Come to the RSA show, and you’ll find plenty of cybersecurity technology. The top vendors from across the industry are here, showing products for fighting ransomware, preventing data breaches and more.But even the best security software is useless if users and businesses aren’t taking the right steps to protect themselves. So we asked experts at the show for their best cybersecurity tips.Joe Stewart, director of malware research at Dell SecureWorks He advises everyone to set up two-factor authentication to protect their internet accounts, especially email. It can be particularly useful when stopping hackers who are trying to steal login passwords from users, whether through malware or email phishing schemes.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Google Brain announced release 1.0 of its machine learning (ML) library yesterday at the TensorFlow Developer Summit in Mountain View. ML is a method of programing computers with data to make highly reliable predictions, instead of creating a program in a language like Java, C# or Python.ML is a more efficient method of solving problems such as image recognition, language translation and ranking things like comments and recommendations. Google, along with Facebook, IBM and Microsoft has used ML internally to solve problems like ranking search results.A little over a year ago Google released TensorFlow based on its experience with its proprietary ML library, DistBelief. TensorFlow is in use within Google with about 4,000 source code directories including TensorFlow model description files. It is used in many applications including Google Search, Maps and Gmail’s spam filter.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
PC prices are going up due to a shortage of a number of components, and the situation isn't expected to change in the coming quarters.A shortage of DRAM, SSDs, batteries, and LCDs have conspired to drive up PC prices, Gianfranco Lanci, corporate president and chief operating officer at Lenovo, said during an earnings call on Thursday.The cost of purchasing these components is going up, which is triggering PC prices to also rise, said Lanci, a PC industry veteran. The shortage of components like memory will continue, Lanci said.As component supplies shrink, PC prices will rise, said Mikako Kitagawa, an analyst at Gartner. Moreover, PC makers are raising prices to squeeze more profits out of the shrinking PC market, Kitagawa said.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
More than 100 members of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), the majority of them stationed around the Gaza strip, fell victim to a cyberespionage attack that used malicious Android applications to steal information from their mobile devices.The attack campaign started in July and continues to date, according to researchers from antivirus firm Kaspersky Lab, who cooperated in the investigation with the IDF Information Security Department.The Israeli soldiers were lured via Facebook Messenger and other social networks by hackers who posed as attractive women from various countries like Canada, Germany, and Switzerland. The victims were tricked into installing a malicious Android application, which then scanned the phone and downloaded another malicious app that masqueraded as an update for one of the already installed applications.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Software Defined Networking vendor Versa this week added support for IPv6 to its SD-WAN and security packages.According to Kumar Mehta, founder and CDO of Versa Networks by supporting IPv4 and IPv6 for SD-WAN and SD-Security, customers will have the flexibility to design their WAN under IPv4 today and protect it from obsolescence as they switch over to IPv6 in the future.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Third-party developers have new tools to play with when building integrations with Microsoft’s Teams group chat app. The company announced a pair of new developer-oriented features on Thursday, aimed at giving greater utility to services that work with Teams.Using the Microsoft Bot Framework, developers can now build bots that interact with users inside a channel, in addition to interacting with users in one-on-one private chats. In addition, developers integrating their applications directly into tabs within the Teams client can now give users a way to link their colleagues to content buried deep in the integrated app.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
St. Luke’s Healthcare Systems is tucking several mobile applications for its patients into a platform typically used by professional sports stadiums. Picking a platform designed to help fans find their seats and order hot dogs and beer may seem odd for a hospital system tasked with delivering patient care, but CIO Deborah Gash insists on providing people the convenience they are accustomed to getting from entertainment, retail and other sectors.In other words, Gash wants to treat patients more like valued customers than like, well, patients. "Consumers demand the ability to have more convenient ways to interface with their healthcare providers," says Gash, who joined the organization 25 years ago, spending nearly 11 of those years as CIO.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Dell EMC is now offering a combination of its VxRail hyperconverged infrastructure and the EMC Enterprise Hybrid Cloud (EHC) platform to make it easier for mid-size organizations to build private clouds.+MORE AT NETWORK WORLD: This DARPA-backed Machine Learning program is a quick thinker | Hot Products at RSA 2017 +VxRail, which combines compute, network and virtual storage, is based largely on VMware management software, including the vRealize Suite, which allows for self-provisioning of virtual machines, and vSAN, which is VMware’s virtual storage array. EMC introduced VxRail about a year ago and Thursday said that to date it has sold 8,000 nodes to 1,000 customers, reaching over 65 Petabytes of scale.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
In its quarterly financial results announcement this week, Cisco said it had set aside $125 million to help cover the cost of replacing networking gear impacted by a fatal clock component.
Cisco was the first vendor to post a notice about the clock technology problem earlier this month saying the fatal glitch includes some of the company’s most widely deployed products, such as certain models of its Series 4000 Integrated Services Routers, Nexus 9000 Series switches, ASA security devices and Meraki Cloud Managed Switches. Clock components are critical to the synchronization device functions.
