Zenith Live 2020 EMEA day two highlights: optimizing user experience, Microsoft partnership, and chasing Sandworm

That’s a wrap for day two of Zenith Live 2020 for the EMEA region. It’s been two days of compelling secure digital transformation customer journeys, architectural deep-dives, and the latest product and service innovations from Zscaler. Yes, things looked a little different this year, as every session moved online (and was made available for free). But going virtual only made the premier global cloud summit better, as every seat was in the front row. (Plus, I watched from the comfort of my couch.) Below, some of my day-two highlights.

Like day one yesterday, we began day two of Zenith Live 2020 with some exciting product announcements from Zscaler President and CTO Amit Sinha, whose main-stage presentation was titled “Cyberthreats and Cloud Protection Innovations.” He shared details (and a demo) of Zscaler’s new Cloud Protection service that secures enterprise apps and workloads. He also talked about Zscaler ZDX, a feature that monitors performance, enabling enterprise IT leaders to measure, then optimize user experience.

Amit introduced Reckitt Benckiser (RB) Director of Enterprise Architecture John Dawes, who has put ZDX into practice at the U.K.-based consumer goods multinational. John described how RB used Zscaler Private Access (ZPA) to enable remote work for its employees when COVID hit, and then how they’ve improved user experience for this new way of work. “ZDX has given us some great early insights,” said John. “We've identified some regional Office 365 issues, and on more than one occasion we've encouraged our colleagues to prioritize their own device on their home Wi-Fi network so Microsoft Teams works better."

Following the product innovations session was an engaging “Voice-of-the-Customer” discussion on security transformation. Zscaler CISO and VP of Security Research Deepen Desai spoke with two IT leaders from shipping firm CMA CGM: Group CISO Michael Perrino and IT Security Architect Sebastien Lemieux. The two discussed the French shipping company’s secure digital transformation, and how they led the move from legacy security to a cloud-based Zero Trust architecture to protect 110,000 employees across 160 countries, 755 working locations, 750 warehouses, and almost 500 vessels. They also shared the dramatic story of how CMA CGM deployed ZPA to 27,000 customers in 48 hours to mitigate a ransomware attack in progress.

In the sincere words of Microsoft Identity Division CVP Alex Simons, “Microsoft and Zscaler are partnering to help [customers] realize a true Zero Trust security model.” Alex spoke on the main stage, and talked about the “new world,” one that “needs a new philosophy for security.” He introduced Gerold Nagel, DB Schenker’s SVP of Global Infrastructure Services, who talked about the German logistic firm’s “cloud-first strategy,” an approach he described as “the key enabler for our digital transformation.” Gerold credited DB Schenker’s Microsoft/Zscaler Zero Trust Cloud Model for the company’s recent accelerated shift to remote work: “This is not only a future-proof cloud topology,” he explained, “but it actually helped us implement a seamless business-continuity solution in the face of the pandemic.”

I particularly enjoyed our day-two keynote. Journalist and author Andy Greenberg shared his experience tracking Sandworm, a Russian state-sponsored organization responsible for cyber attacks on Ukraine’s power infrastructure and on the 2018 Olympic Games. The cyber-terrorist group was also behind the catastrophic deployment of the NotPetya malware, which impacted major organizations around the globe. One of many interesting points he made that we can learn from: Ukraine was uniquely positioned to respond to cyber attack. The power companies were staffed with operations personnel who could quickly get out to remote locations to turn the power back on. That simple planning -- intentional or not -- helped minimize collateral damage from the attack.

I had a busy day sharing insights from our customers and partners. I had the pleasure to discuss with Siemens′ Anthony Atherton on how to secure OT and IoT workloads using the Zscaler platform. We showed together how Zscaler and Siemens are building new ways of working to ensure the protection of OT platforms for the enterprise. I then discussed just the “art of the possible” in transformation with Sandvik′s Sebastian Kemi & Takeda′s Thomas Likas. Finally, I was also lucky enough to share how Zscaler can help companies understand what their attack surface is, with the Zscaler Attack Surface Tool.

After two days of engaging virtual sessions at Zenith Live 2020, I’m already looking forward to Zenith Live 2021 (which I fully expect will be an in-person event!). If you weren’t able to join this week, you can still attend: Visit ZenithLive.com for more information, and to register to access recordings of this week’s sessions.