Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1428470
maltatoday | SUNDAY • 14 NOVEMBER 2021 14 COMMERCIAL Maintaining MITA's network infrastructure Elaine, can you start by explaining what you and your team do? I work within the Network Services Team, a team of 18 in total. We are re- sponsible for the design, implementa- tion and support on a national level of the government network. Put simply, the network is divided into three ser- vices. The Data Centre is home to core net- work, the core of this whole infrastruc- ture, since the operation of the minis- tries and the government departments depend on this network. Other services are then built on it. The second services is what is known as the Wide Area Network – WAN. This covers Malta and Gozo, but is also extended abroad. It is known as MAG- NET, Malta Government Network. This network involves high-speed connec- tions, varying between 10 megabits and 200 megabits, and it covers hospitals, local councils, police stations, health centres and other locations. Thousands of users employed by the government use this network to access their systems securely, because their data is accessed or transmitted in an encrypted format, not clear text. The third service is the Local Area Network – LAN – which is basically the network in offices within ministries and departments. Since this is a local net- work, it can be wired or wireless, where users can use and share resources such as printers and cameras, for example. Then, if those users need to also access the Data Centre, a Wide Area Network would be needed. Kenneth, you work on software that is built on this core, am I correct? Yes, the Systems and Databases Team is a team of 18 members responsible for a number of services that are built on this network. These include virtual hosting, which is a platform that over 2,000 virtual machines which host all the services offered by the government. We also look after database hosting. Each database includes information which an application will be accessing. For example, if you log on to myhealth. gov.mt you will be accessing data saved in a database. We look after around 900 of these databases, through the use of var- ious technologies, including Microsoft, Informix, Oracle and Mariadb. Another service we are responsible for is file shar- ing, where we provide a space for govern- ment employees to save their documents and then be able to share them with their colleagues in a secure manner. We are also responsible for the Cor- porate Authentication Services, which is used by the entire government. We distribute a unique account and pass- word to each government employee to enable them to log on to their comput- er and access the government system securely. All of these services have a backup in order to minimise the risk of data corruption. So if a user needs to re- cover a document that was deleted, we can recover it in a short time, limiting the amount of data that is lost. These instances occur on a day to day basis. Audrey, internet is definitely an im- portant service nowadays. Your team is responsible for this service at MI- TA, correct? Today, we have over 26,000 users ac- cessing the internet over the Malta Gov- ernment Network. As Elaine explained, these include users within ministries, various entities and even embassies. This internet includes a Web Filter which provides with secure access and prevents them from accessing offensive content and malware, software that has malicious intent. We manage hundreds of websites that are protected using the latest technol- ogies. Keep in mind that some of these web- sites are also accessed by the public, as in the case of education, health, tax and many others. Other websites are only At the core of MITA's mission are the services it offers to government. To understand how these are hosted and deployed, PAUL COCKS spoke to Elaine St John, Senior Building Architect – Network Services, Kenneth Scicluna, Senior Team Leader – Systems and Databases Team, and Audrey Vidolich, Senior Solutions Architect - Internet and Web Hosting Services. All three work within MITA's Infrastructure Services Department Elaine St John, Senior Solutions Architect, Kenneth Scicluna, Senior Team Leader, and Audrey Vidolich, Senior Solutions Architect - Infrastructure Services Department (ISD)