Why your password policy still sucks

Password policies don't prevent problems, they cause them. Humans are predictable, and generic password policies help attackers crack (or guess) passwords faster.

Google revs its AI engines with a new European research group

Google has made no secret of its AI ambitions, and on Thursday it announced the next step in its bold plans to realize them: a brand-new research group in Europe focused squarely on machine learning.Based in Google Research offices in Zurich, Switzerland, the new group will focus on three key areas of artificial intelligence: machine intelligence, machine perception, and natural language processing and understanding, according to a blog post by Emmanuel Mogenet, head of Google Research for Europe.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Flaws expose Cisco small-business routers, firewalls to hacking

Three models of Cisco wireless VPN firewalls and routers from the small business RV series contain a critical unpatched vulnerability that attackers can exploit remotely to take control of devices. The vulnerability is located in the Web-based management interface of the Cisco RV110W Wireless-N VPN Firewall, RV130W Wireless-N Multifunction VPN Router and RV215W Wireless-N VPN Router. It can be easily exploited if the affected devices are configured for remote management since attackers only need to send an unauthenticated HTTP request with custom user data. This will result in remote code execution as root, the highest privileged account on the system, and can lead to a complete compromise.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Flaws expose Cisco small-business routers, firewalls to hacking

Three models of Cisco wireless VPN firewalls and routers from the small business RV series contain a critical unpatched vulnerability that attackers can exploit remotely to take control of devices. The vulnerability is located in the Web-based management interface of the Cisco RV110W Wireless-N VPN Firewall, RV130W Wireless-N Multifunction VPN Router and RV215W Wireless-N VPN Router. It can be easily exploited if the affected devices are configured for remote management since attackers only need to send an unauthenticated HTTP request with custom user data. This will result in remote code execution as root, the highest privileged account on the system, and can lead to a complete compromise.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Flaws expose Cisco small-business routers, firewalls to hacking

Three models of Cisco wireless VPN firewalls and routers from the small business RV series contain a critical unpatched vulnerability that attackers can exploit remotely to take control of devices. The vulnerability is located in the Web-based management interface of the Cisco RV110W Wireless-N VPN Firewall, RV130W Wireless-N Multifunction VPN Router and RV215W Wireless-N VPN Router. It can be easily exploited if the affected devices are configured for remote management since attackers only need to send an unauthenticated HTTP request with custom user data. This will result in remote code execution as root, the highest privileged account on the system, and can lead to a complete compromise.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Virtualized Networks Invite Cyber Espionage

The cybersecurity and security solutions landscape is in constant flux.

Asus challenges the iPad Mini with the less-pricey ZenPad Z8

At $249.99, Asus' new Android-based ZenPad Z8 tablet could make you ponder why you should buy Apple's iPad Mini 4, which starts at $399.The Asus tablet will be available exclusively through Verizon Wireless, and will ship starting on June 23. It is ready for Verizon's LTE network in the U.S, and can be ordered online.The cellular-ready ZenPad Z8 will come with the latest Android version, Android M OS. A cellular-ready version of the iPad Mini 4 starts at $529.From a pure hardware standpoint, the Android tablet is comparable, and in some respects, offers more than than the iPad Mini 4. It ultimately comes down to whether you want Android or iOS on this sort of device.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Federal Cybersecurity Boondoggle: The Software Assurance Marketplace (SWAMP)

Way back in February, I wrote a blog about President Obama’s proposed Cybersecurity National Action Plan (CNAP).  As part of this plan, the President called for $19 billion for cybersecurity as part of the 2017 fiscal year federal budget, a 35% increase over 2016 spending. While CNAP has a lot of thoughtful and positive proposals, I’m troubled by the fact that federal cybersecurity programs seem to have a life of their own with little oversight or ROI benefits.  I often cite DHS’s Einstein project as an example of this type of government cybersecurity waste.  In my humble opinion, the feds are spending hundreds of millions of dollars on custom research and development for Einstein when commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) network security products could do the same job at a fraction of the cost.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Federal Cybersecurity Boondoggle: The Software Assurance Marketplace (SWAMP)

Way back in February, I wrote a blog about President Obama’s proposed Cybersecurity National Action Plan (CNAP).  As part of this plan, the President called for $19 billion for cybersecurity as part of the 2017 fiscal year federal budget, a 35% increase over 2016 spending. While CNAP has a lot of thoughtful and positive proposals, I’m troubled by the fact that federal cybersecurity programs seem to have a life of their own with little oversight or ROI benefits.  I often cite DHS’s Einstein project as an example of this type of government cybersecurity waste.  In my humble opinion, the feds are spending hundreds of millions of dollars on custom research and development for Einstein when commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) network security products could do the same job at a fraction of the cost.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Security Sessions: How CSOs can reduce alert fatigue

In the latest episode of Security Sessions, Hexadite CEO Eran Barak joins CSO Editor-in-Chief Joan Goodchild to discuss the problem of security alert fatigue, in which a company receives so many alerts from their systems that they end up potentially ignoring or missing critical alerts.

