Latvian developers set record with Christmas tree-lighting Rube Goldberg machine

So you think untangling your Christmas tree lights is tedious?A group of programmers from an ecommerce development company called Scandiweb spent two months building and testing a 412-step Rube Goldberg machine – a World Guinness Record -- that when finished with its 15 minutes of wackiness electrified the capital city of Riga’s Christmas tree.Fear not, you don’t have to watch all 15 minutes, as this slick video boils it all down to about three: The most complicated way to light Christmas tree from Scandiweb on Vimeo.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Looking to 2017: It’s not just enterprise security

IoT, rotten home AP firmware, freaking Wi-Fi cameras: They’re all eating your lunch. Here’s an Advanced Persistent Threat notice: EVERYTHING AROUND YOU can give you a miserable day. It’s now entirely myopic, and hence irresponsible, to think there is such a topic as enterprise security because sadly video cams in Macedonia can give your hosting environment a DDoS headache. Poor TLS handshakes crack browsers open like an egg. Your router vendor had all of the hardening of a “fairy tap.” Remember those when you were a kid? A fairy tap was a gentle touch, designed to invade your space but do no damage. Now the damage is pOwn1ng your infrastructure. Or you business partner’s infrastructure. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Looking to 2017: It’s not just enterprise security

IoT, rotten home AP firmware, freaking Wi-Fi cameras: They’re all eating your lunch. Here’s an Advanced Persistent Threat notice: EVERYTHING AROUND YOU can give you a miserable day. It’s now entirely myopic, and hence irresponsible, to think there is such a topic as enterprise security because sadly video cams in Macedonia can give your hosting environment a DDoS headache. Poor TLS handshakes crack browsers open like an egg. Your router vendor had all of the hardening of a “fairy tap.” Remember those when you were a kid? A fairy tap was a gentle touch, designed to invade your space but do no damage. Now the damage is pOwn1ng your infrastructure. Or you business partner’s infrastructure. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Microsoft and LinkedIn aim for ‘logical’ integrations

Microsoft’s $26.2 billion acquisition of LinkedIn has officially closed, and the CEOs at both companies are sharing some of the early plans for integration across product lines.The largest deal in Microsoft’s 41-year history will combine the “world’s leading professional cloud and the world’s leading professional network,” Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella wrote in a blog post. Both companies share a common mission to “help professionals transform how they work, realize new career opportunities and connect in new ways,” he added.During the coming months, LinkedIn and Microsoft say they will be integrating products, especially in areas where Microsoft’s scale can be an asset. Nadella and LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner spotlighted eight areas the companies are going to pursue immediately:●    LinkedIn identity and network in Microsoft Outlook and the Office suite●    LinkedIn notifications within the Windows action center●    Enabling members drafting resumes in Word to update their profiles, and discover and apply to jobs on LinkedIn●    Extending the reach of Sponsored Content across Microsoft properties●    Enterprise LinkedIn Lookup powered by Active Directory and Office 365●    LinkedIn Learning available across the Office 365 and Windows ecosystem●    Developing a business news desk across our content Continue reading

Connected Classrooms: The Future of Education Technology

As a parent to two kids in elementary school, I’m continually amazed at how quickly teachers and students are using technology to effectively teach and gain new 21st Century skills. Instead of being bombarded with handouts every week, I receive only the ones that require my attention and acknowledgment; all other communication is through email or educational apps. For example, my kindergartener’s teacher uses Seesaw to share my son’s work in the classroom with me. Changing from asking “What did you do at school today?” to saying “I love what you did at school this week!” always brings a smile to his face.

All Flash No Longer Has To Compete With Disk

All-flash arrays are still new enough to be somewhat exotic but are – finally – becoming mainstream. As we have been saying for years, there will come a point where enterprises, which have much more complex and unpredictable workloads than hyperscalers and do not need the exabytes of capacity of cloud builders, just throw in the towel with disk drives and move to all flash and be done with it.

To be sure, disk drives will persist for many years to come, but perhaps not for as long as many as disk drive makers and flash naysayers had expected –

All Flash No Longer Has To Compete With Disk was written by Timothy Prickett Morgan at The Next Platform.

Attackers use hacked home routers to hit Russia’s 5 largest banks

Botnets made up of hacked home routers were used to launch distributed denial-of-service attacks against the five largest financial organizations in Russia.The attacks occurred on Monday, Dec. 5, and were detected and mitigated by Rostelecom, Russia's state-owned telecommunications company. The attacks peaked at 3.2 million packets per second (Mpps) and the longest attack lasted for over two hours, Rostelecom reported Friday.The company did not provide a bandwidth measurement for the attacks, but 3.2Mpps is not that much. DDoS mitigation providers regularly see attacks that exceed 100 Mpps and a very large September attack against the website of cybersecurity blogger Brian Krebs peaked at 665Gbps and 143Mpps.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Attackers use hacked home routers to hit Russia’s 5 largest banks

