Technology Short Take #74

Welcome to Technology Short Take #74! The end of 2016 is nearly upon us, and it looks as if there will be only one more Technology Short Take before the end of the year. So, let’s get on with the content—time is short!

Networking

  • If you haven’t heard of Apstra, David Varnum has a great introduction to Apstra available on his site.
  • Will Robinson talks about how to structure your Ansible playbooks in the context of using Ansible to control your network gear.
  • This is an interesting project to watch, I think—it’s porting OVN (Open Virtual Network) from a “traditional” OvS back-end to an IOVisor-based back-end (IOVisor implements the data plane in eBPF).
  • If you’re interested in playing around with OVN, I’ve built a Vagrant-based environment running OVS/OVN 2.6.0 on Ubuntu 16.04. Have a look here.

Servers/Hardware

Nothing this time, but I’ll stay alert for content to include in the future.

Security

Using OVN with KVM and Libvirt

In this post, I’m going to discuss how to use OVN (Open Virtual Network; part of the Open vSwitch project) with KVM and Libvirt to provide virtual networking for KVM-based virtual machines. This post will build on some concepts around OVS and Libvirt that I’ve discussed previously; be sure to review the OVS posts and Libvirt posts on this site for more details and prerequisite knowledge.

I’ll structure this discussion around 2 key steps:

  1. Setting up OVN
  2. Integrating KVM/Libvirt into OVN

Note that I’m not going to discuss setting up KVM/Libvirt, as that’s something I’ve covered previously and is well-documented.

Ready? Let’s jump in!

Setting up OVN

The biggest “challenge” here is package availability—many Linux distributions don’t have packages available for OVS 2.6.0, which is the first release with non-experimental support of OVN. If you’re an Ubuntu user, then you can use the Ubuntu Cloud Archive for the OpenStack “Newton” release, which includes OVS/OVN 2.6.0 packages. For other distributions, you’ll probably need to compile from source. In that case, the OVS installation documentation is quite accurate and usable.

For the purposes of this post, I’ll assume you’re using Ubuntu 16.04 and will pull packages Continue reading

AMD packs more horsepower into GPUs with new Radeon ReLive software

AMD has called its latest Crimson edition the GPU software update of the year and rightfully so. Called Crimson ReLive, it squeezes more horsepower out of the latest Polaris and older Fury GPUs and makes gaming and VR experiences more compelling. The Crimson ReLive edition is a must-have for AMD GPU owners. Prominent games like Batman Arkham Knight and Deus Ex: Mankind will look and perform better, and VR images will look much sharper on headsets. There are many new features in Crimson ReLive. An interesting feature is Radeon Chill, which keeps the GPU cool by cutting down on the excessive frame rate in games. Essentially, it analyzes the performance of games and adjusts the frame rate without affecting a game's visuals and performance.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Skyhigh Networks adds threat protection and data loss prevention capabilities to the cloud  

This column is available in a weekly newsletter called IT Best Practices.  Click here to subscribe.  Every time I read the quarterly Cloud Adoption & Risk Report published by Skyhigh Networks, I come across some tidbit of information that truly surprises me. What is it in the Q4 2016 report that has me so astounded? Consider this: Fewer than half (42%) of cloud providers explicitly specify that customers own the data they upload to the service. The rest of the providers either claim ownership over all data uploaded, or don’t refer to data ownership at all in their terms and conditions, leaving it open to controversy if service is discontinued.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Cisco Talos: Zeus spawn “Floki bot” malware gaining use, cyber-underworld notoriety

Cisco’s Talos security group this week warned that a variant of trojan monster Zeus has begun to garner a following in the cyber-underworld as a hard-to-detect attack mechanism.“[Floki bot] is based on the same codebase that was used by the infamous Zeus trojan, the source code of which was leaked in 2011. Rather than simply copying the features that were present within the Zeus trojan ‘as-is’, Floki Bot claims to feature several new capabilities making it an attractive tool for criminals,” Talos wrote.+More on Network World: 20 years ago: Hot sci/tech images from 1996+To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Cisco Talos: Zeus spawn “Floki bot” malware gaining use, cyber-underworld notoriety

Cisco’s Talos security group this week warned that a variant of trojan monster Zeus has begun to garner a following in the cyber-underworld as a hard-to-detect attack mechanism.“[Floki bot] is based on the same codebase that was used by the infamous Zeus trojan, the source code of which was leaked in 2011. Rather than simply copying the features that were present within the Zeus trojan ‘as-is’, Floki Bot claims to feature several new capabilities making it an attractive tool for criminals,” Talos wrote.+More on Network World: 20 years ago: Hot sci/tech images from 1996+To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Cisco Talos: Zeus spawn “Floki bot” malware gaining use, cyber-underworld notoriety

