On the ‘net: Crashes and Complexity

It’s a familiar story by now: on the 8th of August, 2016, Delta lost power to its Atlanta data center, causing the entire data center to fail. Thousands of flights were cancelled, many more delayed, and tens of thousands of travellers stranded. What’s so unusual about this event is in the larger scheme of network engineering, it’s not that unusual. If I think back to my time on the Escalation Team at a large vendor, I can think of hundreds of situations like this. And among all those events, there is one point in common: it takes longer to boot the system than it does to fix the initial problem. —CircleID

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Intel’s Kaby Lake chips will include integrated 4K graphics processors

Intel isn't known for its graphics processors, but the company is promising a big improvement with its 7th generation Core processors, code-named Kaby Lake.The Kaby Lake chips, which will succeed Skylake, will feature integrated 4K graphics processors, the company said at the Intel Developer Forum on Tuesday.Intel showed off Blizzard Entertainment's Overwatch shooter game running smoothly on a Dell XPS with a Kaby Lake chip during Intel CEO Brian Krzanich's keynote.Intel also showed off an HP 2-in-1 running 4K graphics.The chip will allow PCs to play premium 4K content smoothly, said an Intel representative demonstrating the PC. The chip will have hardware-accelerated 4K video decoding.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

NEC Builds an NFV Cloud Radio Access Network Product

Cloud-RAN will be important for 5G.

iPhone 7 release date may be a bit later than we thought

Apple's highly anticipated iPhone 7 may be coming to stores a little bit later than initially anticipated. If you recall, reputed leaker Evan Blass published a tweet last month indicating Apple's next-gen iPhone was slated to hit store shelves on Friday, Sept. 16. This rumor was seemingly bolstered when Bloomberg indicated that Apple was planning a special media event for Wednesday, Sept. 7. But now comes word via 9to5Mac that Apple's iPhone 7 might arrive a bit later in the month. According to a leaked memo purporting to come from an official AT&T retail document, AT&T has two days pinned down for special merchandising resets: Sept. 9 and Sept. 23. While certainly not conclusive and admittedly speculative, this tends to suggest that pre-orders for the iPhone 7 may in fact begin on Sept. 9, with shipments finally arriving two weeks later on Sept. 23.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

50% off TaoTronics LED Desk Lamp, (Dimmable, Touch Control, 5 Color Modes, USB Charging Port) – Deal Alert

The TaoTronics energy-saving LED Desk Lamp comes with vision-friendly, low power consumption LED light source, adjustable color modes, and dimmable brightness settings, making this ideal for your dorm room, home or office. With a slight touch from your finger tips, you can switch between a strong white light to soft yellow light. 5 different color temperatures and 7 brightness levels for you to fine tune your illumination. This new generation of eco-friendly LED lighting consumes 75% less power than traditional incandescent lights, while providing the same amount of light. No more fumbling to get a charger, the USB port tucked away behind the touch panel comes in handy for when your smartphone or tablet needs a quick charge. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

AT&T’s Fuetsch: ECOMP Platform Will Be a Game Changer

Other operators can still have their own ‘secret sauce.'

Hackers Hold an Auction for Alleged NSA Secrets

Snowden's guess is that it's the Russians.

Aussie cops reportedly hacked U.S. TOR users during child porn probe

Aussie cops hacked U.S. TOR users as part of a child porn investigation, according to a report by Motherboard. The IP addresses of at least 30 Americans were turned over to the FBI.The police knew the owner of the dark web child porn site called “The Love Zone” started all of his messages with “hiyas.” Search engine results turned up over 450,000 hits for hiyas, but police whittled away at it until they had identified the owner; the former childcare worker is currently serving 35 years for "evil, depraved" sex offenses.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Aussie cops reportedly hacked US TOR users’ during child porn probe

Aussie cops hacked US TOR users as part of a child porn investigation, according to a report by Motherboard. The IP addresses of at least 30 Americans were turned over to the FBI.The cops knew the owner of the dark web child porn site called “The Love Zone” started all of his messages with “hiyas.” Search engine results turned up over 450,000 hits for hiyas, but police whittled away at it until they had identified the owner; the former childcare worker is currently serving 35 years for ‘evil, depraved’ sex offenses.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Aussie cops reportedly hacked U.S. TOR users during child porn probe

Aussie cops hacked U.S. TOR users as part of a child porn investigation, according to a report by Motherboard. The IP addresses of at least 30 Americans were turned over to the FBI.The police knew the owner of the dark web child porn site called “The Love Zone” started all of his messages with “hiyas.” Search engine results turned up over 450,000 hits for hiyas, but police whittled away at it until they had identified the owner; the former childcare worker is currently serving 35 years for "evil, depraved" sex offenses.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Google says its databases are enterprise ready

Google is continuing its campaign to entice enterprises to its public cloud platform by rolling out database services stable enough to serve businesses' production workloads.  To that end, the company announced the general availability of three database-focused products: the second generation of Cloud SQL, its managed database service; Cloud Datastore, its NoSQL document database; and Cloud Bigtable, its NoSQL database service that powers products like Gmail. Each of those products has a service level agreement associated with it, guaranteeing a certain amount of availability. Dominic Preuss, Google's lead product manager for storage and databases, said in an interview that many companies wait until after cloud services have been declared generally available before adopting them. Tuesday's announcements are aimed at reaching those customers at a time when Google is trying to position its cloud as a competitor to Amazon, Microsoft and IBM for large business customers. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Windows 7, 8.1 move to Windows 10 update model

