By Nick Pseftis, Cybersecurity Consultant, OberaConnect
Alabama stands at a critical inflection point. While regional economic development accelerates from Mobile’s expanding health innovation zones to the logistics corridors of Dothan and the fast-growing metros of Baldwin County there remains a widening gap between enterprise ambition and digital infrastructure readiness. The question executive leadership must ask is no longer whether technology supports business operations, but whether infrastructure is resilient, secure, and aligned to the regulatory and threat environments of 2026 and beyond. In many cases, the answer is no.
The Growing Cost of Outdated Infrastructure
The persistent use of outdated copper-based networks, unmanaged flat architectures, single-homed broadband circuits, and perimeter-based firewall models no longer meets the standards required by today’s cyber, compliance, and operational landscape. These are not isolated technical debt issues. They are structural risks exposing healthcare systems, manufacturers, government agencies, and logistics providers to outages, regulatory fines, cyberattacks, and service degradation. At OberaConnect, we regard digital infrastructure not merely as an IT function, but as critical infrastructure on par with transportation, water, and energy systems. Our mission is to close Alabama’s infrastructure divide with a secure, standards-aligned, and operationally auditable foundation capable of supporting statewide digital modernization.
The reality on the ground reveals the depth of the problem. Healthcare networks lack the dual-homed connectivity and segmentation required for HIPAA resilience, making them vulnerable to both downtime and data breaches. Construction and field operations frequently lack stable internet access, undermining digital workflows such as blueprint access and permit submission. Public sector entities continue to operate 911, financial, and SCADA systems over architectures that lack redundancy or role-based access control, rendering critical infrastructure fragile. Logistics and transportation operators still suffer from inadequate real-time visibility due to single-circuit failures, directly impacting SLA commitments. These shortcomings persist despite record-breaking federal investment in broadband and state-led initiatives such as the Alabama Fiber Network. The infrastructure gap has not closed it has shifted into deeper operational consequences.
"In 2023, over 70 percent of ransomware attacks targeted small and mid-sized businesses, according to Coveware."
Compounding this issue is a fundamental shift in the cyber threat landscape. Adversaries are increasingly focused on regional, under-protected organizations that maintain high-value operational responsibilities but lack enterprise-grade defenses. In 2023, over 70 percent of ransomware attacks targeted small and mid-sized businesses, according to Coveware. The calculus is simple: attackers are optimizing for impact and payout. For Alabama-based enterprises, especially those in regulated sectors—the stakes are rising.
This brings the conversation to the C-suite. Infrastructure resilience is now a strategic consideration that falls squarely under the oversight of CEOs, COOs, and CISOs not just CIOs. Downtime is no longer viewed as a technical nuisance but as a material risk to enterprise value. IDC reports that the average cost of unplanned outages for mid-sized firms now exceeds $300,000 per hour, including lost revenue, customer attrition, and operational backlog. At the same time, the regulatory environment continues to harden. Whether under HIPAA, NIST 800-53, CJIS, or the SEC’s new incident disclosure regulations, organizations are expected to demonstrate not just cybersecurity posture but auditable, resilient system design. Distributed workforces and hybrid operating models further intensify the need for cloud-first, identity-driven access frameworks that maintain uptime, continuity, and telemetry integrity.
"IDC reports that the average cost of unplanned outages for mid-sized firms now exceeds $300,000 per hour, including lost revenue, customer attrition, and operational backlog."
From our position as Alabama’s strategic infrastructure partner, OberaConnect is responding with a standards-forward modernization model grounded in both operational resilience and regulatory alignment. Our engineering approach is designed to deliver not only connectivity but mission-ready infrastructure.
First, we lead with multi-transport, fiber-first architecture. Every deployment includes failover paths using fiber, LTE, and licensed point-to-point wireless, supported by edge-to-core telemetry and structured cabling. Second, our managed security stack replaces legacy firewalls with Zero Trust enforcement points that integrate policy-based access, AI-driven anomaly detection, VPN encryption, and threat intelligence correlation—all aligned with NIST, FedRAMP Moderate, and HIPAA expectations. Third, we unify endpoint, identity, and configuration orchestration across distributed environments by employing a policy-driven framework that adapts to evolving threats and operational requirements. This approach ensures continuous visibility, dynamic policy enforcement, and responsive telemetry across all assets enabling timely risk mitigation, automated compliance alignment, and sustained operational integrity regardless of user location or device posture. Fourth, we design for multi-site scalability. Whether supporting hospitals, campuses, city offices, or mobile field units, we deliver cloud-managed switching, remote monitoring, and consistent performance across geographies.
All infrastructure services offered by OberaConnect are implemented within a compliance-first framework, including documented change control, system configuration baselines, and auditable controls that stand up to HIPAA, CJIS, NIST 800-53, FedRAMP Moderate, and FINRA scrutiny. We do not view infrastructure as an afterthought. We treat it as the foundational substrate for enterprise competitiveness, public trust, and digital resilience.
Alabama’s economic future depends on how aggressively we address these infrastructure gaps.
Enterprises must now decide whether they will continue to operate reactively—responding to outages, breaches, and fines after they occur—or strategically position themselves with future-proofed systems capable of weathering the digital, operational, and regulatory challenges ahead.
OberaConnect invites Alabama’s public and private sector leaders to engage in a comprehensive infrastructure audit and modernization strategy. The time to build is before the breach, before the audit, and before the next round of mission disruption. The organizations that act now will lead the next decade of growth. Those that wait will be forced to catch up on someone else’s timeline.
We secure what matters—data, operations, and trust.
Get in touch with our executive team to learn more about our cybersecurity governance programs.