IT Executive news

• FIRST LOOK: Vivaldi 1.0, the new Web browser for the old school

  06-04-2016 23:53
  
  Vivaldi springs forthWhile the trend in modern browsers is to provide as streamlined an experience as possible, with simplicity and ease of use as the guiding principles, there are plenty of users who want powerful, rich feature sets, instead. The team behind Vivaldi, including Opera browser co-creator Jon von Tetzchner, is hoping that their new browser’s blend of throwback functionality and modern tech will catch on. You can download Vivaldi here on Macs, Windows or Linux, but first check
  
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• Sales of desktop 3D printers explode, growing nearly 70%

  06-04-2016 23:46
  
  Sales of desktop 3D printers, the majority of which are still purchased by companies and schools, skyrocketed last year to the tune of a 69.7% increase.
  From 2014 to 2015, the sale of desktop printers with a retail price below $5,000 jumped from 163,999 to 278,385, according to the 21st edition of the Wohlers Report.
  Terry Wohlers, president of industry research firm Wohlers Associates, said desktop sales are booming because they're inexpensive, "yet many of them produce decent models for early
  
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• Internet of Things mainstream, in VS

  06-04-2016 19:17
  Ouders die hun net voor het rijbewijs geslaagde tiener monitoren als deze achter het stuur kruipt en ‘regels’ opstellen voor de met internet verbonden auto, slaapapneu-patiënten die eindelijk aan hun nachtrust toekomen, een wijngaard waarvan de grond intensief wordt gemonitord om betere gewassen te... lees meer
  
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• Apple fixes iOS lock screen bypass that gives access to photos, contacts

  06-04-2016 17:24
  
  Apple has reportedly fixed a vulnerability that could have allowed hackers to bypass the passcode on iPhone 6s and 6s Plus running iOS 9.3.1 in order to access the address book and photos.The bypass technique was discovered by researchers from German security firm Evolution Security and takes advantage of Siri's integration with apps like Twitter or Facebook and the new 3D Touch feature that's only available on the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus models.On a locked device, attackers can call up Siri and a
  
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• IDG Contributor Network: The outsourcing industry has a new set of usual (and small) suspects

  06-04-2016 16:23
  
  I recently had the rare opportunity to have a long, honest conversation about the outsourcing industry with a client of my firm, but not one of my direct clients. We were seated next to each other on a flight, and being trapped in a metal tube at 35,000 feet allowed us to trade opinions and experiences in a way no agenda-driven meeting ever could. I was enlightened.The client, a deeply experienced applications executive, was in the process of moving his entire application portfolio from a legacy
  
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• IDG Contributor Network: Linus Torvalds isn't worried about IoT security

  06-04-2016 16:10
  
  Devices like smart heaters, smart bulbs and smart refrigerators have direct access to unlimited power supply; they have direct access to the internet. And things can go really bad.
  And with IDC predicting that the worldwide IoT market will grow from $655.8 billion in 2014 to $1.7 trillion in 2020, security is becoming a very serious topic.[ Also on CIO.com: Threat geography: Why certain kinds of cyberattacks come from certain places ]To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please cl
  
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• How to stream live NFL, MLB, NBA and NHL games

  06-04-2016 16:04
  
  Many of us simply can't live without our quota of live sports games. That appetite translates into a multi-billion-dollar business for cable and satellite TV providers, so they purposefully make it hard to watch live sports without an expensive TV subscription. Thankfully, the "cord-cutting" movement is changing that.Live streaming NFL and MLB gamesThe National Football League (NFL) announced yesterday that Thursday Night Football games during the upcoming 2016 season will be available for free
  
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• Twitter beat out Verizon, Amazon for NFL streaming deal

  06-04-2016 15:35
  
  Twitter beat out many deep-pocketed rivals for the rights to live stream 10 Thursday night National Football League (NFL) games during the 2016 season. The deal bolsters the social network's position as the source for live, real-time online content and provides it with highly coveted programming that should widen its appeal.Twitter also landed this limited NFL streaming package for a song: $10 million, or $1 million per game, according to Bloomberg.com. Yahoo paid $17 million for the right to st
  