Botnets made up of hacked home routers were used to launch distributed denial-of-service attacks against the five largest financial organizations in Russia.The attacks occurred on Monday, Dec. 5, and were detected and mitigated by Rostelecom, Russia's state-owned telecommunications company. The attacks peaked at 3.2 million packets per second (Mpps) and the longest attack lasted for over two hours, Rostelecom reported Friday.The company did not provide a bandwidth measurement for the attacks, but 3.2Mpps is not that much. DDoS mitigation providers regularly see attacks that exceed 100 Mpps and a very large September attack against the website of cybersecurity blogger Brian Krebs peaked at 665Gbps and 143Mpps.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

22% off ASUS Chromebook C202 11.6″ Rugged Water Resistant Design, 180 Degree Hinge – Deal Alert

The highly rated Chromebook C202 from ASUS features a 180-degree hinge, a spill-resistant keyboard, and a reinforced rubber wrapped frame that meets the daily rigors and intense usage that can happen in and outside the home or classroom. The ASUS Chromebook C202 uses a 360 degree WIFI antenna featuring latest generation 802.11a/b/g/n Wi-Fi which provides strong reception to minimize poor signal connection while you are on-the-go. With a built-in HDMI, USB ports, and a SD card reader, ASUS Chromebook C202 makes data transferring and sharing easy and fast. This model features an Intel Celeron N3060 Processor, 4 GB DDR3 RAM, Storage, 16GB Flash Storage, 11.6-inch HD 1366x768 Anti-Glare Display, and up to 10 hours of battery life on a charge. All for the currently discounted price of just $179. See the discounted ASUS Chromebook on Amazon.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

The IoT: Gateway for enterprise hackers

A very merry Christmas could give way to a not-so-happy New Year security hangover for enterprises, once a few million more Internet of Things (IoT) devices are unwrapped and migrate from homes into the workplace.So, a webinar this week hosted by The Security Ledger titled: “Who Let the IoT in?: Finding and securing wireless devices in your environment,” was designed to offer some advance advice on how to cope with it.Paul Roberts, founder and editor in chief of The Security Ledger, who moderated the event, began by framing part of the problem: Although the IoT is now well established, many of the legacy tools enterprises still use to identify and manage vulnerable devices were, “designed for the ‘Internet of Computers’ rather than the IoT.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

The IoT: Gateway for enterprise hackers

A very merry Christmas could give way to a not-so-happy New Year security hangover for enterprises, once a few million more Internet of Things (IoT) devices are unwrapped and migrate from homes into the workplace.So, a webinar this week hosted by The Security Ledger titled: “Who Let the IoT in?: Finding and securing wireless devices in your environment,” was designed to offer some advance advice on how to cope with it.Paul Roberts, founder and editor in chief of The Security Ledger, who moderated the event, began by framing part of the problem: Although the IoT is now well established, many of the legacy tools enterprises still use to identify and manage vulnerable devices were, “designed for the ‘Internet of Computers’ rather than the IoT.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

10 essential PowerShell security scripts for Windows administrators

PowerShell is an enormous addition to the Windows toolbox that gives Windows admins the ability to automate all sorts of tasks, such as rotating logs, deploying patches, and managing users. Whether it's specific Windows administration jobs or security-related tasks such as managing certificates and looking for attack activity, there is a way to do it in PowerShell.Speaking of security, there's a good chance someone has already created a PowerShell script or a module to handle the job. Microsoft hosts a gallery of community-contributed scripts that handle a variety of security chores, such as penetration testing, certificate management, and network forensics, to name a few.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)

10 essential PowerShell security scripts for Windows administrators

PowerShell is an enormous addition to the Windows toolbox that gives Windows admins the ability to automate all sorts of tasks, such as rotating logs, deploying patches, and managing users. Whether it's specific Windows administration jobs or security-related tasks such as managing certificates and looking for attack activity, there is a way to do it in PowerShell.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)

10 essential PowerShell security scripts for Windows administrators

PowerShell is an enormous addition to the Windows toolbox that gives Windows admins the ability to automate all sorts of tasks, such as rotating logs, deploying patches, and managing users. Whether it's specific Windows administration jobs or security-related tasks such as managing certificates and looking for attack activity, there is a way to do it in PowerShell.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)

How this analyst targeted a phisher

Not unlike any other threat analyst, Marc Laliberte's email inbox fills up minute by minute. Some of which has made its way past the spam filter. The WatchGuard employee decided to finally act upon a certain phishing attempt in hopes of teaching the bad guys a lesson.   Spear phishing is a type of phishing attack in which the perpetrator customizes their attack to a particular individual or group of individuals. The attacker gathers information on the victim and then tailors the attack to be more likely to fool the target. The would-be attack arrived as an email appearing to come from the finance employee’s manager, requesting an urgent wire transfer.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

How this analyst targeted a phisher

Not unlike any other threat analyst, Marc Laliberte's email inbox fills up minute by minute. Some of which has made its way past the spam filter. The WatchGuard employee decided to finally act upon a certain phishing attempt in hopes of teaching the bad guys a lesson.   Spear phishing is a type of phishing attack in which the perpetrator customizes their attack to a particular individual or group of individuals. The attacker gathers information on the victim and then tailors the attack to be more likely to fool the target. The would-be attack arrived as an email appearing to come from the finance employee’s manager, requesting an urgent wire transfer.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here