IDG Contributor Network: Most online tracking is from Google-owned properties

All of the top five tracking tools found on websites are from Google-owned properties.And new, cookie-replacing methods of identifying computers, called fingerprinting, is being used by advertisers, a new study found. Fingerprinting can work by sending audio files to individual web browsers. The method identifies the PC, Princeton University explains in its research (PDF).Princeton says its study, completed in January, is the biggest assessment of online tracking ever. The university trawled a million of the “top” websites.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

What Language Should You Learn?

So you’ve decided, for all the reasons given in my last post on this topic, that you want to learn to code. The next, obvious, question is: what language should you learn? Remember the goal isn’t just to learn to code, but to learn the mindset, tools, and structure of coding; to dog past the simple ability to kick off scripts, and actually pick up an overview of the ground level “stuff” necessary, the “stuff” that is going to transfer from being able to code to being a good engineer. You don’t want to waste your time just learning a new skill, you want to what you learn to intersect with what your main learning goals are in a way that ultimately supports them.

If you’re a bit confused by all this mumbo-jumbo, go back and take a look at one of the first posts on this blog: Jack of All Trades.

To answer the question—which languages should I learn—I need to look beyond what’s “easiest to learn,” or “most popular right now,” or any of the “standard” ways people make this sort of decision. To relate this back to network engineering terms, I want to learn routing, not how Continue reading

Network Break 88: Cisco’s Big Quarter, Dell’s Debt Deal

Take a Network Break! On today's episode we parse Cisco's latest quarterly earnings and future strategy, examine Dell's latest efforts to raise money for its EMC acquisition, and more.

The post Network Break 88: Cisco’s Big Quarter, Dell’s Debt Deal appeared first on Packet Pushers.

Network Break 88: Cisco’s Big Quarter, Dell’s Debt Deal

Take a Network Break! On today's episode we parse Cisco's latest quarterly earnings and future strategy, examine Dell's latest efforts to raise money for its EMC acquisition, and more.

The post Network Break 88: Cisco’s Big Quarter, Dell’s Debt Deal appeared first on Packet Pushers.

The sad reality about Windows Phones

Everybody loves smartphones, but almost nobody loves Windows smartphones.A majority (78 percent) of all mobile phones sold worldwide between January and March were smartphones, and smartphones sales grew by 4 percent compared to the same time period the year previous, according to a recent report by market research firm Gartner. Yet with all that smartphone activity, Windows phone sales fell even further. Actually, the word “fell” is being generous. The truth is they crashed.Hard.MORE ON NETWORK WORLD: 10 (FREE!) Microsoft tools to make admins happier Windows mobile device market share fell below the one percent mark worldwide to 0.7 percent during the first quarter of 2016, according to Gartner. Just one year ago, Windows device sales were anemic at 2.5 percent, but that’s still many times better compared to where they are now.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

How to go back to Windows 7 or 8 after an unwanted Windows 10 upgrade

Microsoft’s putting away the carrots and breaking out the sticks in its quest to migrate 1 billion users to Windows 10 over the next couple of years.After pushing out the free upgrade as a Recommended update to Windows 7 and 8 users earlier this year—which means that you downloaded the initial installation bits if you use the default Windows Update, like most people should—Microsoft changed its nagging pop-up prompt in an insidious way over the past week. For the past six months, the “Get Windows 10” pop-up asked permission to start an update, but lacked a “No thanks” option, so the only way to avoid it was to close the window by pressing the X in the upper-right hand corner. Now, the pop-up says “We will upgrade you at this time,” and pressing the X counts as consent. You need to click a small, easily missed link in the pop-up to cancel the upgrade, instead.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Join GNS3 & Solarwinds Tomorrow to Test Drive Network Performance Monitor in a Risk-Free Virtual Environment

Learn how to set up and configure a virtual network for testing and optimizing network performance monitoring software.

Microsoft updates Dynamics CRM with a new IoT twist

There's an update available for Microsoft's Dynamics CRM 2016, and it brings with it a brand-new tool to help companies tap the Internet of Things for their customer-service efforts.Announced on Monday, the Spring 2016 Wave of Dynamics CRM adds Connected Field Service, a new tool companies can soon use to leverage the potential of predictive maintenance via IoT devices.Available as a preview in June, Connected Field Service continuously monitors IoT-enabled devices for anomalies, generating alerts that trigger automated actions or service tickets and workflow according to service level agreements. Service technicians with the right skills and tools are then matched against the service requirement based on availability and proximity and routed to customer locations for preventive action.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Enhancing Network Security With SDN Automation

Quarantine and monitoring can strengthen your SDN security position.

Worth Reading: Ambry Open Source Object Store

Today, we are announcing that Ambry is now available as an open source project under the Apache 2.0 license. Ambry is optimized to store and serve media. Media content has become critical for any website to increase user engagement, virality and monetization. Media pipelines will need to be supported by more companies, especially with the advancement of video and virtual reality. -LinkedIn Engineering Blog

The post Worth Reading: Ambry Open Source Object Store appeared first on 'net work.

What are hackers up to these days?

