Canonical brings OpenStack to small-scale clouds
Canonical has announced the extension of its commercial OpenStack offering to small-scale cloud environments with a new project, Sunbeam.
The project is 100 percent open source and is available free-of-charge, but enterprise customers can also opt-in for comprehensive security coverage and full commercial support under the Ubuntu Pro + Support subscriptions once they’ve completed the deployment.
Industry cloud platforms: The complete guide
Although general-purpose cloud platforms paved the way for new business technologies, they only address horizontal market issues. Simply put, these cloud computing products provide generalized solutions. SaaS products leave little room for configuration, while IaaS and PaaS systems require extensive coding experience.
To tackle vertical market challenges, you need industry cloud platforms. They’re an emerging trend that combines SaaS, IaaS, and PaaS technologies into one out-of-the-box system, and you can configure them to focus on industry-specific issues. Since they’re new to the market, you might find them confusing. Don’t worry -- we’ll discuss everything you should know about industry cloud platforms, their advantage over general cloud products, and the common challenges faced when executing them.
Microsoft no longer supports Windows 8, and soon neither will Google Drive
It is now several months since Microsoft stopped supporting Windows 8 and Windows 8.1. As such, the developers of numerous apps and services are following suit -- Google included.
The company has revealed that it will end support for Google Drive for desktop on Windows 8, Windows 8.1 and Windows Server 2012 later this summer. No 32-bit version of Windows will be supported either, meaning that Drive users will have to upgrade their operating system, or stick with the web-based version of Google's cloud storage service.
The challenge of protecting data in the cloud [Q&A]
Modern enterprises hold huge volumes of data and increasingly it's stored in the cloud. This means that protecting the information is a significant challenge and it can even be easy to lose track of where data is.
We spoke to Dan Benjamin, co-founder and CEO of Dig Security, to discuss the risks around cloud data storage and how to address them.
Google Drive security flaw allows data to be stolen without trace
Cloud incident response company Mitiga has released research on a significant forensic security deficiency in Google Workspace that enables threat actors to exfiltrate data in Google Drive without any trace.
Data theft is one of the most common motives for attack, and with more than six million businesses using Google Workspace -- including Google Drive -- the cloud-based repository has been a prime target for data exfiltration.
90 percent of organizations have had identity-related incidents in the past year
In the last 12 months, 90 percent of organizations have suffered an identity-related incident, an increase of six percent over the previous year.
A new report, based on an online survey of over 500 identity and security professionals, from The Identity Defined Security Alliance, shows that only 49 percent of respondents say that their leadership teams understand identity and security risks and proactively invest in protection before suffering an incident, while 29 percent only engage and support after an incident.
Beating the headache of SaaS sprawl [Q&A]
Moving to the cloud has always presented something of a challenge, but the pandemic made things even more difficult because of the need to manage more applications across a distributed workforce.
Add in the issue of shadow IT, and enterprises are increasingly struggling with SaaS sprawl. We spoke to BetterCloud CTO, Jamie Tischart to learn more about the problem and how to deal with it.
The top five cloud security risks
New analysis by Orca Security of scan results from its Cloud Security Platform reveals the top risks facing organizations this year.
The analysis of workload, configuration and identity data from real-world production cloud assets on Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud, Kubernetes and more identifies five of the most common, yet severe, cloud security risks which are found in many cloud environments.
Google will start deleting inactive accounts and wiping out user data later this year
Google has announced an update to its inactive account policies that means some user accounts will be deleted before the end of the year.
The company says that accounts that have not been accessed for two years will be deleted starting in December. While the deletion of inactive accounts might seem fairly innocuous, there are serious implications for many people, such as those who have used Google cloud storage, or Gmail, as a means of backing up data and have had no reason to access their account since.
Microsoft is able to look inside your password protected zip files
Microsoft has been spotted scanning for malware within password protected zip files stored on its cloud services.
Security researcher Andrew Brandt was among those to notice that Microsoft appears to be bypassing passwords added to zip archives in order to check for malware. While the intentions of the company may be good, the practice raises serious questions about privacy and security.
Cloud professionals cling to their passwords despite the risks
Despite the fact that insecure password practices are regularly exploited in cyberattacks worldwide, 83 percent of cloud professionals surveyed at the recent Cloud Expo Europe event say they are confident about passwords' security effectiveness, with 34 percent 'very confident'.
But the study, of over 150 people, carried out by Beyond Identity also reveals frustrations. 60 percent find it frustrating to remember multiple passwords, 52 percent are frustrated by having to regularly change their passwords, and 52 percent by the requirement to choose long passwords containing numbers and symbols.
How does adopting cloud and hybrid environments drive change in managing identities?
Businesses of all sizes have had to accelerate digitization across the entire business in recent years, as the adoption of hybrid working practices forces them to make changes to ensure operational continuity. By digitizing processes and embracing the cloud, businesses have delivered faster, more flexible, and more resilient services for employees and customers.
The rate of cloud adoption shows no signs of relenting. Gartner forecasts worldwide public cloud end-user spending to reach nearly $600 billion in 2023. This growth presents a multitude of opportunities, but the compounded cyber risk that comes with a widening digital footprint presents IT and security teams with an immense challenge.
Google brings AI collaboration to work
Google used yesterday's Google I/O to announce new services and capabilities across Google Cloud and Workspace.
Among these is Duet AI, an AI-powered collaborator, to enable more users and developers to start seeing the impact AI can have on their organization and help solve day-to-day work challenges.
Exploring the potential of cloud PCs for strategic cost rationalization
The introduction of advanced technologies has opened a world of possibilities for global corporate growth. The problem is that IT department budgets continue to be constrained, limiting the scope of technology investments at large.
This means that business leaders need to innovate to be prepared for changing business conditions. Advancing their digital transformation roadmaps should take priority as this will likely provide the greatest return on IT investment since the technology choices they make today will have a major impact on future success.
Should IT chiefs be wary of vendor lock-in when moving to the cloud? [Q&A]
In the dash to move systems to the cloud it's easy to become dependent on the services of a specific vendor, making it time-consuming or costly to move to an alternative at a later date.
We spoke to Cooper Lutz, chief architect, digital solutions at AHEAD, to get his advice for IT teams making their way to the cloud on the best practices to mitigate vendor lock-in.
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