Cavium Snaps Up QLogic in $1.36B Deal

$45 million in synergies is expected from the deal.

Samsung enters the cloud market

For years those who track the cloud computing market have predicted consolidation. The market is young enough, promising enough, and the barriers to entry for companies that want a slice of this market are high enough that mergers and acquisitions are to be expected. Stephen Lawson At its 2016 developer conference in San Francisco this week, the company worked to get developers excited about its software and services as well as its hardware platforms.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Worth Reading: The danger of macros

Back in 2012, faced with the need to write the identical thing—language regarding FISA minimization procedures—many, many times, NSA tried to develop some efficiency by automating a portion of their Word templates. This worked fine, until for whatever reason, NSA Hawaii redesigned its network to block external access from other parts of the NSA. -Lawfare

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Gartner on doing business in China: Privacy? What’s that?

Tim Greene Jie Zhang NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. -- Jie Zhang says that as a child in China she played a game picking up marbles with chopsticks and performing the delicate task of carrying them to another room without dropping them. That’s what doing business in China is like for Westerners, she told a breakfast gathering today at Gartner’s Security and Risk Management Summit.They have to get used to long-standing customs and practices that violate some basic business principles respected outside of China and some new ones that deal specifically with technology.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Gartner on doing business in China: Privacy? What’s that?

Tim Greene Jie Zhang NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. -- Jie Zhang says that as a child in China she played a game picking up marbles with chopsticks and performing the delicate task of carrying them to another room without dropping them. That’s what doing business in China is like for Westerners, she told a breakfast gathering today at Gartner’s Security and Risk Management Summit.They have to get used to long-standing customs and practices that violate some basic business principles respected outside of China and some new ones that deal specifically with technology.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Cisco Tetration: The timing is right for Cisco to jump into analytics

Cisco has always been a master at picking the right adjacent markets to move into at the right time, and it often becomes one of the leaders in that space. Think of the impact the company has had in telephony, blade servers and security—to name just a few.This week at an event with a lot of pomp and circumstance that included CEO Chuck Robbins, Cisco announced it is moving into the analytics market. At first glance, one might ask what the heck Cisco is doing in analytics.The timing for Cisco is right, though. Many of the building blocks of the digital enterprise—technologies such as Internet of Things, cloud computing, mobility and security are network centric today. By harnessing network data, Cisco can provide data and insights that another vendor could not. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Cisco Tetration: The timing is right for Cisco to jump into analytics

Cisco has always been a master at picking the right adjacent markets to move into at the right time, and it often becomes one of the leaders in that space. Think of the impact the company has had in telephony, blade servers and security—to name just a few.This week at an event with a lot of pomp and circumstance that included CEO Chuck Robbins, Cisco announced it is moving into the analytics market. At first glance, one might ask what the heck Cisco is doing in analytics.The timing for Cisco is right, though. Many of the building blocks of the digital enterprise—technologies such as Internet of Things, cloud computing, mobility and security are network centric today. By harnessing network data, Cisco can provide data and insights that another vendor could not. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

IDG Contributor Network: 4 things you can do on a mainframe—without knowing how to use a mainframe

Remember when you got your driver’s license? That was a pretty big day. Now imagine that as the person at the DMV handed you your card, he or she also slipped you permits to operate a boat, drive a motorcycle and fly the Space Shuttle. Sounds crazy, right? Yet it’s happening in the world of mainframes every day thanks to new tools that make it possible to program and manage big iron in just about any language and on any platform. Even five years ago it would have been inconceivable for this to happen. If you wanted to use a mainframe, you had to know COBOL. That’s all fine and good—if you graduated from college in 1978. But what about the next generation of mainframers? How were they supposed to use computers that required users to know a language that wasn’t even taught in most computer science programs anymore?To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

IDG Contributor Network: 4 things you can do on a mainframe—without knowing how to use a mainframe

Remember when you got your driver’s license? That was a pretty big day. Now imagine that as the person at the DMV handed you your card, he or she also slipped you permits to operate a boat, drive a motorcycle and fly the Space Shuttle. Sounds crazy, right? Yet it’s happening in the world of mainframes every day thanks to new tools that make it possible to program and manage big iron in just about any language and on any platform. Even five years ago it would have been inconceivable for this to happen. If you wanted to use a mainframe, you had to know COBOL. That’s all fine and good—if you graduated from college in 1978. But what about the next generation of mainframers? How were they supposed to use computers that required users to know a language that wasn’t even taught in most computer science programs anymore?To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Basics: Is there always a feasible successor in EIGRP ?

Question : Is there always a feasible successor in EIGRP ? Background: An operational route is passive. If the path is lost, the router examines the topology table to find an FS. If there is an FS, it is placed in the routing table; otherwise, the router queries its neighbors, sending the route into active mode. Answer: There has to […]

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