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• Hands-on with Surface Hub: Microsoft's huge tablet has some productivity holes

  06-04-2016 14:30
  
  For $21,999, I expected a little more from Microsoft’s new Surface Hub.
  Don’t get me wrong: the Hub's 84-inch 4K touchscreen, flanked by a pair of eye-height, 1080p cameras, videoconferencing, and full Windows 10 capabilities—all makes for one very impressive package, especially when it dominates one wall of a room. Heck, it practically is the wall. Mark HachmanMicrosoft’s Surface Hub is, in a word, enormous.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please
  
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• Kinder, gentler hacks: A bevy of low-stakes early computer breaches

  06-04-2016 14:10
  
  When the world was newImage by National Security AgencyToday, IT security is a deadly serious business. But in the early days of computing, the stakes were a bit lower. Maybe it's just that we're seeing it through a nostalgic lens, but the computer breaches in the '70s, '80s, and '90s just seemed a bit more ... fun? We spoke to some people who were there, who enjoyed reminiscing about a gentler era, whether they were the ones hacking or the ones being hacked.To read this article in full or to le
  
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• IDG Contributor Network: Blockchain is not Bitcoin: Why unfamiliarity is slowing healthcare adoption

  06-04-2016 14:07
  
  Beyond the hypeThe premise that blockchain is hype is false.What is hype? The Oxford Dictionary defines hype as, “promoting or publicizing (a product or idea) intensively, often exaggerating its importance or benefits.” The simple version, the hype is an exaggerated advantage.  A benefit that doesn't align to the future reality of the product or service. As with many new technologies, there is excitement. However, the buzz and excitement around blockchain are more than hype; it'
  
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• How to do data-driven marketing right

  06-04-2016 14:00
  
  Enterprises today accumulate a lot of data, which they typically use internally for CRM, sales forecasting, and marketing strategies, among other things.But some savvy companies, particularly those in the technology industry, share this data with the media and the world at large. The benefits of data-driven content marketing can be considerable. Here's how some companies leverage their own data for marketing, brand awareness, and thought leadership, along with tips and best practices for success
  
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• How to build cybersecurity into outsourcing contracts

  06-04-2016 13:41
  
  Any time a company shares data or provides access to third-parties, it increases its vulnerability to unauthorized access or breach. So in today’s IT environment in which enterprises partner with multiple IT service providers, who in turn may have multiple subcontracters, cyber risks increase exponentially.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
  
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• Quicken aims to restore glory days

  06-04-2016 13:40
  
  The newly-independent Quicken will try to reverse years of neglect by its former parent Intuit, the chief executive of Quicken Inc. said today.
  "QuickBooks and TurboTax put Quicken into the shadows," said Eric Dunn in an interview, speaking of Intuit's two biggest revenue generators. "Marketing [at Intuit] was focused on the lower-hanging fruit, and not on acquiring new users [for Quicken]. Quicken can provide comprehensive capabilities for people with some additional complexity in their lives,
  
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• Who's the boss of workplace culture?

  06-04-2016 13:13
  
  Who really drives culture in your workplace? According to a study from The Workforce Institute at Kronos and the research and consultancy firm WorkplaceTrends.com, HR believes it does. So do managers and executives. So, too, do your employees.
  There's clearly a disagreement about who's in charge of creating, maintaining and supporting workplace culture, but there's one thing every group agrees on: Workplace culture is incredibly important. The disconnect, though, isn't just comical. Without unde
  
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• Are you failing Security Basics 101?

