Infrastructure audit
An IT infrastructure audit is a systematic-documented verification of the condition and efficiency of each infrastructure component individually and of the entire system.
It is important to understand that an IT audit is an expert assessment conducted by independent specialists. Of course, there is also an internal audit, but still the specifics of the audit mean that it requires high-level specialists who have experience working with different projects and companies.
Why may I need an IT audit?
During our work we have encountered different situations, but if we summarize them, we can highlight some of the most common scenarios.
Performance Optimization. A company is looking for ways to make a system run faster. For example, a store’s website takes longer than three seconds to load pages, causing visitors to get annoyed and leave without buying.
Cost-cutting. The client suspects that the current infrastructure is costing an inordinate amount of money to maintain. To understand whether IT costs can be optimized without sacrificing performance, he requires a complete picture of the current situation.
Second opinion. The customer requires a “fresh head” and wants to understand whether the infrastructure decisions were made correctly. Sometimes there is a need to monitor another contractor’s audit and compare recommendations or evaluate the work of the in-house team.
Analyzing the causes of the incident. An audit is decided after some failure, for example, a serious downtime in service operation that was not eliminated in time due to incorrectly configured monitoring system or data loss due to lack of backups. Of course, having faced this situation once, no one wants it to happen again.
Big Problem. There is a problem that cannot be solved by your own efforts. Such an issue can be, for example, a protracted move to Kubernetes or regular failures in production.
How is an audit conducted?
An audit can be carried out in different ways. For example, the course of the procedure is strongly influenced by the customer’s request: audits can be general or targeted. Yes, even in the audit of DevOps processes there can be a specific goal: if there is a need only to assess the security of the infrastructure, then the whole process will be built accordingly.
A general audit procedure usually consists of several steps:
- Description of the current infrastructure. Based on all available data, the initial state of the infrastructure is described in as much detail as possible: both in text and in the form of diagrams. Both “hardware”, network infrastructure, and software are described. Employees of the auditing company get temporary access to the infrastructure, which gives the opportunity to analyze the work of servers, to describe the entire technology stack used, to check the compliance of monitoring and logging systems with the company’s needs, to assess the state of CI/CD processes.
- Identification of deficiencies. Although the work on this item goes in parallel with the description of the existing infrastructure, this process should be emphasized separately. It is one thing to describe the system, and another to pay attention to its weaknesses.
- Report writing. Whatever the audit is, general or targeted, its distinguishing feature is documentability. At the end of the procedure, the customer receives a report with the audit results: most often it is a rather voluminous document containing sections corresponding to the audit criteria, a summary (with basic information) and recommendations for improving the IT infrastructure.
IT infrastructure audit is an integral part of strategic management of information security and efficiency of business processes. A properly performed audit provides management and those responsible for the infrastructure with valuable information to make informed decisions, and helps minimize risks and improve customer service.
Need an audit? Submit a request and we will contact you within 24 hours.