Citizens of Tech Podcast Has Re-Launched!

My friend Eric Sutphen and I started the Citizens of Tech podcast using some spare capacity on the Packet Pushers platform to see what folks thought of the idea. We received lots of positive comments from the audience. Several of you stated that Citizens of Tech quickly became one of your "must listen" shows. With warm, glowing feelings of audience love in mind, we've opted to give the show a site of its very own! http://citizensoftech.com

A bad debate for tech

Most of the references to technology in the so-called main-stage GOP debate Wednesday night were around protecting U.S. borders. There were calls for drones, visa entry and exit tracking systems, and overall more reliance on electronics to deter illegal crossings. It was all about building a better fence, and not about government's role in advancing technology.There was no discussion about the H-1B visa except at the margins. There was no mention of the federal government's role in science investment. Space exploration? Not discussed. Technology hardly came up in the three-hour debate, the same as what happened in the first debate on August 6.Climate change, bypassed in the first debate, did come up in Wednesday night's debate. It's a subject that offers much opportunity to talk about science, government investments in basic science including supercomputers, alternative energy systems and energy storage.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Why Windows 10 is the most secure Windows ever

Microsoft added two game-changing security features for enterprise users in Windows 10, but until recently, the company has been relatively quiet about them.So far the buzz has mainly been about Windows Hello, which supports face and fingerprint recognition. But Device Guard and Credential Guard are the two standout security features of Windows 10 -- they protect the core kernel from malware and prevent attackers from remotely taking control of the machine. Device Guard and Credential Guard are intended for business systems and are available only in Windows 10 Enterprise and Windows 10 Education.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

DLSP – QoS-Aware Routing Protocol on Software Gone Wild

When I asked “Are there any truly QoS-aware routing protocols out there?” in one of my SD-WAN posts, Marcelo Spohn from ADARA Networks quickly pointed out that they have one – Dynamic Link-State Routing Protocol.

He also claimed that DLSP has no scalability concerns – more than enough reasons to schedule an online chat, resulting in Episode 40 of Software Gone Wild. We didn’t go too deep this time, but you should get a nice overview of what DLSP is and how it works.

Understanding QEMU

Since QEMU is the main tool I use in our virtual lab, it is crucial to know what qemu in general is and what are all the qemu options for? And I am no expert here, actully I ran some qemu images myself without honest understanding why am I providing this particular set of options and

The 2015 Ig Nobel Prize winners

Uncooking an egg, peeing like a whale, and fathering a few hundred childrenDon’t look so confused – it’s the 2015 Ig Nobel awards, the scientific equivalent of the Razzies, given out to real science projects “that make you laugh, and then make you think.” Or, in the case of several of this year’s “winners,” that make you squirm uncomfortably in your chair. Read on, if you dare.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Announcing CloudFlare’s Internet Summit – And How to Get an Invitation

Five years ago next week, CloudFlare launched its service to the public. We’re celebrating our birthday in a variety of ways, including holding our first-ever Internet Summit on Thursday, September 24th. As part of the Internet Summit, we’re bringing together policymakers, business executives, cybersecurity experts, and academics from all over the world to discuss the threats and opportunities for the Internet over the next five years.

Through a series of fireside chats and panel discussions, featured speakers will discuss the top technology trends shaping business today, including cyber security, mobility, and the Internet of Things. These compelling perspectives will offer insights into the future of the global Internet and its implications on society.

Featured speakers include:

  • Toomas Hendrik Ilves, The President of Estonia
  • Alex Stamos, chief security officer of Facebook
  • Matt Grob, chief technology officer of Qualcomm
  • Andrew Ng, chief scientist at Baidu
  • Nicole Wong, former US deputy CTO & legal director for products at Twitter
  • Andy McAfee, MIT professor & author of "The Second Machine Age"
  • Cindy Cohn, executive director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation
  • Adam Langley, security engineer at Google
  • David Brin, scientist, best-selling author & tech-futurist
  • Rajiv Pant, former chief technology officer of The New York Times
  • Continue reading

How to use stipends to ensure BYOD success

Stipends are a way for businesses to reimburse employees for a portion of their wireless costs and, if implemented properly, address these common issues: cost, eligibility, control and taxes. Here’s how:

* Costs. When businesses talk about costs, they generally are referring to either time or money. And companies opting to use expense reports for stipends will find the task occupies a good bit of both. It’s time-consuming for accounting departments to sort through individual expense reports and issue payments only after an employee’s usage has been verified. It’s no surprise, then, that an Aberdeen Group study suggests each expense report costs $18 to process. Compounding those costs, companies opting for this method will issue hundreds or even thousands of payments each month, so the benefits that attend stipends can be quickly outweighed.

To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Under DDoS attack? Look for something worse

When businesses are hit by noticeable distributed denial-of-service attacks, three-quarters of the time those attacks are accompanied by another security incident, according to Kaspersky Lab.Those other attacks may or may not originate from the same party, but they can go undetected if IT staff is totally focused on defending against the DDoS, says Evgeny Vigovsky, head of Kaspersky DDoS Protection.“In many cases, it may be a coordinated effort, but even if these attacks originate from different sources, IT staff have to allocate resources to solve two problems at the same time, under a lot of stress,” Vigovsky says. Kaspersky polled top managers and IT pros at 5,500 companies in 26 countries about their experiences with DDoS attacks.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Celebrating 25 years of wacky Ig Nobel Prize brilliance

25 years oldEach year since 1991, Improbable Research has highlighted a handful of real researchers whose work might seem goofy on the surface, but often has serious implications. The Ig Nobel prizes are awarded annually at a ceremony at Harvard University shortly before the Nobel prizes are announced. Here’s a look at a winner from each of the past 24 years, with the 2015 prize winners being announced tonight.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Celebrating 25 years of wacky Ig Nobel Prize brilliance

25 years oldEach year since 1991, Improbable Research has highlighted a handful of real researchers whose work might seem goofy on the surface, but often has serious implications. The Ig Nobel prizes are awarded annually at a ceremony at Harvard University shortly before the Nobel prizes are announced. Here’s a look at a winner from each of the past 24 years, with the 2015 prize winners being announced tonight.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Malware enables cheating at online poker

Online poker malware lets players cheat by getting a peek at cards held by opponents whose machines have been infected.The Trojan, called Win32/Spy.Odlanor, is typically downloaded by victims because it is disguised as installers or resources such as poker databases and poker calculators, according to the ESET WeLiveSecurity blog.“In other cases, it was loaded onto the victim’s system through various poker-related programs … such as Tournament Shark, Poker Calculator Pro, Smart Buddy, Poker Office, and others,” the blog says.Once installed it grabs screenshots of the PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker clients, letting the attackers see what cards the victim holds. In order to carry out the scam, the cheaters have to find and join the table at which the infected machine is playing.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

IDG Contributor Network: What does a next-generation WAN look like?

After years of sitting in the shadow of virtualization, SaaS, containers, and all the other exciting IT trends, the wide area network is finally getting some attention. These other trends are actually drivers for this change in many cases; while WAN architectures have remained relatively static in recent years, the applications they need to support have changed beyond recognition. This is driving the need to re-think what the WAN looks like and how it operates.The phrase 'next-generation WAN' will mean different things to different enterprises, but let's identify some of the characteristics that are starting to become more common. Some of these are new, but in many cases the next-generation WAN is a new network methodology or mindset. This can impact the technologies used, insourcing/outsourcing decisions, and functionality provided by the network.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here