  06-04-2016 13:09
  
  Security tools are getting more sophisticated. DevOps is bringing us automation in operations, and a more holistic way of looking at how we manage infrastructure. But all too often, we’re not doing basic things to improve security and reliability, like protecting against known vulnerabilities.Hewlett Packard Enterprise’s 2016 Cyber Risk Report points out that “29 percent of all exploits samples discovered in 2015 continued to use a 2010 Stuxnet infection vector that has been pa
  
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• IDG Contributor Network: MacHash 6.0: The best Apple news app gets a huge update

  06-04-2016 13:00
  
  As you might imagine, I’m an Apple news junkie. Since I write this blog I need to stay up to date with what’s happening in the world of Apple. And one of the ways I do this is to use the MacHash news app on my iPhone 6s and iPad Pro.MacHash comes bundled with all of the best Apple news sites and blogs built right into it. So it’s easy and fast to hop around from site to site and get all of the latest news about Apple and it’s products.MacHash 6.0 adds some great new featu
  
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• Samsung Galaxy TabPro S: An enterprise contender?

  06-04-2016 12:54
  
  When Samsung announced the Galaxy TabPro S, it made headlines not only as the first hybrid from Samsung, but also as the first Samsung device running Windows 10. With past devices, Samsung has held tight to Android, usually layering a skin over the stock version to make it a unique -- and sometimes frustrating -- experience. This time, Samsung opted to equip its latest flagship with Windows 10, and left the OS mostly alone save for a bit of standard Samsung bloatware.
  As hybrids enter the workfo
  
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• Hospitals hacks put patient health at risk

  06-04-2016 12:30
  
  A report that highlights the vulnerabilities in medical devices and the risks they pose to patient health issued by Independent Security Evaluators comes at an opportune time as the past month has shown that hospitals are becoming targets for criminals.
  Ted Harrington, executive partner at Independent Security Evaluators said, "It’s a scary report in a lot of ways, but our hope is to organize an industry in recognizing these problems. We are trying to make an entire industry start changin
  
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• Deep-dive review: The new LG G5 restores the replaceable battery

  06-04-2016 12:30
  
  All you folks who miss having a replaceable battery in your high-end smartphone, your ride is here.
  LG's new flagship, the LG G5, has as its signature feature a slide-out replaceable battery. It's not the only interesting thing about the phone, but it's the most obvious -- and LG's decision to zag when the entire rest of the world is zigging will get most of the attention. The question is: Does the phone as a whole rate as a high-end device?About the batteryBatteries that could be swapped out b
  
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• At MIT, a glimpse into our techno future

  06-04-2016 12:03
  
  In the future, you may use aeroponic systems at home to bring in water mixed with nutrients. You'll use this water to grow vegetables, home-grown food that can cut your produce costs in half.Your commute to work may be on a covered, quasi-bike vehicle that uses battery power to assist the pedaling rider (who gets healthier from the effort).And the era of the large suburban homes will end. Why have multiple rooms for various purposes?"The cost of transformable furniture is much less than a mortga
  
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• Review: IBM Watson strikes again

  06-04-2016 12:00
  
  To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
  
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• Microsoft’s TypeScript 2.0 is due by June

  06-04-2016 12:00
  
  TypeScript 2.0, the next major version of Microsoft's typed superset of JavaScript, is due by June and will feature non-nullable types.
  Among the most requested feature for TypeScript, non-nullable types use a compiler switch called strict null checks, said Anders Hejlsberg, a Microsoft technical fellow and developer of TypeScript. "In strict null checks, we say undefined and null are no longer part of all of the types." A number is a number, a string is a string, and a Boolean is only true or
  
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• Grunt JavaScript task-runner nears 1.0 release

  06-04-2016 12:00
  
  Grunt, a well-known task runner for automating JavaScript tasks, has gone to a 1.0.0 release. Changes include prevention of the async callback function from being called multiple times, removal of duplicate BOM (byte order mark) strip code, and updates to the command-line interface.
  But the 1.0.0 version no longer supports Node.js 0.8, which debuted in mid-2012.[ Get the most out of collaborative programming with InfoWorld's 20 essential pointers for Git and GitHub. | Keep up with hot topics in
  
