DevOps adoption has been going on for a decade and shows no signs of slowing. In Forrester’s 2024 developer experience survey, 87% of developers indicated that their organisation had already adopted DevOps practices or planned to do so in the coming year.
But for many organisations, scaling their DevOps practice has been complicated, expensive and, in the end, insufficient in delivering the value leaders had expected. These organisations start with a grassroots approach to DevOps adoption, with each team self-selecting its toolchain, creating its best practices and infusing its institutional knowledge.
Forrester clients tell us this team-based approach breaks down at scale. It creates as many problems as it solves and does not deliver the results the C-suite was expecting.
For instance, bespoke toolchains create headaches. Organisations that took this approach are now saddled with too many unique toolchains, each requiring nurturing by the same developers who are supposed to be building customer-focused products. These toolchains also require unique automation, create trapped institutional knowledge, contribute to tool sprawl and limit any chance for volume DevOps tool pricing.
All these factors create headaches for IT leaders trying to reduce overheads while improving productivity and efficiency.
Many organisations now understand that improving the developer experience increases efficiency by removing impediments to the development process. High among those impediments is unnecessary context switching, which breaks the concentration of developers and decreases flow.
Disconnected automation tools, multiple systems of record and multiple platforms slow developers down by forcing them to play hopscotch with numerous tools. Without a common platform as the backbone, when developers change projects, they may go through entirely new onboarding procedures to get access to repositories and commit their first pull request.
The lack of standardised practices causes governance issues as well. Without a standard approach to software delivery, you end up with ad hoc governance implemented differently depending on the toolchain. This creates trust barriers between developers and enterprise governance teams, can add manual oversight and red tape that slows processes down, and works against efforts to improve productivity and efficiency at scale.
Another issue software developers face is that the traditional IT service catalogue is a heavyweight solution. Many organisations have had service portals for years, grounded in IT and enterprise service management practices and based on products such as ServiceNow, Atlassian’s Jira Service Management or BMC Helix.
These tools remain because they often serve non-technical users and may be leveraged by traditional infrastructure organisations for ticketed offerings. However, developers find ticket ops to be too slow and unresponsive, which is why a market emerged for dedicated internal developer platforms (IDPs).
A scaled platform for services
IDPs provide a framework for creating an IT platform where services can be defined, automated and exposed across the enterprise.
Examples of IT services that can be incorporated into an IDP include allocating a new piece of infrastructure, such as a new virtual machine, instantiating an automated continuous integration/continuous delivery (CI/CD) pipeline to build and deliver code, or creating the scaffolding for a new microservice project using organisational best practices.
Internal developer platforms provide a framework for creating an IT platform where services can be defined, automated and exposed across the enterprise Forrester
IDPs facilitate management and access to service automations by providing a framework to manage and expose automation at scale.
IDPs can provide visibility into tools and frameworks. One feature of IDPs is scorecards, which provide information about both the technical and business performance of technologies. This helps developers make the right choice when faced with multiple frameworks, and also gives leaders insight into adoption.
New tool adoption becomes apparent to leadership, as does abandonment of older technologies, enabling leaders to deprecate and remove older components when it makes sense for the business.
At a high level, IDPs can serve a similar role to traditional platform as a service (PaaS) by providing an abstraction layer to IT infrastructure services. However, whereas many PaaS implementations have opaque abstraction layers, IDPs offer a transparent layer via service definition files that enable developers and infrastructure engineers to view, reuse and improve upon the underlying abstraction mechanisms.
Platform builders need to understand these differences to determine which abstraction model will serve their needs best.
There are several reasons for its adoption. Spotify has a reputation for transformational engineering processes. Many organisations have adopted the now-famous Spotify model, featuring squads, tribes and guilds. Having Backstage reside in the CNCF ensures governance and a healthy community of contributors and adopters. A growing number of commercial DevOps tool suppliers support Backstage plug-ins. And most importantly, because it’s open source, Backstage is free for developers to download and try, further accelerating interest in platforms in general.
Before committing to an IDP, IT leaders should build a compelling business case outlining which benefits the IDP will bring to the organisation and how it will measure these Forrester
Many teams had assumed, or hoped, that Backstage was a ready-to-use platform, but soon became overwhelmed by its complexity. This has created an opportunity for commercial software providers to differentiate their offerings from Backstage. These commercial tools providers claim their products are easier to get started with, have a lower learning curve and offer technological advantages to Backstage, such as providing a service orchestration layer.
