Picture this. It’s a busy week for real estate closings and your staff is on a full-out 100-yard dash to get to the finish line.
Suddenly, every application on your system starts to slow down. It takes forever to upload a document to a critical application. In-putting data is suddenly a slog. Launching an application takes so long, it times out.
Of course, the immediate concern is that there is some virus or malware that has caused the aberration, and you certainly want to check that out first.
But often times it is a simple mathematical problem – too many people running too many applications at once and consuming the server bandwidth. Under normal conditions, that bandwidth is enough, so you can go days and weeks without a problem. But you certainly don’t want everything crashing when you need computing power the most.
One modern solution to that problem is called autoscaling.
Allocating Computer Resources
Autoscaling is a technique for balancing or allocating computer resources as needs fluctuate.
AVI Networks defines autoscaling as “a cloud computing feature that enables organizations to scale cloud services such as server capacities or virtual machines up or down automatically, based on defined situations such as traffic or utilization levels.”
You are probably familiar with cloud computing providers, such as Microsoft Azure, which offer autoscaling tools. At Premier One, we specialize in cloud-based solutions, including Microsoft Azure, because we recognize the cost advantages we can provide our clients by lowering their equipment and storage costs.
While cost savings are an important aspect of autoscaling, for the title insurance industry, performance reliability may be equally important. While autoscaling is automatically responding to a spike in the background, the users are enjoying a seamless experience on their computers. This is a critical advantage during your busiest times.
Security Considerations in Autoscaling
Autoscaling also offers a security advantage, an increasingly important focus for the title insurance industry. Because all systems are being monitored for resource usage, it is more likely to detect a spike that is driven by a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack.
DDoS is an attack in which a cybercriminal floods a business’s server with internet traffic, slowing its systems and in the worst-case scenario, rendering its systems inoperative. Sometimes it is carried out as retaliation against a company, but more often for financial reasons, either by a competitor or for the purpose of holding the company’s servers hostage until a ransom is paid.
Title agents need to focus on what they do best – providing expert title services, protecting their client’s information and escrow funds, and successfully closing real estate transactions. While you need IT services to help you perform those critical tasks, we understand that IT is not necessarily your preferred expertise.
At Premier One, we utilize the latest technologies to help our clients do the things they do best without worrying about their IT problems or network issues. We want you to be the best you can be. and we want to help you get there. Contact us today to learn more about how we can help you manage your IT services to ensure a year of successful real estate closings for your clients.
