WAN Connectivity Options: A Primer

Cost optimization gains ground in IT infrastructure decisions

In business, as in life, a great deal of time is spent predicting the future, especially at the dawn of a new year. Market watchers are scrambling to identify the top IT trends that will shape buying patterns in 2017. Amid all the data gathering and crystal-ball gazing, I prefer to look back and learn from what’s happened in the past so I’ll be better prepared to handle what lies ahead. Last month, I attended the Gartner Data Center, Infrastructure & Operations Management Conference, which never fails to deliver an insider’s look at the latest priorities, challenges and transformations in the corporate data center. This past conference provided lots of valuable insight, especially when it came to the topic of cost optimization. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Home products that fix/mitigate bufferbloat…

My new years resolution is to restart blogging.

Trying to steer anything the size of the Internet into a better direction is very slow and difficult at best. From the time changes in the upstream operating systems are complete to when consumers can buy new product is typically four years caused by the broken and insecure ecosystem in the embedded device market. Chip vendors, box vendors, I’m looking at you… So much of what is now finally appearing in the market is based on work that is often four years old. Market pull may do what push has not.

The fq_codel & cake work going on in the bufferbloat project is called SQM – “smart queue management.”

See What to do About Bufferbloat for general information. And the DSLReports Speedtest makes it easy to test for bufferbloat. But new commercial products are becoming increasingly available.  Here’s some of them.

Evenroute IQrouter

First up, I’d like call out the Evenroute IQrouter. DSL users have often suffered more than other broadband users, due to bad bloat in the modems compounded by minimal bandwidth, so the DSL version of the IQrouter is particularly welcome.   Often DSL ISP’s seem to have the tendency (more Continue reading

HPE acquires security startup Niara to boost its ClearPass portfolio

Hewlett Packard Enterprise has acquired Niara, a startup that uses machine learning and big data analytics on enterprise packet streams and log streams to detect and protect customers from advanced cyberattacks that have penetrated perimeter defenses. The financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. Operating in the User and Entity Behavior Analytics (UEBA) market, Niara’s technology starts by automatically establishing baseline characteristics for all users and devices across the enterprise and then looking for anomalous, inconsistent activities that may indicate a security threat, Keerti Melkote, senior vice president and general manager of HPE Aruba and cofounder of Aruba Networks, wrote in a blog post on Wednesday.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

HPE acquires security startup Niara to boost its ClearPass portfolio

Hewlett Packard Enterprise has acquired Niara, a startup that uses machine learning and big data analytics on enterprise packet streams and log streams to detect and protect customers from advanced cyberattacks that have penetrated perimeter defenses. The financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. Operating in the User and Entity Behavior Analytics (UEBA) market, Niara’s technology starts by automatically establishing baseline characteristics for all users and devices across the enterprise and then looking for anomalous, inconsistent activities that may indicate a security threat, Keerti Melkote, senior vice president and general manager of HPE Aruba and cofounder of Aruba Networks, wrote in a blog post on Wednesday.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

HPE acquires security startup Niara to boost its ClearPass portfolio

Hewlett Packard Enterprise has acquired Niara, a startup that uses machine learning and big data analytics on enterprise packet streams and log streams to detect and protect customers from advanced cyberattacks that have penetrated perimeter defenses. The financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. Operating in the User and Entity Behavior Analytics (UEBA) market, Niara’s technology starts by automatically establishing baseline characteristics for all users and devices across the enterprise and then looking for anomalous, inconsistent activities that may indicate a security threat, Keerti Melkote, senior vice president and general manager of HPE Aruba and cofounder of Aruba Networks, wrote in a blog post on Wednesday.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Why OSPF Needs Forwarding Address with NSSA Areas

In the previous blog posts I described how OSPF tries to solve some broken designs with Forwarding Address field in Type-5 LSA – a kludge that unnecessarily increases the already too-high complexity of OSPF.

NSSA areas make the whole thing worse: OSPF needs Forwarding Address in Type-5 LSAs generated from Type-7 LSAs to ensure optimal packet forwarding. Here’s why:

Hackers are seeking out company insiders on the black market

If you’re the CEO of a company, here’s another threat you need to worry about: hackers trying to recruit your employees for insider-related crimes.Researchers at security firms RedOwl and IntSights have noticed growing activity from online black market dealers trying to recruit company employees for insider trading and cashing out stolen credit card numbers. These dealers are appearing on underground forums located on the dark web, which are accessible through Tor, a browser designed for anonymous web surfing, according to the researchers, who published their findings on Tuesday. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Hackers are seeking out company insiders on the black market

If you’re the CEO of a company, here’s another threat you need to worry about: hackers trying to recruit your employees for insider-related crimes.Researchers at security firms RedOwl and IntSights have noticed growing activity from online black market dealers trying to recruit company employees for insider trading and cashing out stolen credit card numbers. These dealers are appearing on underground forums located on the dark web, which are accessible through Tor, a browser designed for anonymous web surfing, according to the researchers, who published their findings on Tuesday. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Trump may ask businesses to boost cybersecurity

President Donald Trump may be seeking more cooperation from private businesses to shore up the defense of critical infrastructure that they control.The signing of an executive order on cybersecurity was canceled unexpectedly Tuesday, but a draft of the order was leaked to The Washington Post.In it, Trump calls for, “…economic and other incentives to: induce private sector owners and operators of the Nation’s critical infrastructure to maximize protective measures; invest in cyber enterprise risk management tools and services; and adopt best practices with respect to processes and technologies necessary for the increased sharing of and response to real-time cyber threat information.”To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Trump may ask businesses to boost cybersecurity

President Donald Trump may be seeking more cooperation from private businesses to shore up the defense of critical infrastructure that they control.The signing of an executive order on cybersecurity was canceled unexpectedly Tuesday, but a draft of the order was leaked to The Washington Post.In it, Trump calls for, “…economic and other incentives to: induce private sector owners and operators of the Nation’s critical infrastructure to maximize protective measures; invest in cyber enterprise risk management tools and services; and adopt best practices with respect to processes and technologies necessary for the increased sharing of and response to real-time cyber threat information.”To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Extreme Networks Bullish on Its WLAN Business

Extreme scored new enterprise customers like Kroger, Walmart, and CVS thanks to the Zebra deal.

