In as little as four hours, the bad guys can reverse engineer a software patch for an open-source content management system (CMS) and build an exploit capable of turning millions of websites into spammers, malware hosts or DDoS attackers. "There's just not enough time for normal site owners to apply the updates," said David Jardin, a member of the German association CMS Garden, which promotes the use of open source CMS software including Drupal, Joomla, WordPress and others.To help ordinary users patch more quickly, CMS Garden is participating in a government-funded project, Secure Websites and Content Management Systems (Siwecos), to make the websites of SMEs more secure. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
In my previous blog post, I described the trends that are driving continued growth in the SD-WAN market, and the potential it presents to managed service providers. In this blog, I share insights on factors that are influencing enterprise choice of managed SD-WAN services.MANAGED SD-WAN SERVICESManaged SD-WAN services are similar to a number of existing managed services offerings (managed LAN/WAN, managed router, managed firewall, managed VPN, to list a few) that network service providers (NSPs) offer in the market today. With managed SD-WAN services, the service provider installs and manages the edge CPE devices, procures and manages access links from multiple NSPs, and manages all day-to-day network management aspects of the solution.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Qualcomm has its first customer for the 48-core ARM server processor it currently has under development. Packet, a bare-metal cloud provider for developers, said it plans to offer customers access to Qualcomm’s Centriq 2400 later this year.Packet offers a bare-metal cloud platform for developers running Cavium's 48-core ARMv8-A ThunderX processors. A bare-metal solution means it offers no OS or any operating platform. You have to provide all of the software. It’s not a popular option; only IBM’s SoftLayer offers bare-metal in any significant way. But it’s ideal for a developer. They can load their entire development or operating environment onto Packet’s systems and have a realistic development and testing environment that matches their future deployment platform. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
There should be no question in anyone’s mind that the cloud era has arrived. Businesses are adopting the cloud at an unprecedented rate and by 2020, the number of cloud workloads will be on par with the number of on-premises ones.Businesses of all sizes are turning to the cloud to help them become digital by increasing the level of agility. To be an agile business, though, the entire network stack—from the network through applications must be agile.+ Also on Network World: Juniper heads to the clouds with Unite +
However, organizations are also more cost conscious than ever, so whatever solution is deployed must save money in addition to making the network more dynamic. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Organizations should consider migrating their network infrastructure and devices over to IPv6. It may be a challenge to persuade leadership to prioritize it over other projects such as cloud computing or big data migrations, but it is essential to start planning for a migration.Many service providers, such as Comcast, Verizon and AT&T, have already started using IPv6 addresses and are presently encouraging other organizations across the United States to do the same. The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) has encouraged organizations to move forward with these migrations for over a decade, and with more devices connecting to the internet, the need has increased. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Hackers proclaiming to be pro-ISIS defaced 10 Ohio government websites on Sunday as well as the government websites for Howard County, Maryland, and Brookhaven, Long Island.“Hacked by Team System DZ,” the defacements read. “Anti: Govt all word.”The pro-ISIS message continued:
You will be held accountable Trump, you and all your people for every drop of blood flowing in Muslim countries. I Love Islamic state.
Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Corrections via Ohio Treasurer Josh Mandel
A screenshot of the defaced Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Corrections website was posted on Facebook and Twitter by Ohio Treasurer Josh Mandel. He added, “OH Dept of Corrections website right now, this is what you see. Wake up freedom-loving Americans. Radical Islam infiltrating the heartland.”To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Inflexible IT architectures can be a barrier to organizational change. As companies embark on digital transformations aimed at improving their business, the pressure is on IT to reduce complexity and increase the efficiency of enterprise systems and applications. Fave Raves is an annual feature from Network World that invites IT pros to share hands-on assessments of products they love. Several tools that enable organizations to simplify their infrastructure and automate key tasks ranked among the favorites in 2017 and recent years. Here’s what IT pros had to say, in their own words. For more enterprise favorites, check out the full Fave Raves collection.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Amazon has announced that it is buying Whole Foods for $13.7 billion. The implications of this upon the grocery business have been widely written about in a variety of publications including Forbes, and Business Insider. The point of this post is not to rehash what Amazon will or will not do to the grocery business but rather to focus upon the lessons of this acquisition for Enterprise IT Operations.Every business is a digital business
At the recent IT Operations Strategies Summit, Gartner released the results of a survey that it had done with the CEO’s of its clients. The results were that by 2020 these CEO’s expected the following:To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
I met with a team of Microsoft AI researchers recently to discuss original adaptations of Resnet 50, a version of the convolutional network Microsoft used to win the Imagenet 2015 image recognition competition. The discussion about the scientists work caused me to reconsider the inextricable link between IoT and machine learning.Control loops are a fundamental principal of the internet of things (IoT.) If then, then that (ITTT) has a long history in conditionally controlling things dating to the invention of the electric relay in the 1830s. Over time, single relays were combined into state machines, and later, relays became transistors. During the glamorous growth of computers in IT, consumer and mobile sectors, less glamorous ITTT computers have been applied to many use cases such as controlling machines in factories and performing lab experiments.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Cisco this week jumped head first into the intent-based networking market, saying the technology that uses machine learning and advanced automation to control networks could be a major shift in how networks are managed.But what exactly is intent-based networking?+MORE AT NETWORK WORLD: Why Cisco’s new intent-based networking could be a big deal +To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
So you’re in the market for a new iPad. Excellent choice—I couldn’t live without mine. It’s my companion when I’m catching up on news and email in the morning over tea, reading a comic book in the evening to unwind, or watching a movie while traveling on a plane. Update 6-22-2017: This article has been updated to include information about the new 2017 iPad, as well as the upgrades to the iPad Pro line.But these days, picking an iPad can be tricky. Apple currently sells four different models of iPad, with prices ranging from $329 to $1229. There are size, storage, color, and connectivity options to consider. All in all, there are 60 different variations of iPad from which to choose. So which iPad is right for you? Read on.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