The long answer is more complex, but security vendor Trustwave offered some insights in its 2016 Trustwave Global Security Report, which was released last month."Criminals are getting a lot savvier," says Karl Sigler, Trustwave's threat intelligence manager. "We're seeing their tactics changing a little bit."New bad news In the study, Trustwave found that compromises affecting corporate and internal networks hit 40 percent in 2015, up from 18 percent from the year before."Criminals are discovering that if they can get themselves embedded into a corporate network, there's a wealth of monetizable data in those networks," says Sigler. This could also be a result of what he calls a "drastic decline" in the rate of point-of-sale breaches, which dropped by 18 percentage points from 2014 to 2015, according to the study. "Criminals don't go away. They just shift targets," he says.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

What are hackers up to these days?

The long answer is more complex, but security vendor Trustwave offered some insights in its 2016 Trustwave Global Security Report, which was released last month."Criminals are getting a lot savvier," says Karl Sigler, Trustwave's threat intelligence manager. "We're seeing their tactics changing a little bit."New bad news In the study, Trustwave found that compromises affecting corporate and internal networks hit 40 percent in 2015, up from 18 percent from the year before."Criminals are discovering that if they can get themselves embedded into a corporate network, there's a wealth of monetizable data in those networks," says Sigler. This could also be a result of what he calls a "drastic decline" in the rate of point-of-sale breaches, which dropped by 18 percentage points from 2014 to 2015, according to the study. "Criminals don't go away. They just shift targets," he says.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

How data virtualization delivers on the DevOps promise

Using live data in development means you can test real workloads and get realistic results in transactions and reports. It’s also a significant security risk, as U.K. baby retailer Kiddicare recently found out: The company used real customer names, delivery addresses, email addresses and telephone numbers on a test site, only to have the data extracted and used to send phishing text messages to customers.In 2015, Patreon CEO Jack Conte admitted the names, shipping addresses and email addresses for 2.3 million users of the crowdfunding site had been breached, also “via a debug version of our website that was visible to the public” that had a “development server that included a snapshot of our production database.” And earlier this year a developer at Sydney University in Australia lost a laptop containing an unencrypted copy of a database with the personal and medical details of 6,700 disabled students.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)

How data virtualization delivers on the DevOps promise

Using live data in development means you can test real workloads and get realistic results in transactions and reports. It’s also a significant security risk, as U.K. baby retailer Kiddicare recently found out: The company used real customer names, delivery addresses, email addresses and telephone numbers on a test site, only to have the data extracted and used to send phishing text messages to customers.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)

A recently patched Flash Player exploit is being used in widespread attacks

It took hackers less than two weeks to integrate a recently patched Flash Player exploit into widely used Web-based attack tools that are being used to infect computers with malware.The vulnerability, known as CVE-2016-4117, was discovered earlier this month by security researchers FireEye. It was exploited in targeted attacks through malicious Flash content embedded in Microsoft Office documents.When the targeted exploit was discovered, the vulnerability was unpatched, which prompted a security alert from Adobe Systems and a patch two days later.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

A recently patched Flash Player exploit is being used in widespread attacks

It took hackers less than two weeks to integrate a recently patched Flash Player exploit into widely used Web-based attack tools that are being used to infect computers with malware.The vulnerability, known as CVE-2016-4117, was discovered earlier this month by security researchers FireEye. It was exploited in targeted attacks through malicious Flash content embedded in Microsoft Office documents.When the targeted exploit was discovered, the vulnerability was unpatched, which prompted a security alert from Adobe Systems and a patch two days later.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Users Cite Management Challenges With Network Virtualization

EMA research has found the majority of early adopters have management challenges with NV and SDN.

Brocade Webinar Q&A – Complete Transformation of Mobile Networks Through Innovative Brocade Virtual EPC Solutions

Thanks to all who submitted questions to the Brocade Mega NFV Report Report Pt 2 where we learned about innovative Brocade vEPC solutions.

Identity and Access Management (IAM) Infrastructure is Misaligned with Security

Several CISOs I’ve spoken to over the past few years agree that identity is a new security perimeter.  The thought here is that a combination of mobile device and cloud use renders existing network perimeters obsolete so security policy enforcement decisions must be driven by identity attributes (i.e. user identity, role, device identity, location, etc.) rather than IP packet attributes.  We see this transition coming to fruition with the concept of a software-defined perimeter (SDP) and technologies such as Google BeyondCorp and Vidder PrecisionAccess.Yup, this makes sense.  Armed with identity attributes, organizations can make intelligent network access decisions on who gets access to which IT assets regardless of their location.  Unfortunately, there is a big problem here.  The IAM infrastructure was built organically over the last 10-15 years so it depends upon a morass of disconnected and fragile elements.  This situation greatly impacts security. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Identity and access management infrastructure is misaligned with security

Several CISOs I’ve spoken to over the past few years agree that identity is a new security perimeter. The thought here is that a combination of mobile device and cloud use renders existing network perimeters obsolete, so security policy enforcement decisions must be driven by identity attributes (i.e., user identity, role, device identity, location, etc.) rather than IP packet attributes. We see this transition coming to fruition with the concept of a software-defined perimeter (SDP) and technologies such as Google BeyondCorp and Vidder PrecisionAccess. Yup, this makes sense. Armed with identity attributes, organizations can make intelligent network access decisions on who gets access to which IT assets regardless of their location. Unfortunately, there is a big problem here. The identity and access management (IAM) infrastructure was built organically over the last 10-15 years, so it depends upon a morass of disconnected and fragile elements. This situation greatly impacts security. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here