+More on Network World: Cisco: Faulty clock part could cause failure in some Nexus switches, ISR routers, ASA security appliances+To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Fitbit Alta is a customizable fitness tracker designed to fit your personal style and keeps you motivated by tracking all-day activity like steps, distance, calories burned and active minutes, and get credit for your workouts with Smart Track automatic exercise recognition. At night, track your sleep and set a silent alarm to wake better and get your best rest. No matter where you're headed, the easy-to-read OLED screen keeps your goals in focus with stats, time, and call or text notifications on display. Available accessory wristbands in metal, leather and sport, help you find the right style for every occasion. The Fitbit Alta currently averages 4 out of 5 stars on Amazon from over 7,700 people (read reviews), and its typical list price of $129.95 has been reduced to $99. See it now on Amazon.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Microsoft has decided to bundle its February patches together with those scheduled for March, a move that at least some security experts disagree with."I was surprised to learn that Microsoft wants to postpone by a full month," said Carsten Eiram, the chief research officer at vulnerability intelligence firm Risk Based Security, via email. "Even without knowing all the details, I find such a decision very hard to justify. They are aware of vulnerabilities in their products and have developed fixes; those should always be made available to customers in a timely fashion."Microsoft took everyone by surprise on Tuesday when it announced that this month's patches had to be delayed because of a "last minute issue" that could have had an impact on customers. The company did not initially specify for how long the patches will be postponed, which likely threw a wrench in some systems administrators' patch deployment plans.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Portions of this post were originally posted on the Puppet blog, and are republished here with Puppet's permission.Change is constant and necessary in IT, even if it’s an uphill battle. Fortunately, you can purposefully drive change through collaboration, automation and DevOps practices.
In a recent Puppet-sponsored webinar, we discussed the complexity and accelerating rate of change in IT, and how it impacts user expectations and tool evolution.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Users of Amazon’s Alexa virtual assistant can now ask it questions about the contents of their Microsoft-hosted calendars. On Wednesday, the assistant gained the ability to interact with calendars from Outlook.com and Office 365, similar to how it works with Google Calendar.Amazon didn’t make an announcement for the new feature. When asked about the change, a spokesperson for the company said that it was designed to only work with personal calendars.That said, it was possible for me to connect my Office 365 calendar, which is provided through an enterprise subscription. When asked about what’s on my schedule, Alexa answered with the contents of my work calendar. It’s unclear if Amazon plans to continue supporting that functionality, and it may break at any time.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Major shifts are happening in our ecosystem as companies strive to become fully data-driven in the digital era. Gathering insights from data has become increasingly complicated due to a tidal wave of enterprise applications generating data.In addition, billions of users and trillions of connected “things” generate exponentially more data outside the enterprise. At the center, enterprises deploy cloud, mobile, and analytics technologies to hopefully turn that data into insight. Unfortunately, Gartner predicts that 2017 will see 60 percent of big data projects fail. They won’t go beyond piloting and experimentation phases, and will eventually be abandoned. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
IDC recently made a strong case for enterprise adoption of hybrid network-based IP virtual private network (VPN) services that combine Multiprotocol Label Switching (MPLS)-enabled VPNs for larger sites and IPSec network-based VPNs for smaller locations.
Many enterprises rely on MPLS for high-performance, critical communications. With an ability to support multiple protocols and to direct traffic more speedily from point to point, such as between data centers and major office hubs, MPLS has been a preferred option for knitting together enterprise virtual private networks (VPNs) over wide area networks (WANs).
But, as enterprises have decentralized their workforces, they have adopted IPSec VPNs to accommodate remote and mobile workers using a variety of devices.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Moving fast is a fundamental requirement in today’s business environment; flexibility and responsiveness are essential. New Zealand manufacturer Fisher & Paykel is leveraging new networking technologies to help it keep up with market changes.
“We have large manufacturing sites in five countries; we sell in over 50; and distribute around the world,” says Jon White, general manager of IT for Fisher & Paykel, which has been manufacturing high quality appliances since 1934.
“Technology helps us where we have distributed design centers, so we can allow people to collaborate on designs, and also make sure we that we reduce costs,” says White.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Apple has overtaken Samsung Electronics in smartphone sales for the first time in two years -- but don't count on it staying ahead for long.Samsung sold 76.8 million smartphones in the fourth quarter, giving it a market share of 17.8 percent, but it was just beaten by Apple, which sold 77 million iPhones for a 17.9 percent share, according to figures from Gartner.The fourth quarter is usually a strong one for Apple, boosted by holiday sales of the new generation of iPhones it releases each September, said Anshul Gupta, a research director at Gartner.For Samsung, though, 2016 ended particularly badly, dominated by the fiasco around the recall of its incendiary Galaxy Note7.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
How should the U.S. respond to cyber attacks? That’s been a major question at this year’s RSA security conference, following Russia’s suspected attempt to influence last year’s election.
Clearly, the government should be doing more on cybersecurity, said U.S. lawmakers and officials at the show, but they admit that politics and policy conflicts have hampered the government's approach.
“I wish the federal government could do this, but it’s very hard, unfortunately, due to partisan politics,” said Virginia State Governor Terry McAuliffe, during a speech at the show. “They haven’t been able to take the lead on this issue as they should have.”To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
AT&T is accelerating its rollout of LTE-M, an IoT network that’s already being used to track shipping containers and pallets, monitor water use and connect fleets to the internet.The carrier said Tuesday it will have nationwide LTE-M coverage in the U.S. by the middle of this year, six months ahead of schedule. Previously, AT&T had said LTE-M would cover the U.S. by year’s end.That means everywhere in the country that AT&T has an LTE network, it will also offer LTE-M. By the end of the year, it will have LTE-M across Mexico too, creating a broad coverage area for businesses that operate on both sides of the border.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here