Tech Update SummaryBlue Mountain Data Systems

March 2015

For CTOs, CIOs & CISOs

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For CTOs, CIOs & CISOs

Every business day, we publish a Daily Tech Update for Federal & State CTOs ,CIOs & CISOs on the Blue

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Here’s the summary of the Daily Tech Updates for March 2015. Hope the information and ideas prove

useful.

Best,

Paul Vesely

President and Principal Architect

Blue Mountain Data Systems Inc.

For the CTO, CIO & CISO

TRANSITION: NGA To Reorganize CIO, IT Services Departments. National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency’s IT services and the office of the CIO will be combined under a single IT architecture. The new setup is designed to speed adoption of new technologies within the agency and help it meet the mission of providing critical data to the intelligence community. Read more[FEDERALTIMES.COM]

MANAGEMENT: 4 Resolutions For CIOs In 2015. The role of CIO continues to increase in importance, so the resolutions these tech execs make for 2015 will have wide-ranging and far-reaching effects, changing technology and business strategy for the new year. Read more[FORBES.COM]

For the CTO, CIO & CISO

SECURITY AND PRIVACY: Thwarting a New Breed of Cyberattack. Cybercrime has evolved from simply stealing information for financial gain to ruthlessly infiltrating industries with the goals of destroying intellectual property, damaging reputation and crippling critical operating functions. Read more[FIERCECIO.COM]

DATA PROTECTION: CIOs Face the Growing Risk of Digital Data Loss. While digital technologies have unlocked enormous productivity gains and helped businesses boost the bottom line, there’s also a growing risk of significant data loss. Read more[CIOINSIGHT.COM]

For the CTO, CIO & CISO

SECURITY LEADERSHIP: 3 Things CSOs Can Learn From CPOs. The role of the CSO and CIO has been changing dramatically as technology becomes more and more vital to business strategies. Sometimes, it can be hard to keep up. Amol Joshi, SVP of business development at Redwood City, Calif.-based Ivalua Inc., suggests that CSOs and CIOs can pick up a few tricks from Chief Procurement Officers. Read more[CSOONLINE.COM]

STRATEGIC CIO: Dear Marketing: You’re Doomed (If You Don’t Change). The grim stereotype of IT pros is that we’re sworn enemies of vendor marketing, but in fact many IT folks receive pitches with a fairly open mind. If you stick your head in the sand about new tech, you’ll learn nothing and have nothing to leverage as a competitive advantage in your business. Read more[INFORMATIONWEEK.COM]

For the CTO, CIO & CISO

CAREERS: Video Series Lets Public ‘Test Drive’ Key IT Jobs. Nothing beats the ability to take a trial run at something before making a major investment in it, so why not offer test drives for IT jobs? Read more[FIERCECIO.COM]

CLOUD MIGRATION: The Silver Lining for CIOs in HR’s Cloud Challenges. HR executives are flocking to the cloud as a means to better engage talent and empower employees. In many organizations, HR executives are flying solo on their cloud transitions without the support of IT—as cloud vendors sidestep the IT departments and sell directly to Chief Human Resource Officers (CHROs). Read more[CIODASHBOARD.COM]

TECH AND FINANCE: Addressing Analytics: Extracting Value from the New Data Currency. As many financial service organizations are discovering, there’s a new currency in town and it’s unlike anything we’ve ever dealt with before. Read more

[INTEL.COM]

For the CTO, CIO & CISO

CIOs: A Glimpse Into The Future: Software Goes Invisible. Software is getting smarter, thanks to predictive analytics, machine learning, and artificial intelligence (AI). Whereas the current generation of software is about enabling smarter decision-making for humans, we’re starting to see “invisible software” capable of performing tasks without human intervention. Read more[BLOGS.FORRESTER.COM]

BUSINESS CONTINUITY: How To Create An Effective Data Security Communication Plan. In today’s global office, IT security leadership spends a great deal of time and resources creating a defense-in-depth approach to data security. This often includes layering on both logical and physical solutions as well as detailing out policies and procedures for accessing company data in a secure manner. Read more[CSOONLINE.COM]

