Easily Finding the Latest CoreOS AMI ID

It seems as if finding the right Amazon Machine Image (AMI) ID for the workload you’d like to deploy can sometimes be a bit of a challenge. Each combination of region and AMI produces a unique ID, so you have to look up the AMI for the particular region where you’re going to deploy the workload. This in and of itself wouldn’t be so bad, but then you have to wade through multiple versions of the same AMI in each region. Fortunately, if you’re using CoreOS Container Linux on AWS, there’s an easy way to find the right AMI ID. Here’s how it works.

CoreOS publishes a JSON feed of the latest AMI for each of their channels (stable, beta, and alpha). You can find links to these JSON feeds on this page. This is powerful for 2 reasons:

1. Because it’s available via HTTP, you can use curl to retrieve it anytime you need it.

2. Because it’s in JSON, you can use jq (see my post on jq for more information) to easily parse it to find the information you need. (Not super comfortable with JSON? Check out my introductory post.)

Putting these two reasons together, you end up Continue reading

US House votes to undo broadband privacy rules

The U.S. House of Representatives has followed the Senate in voting to repeal privacy rules that can prevent broadband providers from selling customers’ internet-browsing histories and other data without their permission.On Tuesday, the House voted 215-205 to do away with the privacy rules that the U.S. Federal Communications Commission passed last year. The rules had yet to come into effect.They require broadband carriers to first obtain opt-in approval from customers before using and sharing their sensitive personal information, such as web browsing history, geo-location data and what applications they've used.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

US House votes to undo broadband privacy rules

The U.S. House of Representatives has followed the Senate in voting to repeal privacy rules that can prevent broadband providers from selling customers’ internet-browsing histories and other data without their permission.On Tuesday, the House voted 215-205 to do away with the privacy rules that the U.S. Federal Communications Commission passed last year. The rules had yet to come into effect.They require broadband carriers to first obtain opt-in approval from customers before using and sharing their sensitive personal information, such as web browsing history, geo-location data and what applications they've used.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Microsoft signs off on Windows 10 Creators Update final code

After a few more test builds in recent weeks, Microsoft has officially signed off on Build 15063 as the final code for the Windows 10 Creators Update and is making it widely available for download. Build 15063 was released last week to Windows Insiders for testing, and it seems this build is the RTM build that will be sent out to the general public next month. While Microsoft hasn't said anything official yet, the official Windows 10 Update Assistant tool is listing Build 15063 as the Creators Update. Microsoft released an Update Assistant last year for the Anniversary Update. This new version was leaked to the internet by Microsoft tipster Walking Cat (a fairly reliable source of news on Microsoft), so a lot of people, including Windows bloggers, have it.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

47% off First Alert 10-Year Carbon Monoxide Alarm with Temperature – Deal Alert

First Alert's CO710 CO alarm is powered by sealed, ten year lithium batteries to provide continuous protection for ten years without battery replacement, and a built-in end-of-life alarm lets you know when its time is up. Its modern, compact design allows easy tabletop or wall mount placement, and it displays CO levels along with room temp on a backlit display. The unit's "peak" function captures and allows you to retrieve the highest CO level recorded in your home. In the event of a CO incident, this valuable information can be passed along to emergency or hospital staff. The CO710 averages 4.5 out of 5 stars on Amazon, where its list price is discounted 47% to $31.66. See this deal on Amazon.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

46% off CyberPower Surge Protector 3-AC Outlet with 2 USB (2.1A) Charging Ports – Deal Alert

The Professional Surge Protector CSP300WUR1 safeguards common home and office devices, such as computers and electronics, by absorbing spikes in energy caused by storms and electrical power surges. Designed for convenience, the portable CSP300WUR1 is ideal for travelers. It provides 600 joules of protection, has three surge-protected outlets, and a folding wall tap plug. Two USB ports (2.1 Amp shared) charge personal electronics, including smartphones, digital cameras, MP3 players, and other devices. A Limited-Lifetime Warranty ensures that this surge suppressor has passed high quality standards in design, assembly, material or workmanship and further protection is offered by a $50,000 Connected Equipment Guarantee. It currently averages 4 out of 5 stars on Amazon, where its typical list price of $21.955 has been reduced 46% to just $11.88. See the discounted CSP300WUR1 on Amazon.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

46% off CyberPower Surge Protector 3-AC Outlet with 2 USB (2.1A) Charging Ports – Deal Alert