Cisco’s Talos security group this week warned that a variant of trojan monster Zeus has begun to garner a following in the cyber-underworld as a hard-to-detect attack mechanism.“[Floki bot] is based on the same codebase that was used by the infamous Zeus trojan, the source code of which was leaked in 2011. Rather than simply copying the features that were present within the Zeus trojan ‘as-is’, Floki Bot claims to feature several new capabilities making it an attractive tool for criminals,” Talos wrote.+More on Network World: 20 years ago: Hot sci/tech images from 1996+To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

IEEE-USA wants Trump to end H-1B lottery

The IEEE-USA intends to urge President-elect Donald Trump to quickly replace the random H-1B lottery with a system that gives priority to companies that pay the best wages.This proposal would also move large H-1B users to the back of the visa distribution line. For this to happen, all it would take is an executive order by the president, the engineering group says.Separately, the IEEE-USA also wants Trump to prod the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate what it claims is discrimination against U.S. workers by H-1B visa-using companies. This discrimination occurs when U.S. workers are replaced by visa-holding workers.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Worth Reading: Binge Watching Makes You Stupid

Binge is the new black. That’s what Netflix, and other media outlets tell us as they rev up for the holiday season. Are your in-laws too much? Kids driving you nuts? Had enough holiday cooking, cleaning, and entertaining? Well, take a break from real life and the stresses of the holidays and focus on something less confrontational: television. —Acculturated

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IDG Contributor Network: Will the real edge computing please stand up!

In its simplest form, edge computing is basically about putting an extra layer of computing in the network between the end device and a centralized data center, which is commonly referred to as being located in the cloud. The “edge” moniker implies that this extra layer of computing is as close as possible to the end device.The primary reasons for deploying edge computing is to significantly reduce the network processing delay for time-critical applications, and to greatly reduce the amount of data that needs to be carried further upstream into the network.How it all started The idea of having computing at the edge of the network, such as a gateway in a remote enterprise office, has been around for a long time. However, typically these have been for very specific use cases and in comparatively low volumes. It has only been more recently, driven by newer uses cases and enabling technologies, that edge computing has taken on more significance and added value in the networking world.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Russian cyberspies likely behind DNC breach move on to German election

A group of suspected Russian cyberspies blamed for interfering in the U.S. election is also attempting to influence the upcoming vote in Germany, according to the country's domestic intelligence agency.The Russian hacking group known as Fancy Bear or APT 28 has been targeting political parties in the country, Germany's Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV) intelligence agency said in a statement Thursday posted online by Politico.The hacking activities have led to a surge in spear-phishing email attacks directed at German politicians, the agency said.  To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Russian cyberspies likely behind DNC breach move on to German election

A group of suspected Russian cyberspies blamed for interfering in the U.S. election is also attempting to influence the upcoming vote in Germany, according to the country's domestic intelligence agency.The Russian hacking group known as Fancy Bear or APT 28 has been targeting political parties in the country, Germany's Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV) intelligence agency said in a statement Thursday posted online by Politico.The hacking activities have led to a surge in spear-phishing email attacks directed at German politicians, the agency said.  To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

7 ways to tighten enterprise social media security

Thumbs upImage by Umberto NURSSocial media has become the new cyber battleground. Not only is this landscape growing rapidly, but it also represents one of the most dynamic, unstructured and unregulated datasets anywhere in the digital world. In the wake of the social media revolution, cybercriminals exploit businesses and their customers at a massive scale.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

7 ways to tighten enterprise social media security

Thumbs upImage by Umberto NURSSocial media has become the new cyber battleground. Not only is this landscape growing rapidly, but it also represents one of the most dynamic, unstructured and unregulated datasets anywhere in the digital world. In the wake of the social media revolution, cybercriminals exploit businesses and their customers at a massive scale.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

9 big small business social media no-nos

These days, just about every business, regardless of size, has a presence on social media. It might be just a Facebook or a Pinterest page, but chances are if you are a small business owner, especially a retailer, you have an account on one of the major social media platforms. And while having a Facebook and Pinterest (as well Twitter and Instagram) page can be beneficial, it can negatively impact your business if you make one (or more) of these nine small business social media mistakes.[ Related: Facebook, Snapchat and the future of live video ]To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

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