If you are a holdout who did not make the move to Windows 10, you're going to see its influence on your legacy operating system anyway. Microsoft is changing the way it delivers updates to Windows 7 and Windows 8.1, mirroring the delivery model of Windows 10.Normally a Windows update for 7 or 8.1 would mean a number of individual updates. Every Patch Tuesday you got 6, 10, 15 or whatever number of individual updates, each with their own number. However, starting in October, Microsoft will release all Windows 7 and Windows 8.1 updates using a "Monthly Rollup" method similar to the cumulative rollup of all fixes in one lump sum.The update process will also be added to Windows Server 2008 and Server 2012. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

AWS Sales & Marketing exec leaving

Multiple media reports today indicate that Amazon Web Service’s vice president of marketing, sales and support Adam Selipsky is leaving the company, marking a high-profile executive change at the leading public IaaS cloud vendor.+MORE AT NETWORK WORLD: IBM's big cloud win | Amazon remains top dog in Gartner's IaaS Magic Quadrant +To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

5 things to know about the Trans-Pacific Partnership

The U.S. presidential campaign has shined a spotlight on the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a proposed trade deal that's simmered on the back burner for years.Both major-party presidential candidates oppose the deal, negotiated in secret among 12 Pacific Region countries, including the U.S., Japan, Australia, Canada, and Singapore. China and Russia are notably absent from the negotiations.While negotiators approved the final language in October, the U.S. has not yet ratified the deal.Here are five important things to know about TPP:What's in the TPP? The goal of the trade deal, with negotiations that began in 2008, is to lower trade barriers, including tariffs, between the countries. The deal also allows companies to ask for legal arbitration against countries they believe to be discriminating against their products.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Tech industry desperate for US action on the Trans-Pacific Partnership

The Trans-Pacific Partnership, a controversial trade deal supported by many U.S. tech companies, is on death row, with both major party presidential candidates opposed. It's a long shot, but some tech trade groups are hoping for last-minute clemency from Congress and outgoing President Barack Obama. The trade groups are pushing for Congress to vote to approve the deal after November's general election, in the lame-duck session before a new Congress and a new president takes office.The TPP, a free-trade deal negotiated among the U.S. and 11 other Pacific Region nations for seven years, has become a major presidential campaign issue in recent months. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Tech industry desperate for US action on the Trans-Pacific Partnership

The Trans-Pacific Partnership, a controversial trade deal supported by many U.S. tech companies, is on death row, with both major party presidential candidates opposed. It's a long shot, but some tech trade groups are hoping for last-minute clemency from Congress and outgoing President Barack Obama. The trade groups are pushing for Congress to vote to approve the deal after November's general election, in the lame-duck session before a new Congress and a new president takes office.The TPP, a free-trade deal negotiated among the U.S. and 11 other Pacific Region nations for seven years, has become a major presidential campaign issue in recent months. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Worth Reading: Networking needs information, not data

Data is useless. We need to perform analysis on it to get information. That’s where a new wave of companies is coming into the networking market. They are building on the frameworks and systems that are aggregating data and presenting it in a way that makes it useful information. Instead of random data points about NetFlow, these solutions tell you that you’ve got a huge problem with outbound traffic of a specific type that is sent at a specific time with a specific payload. The difference is that instead of sorting through data to make sense of it, you’ve got a tool delivering the analysis instead of the raw data. —Networking Nerd

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Cerber ransomware earns $2.3mil with 0.3% response rate

The fast-growing Cerber ransomware earned nearly $200,000 in July despite a payment rate of just 0.3 percent as a result of its affiliate distribution model, according to a new report by Check Point and IntSights Cyber Intelligence.That puts it on track to make $2.3 million this year, said Maya Horowitz, group manager of threat intelligence at Israel-based Check Point Software Technologies Ltd..In the affiliate model, non-technical customers can run their own campaigns using the platform and get to keep 60 percent of the profits. Affiliates get access to easy-to-use management tools, Cerber's Bitcoin laundering system, as well as the ransomware itself. Each day, eight new Cerber ransomware campaigns are launched, she said, with over 150 affiliates at current count.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Cerber ransomware earns $2.3mil with 0.3% response rate

The fast-growing Cerber ransomware earned nearly $200,000 in July despite a payment rate of just 0.3 percent as a result of its affiliate distribution model, according to a new report by Check Point and IntSights Cyber Intelligence.That puts it on track to make $2.3 million this year, said Maya Horowitz, group manager of threat intelligence at Israel-based Check Point Software Technologies Ltd..In the affiliate model, non-technical customers can run their own campaigns using the platform and get to keep 60 percent of the profits. Affiliates get access to easy-to-use management tools, Cerber's Bitcoin laundering system, as well as the ransomware itself. Each day, eight new Cerber ransomware campaigns are launched, she said, with over 150 affiliates at current count.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Cerber ransomware rakes in cash by recruiting unskilled hackers

A ransomware strain has been making a pretty penny by opening its doors to unskilled hackers.  Security firm Check Point gained a rare look at the inner workings of the Cerber ransomware and found that its developers are building a network of partners to attack more targets -- and rake in more cash.  Check Point also warned that because of Cerber, more unskilled cybercriminals might choose to participate in ransomware schemes.  "Even the most novice hacker can easily reach out in closed forums to obtain an undetected ransomware variant," it said in a new report.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here