The Professional Surge Protector CSP300WUR1 safeguards common home and office devices, such as computers and electronics, by absorbing spikes in energy caused by storms and electrical power surges. Designed for convenience, the portable CSP300WUR1 is ideal for travelers. It provides 600 joules of protection, has three surge-protected outlets, and a folding wall tap plug. Two USB ports (2.1 Amp shared) charge personal electronics, including smartphones, digital cameras, MP3 players, and other devices. A Limited-Lifetime Warranty ensures that this surge suppressor has passed high quality standards in design, assembly, material or workmanship and further protection is offered by a $50,000 Connected Equipment Guarantee. It currently averages 4 out of 5 stars on Amazon, where its typical list price of $21.955 has been reduced 46% to just $11.88. See the discounted CSP300WUR1 on Amazon.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

FBI warns of attacks on anonymous FTP servers

The FBI warns that attackers are targeting vulnerable FTP servers used by small medical and dental offices as a way to obtain medical records and other sensitive personal information.While the dangers of placing sensitive data on these servers is well known, smaller businesses may not have the expertise or motivation to upgrade.The attackers can use the stolen data to harass, intimidate and blackmail these businesses, the FBI says, and may also include using the stolen information to commit fraud.The attackers could also write to the servers in order to store malware and launch attacks, the FBI says.The remedy is to remove any personally identifiable information or protected health information from these servers and replace FTP with something more secure.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

FBI warns of attacks on anonymous FTP servers

The FBI warns that attackers are targeting vulnerable FTP servers used by small medical and dental offices as a way to obtain medical records and other sensitive personal information.While the dangers of placing sensitive data on these servers is well known, smaller businesses may not have the expertise or motivation to upgrade.The attackers can use the stolen data to harass, intimidate and blackmail these businesses, the FBI says, and may also include using the stolen information to commit fraud.The attackers could also write to the servers in order to store malware and launch attacks, the FBI says.The remedy is to remove any personally identifiable information or protected health information from these servers and replace FTP with something more secure.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Scaling Deep Learning on an 18,000 GPU Supercomputer

It is one thing to scale a neural network on a single GPU or even a single system with four or eight GPUs. But it is another thing entirely to push it across thousands of nodes. Most centers doing deep learning have relatively small GPU clusters for training and certainly nothing on the order of the Titan supercomputer at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

The emphasis on machine learning scalability has often been focused on node counts in the past for single-model runs. This is useful for some applications, but as neural networks become more integrated into existing workflows, including those …

Scaling Deep Learning on an 18,000 GPU Supercomputer was written by Nicole Hemsoth at The Next Platform.

RIP Raimund Genes, Trend Micro CTO

Raimund Genes I learned this past Saturday that my good friend and Trend Micro CTO, Raimund Genes, passed away suddenly last week. Raimund was only 54.If you were lucky enough to cross paths with Raimund, you probably share my profound sorrow at his passing. For those who never had the pleasure of a meeting, allow me to provide a few thoughts about him: I first met Raimund at an industry event where he was supposed to go through a PowerPoint presentation with me. Upon shaking my hand, he said something like, “Let’s skip the formalities of a canned presentation, go to the bar, get a drink, and just talk.” We did have a drink at the bar that day, but what I remember most was an hour of insightful and entertaining banter. He was both informal and informative simultaneously, and we immediately connected. One of the things that I love about my job is that I get to speak to some of the smartest cybersecurity people—professionals, researchers, technology vendors, legislators, etc.—on a regular basis. Out of this exceptional population, however, some people stand out. I call these folks my “beacons” in that I’m more engaged when I Continue reading

RIP Raimund Genes, Trend Micro CTO

I learned this past Saturday that my good friend and Trend Micro CTO, Raimund Genes, passed away suddenly last week.  Raimund was only 54.If you were lucky enough to cross paths with Raimund, you probably share my profound sorrow at his passing.  For those who never had the pleasure of a meeting, allow me to provide a few thoughts about him: I first met Raimund at an industry event where he was supposed to go through a PowerPoint presentation with me.  Upon shaking my hand, he said something like, “let’s skip the formalities of a canned presentation, go to the bar, get a drink, and just talk.”  We did have a drink at the bar that day, but what I remember most was an hour of insightful and entertaining banter.  He was both informal and informative simultaneously and we immediately connected. One of the things that I love about my job is that I get to speak to some of the smartest cybersecurity people – professionals, researchers, technology vendors, legislators, etc. – on a regular basis.  Out of this exceptional population however, some people stand out.  I call these folks my “beacons” Continue reading