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• Windows 10 forecast: On as many as 342M PCs at one-year mark

  06-04-2016 04:08
  
  Windows 10 will have grabbed between 19% and 21% of the personal computer operating system market by its one-year anniversary, putting Microsoft a third of the way toward its goal of 1 billion devices, according to an analysis of the upgrade's uptake rate so far.
  Data published last week by analytics vendor Net Applications pegged Windows 10's user share -- an estimate of the percentage of the world's computers that run individual operating systems -- at 14.2% for March, an increase of 1.3 perc
  
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• Is Twitter's NFL deal a Hail Mary or a solid fix?

  06-04-2016 04:06
  
  With Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey under pressure to improve the social network's user base and financial coffers, analysts are split on the company's deal with the National Football League.
  Twitter and the NFL announced today that they have signed an exclusive deal in which Twitter will live stream Thursday night NFL football games for the upcoming season. The 10 streamed games will be free and will run across devices.
  In a bid to extend the NFL's social media presence, Twitter will also offer pre-g
  
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• Blindsided by the IoT?

  06-04-2016 04:05
  
  The Internet of Things (IoT), software-defined networks (SDN), cloud-based services and network virtualization (NV) don’t sound like emerging technologies. They have all been around for more than a decade – that’s multiple generations in the high-tech world.But according to Dr. James Burrell, deputy assistant director at the FBI, they are indeed still emerging. Burrell told an audience at the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston’s 2016 Cybersecurity Conference that, “what
  
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• Server software poses soft target for ransomware

  06-04-2016 03:13
  
  An alternate method for infecting computers with ransomware signals a shift in tactics by cybercriminals that could put businesses at greater risk, according to Symantec.A type of ransomware called Samsam has been infecting organizations but is not installed in the usual way."Samsam is another variant in a growing number of variants of ransomware, but what sets it apart from other ransomware is how it reaches its intended targets by way of unpatched server-side software," Symantec wrot
  
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• WhatsApp turns on end-to-end encryption

  06-04-2016 02:47
  
  Facebook-owned WhatsApp has strengthened the encryption of its widely used instant messaging app, a development that in theory makes it harder for law enforcement to gain access to communications.WhatsApp's founders said Tuesday that the application now implements end-to-end encryption, which means only authorized users can decrypt messages."The idea is simple: when you send a message, the only person who can read it is the person or group chat that you send that message to," Jan Koum and B
  
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• GE’s move to Boston could revive local tech business ambitions

  06-04-2016 02:47
  
  Jeff Immelt candidly told Boston’s business and political elite yesterday about what GE hoped to get from the company’s move to Boston. He said GE moved to Boston for two reasons: to win the Internet of Things and rethink how companies work in this winner-take-all technology innovation economy.He also said he liked Boston because of the chip the tech community has on its shoulder; an obvious reference to the Silicon Valley’s domination of nearly every segment of technology. The
  
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• Sigfox's slow but thrifty IoT network is going Down Under

  06-04-2016 01:11
  
  The Sigfox low-power IoT network is due for an expansion that may not be game-changing in practical terms but will certainly look good on a map.
  Sigfox announced a deal on Tuesday with a partner that will build a network across Australia and New Zealand using the French company's technology. That's a visible win for a vendor competing to connect small Internet of Things devices like sensors and meters around the world.
  Several vendors and industry groups are pushing technologies for networking
  
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• Twitter signs deal to stream Thursday night NFL games

  06-04-2016 00:16
  Twitter just cemented its reputation as the social network for sports fans. Twitter just won the rights to stream 10 Thursday night football games for the 2016-2017 NFL season with originating broadcasts from CBS and NBC. The games will also be simulcast on the NFL Network, which the league calls a “tri-cast” distribution model that covers broadcast TV, cable, and online.
  The broadcasts will be free and won’t require cable authentication or a Twitter account. The games will be
  
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