{"id":28258,"date":"2022-01-24T11:07:51","date_gmt":"2022-01-24T11:07:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.n-able.com\/?p=28258"},"modified":"2022-10-20T18:11:09","modified_gmt":"2022-10-20T17:11:09","slug":"automate-almost-all-the-things","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.n-able.com\/it\/blog\/automate-almost-all-the-things","title":{"rendered":"Automate (almost) all the things"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"p3\">My mantra with regards to automation has always been, \u201cIf you do it more than twice, automate it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\">And I stick by that, with a few exceptions. There are some things you should never trust to an automated script.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"p3\">User data deletion<\/h2>\n<p class=\"p3\">I should make clear the difference between \u201cuser data\u201d and things like temporary files, caches, scratch disk, and their ilk. In most cases, the operating system or applications that create those temporary files are also designed to purge them periodically. When the OS falls down on its job, and those purgeable folders start to fill up the drive, a well-aimed script can make a big difference\u2014as long as you make absolutely certain that what gets deleted is only those files and paths that can safely be purged. A script that does this for you can save the time of manually finding and selecting folders as well as prevent the kind of mistake that nearly deleted <a href=\"https:\/\/thenextweb.com\/news\/how-pixars-toy-story-2-was-deleted-twice-once-by-technology-and-again-for-its-own-good\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">\u201cToy Story 2\u201d<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\">User data, on the other hand, is something that was created by a person, not a process. Even if it\u2019s an installer that user has downloaded 10 copies of already, or another kitten meme, no script should be responsible for permanently deleting it. I would go so far as to say your scripts shouldn\u2019t even empty the Mac trash or the Windows recycle bin. I have personally witnessed\u2014on more than one occasion\u2014a user that was devastated when the only copy of a file they needed was deleted after support emptied the trash.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<hr width=\"50%\" \/>\n<blockquote>\n<p class=\"p3\"><i><strong>Eric Harless, head backup nerd at N&#8209;able, says:<\/strong> \u201cThe phrase \u2018Measure twice, cut once\u2019 works as well for data protection as it does for carpentry. Before you \u2018cut\u2019 data (i.e., format a volume, delete a directory, or even empty a recycle bin), it\u2019s best you ensure that you have a validated backup and that you (or your end user) don&#8217;t truly need the data you\u2019re about to remove.\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\"><strong><i>Check out Eric&#8217;s blog series on Backup monitoring to learn more, <\/i><a href=\"https:\/\/www.n-able.com\/blog\/backup-monitoring-part-1-manage-exception\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span class=\"s2\"><i>Backup Monitoring: Part 1\u2014Manage by Exception<\/i><\/span><\/a><span class=\"s2\"><i>.<\/i><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<hr width=\"50%\" \/>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\">Like Hippocrates said, \u201cFirst, do no harm.\u201d If the drive is getting full, and something\u2019s got to go, purge whatever you can from the caches and temporary files. And if there\u2019s still no room? An automated task should be able to notify the user that there\u2019s a few gigabytes hiding in their downloads folder in files they haven\u2019t touched for 30 days or more. If they were to empty the recycle bin they would get a few more gigabytes back, but leave it up to them to take that action and make it all disappear forever.<\/p>\n<h2 class=\"p3\">Bypassing security for convenience<\/h2>\n<p class=\"p3\">Modern secure systems often rely on multiple factors to authenticate the person using them. These come down to something you <i>know<\/i> (like a password), something you <i>have<\/i> (a token from your phone or an RSA key fob), and something you <i>are<\/i> (biometrics, like fingerprints).<\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\">Security professionals sometimes liken simple password authentication to a locked door\u2014to a determined thief, it\u2019s only a brief hindrance. Anyone can watch a few YouTube videos to learn lock-picking, buy an inexpensive set of tools, and they\u2019re in. If you\u2019re leaving the key under the welcome mat, why even have a lock?<\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\">Often, you will need to log into another system as part of automating your work. If that server only requires a password for authentication, it\u2019s tempting to just save that in your script. It would save you a step each time you run your task to not have to stop and type in a password. But just how secure is the text file that represents that script? And the laptop or server it\u2019s stored on? You don\u2019t have to look far to find stories of breaches, ransomware, or other attacks that were made possible by a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.csoonline.com\/article\/3634784\/how-corporate-data-and-secrets-leak-from-github-repositories.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">user\u2019s credentials stored in the clear<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<hr width=\"50%\" \/>\n<blockquote>\n<p class=\"p3\"><i><strong>Lewis Pope, head security nerd at N&#8209;able, says:<\/strong> \u201cAs your coding skills improve and the complexity of the tasks you automate through scripting increase, so does the damage an \u2018oops\u2019 moment can have. Leaving a highly privileged set of credentials in plain text in a script is one of those moments. Using plaintext passwords directly in scripts is one of the cybersecurity bad habits that almost everyone is guilty of having done at some point when first learning how to write scripts.\u201d\u00a0<\/i><\/p>\n<p class=\"p4\"><strong><span class=\"s3\"><i>Read more in Lewis\u2019s blog on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.n-able.com\/blog\/25-cybersecurity-bad-practices\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">security bad practices<\/a>.<\/i><\/span><\/strong><i><\/i><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Automation\u2019s a fantastic way to improve your overall efficiency, but, as this blog points out, there are some things that should never be automated.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-28258","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","topic-apple","topic-automation","topic-head-nerds"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v27.2 (Yoast SEO v27.2) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Automate (almost) all the things - N-able<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Automation\u2019s a fantastic way to improve your overall efficiency, but there are things you should never automate. 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