The newly-announced Echo Show is available for pre-order in black or white and the shipping date is finally right around the corner: Wednesday, June 28. If you're interested, there are two things you need to know. Right now if you buy two of them and enter the code SHOW2PACK at checkout, you'll activate a $100 discount. So you'll get two new Echo Shows for the price of two standard Echos. Go in on this deal with a friend, or buy a few for yourself (they work very well in multiple rooms). The other thing you should know is that by selecting Prime 2-day shipping, Amazon will actually have the Echo Show on your doorstep the very day it's released. Echo Show brings you everything you love about Alexa, and now she can show you things. Amazon has announced an integration with some of the big names in wireless security cams, so you can simply say "Alexa, show me the front door camera". Echo Show should make a good kitchen assistant as well -- just ask for a recipe. You can watch news briefings, YouTube videos, ask for a weather forecast, video chat with family and friends (if they have Echos Continue reading
This column is available in a weekly newsletter called IT Best Practices. Click here to subscribe. To state the obvious, enterprises are moving their applications to the cloud, and this movement is happening at an accelerating pace. Many technology chiefs are working under a “cloud-first policy,” which means that if an application can be deployed as a service, then that should be the first choice for the way to go.While the applications themselves are moving to the cloud, the application delivery infrastructure is still stuck in the enterprise data center. Under the existing network architecture that most enterprises still have today, all traffic comes back to the enterprise data center before going out to the cloud. The on-premises data center is where the switching and routing, security, and application delivery controllers reside. This infrastructure is architected for a bygone era when applications were all in the data center.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Businesses dragging their heels over rolling out TLS 1.2 on their website might have an excuse to delay a little longer: Version 1.3 of the TLS (Transport Layer Security) encryption protocol will be finalized later this year, and early deployments of it are already under way.TLS, the successor to SSL, is used to negotiate secure connections to web or mail servers, encrypting data on the move.Six years in the making, TLS 1.2 added new, stronger encryption options -- but retained all the older, weaker encryption schemes that had gone before in the name of backward compatibility. Unfortunately, this meant that someone able to perform a man-in-the-middle attack could often downgrade connections to a weaker encryption system without the user being aware.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Enterprises understand the advantages of colocation, but they also know that entrusting mission-critical infrastructure to third-party data centers means giving up some control over their servers.Data center Infrastructure Management (DCIM) tools can provide colocation customers with transparency into their data center's operations, to verify that providers are fulfilling the terms of their Service Level Agreements. A DCIM platform gives customers a "single pane of glass" to view the status of their IT infrastructure."Today, more colocation providers are offering their customers access to DCIM portals," explains Rhonda Ascierto, Research Director for Data centers and Critical Infrastructure at 451 Research. "Customers want to see how well a colocation facility is operating, not just rely on the SLA. A DCIM tool gives the customer visibility into data center operations, and assurance that the colocation provider is meeting their obligations."To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
A virtual private network is a secure tunnel between two or more computers on the internet, allowing them to access each other as if on a local network. In the past, VPNs were mainly used by companies to securely link remote branches together or connect roaming employees to the office network, but today they're an important service for consumers too, protecting them from attacks when they connect to public wireless networks. Given their importance, here's what you need to know about VPNs:VPNs are good for your privacy and securityOpen wireless networks pose a serious risk to users, because attackers sitting on the same networks can use various techniques to sniff web traffic and even hijack accounts on websites that don't use the HTTPS security protocol. In addition, some Wi-Fi network operators intentionally inject ads into web traffic, and these could lead to unwanted tracking.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
Vapor IO, an Austin-based data center technology startup, is launching a rather interesting collocation business by offering leased data center capacity at cellular network towers. The company’s argument is that it should offer compute and network capabilities together for maximum edge computing.The service, called Project Volutus, includes everything from site selection to rack space, power, connectivity, infrastructure management software, and remote hands. The company believes that the need for edge computing capacity will increase as things like IoT, connected and autonomous cars, augmented and virtual reality, and 5G wireless come to market and start scaling.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
The Linux column command makes it easy to display data in a columnar format -- often making it easier to view, digest, or incorporate into a report. While column is a command that's simple to use, it has some very useful options that are worth considering. In the examples in this post, you will get a feel for how the command works and how you can get it to format data in the most useful ways.By default, the column command will ignore blanks lines in the input data. When displaying data in multiple columns, it will organize the content by filling the left column first and then moving to the right. For example, a file containing numbers 1 to 12 might be displayed in this order:To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
The Internet has entered a new chapter called the Internet of Things (IoT). It follows the fixed-Internet era characterized by connected PCs and laptops through the 1990s, and builds on the mobile-Internet era spearheaded by the proliferation of smartphones during the first two decades of this century. This new chapter has a new set of challenges and opportunities because it involves a broader diversity of devices — ranging from connected light bulbs, smart gas meters and smart speakers, to IP monitoring cameras, smart watches, drones, and robots. And while the connectivity and compute requirements of these IoT devices vary widely, they all have a common need: strong security.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
The Razer Wildcat controller is compatible with both Xbox One and Windows 10 PC. An elite level controller developed for tournament play with feedback from the best eSports athletes, it features four additional fully-programmable buttons for a personalized layout, a well thought out ergonomic shape and weight, reduced trigger travel distance for rapid fire, and much more. If you're an Amazon Prime member, the typical list price has been reduced generously to just $74.99. If you're not a Prime member but still want this deal, Amazon's 30 day Prime free trial (signup page here) is quick to activate and gets you all of the same benefits with no financial commitment required (unless you decide to keep it). See this deal now on Amazon.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here