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By Zac Abdulkadir, President and CEO of Netready
March 27, 2025
With over 25 years of experience serving businesses in Pasadena and Riverside, California, I’ve witnessed the evolution of IT support firsthand. The IT services industry has undergone seismic shifts from the early days of break-fix models to the sophisticated managed service frameworks we rely on today. However, we’re now on the brink of an extraordinary transformation driven by artificial intelligence (AI) and automation. These technologies aren’t simply incremental upgrades—they fundamentally reshape how IT support operates, enhance cybersecurity, ensure compliance, and deliver unparalleled efficiency. In this article, I’ll explore how AI and automation revolutionize managed IT services, drawing on my deep cybersecurity and IT compliance expertise to provide a forward-thinking, technical perspective.
The Current State of Managed IT Services
Managed IT services have traditionally centered around proactive maintenance, monitoring, and support. At Netready, we’ve built a solid reputation for delivering predictable IT outcomes—securing networks, managing endpoints, and ensuring compliance with frameworks like HIPAA, PCI DSS, and NIST. Historically, this work relied heavily on human expertise—engineers analyzing logs, technicians responding to alerts, and compliance officers auditing systems. While this approach was effective, it has its limitations: human bandwidth is finite, and the complexity of modern IT environments is expanding at an unprecedented rate.
Today, businesses face a deluge of cybersecurity threats—ransomware, phishing attacks, and zero-day vulnerabilities—while also grappling with increasingly stringent regulatory requirements. For example, the cost of a data breach in 2024 exceeded $4.5 million, according to IBM, and the downtime caused by ransomware attacks can cripple small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) for days or even weeks. At Netready, we've seen clients lose over $100,000 per ransomware incident due to operational halts. Meanwhile, compliance frameworks demand real-time monitoring and documentation—tasks that strain traditional IT teams. This is where AI and automation come into play. These tools don’t just assist; they revolutionize how we address these challenges.
AI-Powered Threat Detection and Response
Cybersecurity is the backbone of managed IT services, and AI fundamentally alters how we approach threat detection. Traditional signature-based antivirus tools are increasingly ineffective against polymorphic malware and advanced persistent threats (APTs). Conversely, AI leverages machine learning (ML) to detect anomalies in real-time. At Netready, we’ve integrated AI-driven endpoint detection and response (EDR) systems that continuously analyze user behavior and system activities, such as file access spikes or unusual network traffic, to identify potential threats before they escalate.
For instance, consider a recent example: a client in Riverside fell victim to a spear-phishing campaign targeting their finance team. Legacy systems might have missed the subtle indicators, like slightly altered email domains. However, our AI-powered security information and event management (SIEM) platform cross-referenced the email metadata against global threat intelligence feeds, identifying and quarantining the attack within minutes. This real-world scenario demonstrates how AI’s predictive capabilities can detect and mitigate cyberattacks in ways that traditional methods simply cannot. Gartner predicts that by 2026, 80% of enterprises will rely on AI-driven cybersecurity tools, and at Netready, we’re already seeing this shift in action.
Automation plays a key role here as well. Once our SIEM detects a threat, automated playbooks execute a series of predefined responses. These include isolating affected endpoints, revoking compromised credentials, and initiating forensic logging—all without human intervention. This dramatically reduces the mean time to respond (MTTR) from hours to seconds, which is critical when ransomware can encrypt data in less than a minute. The combination of AI detection and automated remediation represents the future of threat management—fast, efficient, and highly effective.
Streamlining IT Operations with Automation
Beyond security, automation is also transforming the operational side of managed IT services. Routine tasks such as patch management, backups, and system updates, which once consumed hours of technician time, are now handled by robotic process automation (RPA). At Netready, our Pasadena office oversees hundreds of endpoints across client networks, and thanks to automation, we can deploy patches to all systems simultaneously when fixes are released. This isn’t just about efficiency—it’s a critical compliance requirement, particularly for frameworks like NIST 800-53, which mandates the timely application of patches.
AI takes this further by incorporating predictive maintenance. Using historical data—such as CPU usage, disk health, and network latency—AI models can forecast potential hardware failures before they happen. For instance, we once used AI to predict a server crash for a manufacturing client in Riverside due to overheating trends. We replaced the hardware during a scheduled downtime window, saving the client an estimated 20 hours of unplanned downtime. This approach improves uptime, reduces operational costs, and strengthens client trust in Netready’s proactive management.
