24/07/2024 – Driver 38 and TLS 1.2

Below is a detailed review of the changes now available to support TLS1.2 and TLS1.3.

The latest version of BEST includes this feature without any additional costs, however existing sites will need to pay for the work required and also be prepared to carry out full testing of a test application before agreeing to go live with the new changes. This is not just an installation of a patch as many forms needs to be modified and replaced.

Sites that have been running a version 5 years or more will pay £5,000 + VAT.
Sites with more recent installations will be discounted by £1,000 + VAT per year.

Example:
If you are in your 2nd year of a new installation of BEST the cost would be £2,000 + VAT.

Payment Plan:
The 1st £1,000 + VAT is to be paid on completion of the work, whilst the remainder of the costs can be off-set at £1,000 + VAT per annum as part of your Annual License Renewal until the payment for the work is made in full.

April this year saw Microsoft cease support of a network security protocol called TLS (Transport Layer Security) Version 1.1. We at Soft Options have had to pull out all of the stops to carry out a complete re-write of Driver38 which also required the modifying of screens within BEST to support it. With this work now complete Driver 38 includes support for both TLS1.2 and TLS1.3.

Due to customisations for each service, each function within BEST needs to be fully tested by the service within the test system before going live. Once it had been fully tested by the Soft Options team, the new driver was added to Birmingham’s test system.

The team at Birmingham were fantastic at thoroughly testing each function within BEST to ensure that it was working as they expected and any issues were raised on an SOS ticket and quickly resolved.

Following the testing, Birmingham then went live. We asked Kerry for some words on the experience of moving to Driver 38 for TLS1.2.

In June 2023 the transfer of Best to TLS1.2 commenced. This was a lengthy process with a lot of work involved for Soft Options.
Meetings were held with Soft Options and BCHC IT to look at the way forward and what was needed to ensure the change was smooth and completed by the 31st May 2024.
Soft Option put a large volume of work into TLS1.2 and monthly updates were received to clarify where they were with TLS1.2 this was a great help for us to report back in monthly management meetings.
Once Soft Options were reading which was well before the 31st May a test version of Best was released. With BCHC there are 6 services that use Best and in-depth testing needed to be completed by all services to ensure that BEST still working how it should on the TLS1.2 Platform. It is crucial that this testing is completed and if any issues were found a ticket would be raised and was very promptly investigated by Soft Options.
Once the testing was complete and agreed by all parties it was ready to go live.
A meeting was held with Soft Options and BCHC IT and dates were set.
We went live on the 31st May and this was a very smooth process. It’s evident from this process that communication is key and to be transparent with all concerns and Soft Options always deliver this.
The overall experience with Soft Options was professional and very knowledgeable. Although there were some setbacks from BCHC Soft Options were always flexible and willing to share their font of knowledge and experience not only as a Business but individuals with BCHC this was greatly appreciated I know that Simon Henry played a very key part in this process and my hat goes off to him with how professional and knowledgeable he was not only in meetings but emails too and of course Dave without his dedication patience and knowledge we would not be where we are today without him
I would like to thank all the staff at Soft Options in making this happen in the time frame and their continued support since we very first went live with Best in 2016.

Kerry McLean
Equipment Management System Lead at Birmingham

All existing BEST V14 sites can upgrade to Driver 38.
Once live, from a BEST point of view TLS1.0 and TLS1.1 can be disabled.