COVID-19 vs. our Networks

Sat Mar 14 18:49:12 UTC 2020

On Sat, Mar 14, 2020 at 11:01:48AM -0700, Mike Bolitho wrote:
> Third, the trouble we had was a third party service having congestion
> issues. 

This is a tiny sample of what's coming.  We're all about to be tested
in a major way, and lots of latent problems are about to become real,
pressing problems.  So:

1. Get some rest.  Stock up (judiciously, don't hoard) on supplies
including medications, fluids, food, etc.

2. Find all the phone chargers, laptop chargers, USB sticks, cables,
everything.  If you're not already obsessive about keeping things
charged, get that way.

3. Make sure your role addresses are up-to-date and working:

	postmaster@
	webmaster@
	security@
	abuse@
	noc@

and whatever else is appropriate.  Make sure that eyeballs are watching
everything that comes in there and anticipate that some people -- under
stress and anxious -- will send things to the wrong place.

Same for your phone contacts.  And make sure frontline support personnel
have the ability and judgment to rapidly escalate, do not allow urgent
needs to get lost in some ticketing system.

4. Make sure your WHOIS contacts on networks and domains are up-to-date
and working.  Same for your phone contacts.

5. Identify any spare resources that you can lend out.  Identify any
resources that you can guess will be needed.

6. Everyone who can telecommute should be telecommuting right now.
If you need hands on-site, and of course lots of people will, keep
those people separated from others.  Make sure hands-on people know
how to sanitize equipment, tools, etc.

7. Find time in the midst of this for self-care.  You can't help
anybody if you're exhausted.  Take a shower, watch dog videos, do
whatever you need to in order to stay functional.

Here's a resource page that I threw together with a little help
from some epidemiologists.  It's short, plain HTML so it should
load very fast, and of course because it's short it's probably missing
things.  Send suggestions to me off-list.

	http://www.firemountain.net/covid19.html

---rsk