IT Executive news

• Extreme grabs Avaya’s networking business for $100M

  07-03-2017 23:58
  
  Extreme Networks continued to expand its enterprise networking portfolio today buying up the network technology of Avaya Holdings– which is in Chapter 11 bankruptcy -- for $100 million.
  Extreme’s Ed Meyercord, President and CEO said he expects the deal will broaden the company’s software and strengthen its presence in vertical markets such as healthcare and manufacturing.
  Norman Rice, an executive vice president with Extreme added that some of Avaya’s strengths included
  
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• First full-scale Hyperloop system is almost ready for takeoff

  07-03-2017 23:56
  
  Hyperloop One is well on its way to developing the world's first fully operational Hyperloop transportation system. The company revealed its progress on Tuesday at the Middle East Rail conference in Dubai, sharing pictures and footage of its Nevada development site dubbed "DevLoop." 
  Taking Elon Musk's Hyperloop concept of a levitating pod in a low-pressure tube, Hyperloop One has developed what is so far the only full-scale, full-system Hyperloop test site. Back in May 2016, the company s
  
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• Extreme will buy Avaya's networking business for $100 million

  07-03-2017 23:51
  
  Avaya has found a buyer for its networking business: Extreme Networks will buy the division for about US$100 million as part of Avaya’s bankruptcy process.The venerable enterprise voice, collaboration and networking company filed for bankruptcy in January and said it would shift its focus from hardware to software and services.Extreme, based in San Jose, California, makes wired and wireless enterprise network products, including an SDN (software-defined networking) controller based on the
  
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• Robots can read your mind to fix their mistakes

  07-03-2017 23:28
  
  Imagine a robot stacking boxes in a warehouse when it suddenly sees that one box is in the wrong stack. It goes back and puts the container in the right place. How did the machine know it had made a mistake?
  The robot's human boss didn't punch any codes into a computer to have the robot correct its mistake. The boss didn't say a word. She simply looked over, recognized the robot's error, and the robot was able to recognize her thoughts and correct its mistake.
  This may sound like a scene out of
  
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• Wikileaks’ dump of CIA exploits exposes enterprises to new risks

  07-03-2017 23:12
  
  Corporations concerned about the release of thousands of CIA documents detailing hacks against Apple iOS and Mac OSX, Google’s Android, Microsoft’s Windows, Linux and Solaris need to conduct a fresh round of risk assessment that takes the new revelations into account.
  While the trove of leaked data – known as Vault 7 – doesn’t include code for actual exploits, it does describe the types of vulnerabilities they take advantage of, which can still be of value to both
  
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• Tesla hires new CIO

  07-03-2017 23:03
  
  Tesla Motors has hired Gary Clark, formerly IT CTO and engineering CIO of Juniper Networks, as its new CIO. Clark replaces Jay Vijayan, who left the company in January 2016 to launch a startup.Clark, who oversaw Juniper's broad shift to cloud infrastructure and SaaS (software-as-a-service) applications, revealed the appointment on his LinkedIn profile but did not respond to a request for comment.[Related: Tesla will rule the car world ]To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please c
  
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• IT professionals think Apple devices are easier to manage, according to new survey

  07-03-2017 23:00
  
  A recent survey has found that your IT department thinks a Mac is more manageable than a PC or Chromebook.
  According to a survey of IT professionals, Macs and iOS devices are easier to manage when it comes to security, device configuration, software deployment, and support. Of those surveyed, 62 percent said the Mac is as easy or easier to deploy than PC, and 93 percent said it’s as easy or easier to deploy an iPhone or iPad over another device.
  While most IT professionals found Appl
  
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• Firefox 52 bans plug-ins, supports 'game changer' standard

  07-03-2017 22:13
  
  Mozilla today updated Firefox to version 52, which warns users when they put passwords into non-encrypted websites, bars all plug-ins other than Adobe's Flash Player and adds support for an under-consideration technology standard that claims to run web apps at nearly the same speed as native code.
  Firefox 52 also patched 28 security vulnerabilities, a half dozen of them tagged with the "Critical" label. On another security front, the browser now pops up a warning message when users start to typ
  