Spotify also offers Backstage as a paid commercial subscription that includes product support, additional plugins and no-code capabilities to help companies get started faster with greater confidence. Users see these commercial add-ons, such as Soundcheck (a plug-in that helps teams visualise quality, security and reliability checks on services), as value-adds.
Before committing to an IDP, Forrester recommends IT leaders build a compelling business case outlining which benefits the IDP will bring to the organisation and how it will measure these. Developing a comprehensive business plan will ensure alignment between the stakeholders funding the platform initiative and those responsible for its creation.
Forrester has found that nearly every IDP company and end user who has successfully built an IDP started small by building a proof of concept (PoC). The first implementation can take several weeks to months.
Forrester recommends that IT leaders first identify a team that is collaborative and sees the benefit of an IDP approach. Then, build the PoC around a few of members’ crucial needs while engaging with them for additional suggestions and even their own contributions to improve the IDP. This approach can be built upon and used as a springboard for other teams to continue to grow the IDP in a sustainable way.
Mexico City is one of the fastest sinking cities in the world. Now, a powerful satellite from the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) confirms the accelerated advance of this silent threat that puts nearly 20 million people at risk.
The satellite designed by NASA and the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO), known as NISAR (NASA-ISRO Synthetic Aperture Radar), was able to capture with unprecedented precision the magnitude and evolution of this phenomenon in different areas of the Mexican capital. The analysis is based on preliminary measurements taken from space between October 2025 and January of this year, during the dry season in Mexico City.
Their findings were captured in a map that shows how the subsurface of the metropolis is shifting. In the map, NASA identified areas with subsidence greater than 2 centimeters per month (marked in dark blue). The agency specifies that the areas marked in yellow and red could correspond to background signals (or noise) that are expected to diminish as the satellite instrument collects more data.
The image also highlights the location of Benito Juarez International Airport, located near Lake Nabor Carrillo, which operates in the middle of an area with accelerated subsidence. “Images like this confirm that the NISAR measurements are in line with expectations,” said Craig Ferguson, deputy director of the project.
Mexico City sits atop the clay and lake bed of ancient Lake Texcoco. NASA explains that this process is a consequence of intense groundwater pumping and the increasing weight associated with urban development. Both factors have caused the compaction of the ancient lake soil for more than a century.
The phenomenon was first documented in 1925 by engineer Roberto Gayol. Between the 1900s and 2000s, some areas experienced a drop of nearly 35 centimeters per year, causing damage to infrastructure such as the Metro, one of the largest mass transit systems in the Americas.
A study conducted in 2024 by Dario Solano-Rojas, a remote-sensing specialist at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, found that subsidence is not uniform. After analyzing changes in the city’s elevation between 2011 and 2020, the researcher and his team concluded that subsidence rates are highly variable: While some areas register up to 50 centimeters per year, in others the phenomenon is almost imperceptible.
This creates “differential subsidence,” where the ground sinks unevenly not only across square kilometers or city blocks, but even on a meter scale. When a street, railway, or building sinks differently at one end compared to the other, its stability is compromised.
I’m looking at Volume 1,536 of the Epstein files, page 311. It’s an early 2016 email thread between Jeffrey Epstein and a woman whose name is redacted by the Department of Justice.
In the thread, Epstein asks the unidentified woman for a “naughty selfie” and later sends her a camera. In late February, he replies with a different ask: “Do you have any friends that might want to work for me?…I will give you money if you find someone willing to travel, 22-25, educated. Personable.”
The exchange carries extra resonance when you consider that Epstein is accused of sex trafficking minors, with the Department of Justice estimating that he had more than 1,200 potential victims. But I just happen to flip to it randomly during my recent visit to the newly opened Donald J. Trump and Jeffrey Epstein Memorial Reading Room.
Photograph: Anna Maria Lopez/Courtesy of BPI Group
Tucked away in a nondescript gallery in New York City’s Tribeca neighborhood, the reading room is a massive library of all 3.5 million pages of Epstein-related records released by the Department of Justice earlier this year, compiled into more than 3,700 individual volumes. From May 8 to 21, the reading room will be open to the public by appointment only.
The library—essentially, the Epstein files in analog—is intended to represent the staggering scale of Epstein’s crimes, as well as the impunity with which he carried them out. More than 17,000 pounds of evidence is on display at the library, says David Garrett, the main organizer of the exhibit at the Institute for Primary Facts, a nonprofit intended to promote transparency and accountability in the US government.
“The evidence in this room is evidence of one of the most horrific crimes in American history,” Garrett says. “When people come through this room, I hope they realize that in America, we have the rule of law, and if they stand up they can take action and demand accountability for the crimes that were committed.”
