News in the Channel - issue #34

NETWORK SECURITY FOR EDUCATION PROVIDERS

be backing up their data regularly. “It’s also important to stress to customers that they are ensuring they eliminate software and firmware vulnerabilities by staying up to date with released patches,” he says. “Vulnerabilities, if exploited, can result in a major cyberattack, so it’s imperative to ensure that they are prioritised and remediated immediately.” Future Ed says it is expected that MSP-first adoption with continue to grow as education institutions outsource more of their network operations to trusted partners. “Monitoring and security capabilities will increasingly converge, giving IT leaders a unified view of performance, risk, and compliance,” he adds. “Automation will play a greater role in detection and remediation, reducing time- to-resolution. We will also see growing demand for compliance-ready reporting as schools seek to demonstrate cyber resilience to boards and regulators. Ultimately, the goal is greater reliability and peace of mind, keeping the focus on teaching rather than troubleshooting.” Dray adds that identity first and zero trust approaches will accelerate alongside automation and AI driven detection. “Also, expect more emphasis on identity hygiene, continuous authorisation and regulatory pressure on ransomware readiness.” Graham agrees that we should expect AI-powered threat intelligence, cloud-native security tools and hyper-

automated compliance reporting to become standard. “With attacks growing more sophisticated, proactive strategies and intelligent, automated defences will dominate,” he adds. “Resellers who can deliver future-proof, layered security will lead the market.” Scott adds that a shift towards more advanced threat detection solutions that will safeguard schools against any out- of-the-ordinary activity on a network, and more adoption of SaaS and managed security services will continue. “I also think we will see more partnerships forming between channel businesses that have specialist skills in key areas of cybersecurity,” he adds. “It’s a challenge to keep pace with all the developments taking place in digital security and more partners are starting to make use of our in-house expertise to ensure they can provide the best advice and solutions to their customers.” VimalRaj agrees that 2026 will be the year of convergence and collaboration in cybersecurity for education. “Schools and universities will increasingly move towards security-as-a-service models such as managed endpoint protection, SOC-as-a-service, and automated patching, delivered through trusted channel partners,” he says. “For resellers, the opportunities lie in offering bundled, value-driven solutions that combine compliance readiness, threat visibility and automation, enabling education customers to achieve more with less.” n

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With attacks growing more sophisticated, proactive strategies and intelligent, automated defences will dominate... ...Resellers who can deliver future-proof, layered security will lead the market.

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