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• Google ignites Python library for command lines

  07-03-2017 21:55
  
  With its Python Fire library, Google is offering Python developers a mechanism to easily generate command-line interfaces.
  Newly available via open source, Python Fire turns code into a CLI without developers needing to do any more work, so it's easier to transition between the Bash Linux CLI and Python. Google engineers have already used Python Fire to produce CLI tools from Python libraries, including the Python Imaging Library and a tool in the Google Brain machine intelligence project that
  
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• BrandPost: 17 questions to measure DevOps

  07-03-2017 21:24
  
  If you ask 10 people to define DevOps, you’ll probably get 10 different answers. Some answers will focus on culture and collaboration; others may focus on tooling. (If you’re interested in our definition of DevOps, we wrote a post called What is DevOps?)DevOps is hard to pin down, but most people agree that it’s about much more than tooling. It’s about people, processes and tools — and probably in that order. It’s about aligning team values and workflows to ac
  
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• How to update your PC's BIOS

  07-03-2017 21:18
  
  A tiny BIOS chip lurks inside every computer, sitting on your motherboard to breathe life into your system when you press the power button. BIOS stands for basic input and output system, and the BIOS chip initializes all the other devices in your PC, like the CPU, GPU, and motherboard chipset.
  A few years ago, motherboard manufacturers—in partnership with Microsoft and Intel—introduced a replacement for traditional BIOS chips dubbed UEFI (Unified Extensible Firmware Interface). Almo
  
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• Microsoft's Slack competitor is coming March 14

  07-03-2017 20:54
  
  Microsoft’s entry into the modern workplace chat app market will be generally available in a week. The company announced Tuesday it will be marking the occasion with a webcast to discuss what’s new since the service was announced last year.The Teams product is Microsoft’s answer to group chat apps like Slack and HipChat. The service provides Office 365 customers with shared workspaces they can use to discuss work with one another. It connects with Office 365 to let users collab
  
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• Raspberry Pi roundup: Happy 5th birthday, baby! Also, new software, a tough piano, and, well, Windows 98

  07-03-2017 20:44
  
  I am a shameful forgetter of important dates, as family and ex-girlfriends will be happy to tell you. They can detail the brainless “duh?” expression, with tinges of dawning comprehension, that I make when I am reminded that, yes, it’s today, and yes, I have forgotten.
  It’s a different story, professionally – I did remember that the Raspberry Pi’s fifth birthday took place this weekend, but I was traveling to cover a wireless company’s annual conference
  
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• 50% off Corsair Gaming MM300 Anti-Fray Cloth Gaming Mouse Pad - Deal Alert

  07-03-2017 20:35
  
  The MM300 is a high endurance, pro-grade cloth mouse pad for high-DPI gaming mice. Reinforced stitched edges guard against surface peeling, and the optimized textile-weaved surface design gives superior control and precision tracking for absolutely lethal in-game accuracy. With multiple sizes available, from small to extended, the MM300 has just the right size to fit your needs.  This gaming pad currently averages 4.7 out of 5 stars from over 700 people (read reviews) on Amazon, where
  
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• GOP lawmaker drags iPhone into healthcare debate

  07-03-2017 20:23
  
  Utah Republican Rep. Jason Chaffetz today dragged Apple and its iPhone into the debate about healthcare coverage during an appearance on CNN.
  Chaffetz, who heads the House Oversight Committee, told "New Day" host Alisyn Camerota that Americans might have to decide between buying a new iPhone and paying for health insurance.[ To comment on this story, visit Computerworld's Facebook page. ]
  "Well, we're getting rid of the individual mandate. We're getting rid of those things that people said that
  
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• IDG Contributor Network: VMWare joins the Linux Foundation as a Gold Member

  07-03-2017 19:48
  
  VMware, the company known for changing the datacenter landscape with virtualization, has joined the Linux Foundation as a Gold member. This is the second highest membership tier at The Linux Foundation.
  “VMware has underscored its commitment to the principles of open source development,” said Jim Zemlin, executive director, The Linux Foundation. “The open source community will benefit from VMware’s wealth of talent and resources as we collaborate to solve technology chal
  