Computing conference to celebrate 50 years of Turing Award

The Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) has announced it will celebrate 50 years of the A.M. Turing Award -- dubbed the "Nobel Prize of Computing -- with a (tech) star-studded conference in San Francisco this summer.The two-day event, to be held June 23-24, will "explore how computing has evolved and where the field is headed," according to the ACM.MORE: Why there's no official Nobel Prize in ComputingACM, which boasts of nearly 100,000 computing professional and student members around the world, is calling the event the Celebration of 50 Years of the ACM Turing Award. If you can't attend in person, be aware that a live stream will be available.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Computing conference to celebrate 50 years of Turing Award

The Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) has announced it will celebrate 50 years of the A.M. Turing Award -- dubbed the "Nobel Prize of Computing -- with a (tech) star-studded conference in San Francisco this summer.The two-day event, to be held June 23-24, will "explore how computing has evolved and where the field is headed," according to the ACM.MORE: Why there's no official Nobel Prize in ComputingACM, which boasts of nearly 100,000 computing professional and student members around the world, is calling the event the Celebration of 50 Years of the ACM Turing Award. If you can't attend in person, be aware that a live stream will be available.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Raspberry Pi roundup: Secret messages from your washing machine, smelling the fruit, and Rubik’s Cubes

The one-time pad, familiar from a thousand spy novels, is still among the most secure possible ways to encode a message to keep it safe from prying eyes. A cipher based on truly random numbers, with the keys held only by the sending and receiving parties, is theoretically unbreakable.And thanks to the Raspberry Pi, your messages to the Glorious Motherland can be proof against western imperialist snooping – the Pi, according to an article by Nate Drake for Techradar, is a pretty good source of randomness, and can generate its own sequences of gibberish numbers, which you can print out using an Adafruit Printer and use.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Gmail will push users further away for XP and Vista

Google quietly announced Tuesday that Gmail will stop supporting older versions of its Chrome browser soon, in a move that will put another nail in the coffins of Windows XP and Windows Vista.Users of Chrome version 53 and older editions of the browser could start being redirected to the basic HTML version of Gmail as early as December, the company said in a blog post. Starting next week, users who will be affected by the change will start seeing a banner at the top of Gmail telling them to upgrade to an up-to-date version of Google’s browser.The affected browser versions include Chrome v49, the last version of the software that supports XP and Vista. While Microsoft officially ended support for XP more than two and a half years ago, Gmail has continued to work with it. Vista Service Pack 2 will reach the end of its extended support period on April 11.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Gmail will push users further away from XP and Vista

Google quietly announced Tuesday that Gmail will stop supporting older versions of its Chrome browser soon, in a move that will put another nail in the coffins of Windows XP and Windows Vista. Users of Chrome version 53 and older editions of the browser could start being redirected to the basic HTML version of Gmail as early as December, the company said in a blog post. Starting next week, users who will be affected by the change will start seeing a banner at the top of Gmail telling them to upgrade to an up-to-date version of Google’s browser.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

WhatsApp reduces spam, despite end-to-end encryption

Can a spam filter work even without reading the content of your messages?WhatsApp thinks so. Since last April, the messenger app has been successfully fighting spam abuse, even as it’s been using end-to-end encryption.That encryption means that no one -- not even WhatsApp -- can read the content of your messages, except for the recipient.More privacy, however, can raise issues about spam detection. If WhatsApp can’t scan your messages for suspicious content, say for advertisements peddling cheap Viagra, then how can it effectively filter them out?To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

WhatsApp reduces spam, despite end-to-end encryption

Can a spam filter work even without reading the content of your messages?WhatsApp thinks so. Since last April, the messenger app has been successfully fighting spam abuse, even as it’s been using end-to-end encryption.That encryption means that no one -- not even WhatsApp -- can read the content of your messages, except for the recipient.More privacy, however, can raise issues about spam detection. If WhatsApp can’t scan your messages for suspicious content, say for advertisements peddling cheap Viagra, then how can it effectively filter them out?To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

AMD sets Ryzen up for a strong start as chip battle with Intel looms

As a pesky underdog, AMD challenged Intel in chip innovation until the mid-2000s. AMD churned out innovations like dual-core and 64-bit chips, which kept Intel on its toes.But some disastrous technological and management decisions cost AMD dearly, and over time, buyers began to consider its processors inferior to Intel's chips. Intel ran away with PC and server chip market share.AMD now is looking to rally its dwindling fan base with a series of Zen-based chips this year for desktops, servers, and laptops. The hyped-up Zen chips are expected to be good, and even Intel readily acknowledges the stiff competition coming its way.AMD promises that Zen chips will deliver a 40 percent improvement in instructions per cycle, an important metric for chip performance. That number is impressive, considering most chips based on a new architecture have typically boasted CPU improvements of up to 20 percent.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here