Epstein, who died in prison in 2019, is now synonymous with systemic corruption and abuse, particularly in light of his ties to President Donald Trump. The installation features a detailed timeline of Epstein’s relationship with Trump, from their purported initial meeting in Palm Beach in 1987 to Epstein’s 1993 attendance at Trump’s wedding to Marla Maples to the end of Epstein’s membership at Mar-a-Lago in 2007, when Trump allegedly witnessed him behaving inappropriately toward the teenage daughter of another member. The shelves are organized around an exhibit in support of Epstein’s survivors, with candles laid out on the ground to represent the more than 1,200 victims. In response to a request for comment, White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson said Trump has “been totally exonerated on anything relating to Epstein,” claiming that he “has done more for Epstein’s victims than anyone.”
Fahad Ansari, who specialises in national security cases, argues that police unlawfully stopped and questioned him because they wrongly “equated” him acting as a lawyer for Hamas with being a member of the proscribed organisation.
The case is believed to be the first targeted use of Schedule 7 powers, which allow police to stop and question people and seize their electronic devices without the need for suspicion, against a practising solicitor.
Ansari, an Irish solicitor who represents Hamas in a legal appeal to have its proscribed status overturned in the UK, was stopped and questioned by police after returning home with his family from Ireland to Holyhead in August 2025.
Police risk assessment stated ‘Hamas’
A police officer who completed a risk assessment made a handwritten note under the heading “membership of a known group” stating “Hamas”.
According to a legal submission from Ansari’s barrister for a judicial review originally due to be held today, the police officer was “essentially” equating Ansari, who is not a member of Hamas, with his client.
The police officer confirmed in a witness statement that his note was inaccurate. “What I had intended to write was that Mr Ansari worked as a solicitor for Hamas, and not that he was a member of the group,” he said.
Ansari not questioned in earlier stop
It emerged that Ansari was stopped previously in 2024 under Schedule 7 of the Terrorism Act, before he represented Hamas, in what appeared to be a random stop.
He identified himself as a solicitor and was not asked any questions about Hamas or Palestine. He did not have his mobile phone seized, downloaded or copied, unlike his later Schedule 7 stop , barrister Hugh Southey KC, wrote in a skeleton argument.
He said the significant difference between the two Schedule 7 stops was that Ansari had made an application on behalf of Hamas before the second stop.
The chief constable of North Wales Police has made contradictory statements about the reasons for stopping Ansari for the second time in 2025.
In January 2026 she stated that “there was an underlying reason or reason for the stop: it was not random”. The chief constable now states that she has “not confirmed” that the stop was a “targeted stop”.
It appears that the chief constable has approached litigation heard in open court in a “confused, contradictory and less than candid manor”, Southey wrote.
Legally privileged material
The phone seized by North Wales Police, contained legally privileged material, including communications with clients, their families, witnesses and experts, documents, financial information, and internet research related to clients.
A police officer subsequently prepared a list of keywords, including names of UK proscribed organisations and keywords based on research the officer had conducted into Ansari, to allow an independent counsel to “sift and review” data on Ansari’s phone.
Ansari argues that the safeguards, including using an independent counsel to assess the contents of the phone, were inadequate to protect legally privileged material, and that he has no way of knowing whether such material was accessed by investigators.
The Chief Constable wrote to Ansari in March this year stating that the police had completed their examination of Ansari’s work phone. Ansari has sought confirmation whether police officers had inadvertently seen privileged material from the phone.
Lack of rights
The consequence of the approach taken by the Chief Constable of North Wales Police is that Ansari would be entitled to greater safeguards if he were investigated for having committed an actual offence, and where there had already been a judicial warrant, Southey wrote in the skeleton argument.
Ansari said that Court of Appeal had recognised that his argument for greater disclosure from the police had merit.
“Previously, the High Court allowed the police to rely on secret evidence. In situations like this, it’s normally expected that at least a summary of the allegations is shared to allow a semblance of a fair hearing,” he wrote in a post on LinkedIn.
The police’s apparent lack of distinction between being a member of Hamas and being a legal representative of Hamas raised “serious concerns,” and would deter lawyers from representing proscribed groups, he added.
“This is not Belfast in the 1980s when such messages were delivered by bullets, but the intention feels uncomfortably similar: represent clients and face consequences,” he said.
Phantom Parrot
A document leaked by whistleblower Edward Snowden in 2013, raised concerns that information collected from phones during Schedule 7 searches was being covertly collected at UK borders under GCHQ’s “Phantom Parrot” programme.
Ansari said that North Wales Police had declined to say whether information from his phone had been shared with any other organisations.
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