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• Better smartphone cameras on the way

  07-03-2017 19:36
  
  Improvements to cameras, photos and video in smartphones are among the biggest lures for buyers, and several smartphone manufacturers at Mobile World Congress announced camera innovations designed to meet that demand.
  Huawei announced the P10 and P10 Plus smartphones featuring dual rear cameras with high quality Leica lenses. LG announced the G6 with wide-angle cameras on both front and back, with one of the two 13-megapixel rear cameras providing a 135-degree angle. The G6 also has the capabil
  
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• ZTE pays $892M settlement to US over illegal sales to Iran

  07-03-2017 19:05
  
  Chinese smartphone maker ZTE has agreed to pay US$892 million to the U.S. government for illegally selling networking technology to Iran.  ZTE entered a guilty plea over the charges, which include violating export controls meant to keep sensitive U.S. technology away from the Iranian government, the U.S Department of Justice said on Tuesday."They (ZTE) lied to federal investigators and even deceived their own counsel and internal investigators about their illegal acts," Attorney General Jef
  
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• MongoDB adds free tier and migration utility to cloud service

  07-03-2017 18:59
  
  NoSQL database specialist MongoDB unveiled a new free tier for its MongoDB Atlas database-as-a-service (DaaS) offering on Tuesday. The company also released a utility to support live migration of data to MongoDB Atlas, whether that data is on-premise or in the cloud.[ Related: 9 MongoDB success stories ]"Since we first introduced MongoDB to the community in 2009, we have been laser-focused on one thing — building a technology that gets out of the way of developers and makes them more produ
  
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• Microsoft supports creative work with tech-enabled spaces

  07-03-2017 18:57
  
  The space in which you work has a big impact on how you work. While research shows that white collar work is increasingly dependent on creativity and collaboration, traditional office spaces tend to inhibit rather than encourage them, says Sarah Armbruster, vice president of strategy, research and new business innovation for Steelcase, the world's largest manufacturer of office furniture and specialists in commercial architecture and design.
  Armbruster says organizations determined to transform
  
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• Honeypot catches social engineering scams on social media

  07-03-2017 18:55
  
  Say you just got laid off from your job. Bills are piling up and the pressure to get a new job quickly is building. Your desperation has you taking chances you wouldn’t normally take, such as clicking on a link to a job offer — even if something about it doesn't quite look right.
  Research firm ZeroFOX has found that unless a company has a verified recruiting account, it can be difficult for an applicant to decipher a legitimate account from an impersonator. One way to spot an i
  
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• Yahoo's Captain is a family assistant that lives in your messaging app

  07-03-2017 18:38
  
  Yahoo might be on the verge of being sold to Verizon for a king’s ransom, but that doesn’t mean it hasn’t stopped making online tools of questionable usefulness. Its latest effort, Captain, is a chatbot that “streamlines family logistics,” or in simple terms: it keeps you and your family in sync.
  You don’t need to download an app or install anything to use it. To get started, text “Hi” to CAPTAIN (773-786), and you’ll get a response from a c
  
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• IDG Contributor Network: Should Apple turn the iPhone into a Nintendo Switch?

  07-03-2017 18:27
  
  Nintendo’s brand new Switch console lets you easily plug it into a dock to play videogames on your TV. When you want to play on the go, you can quickly remove the Switch from the dock and take it with you wherever you go.Should Apple create a home docking unit with controllers for the iPhone that would turn it into a Nintendo Switch type gaming console? This question came up recently in the Apple subreddit. I’ll share my own thoughts below, but first take a look at some comments from
  
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• Salesforce launches custom image recognition as Einstein goes GA

  07-03-2017 17:20
  
  Salesforce is getting into the computer vision business with a new tool designed to let users easily train a custom image recognition system.Einstein Vision, as it’s known, allows users to upload sets of images and classify them in a series of categories. After that, the system will create a recognizer based on machine learning technology that will identify future images fed into it.While Salesforce customers will have to wait a couple weeks before Vision is generally available, the compan
  
