So What Exactly Is SDN?

Five years after the SDN hype exploded, it remains as meaningless as Cloud, and it seems that all we’re left with is a plethora of vendors engaged in SDN-washing their products.

Even when a group of highly intelligent engineers considering these topics on a daily basis gets together they don’t get very far apart from a great question: “what business problem is it supposed to solve?” (or maybe they got distracted by irrelevant hot-air opinions).

Is it still worth trying to find a useful definition of SDN? It seems it’s easier to list what SDN is not like I’ll be doing in the free Introduction to SDN webinar on February 10th. Let’s see:

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mixi Taps Juniper Networks to Boost Hybrid Cloud Agility

TOKYO, JAPAN–(Marketwired – February 02, 2016) – Juniper Networks (:), the industry leader in network innovation, today announced that Japan’s leading social networking service and smartphone gaming provider mixi, Inc. (: ) has selected Juniper Networks to implement their data center solution utilizing Juniper Networks® QFX5100 Ethernet Switches to support MPLS/VRF in conjunction with Juniper Networks... Read more →

Custom Web browser from Comodo poses security threat, researcher says

A customized version of Google's Chrome browser developed by security vendor Comodo has a jaw-dropping flaw, according to a researcher.Tavis Ormandy, an information security engineer with Google, analyzed Comodo's "Chromodo," a browser based on the Chromium open-source code.Chromodo is marketed as a browser with enhanced security and privacy controls. But Ormandy found it contains a flaw that violates one of the most basic rules for Web security.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

What is the Wi-Fi password?

This is one of the most common questions heard in small and mid-sized businesses (SMBs) today. With the shift in technology and consumer expectations of connectivity, SMBs do more than just provide products and services to their customers—they provide Wi-Fi....

Malwarebytes still fixing flaws in antivirus software

Malwarebytes said it could take three of four weeks to fix flaws in its consumer product that were found by a Google security researcher.The company has fixed several server-side vulnerabilities but is still testing a new version of its Anti-Malware product to fix client-side problems, CEO Marcin Kleczynski said in a blog post.In the meantime, customers can implement a workaround: those using the premium version of Anti-Malware "should enable self-protection under settings to mitigate all of the reported vulnerabilities," he wrote.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Arista violated 3 Cisco patents: ITC

The International Trade Commission has made an initial determination that Arista Networks infringed on three Cisco patents in its switches, the latest development in a 13-month-old suit.The ITC said Arista violated patents associated with a central database for managing configuration data (SysDB) and private VLANs. As part of its 2014 suit alleging patent and copyright infringement, Cisco sought an injunction on Arista product from the ITC.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Protecting IP or Market Share?

Protecting IP or Market Share?

It's tough times on Tasman Drive.  Struggling to apply old technology to the new world of cloud computing, Cisco is potentially facing the largest loss of data center market share in its history.  We can understand why Cisco would take the battle from the marketplace to the courtroom.  What surprises us is the length that Cisco has gone to misrepresent our actions and the nature of the litigation in order to justify their assault.

Q&A: As prices fall, flash memory is eating the world

Western Digital in October announced plans to acquire SanDisk for some $19 billion in a deal that -- once finalized -- will marry leaders in the traditional hard drive and the emerging flash memory markets. Sumit Sadana, SanDisk's chief strategy officer and general manager of its Enterprise Solutions unit, spoke recently with IDG Chief Content Officer John Gallant to share insights on the merger and to explore the evolving role of flash in corporate data centers. What continues to hold enterprise back with flash? Just the price perception issue?Is the cloud a threat to your consumer device business? More and more, consumers use the cloud for photos or other things that they're saving. Is it such that the better the cloud opportunities get, the weaker the consumer opportunity gets?To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)

IDG Contributor Network: Next frontier: Aquatic IoT

Underwater communications networks are excruciatingly slow, and that's hampering oil and gas exploration and scuba communications, among other businesses.The communications technology needs upgrading to more closely match high-speed, through-air radio networks, say experts.One answer may be to adapt software-defined radios and couple them with special underwater acoustic modems, according to electrical engineers at the University of Buffalo.Radio too slow Sound-waves—like those used by whales and dolphins—as opposed to radio-waves, are the best media for communicating underwater, the scientists say.Traditional radio methods don't work properly. The problem is that radio doesn't function well underwater. Commercial underwater modems are slow, and voice solutions are limited by distance and clarity, the scientists say.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

They are deadly serious about crypto backdoors

Julian Sanchez (@normative) has an article questioning whether the FBI is serious about pushing crypto backdoors, or whether this is all a ploy pressuring companies like Apple to give them access. I think they are serious -- deadly serious.

The reason they are only half-heartedly pushing backdoors at the moment is that they believe we, the opposition, aren't serious about the issue. After all, the 4rth Amendment says that a "warrant of probable cause" gives law enforcement unlimited power to invade our privacy. Since the constitution is on their side, only irrelevant hippies could ever disagree. There is no serious opposition to the proposition. It'll all work itself out in the FBI's favor eventually. Among the fascist class of politicians, like the Dianne Feinsteins and Lindsay Grahams of the world, belief in this principle is rock solid. They have absolutely no doubt.

But the opposition is deadly serious. By "deadly" I mean this is an issue we are willing to take up arms over. If congress were to pass a law outlawing strong crypto, I'd move to a non-extradition country, declare the revolution, and start working to bring down the government. You think the "Anonymous" hackers were bad, Continue reading

Is packet-sniffing illegal? (OmniCISA update)

In the news recently, Janet Napolitano (formerly head of DHS, now head of California's university system) had packet-sniffing software installed at the UC Berkeley campus to monitor all its traffic. This brings up the age old question: is such packet-sniffing legal, or a violation of wiretap laws.

Setting aside the legality question for the moment, I should first point out that's its perfectly normal. Almost all organizations use "packet-sniffers" to help manage their network. Almost all organizations have "intrusion detection systems" (IDS) that monitor network traffic looking for hacker attacks. Learning how to use packet-sniffers like "Wireshark" is part of every network engineer's training.

Indeed, while the news articles describes this as some special and nefarious plot by Napolitano, the reality is that it's probably just an upgrade of packet-sniffer systems that already exist.

Ironical, much packet-sniffing practice comes from UC Berkele. It's famous for having created "BPF", the eponymously named "Berkeley Packet Filter", a standard for packet-sniffing included in most computers. Whatever packet-sniffing system Berkeley purchased to eavesdrop on its networks is almost certainly including Berkeley's own BPF software.


Now for the legal question. Even if everyone is doing it, it doesn't necessarily mean it's legal. But the wiretap Continue reading
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