9 biggest information security threats through 2019

The information security threat landscape is constantly evolving. To help you navigate the terrain, each year the Information Security Forum (ISF) — a nonprofit association that researches and analyzes security and risk management issues on behalf of its members — puts out its Threat Horizon report to provide members with a forward-looking view of the biggest security threats over a two-year period. What follows are the nine biggest threats on the horizon through 2019 that your organization may have to manage and mitigate.Theme 1: Disruption from an over-reliance on fragile connectivity Organizations today depend of instant and uninterrupted connectivity, smart physical devices and trustworthy people. But that dependence makes them vulnerable to attacks on core internet infrastructure, devices used in daily business and key people with access to mission-critical information.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

9 biggest information security threats through 2019

The information security threat landscape is constantly evolving. To help you navigate the terrain, each year the Information Security Forum (ISF) — a nonprofit association that researches and analyzes security and risk management issues on behalf of its members — puts out its Threat Horizon report to provide members with a forward-looking view of the biggest security threats over a two-year period. What follows are the nine biggest threats on the horizon through 2019 that your organization may have to manage and mitigate.Theme 1: Disruption from an over-reliance on fragile connectivity Organizations today depend of instant and uninterrupted connectivity, smart physical devices and trustworthy people. But that dependence makes them vulnerable to attacks on core internet infrastructure, devices used in daily business and key people with access to mission-critical information.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Refurbishing Samsung Note7s for resale is a ‘disastrous’ plan, analyst says

Just two days before Samsung's launch of the Galaxy S8 on Wednesday, the company announced it will consider using some recalled Galaxy Note7 smartphones for re-sale as refurbished or as rental phones.One analyst bashed the plan as "disastrous," while another said Samsung is performing a "balancing act" following the Note7 fallout when some units overheated and caught fire.Samsung also said in a statement on Monday that it could detach salvageable components from the Note7s for reuse. It may also extract metals like copper, gold, silver and nickel from the devices using environmentally friendly methods.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Report: Samsung’s flagship smartphones tank just before Galaxy S8 launch

A financial report cited by South Korea’s Yonhap News says that Samsung’s higher-end smartphones are accounting for a rapidly decreasing share of the company’s sales.Premium smartphones account for just 29% of Samsung’s smartphone sales, down from 75% in mid-2013, Yonhap quotes a Hana Financial Investment report as saying. The disastrous battery problems experienced by the Samsung Galaxy Note 7 undoubtedly have a lot to do with the company’s shrinking premium device sales, but the report indicates that those sales were already in decline before the Note 7 incidents began to attract widespread negative publicity.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Amazon Connect brings contact centers to the cloud

Amazon today released Connect, a contact center as a service offering hosted in the Amazon Web Services cloud.The move represents AWS attempting to jump into a burgeoning market for cloud-based contact center software, while continuing to push AWS into the enterprise communications market. Just last month AWS announced Chime, a cloud-based Unified Communication as a Service (UCaaS) offering.+MORE AT NETWORK WORLD: Amazon Web Services vs. Microsoft Azure vs. Google Cloud Platform | This is not the sort of publicity Avaya was seeking +To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Worth Reading: Odds are in Favor of Quantum Encryption

No kinds of organizations have tighter security than the average casino. After all, the house always wins, and it wants to keep those winnings. A recent Wired article, however, explains how a team of Russian hackers managed to beat a lot of casinos worldwide. They did so by exploiting inherent flaws in the pseudo-random number generators (PRNG) that are integral parts of randomizing every spin of a slot machine. Even if you don’t care about wealthy casino bosses losing money, you still need to be concerned about the drawbacks to using PRNGs because slots aren’t the only things that are vulnerable. Most of the world’s encryption is also based on pseudo-random numbers. —Cloud Security Alliance

The post Worth Reading: Odds are in Favor of Quantum Encryption appeared first on 'net work.

Being a Linux user isn’t weird anymore

A few days ago, I was down at the Starbucks in my local bookstore—sipping on a hot chocolate, using the free (but rather pokey) Wi-Fi, and getting some work done.This is pretty typical for me. Since I work from home, it’s nice to get out of the house and shake things up a little bit. Working for a few hours at a coffee shop tends to be just about right. I’m not the only person in the world who uses coffee shops as short term offices—it’s become so normal, it’s almost a cliché.The one thing that typically sets me apart from the other people working from any given coffee shop is my computer. I run Linux (currently openSUSE with GNOME). And often, I’ll have some sort of unusual Linux-powered gadget with me (such as my PocketCHIP or my trusty old Nokia N810). To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Ericsson’s Turnaround Plan Includes Around $2B in Charges

The restructuring plan includes the elimination of four members of management.