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• 23% off iHome Bluetooth Color Changing Alarm Clock with USB Charging - Deal Alert

  07-03-2017 17:19
  
  Perfect for parties or setting the mood while listening at home, the iBT28 from iHome is a Bluetooth-enabled alarm clock with an adjustable LED cabinet.  Send digital audio wirelessly to iBT28 from your iPad, iPhone, and iPod touch, Android, Blackberry or other Bluetooth-enabled audio device, or play directly via its audio input port. The alarm clock includes two independent alarms allowing you wake to Bluetooth audio, FM radio or buzzer at separate times. The multiple color
  
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• Google Assistant learns how to read texts as its prime-time rollout continues

  07-03-2017 17:08
  
  Google Assistant is having a great month. Just last week Google started rolling out its voice-activated aide to all Android phones running Marshmallow and Nougat, and now it’s showing off a new trick that will make it much more useful: integration with our messages.
  For whatever reason, Google Assistant struggled when it came to reading our messages before. Even though it had a second home in Allo and could send messages on command, Assistant balked when asked basic questions about our in
  
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• WikiLeaks' CIA document dump shows agency can compromise Android, TVs

  07-03-2017 17:01
  WikiLeaks has released more than 8,700 documents it says come from the CIA's Center for Cyber Intelligence, with some of the leaks saying the agency had 24 "weaponized" and previously undisclosed exploits for the Android operating system as of 2016.Some of the Android exploits were developed by the CIA, while others came from the U.S. National Security Agency, U.K. intelligence agency GCHQ, and cyber arms dealers, according to the trove of documents released Tuesday. Some sma
  
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• Cisco reinforces HyperFlex hyperconvergence system with power, management features

  07-03-2017 16:56
  
  It has been almost a year since Cisco jumped into the hyperconverged arena and while the HyperFlex business has done well – landing 1,100 customers -- the company is expecting a burst of upgrades to significantly speed and simplify management of its HyperFlex systems.
  +More on Network World: Cisco, Mitel, NEC and others are targeting Avaya’s customers as the networking company goes through Chapter 11 bankruptcy+To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
  
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• IDG Contributor Network: 12 ways to reduce your IT costs

  07-03-2017 16:51
  
  IT costs are an expensive component of any organization’s budget.  Cutting these costs can be difficult when there are so many other priorities and the fact that many costs seem like they are fixed.  This article will show that many IT costs are not as fixed as they might appear and offers suggestions for reducing the IT budget.When looking at most IT budgets, personnel costs are often the predominant expense.  Fortunately, there are many strategies for reducing labor costs
  
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• Android gets patches for critical OpenSSL, media server and kernel driver flaws

  07-03-2017 16:40
  
  A five-month-old flaw in Android's SSL cryptographic libraries is among the 35 critical vulnerabilities Google fixed in its March security patches for the mobile OS.The first set of patches, known as patch level 2017-03-01, is common to all patched phones and contains fixes for 36 vulnerabilities, 11 of which are rated critical and 15 high. Android vulnerabilities rated critical are those that can be exploited to execute malicious code in the context of a privileged process or the kernel, p
  
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• Google faces another antitrust complaint in Europe

  07-03-2017 16:19
  
  Another day, another antitrust action against Google: On Monday, the Open Internet Project filed a new complaint with the European Union's top competition authority, charging the search giant with abusing its dominant position in the market for smartphone software.It was in 2014 that the OIP filed its first complaint against Google, contributing to a European Commission investigation into the company's search services that began in 2010.Since then, the OIP has gained 20 new members from ICOMP, t
  
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• HPE to pay $1 billion for Nimble Storage after cutting EMC ties

  07-03-2017 16:13
  
  Hewlett Packard Enterprise plans to acquire Nimble Storage, a vendor of all-flash and hybrid flash storage products, for US$1 billion in an effort to pump up its offerings in those areas.Nimble Storage offers converged flash arrays with predictive software for provisioning to speed up storage performance. The offerings will work alongside technology that HPE acquired from 3Par, which also is centered around provisioning.HPE needs to bulk up its storage offerings after cutting ties with EMC, whic
  
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• Is Sprint about to disappear?

