Security & Privacy A Priority With MQ

Posted on | by Jeff Eveland

By Wendy Sanacore
If you’re company handles funds transferring, sending or viewing invoices or tracking the status of customer orders or transactions, then you most likely use Message Oriented Middleware.
Just one small transaction can trigger multiple business processes, even at the smallest level and can have implications across the board. Many of the industry’s top experts say that IBM’s WebSphere MQ middleware product is the most reliable and efficient to meet your business needs.
 

Why WebSphere MQ?

 
WebSphere MQ is the foundation of the IBM WebSphere brand, and has been long looked to as the standard setting middleware application. MQ acts as the communication backbone for several WebSphere products, including:

  • WebSphere Application Server
  • WebSphere Business Integration
  • WebSphere Commerce
  • WebSphere ESB
  • WebSphere Front Office
  • WebSphere Interchange Server
  • WebSphere Message Broker
  • WebSphere Process Server
  • WebSphere Portal

Interesting fact: WebSphere manages transactions worth more than $1T per day. That’s a huge amount of money and requires the most premier security and protection that can be offered.
It’s no wonder so many banks and financial institutions utilize MQ for their messaging needs.
 

What Does MQ Do?

 
WebSphere MQ provides messaging services to applications and Web services that need to exchange data and events. It offers extreme reliability, integrity, consistency and security. MQ is known for its flexibility, ease and speed, scalability and its proven high performance.
Essentially, MQ is like an email system for Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) applications. It is the transmitter of all pertinent, timely data.
Think about it this way:
You go to the bank and you want to draw out $20.00. You swipe your debit card, and put your pin number in. Magically, the money appears in your hands. How did it get there? How does the bank know to deduct that money from your account?
That’s where MQ steps in. All messaging services are based on something called Queues that store and forward data, based on simple programming commands.
When you entered your pin number and money request, some transaction needed to transmit that request to your account. MQ ensures that your data is not lost or duplicated. That way your account sees just the right deduction of funds.
MQ is essentially a vehicle to transport messages back and forth and make sure they are delivered in a timely and proper fashion
These sent messages are delivered to queues. The queue is a place that holds all the messages. In the queue, there is parallel access by all applications since every message is read by a different application.
WebSphere helps translate the message into a readable version to fit any application trying to access it.
MQ runs messaging across multiple platforms, including Windows, Linux, OS/2, IBM mainframe and midrange, and Unix.
If MQ is properly configured, a message should never be lost. That’s why the proper implementation and deployment of MQ is integral and requires highly skilled technicians who have extensive experience with WebSphere and the IBM platform.
In addition, it never hurts to keep technicians who you trust on call as a security backup, especially when MQ is responsible for such large core functionality within a company. Any outage or miscommunication could be disastrous to company revenue and productivity.
 

About TxMQ

 
TxMQ is a leader in WebSphere staffing and solutions. If you need qualified WebSphere technicians or subject matter experts, we have some of the best in the field.
TxMQ can also help alleviate the pressure of WebSphere support with our managed services offerings. These services act as a 24/7 insurance policy for your WebSphere applications. Contact us today at 716-636-0070 or email wendy@txmq.com for proactive or reactive support questions and options.