, offering innovative solutions that revolutionize SecOps by supercharging your network insights and capabilities.

Our Co-Founder, Nikhil Handigol offers "5 Ways to Supercharge SecOps with Network Insights," where he unveils how SecOps engineers can elevate their SecOps game using digital twin technology. Let's explore five key takeaways that can transform the way you approach security operations:

1. Unlocking Vulnerability Management: Navigating the vast sea of vulnerabilities across servers and applications can be daunting. With a true network digital twin, you can instantly see which vulnerabilities are present in your network ranked by severity, making it easy to prioritize remediation and have mathematical confidence the network is compliant.

2. Attack Surface Management: Understanding your network's attack surface is crucial in fortifying your defenses against cyber threats. With Forward Networks' advanced capabilities, proactively identify areas where your network is out of compliance and analyze your exposure. By visualizing attack vectors and vulnerable hosts, you can proactively defend your network infrastructure.

3. Harnessing the Power of Software: Modern networks demand sophisticated solutions that go beyond use-specific tools. By leveraging network digital twin technology, you can validate your network's security posture with precision. Say goodbye to manual validation processes and embrace the efficiency of AI-driven insights.

4. Enhancing Network Visibility: In the realm of SecOps, visibility is key. Forward Networks' digital twin empowers security engineers with comprehensive insights into network connectivity and configurations. Real-time visibility into your network's traffic flow and behavior enables proactive threat detection and rapid incident response.

5. Transforming Security Operations with Network Insights: Unleash the full potential of your Security Operations Center (SoC) by integrating network insights into your security strategy. With Forward Networks' cutting-edge solutions, bridge the gap between network operations and security, fostering collaboration and efficiency across teams.

Are you eager to learn more? Nikhil goes into greater detail and demonstrates how the network insights delivered by true digital twin technology can supercharge SecOps teams. View the session on demand.

Join the revolution in SecOps with Forward Networks and embrace a future where network security knows no bounds. Stay tuned for more insights, advancements, and partnerships that shape the future of cybersecurity.

In the world of networking, misconfigurations and inconsistencies can lead to significant issues for businesses, especially those in highly regulated industries such as financial services. One Fortune 500 financial services company experienced a nightmare scenario with their MTU (Maximum Transmission Unit) settings, resulting in application and performance problems. Fortunately, the company found a solution in Forward Networks' digital twin. This blog post will delve into the MTU issues faced by the company and how Forward Networks helped them overcome these challenges.

The MTU Nightmare:

The financial industry is known for its tight control over deployments and configurations. However, this also means that any misconfiguration or inconsistency can have severe consequences. The financial services company had been facing application issues and performance problems that had been occurring randomly, making it difficult to identify the root cause. Eventually, it was discovered that there was a misconfiguration in the MTU settings of a cross link between core devices. While jumbo frames were enabled north and south, this cross link was set to a lower MTU size of 1500. The issues became more apparent when the primary path failed, and traffic started traversing this misconfigured link. The network devices had to fragment the traffic, resulting in processing delays.

Before incorporating Forward Networks' digital twin technology, the company had programmers writing custom scripts to identify misconfigurations. These scripts were scattered across personal drives, making it challenging to consolidate and analyze the vast amounts of data they generated. The team became overwhelmed with Excel files containing close to a million lines, making the investigation process nearly impossible.

Recognizing the need for a more efficient and centralized approach to network analysis, the company turned to Forward Networks. The company saw promising results with Forward Networks' digital twin solution, which offered out-of-the-box capabilities to address their MTU issues. Forward Networks provided a pre-built script specifically designed to identify MTU misconfigurations, convincing the company of the platform's suitability for their needs.

Although the pre-written script provided by Forward Networks yielded results, the company still needed to narrow down the information it wanted to see. Despite not being a programmer, one of the company's network engineers was able to customize the script using educational resources provided by Forward Networks and the company’s user community. The engineer successfully created a tailored solution that only displayed infrastructure MTU information, filtering out unnecessary data.

By leveraging the capabilities of Forward Networks' network assurance and intent-based networking platform, this company saved a significant amount of time by automating the identification of MTU issues. Forward Networks enabled them to replace manual, fragmented scripts with a centralized solution, empowering their engineers to analyze network data more efficiently. In turn, they have minimized downtime and ensured that their network infrastructure is robust and reliable.

Just like that, we’ve completed another Networking Field Day (NFD). Only this time, we had a customer present: Michael Wynston, Director of Network Architecture and Automation at Fiserv, joined us to share how the Forward Enterprise network digital twin is saving his organization time and money by delivering a trusted source of truth for his network inventory. 

Additionally, our own Mike Lossmann explained the security benefits of a network digital twin and co-founder, Nikhil Handigol, shared how generative AI is helping engineers of all skill levels gain complex network insights using natural language prompts.   

As usual, the delegates put us through our paces with insightful and sometimes challenging questions, which is the reason we enjoy this event so much: it’s engineers talking to engineers (marketing people like me are verboten), and they don’t hold back. We’re delighted that three of the delegates have published articles detailing their takeaways from our presentations.   

"Forward Networks - The tale of an aptly named company" by Ryan Lambert provides an in-depth exploration of Forward Networks' approach to network digital twins. Lambert delves into the practical applications of network digital twins, highlighting their ability to model network behaviors and streamline network management processes. From compliance verification to outage troubleshooting, he believes that network digital twins promise to revolutionize how organizations manage their networks. 

John Herbert's article, "'AI Assist' is better than 'AI Do It For Me'," offers a candid reflection on the role of artificial intelligence in network management. Herbert emphasizes the importance of maintaining human oversight and control in the face of AI-driven solutions. He likes Forward Networks' AI Assist feature for its user-centric approach, which empowers users to evaluate and modify AI-generated queries, ensuring accuracy and reliability in network management tasks. 

In "Unveiling the power of Digital Twins," Greg Grimes explores the transformative potential of network digital twins in network management. Greg outlines Forward Networks' innovative approach to creating its network digital twin, which eliminates the computational burden associated with traditional virtual appliances. With practical applications ranging from compliance verification to route update predictions, Forward’s network digital twin modernizes network management processes. 

If you get a chance, please take a look at the full-length versions of the articles; they’re written by engineers, not professional journalists or analysts. It’s a window into how “hands-on-keyboard” professionals feel about our capabilities.