  07-03-2017 15:59
  
  Sprint may be weakest of the four major wireless carriers, but losing it to a megamerger is a terrible idea. If, as has been reported, Sprint merges with either T-Mobile or Comcast, the wireless market would shrivel to three nationwide providers, leaving consumers with even less choice than they have now.It’s not like U.S. consumers have a bewildering array of choices when it comes to mobile phone service, but coming at a time when competition in the wireless market is finally heating up,
  
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• Why email is safer in Office 365 than on your Exchange server

  07-03-2017 15:34
  
  Running your own email servers doesn’t do anything to differentiate your business from the competition (except in a bad way, if you get hacked). But avoiding the effort of managing and monitoring your own mail server isn’t the only advantage of a cloud service. The scale of a cloud mail provider like Office 365 means that malware and phishing attacks are easier to spot — and the protections extend beyond your inbox.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please clic
  
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• IDG Contributor Network: Drone certification: how to earn your wings

  07-03-2017 15:00
  
  Stepping out of your comfort zone is where the essence of life occurs. Have you thought about what it would be like to fly drones? Ever considered starting a commercial business running drones? The best things in life start with a dream, a mere belief of what could be. Let’s step into the world of drones and chart your course to drone certification.Why I can offer a useful perspective
  Before you read how to become a drone operator, I wanted to share my aviation journey briefly and explain
  
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• Is Google pushing Apple out of U.S. classrooms?

  07-03-2017 14:45
  
  Google continues to gain share in the education market at Apple’s expense. Chrome OS powers almost six out of 10 computing devices shipped to K-12 schools in the United States last year, according to a new report from research firm Futuresource Consulting.[ Related: How Google overtook Apple in education ]A growing number of inexpensive Chromebooks are making their way into U.S. classrooms while iOS -- and to a lesser extent MacOS -- devices are losing considerable share. Google’s Ch
  
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• IDG Contributor Network: How the smart office revolution will transform the way we work

  07-03-2017 14:40
  
  After years of speculation, 2017 appears to be the year when the Internet of Things becomes an ever-present part of our lives. The rise of smart speakers like the Amazon Echo or Google Home and wearables like the Fitbit means that smart objects are making our lives easier.But while there has been plenty of discussion about the smart home, smart technology also has the potential to radically change the workplace. At a minimum, we should expect small changes in fields such as communication or secu
  
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• Het koekjesmonster

  07-03-2017 14:33
  “Do what you do best and outsource the rest”, zo adviseerde managementgoeroe Peter Drucker ooit. Zijn advies is massaal opgevolgd en zo ontstond een wereldmarkt die volgens de Global-ISG-Index vorig jaar goed was voor een contractwaarde van 129,1 miljard dollar. Outsourcing, offshoring en nearshoring zijn... lees meer
  
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• AMD hopes to break Intel server dominance with new 32-core Naples chip

  07-03-2017 14:00
  
  The outspoken Forrest Norrod has never shied away from challenges. Previously, as a server chief at Dell, he helped the company's data-center hardware business flourish, and he loved experimenting with new types of servers.He has a new challenge as AMD's server chief: to bring back the glory days of chipmaker's server business, which is now in tatters. A mega-chip called Naples, which has 32 cores and is based on the Zen architecture, will be the first test of AMD's return to the server market.T
  
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• Career advice: Work is like 'Game of Thrones,' minus dragons

  07-03-2017 13:39
  
  Ask a Premier 100 IT LeaderGlenn SchneiderTitle: Executive vice president and CIOCompany: Discover Financial ServicesSchneider is this month's Premier 100 IT Leader. If you have a question you’d like to pose to one of Computerworld’s Premier 100 IT Leaders, send it to [email protected] Glenn Schneider, Discover Financial ServicesTo read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
  
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• IDG Contributor Network: Banking-as-a-Service and the survival of banks in the digital age

  07-03-2017 13:00
  
  Most of the innovations in financial services industry, including insurance, are coming through leaders who are very new to the industry or come from outside the financial industry. The growing demands of SaaS (Software-as-a-Service), IaaS (Infrastructure-as-a-Service) and PaaS (Platform-as-a-Service) might give birth to industry-specific services and platforms in a very close future with solutions such as BaaS (Banking-as-a-Service) and BaaP (Banking-as-a-Platform).The correlation between incom
  
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• How to reduce your smartphone use without missing out

  07-03-2017 13:00
  
  Even if you haven’t walked into a pole or driven your car into a pond because you were staring at your smartphone, there’s a chance you’ve wondered if it’s time to cut back.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
  
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• Will you finally read the iTunes Terms and Conditions... as a graphic novel?