Enhancing Compliance Through AI and Automation
Compliance has always been a critical pillar of IT support, particularly for industries like healthcare, finance, and legal sectors. As an IT compliance expert, I’ve guided Netready clients through audits for frameworks like HIPAA, SOC 2, and GDPR. Historically, these processes required extensive manual documentation and hours of painstaking work. However, AI and automation are changing this paradigm.
AI-driven compliance tools can continuously monitor systems and compare them to regulatory benchmarks, automatically flagging any gaps in encryption, access controls, or data retention policies. For example, our AI platform recently detected a misconfigured S3 bucket for a Pasadena client, preventing a potential GDPR violation before it could trigger a fine.
Moreover, automation has streamlined reporting processes. Instead of manually compiling logs for an audit, automated scripts can now generate comprehensive reports on user activity, patch statuses, and incident responses in just hours, not days. This capability aligns perfectly with the NIST Cybersecurity Framework’s focus on continuous monitoring and documentation, something I’ve always emphasized in our operations. By 2027, I predict that 70% of compliance tasks will be fully automated, freeing IT teams to focus on more strategic and impactful initiatives.
The Human-AI Partnership
While AI and automation have revolutionized many aspects of IT support, they won’t replace the need for human expertise—they will augment it. Complex incidents like multi-vector APT attacks or intricate system configurations still require seasoned engineers to analyze and mitigate. At Netready, our team interprets AI-generated insights and adjusts algorithms to reduce false positives (a common challenge with machine learning). For example, after deploying an AI-based firewall, we noticed that it flagged legitimate VPN traffic as suspicious. Our engineers fine-tuned the model’s parameters by training it on our clients' unique network patterns, ensuring that the AI worked harmoniously with our clients’ environments.
Furthermore, the human element is crucial when it comes to client relationships. Businesses trust Netready because we understand their unique operations—whether they are a law firm in Pasadena or a retailer in Riverside. AI can’t replicate this empathy or the strategic consultation we provide. Instead, AI frees us up to focus on high-value tasks like designing secure architectures, advising clients on digital transformation, and educating them on emerging threats like quantum cryptography risks.
Challenges and Ethical Considerations
Despite the advantages, this transformation presents certain challenges. For one, AI systems require vast amounts of data, which can raise privacy concerns, particularly under regulations like CCPA. At Netready, we anonymize client data before feeding it into machine learning models, ensuring compliance with privacy laws while benefiting from AI's power.
There is also the risk of over-reliance on automation. If a misapplied patch or failed update disrupts the network, the effects can cascade throughout an organization. We mitigate this by layering oversight—automated processes are audited by AI and human reviewers, ensuring errors are caught before they have significant consequences.
Ethically, we must address concerns around job displacement. While automation reduces the need for routine tasks, it also increases the demand for skilled roles, such as data scientists, AI trainers, and compliance analysts. At Netready, we are actively upskilling our team to ensure they are prepared for this new landscape, helping them thrive in an AI-driven world. As an industry leader, we believe it’s our responsibility to navigate this transition responsibly.
The Road Ahead
Looking to the future, AI and automation will continue to deepen their impact on managed IT services. Technologies like quantum computing could further accelerate AI’s ability to detect threats, while hyper-automation—integrating AI, RPA, and IoT—will create self-healing networks capable of dynamically adapting to changing conditions. At Netready, we’re already piloting AI-driven network orchestration, where systems automatically adjust bandwidth and security policies based on real-time demand. Imagine a retail client’s network prioritizing POS traffic during a Black Friday surge, all without human input. That’s the future we’re building.
This means more resilient, compliant, and efficient IT support for businesses in Pasadena, Riverside, and beyond. As cyberattacks become more sophisticated and regulations become stricter, AI and automation aren’t just optional but imperative. With over two decades of experience in cybersecurity and IT compliance, I am confident that these technologies will redefine the future of managed IT services. At Netready, we’re leading the charge.
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Zac Abdulkadir
President and CEO of Netready
With a career spanning more than 25 years, Zac Abdulkadir
is a recognized authority in cybersecurity and IT compliance,
dedicated to protecting businesses from evolving threats.