  07-03-2017 12:33
  
  After 16 years of existence, surely hundreds of millions of people have encountered the iTunes Terms and Conditions screen… and hurriedly clicked through to accept the giant wall of text without actually reading its content. It’s cool: we all do it. All of that necessary legal jargon is an absolute pain to read, plus it’s doubtful than many of us would actually quit installation and live without the iTunes ecosystem because of what we read.Drawn & QuarterlyInitially self-
  
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• 7 tips to strengthen online security

  07-03-2017 12:25
  
  Seeing the lightImage by PexelsA lightbulb. We can connect a lightbulb in our house to the internet in case we need to turn the lights on or off while we’re away – or if we’re too lazy to walk to the light switch. The more lightbulbs, devices, apps and online services we use and connect with on a daily basis, the more we expose ourselves to security risks. This is the nature of how our digital lives have evolved and it requires more active participation as individuals to protec
  
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• U.S. immigration data is on paper and a mess, says report

  07-03-2017 12:19
  
  The U.S. government spends $8o billion a year on information technology, but despite this money, its immigration data is in awful shape. Some data is on paper, or of poor quality and out of synch with government systems used to track wages and employment.
  Those are some of the takeaways from a new report that conducted what amounts to a headcount of nonimmigrant visa workers in the U.S. In the course of this investigation, theEconomic Policy Institute (EPI) critiqued the information-gathering s
  
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• Universal USB-C charging: How the dream is coming true

  07-03-2017 12:00
  
  USB-C ports were supposed to bring universal charging, but the last time PCWorld dove into it, the results were pretty dismal. Google’s second-generation Chromebook Pixel and Apple’s original 12-inch MacBook had no issues working with each others’ chargers, but HP, Dell, and Razer all gave us fits. We might as well have been back in the dark ages when cell phones used proprietary chargers, before someone decided to adopt mini-USB and we never looked back.
  Just a little ov
  
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• It’s time to tax the robots

  07-03-2017 12:00
  
  Bill Gates has a modest proposal: Tax robots to slow the growth of automation and fund the kinds of important jobs our economy ignores, such as caring for children and the elderly.
  In an interview with the website Quartz, Gates notes that when a human does $50,000 worth of work, that income is taxed and money goes to the government, but when a robot does the work, no tax is paid on it. So he argues that robots need to be taxed to make up for that lost governmental income — and also to slo
  
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• How to manage group chat in the enterprise (hint: lightly)

  07-03-2017 12:00
  
  There is a lot of chatting going on in corporate America these days, but not everyone is speaking the same language.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
  
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• Google Go's popularity doesn't translate to the enterprise

  07-03-2017 12:00
  
  Go developers have found plenty of uses for Google's open source language both at work and at home, results of a recent poll by The Go Project reveals. But the language still has some work to do to gain a stronger foothold in businesses.
  "[Survey respondents] agree that they would recommend Go to others by a ratio of 19:1, that they'd prefer to use Go for their next project (14:1), and that Go is working well for their teams (18:1)," a report accompanying the survey said. But fewer users agree
  
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• Ransomware picks off broader targets with greater severity

  07-03-2017 11:04
  
  If you thought it was bad when the FBI reported last year that ransomware was on the rise, you should read the forecasts for this year. According to SonicWall’s most recent Annual Threat Report, “ransomware attacks grew 167 times since 2015, from 3.8 million in 2015 to 638 million in 2016.”
  This year, TrendMicro sees a 25-percent growth in the number of new ransomware families available for use in breaches. Reports of the encroachment of ransomware on government, law enforceme
  
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