For the CTO, CIO & CISO

PLANNING: CIOs Name Their Top 5 Strategic Priorities. After breaking up into a number of task forces and discussing strategic priorities, CIOs at the Journal’s CIO Network event came together to create a prioritized set of recommendations to drive business and policy in the coming year. Read more[BLOGS.WSJ.COM]

CONFERENCE: March 31 – April 1, 2015, Amelia Island, Florida. AGENDA is the all-new business leadership conference focused on transforming business for the digital world. Business today not only demands a mobile, social and omni-channel experience for customers and employees alike. It requires that organizations harness these outlets for business growth in new and innovative ways at an ever faster pace as business cycles collapse and competitors sprout up ever faster. Read more[AGENDACONFERENCE.COM]

For the CTO, CIO & CISO

GADGETS: 5 Top Enterprise-Grade Business Gadgets. If you’re a business professionals who travels frequently, runs presentations at work, needs to connect with colleagues, or who has to focus on getting work done before closing time, here are five gadgets you should check out. Read more[CIO.COM]

MALWARE: RansomWeb: Emerging Website Threat That May Outshine DDoS, Data Theft and Defacements? More and more people become victims of ransomware, a malware that encrypts your data and demands money to decrypt them. A new trend on the market shows that cybercriminals will now target your website as well to get a ransom payment from you. Read more[HTBRIDGE.COM]

SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT: Microsoft Pushes More Open Source With .NET Engine CoreCLR. Microsoft is no stranger to open source, but recently it’s been more vocal about its internal efforts to increasingly embrace the model through its core developer tools, such as open sourcing .NET and porting the .NET runtime to Linux and Mac OS. Read more[ZDNET.COM]

For the CTO, CIO & CISO

STAFFING: The Silver Lining for CIOs in HR’s Cloud Challenges. HR executives are flocking to the cloud as a means to better engage talent and empower employees. In many organizations, HR executives are flying solo on their cloud transitions without the support of IT, as cloud vendors sidestep the IT departments and sell directly to Chief Human Resource Officers (CHROs). Read more[CIODASHBOARD.COM]

FEDERAL PROGRAMS: How To Innovate In A Short Timeframe And On A Shoestring Budget. More stringent fraud detection at the Social Security Administration thanks to a Web service that can efficiently sift through terabytes of data. Find out more[NEXTGOV.COM]

IT ASSISTANCE: Help Desks: A Problem of Astronomical Proportions. Some time ago the Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, found themselves with a problem. Not a problem in space, but a problem on the ground: they had too many help desks. Find out more[GOVERNMENTCIOMAGAZINE.COM]

For the CTO, CIO & CISO

DATA PROTECTION: Whodunit? In Cybercrime, Attribution Is Not Easy. Attribution IS one of the major challenges of law enforcement. But while identifying perpetrators is difficult enough in the physical world, it is even tougher in the cyber world, where the ways for perpetrators to cover their tracks or make it look like a breach was committed by someone else are both sophisticated and practically limitless. Read more[CSOONLINE.COM]

IOE SOLUTIONS: Beer Gets Better Through the IoT. Del Papa Distributing, a family-owned beer distribution company that delivers more than 10 million cases of beer annually from 30 suppliers, is embracing the so-called Internet of Everything (IoE) to simplify operations and create a more streamlined system for deliveries at their new 27-acre headquarters in Texas.Read more[MOBILEENTERPRISE.COM]

For the CTO, CIO & CISO

PRESERVING PRIVACY: Five Technologies That Betrayed Silk Road’s Anonymity. Ross Ulbricht was convicted in a Manhattan federal court recently for his role operating the Silk Road online marketplace. He could serve 30 years or more behind bars. Read more[ITWORLD.COM]

UK CHALLENGE: PGI Hosts Latest Cyber Security Challenge Competition. International security firm PGI has challenged amateur cyber defenders in a digital forensics investigation to track down fictitious cyber activist group Flag Day Associates. Read more[COMPUTERWEEKLY.COM]

For the CTO, CIO & CISO

ENTERPRISE SECURITY: How Emerging Threat Intelligence Tools Affect Network Security. Up and coming threat intelligence tools aim to improve data security and even standardize threat intelligence across the industry. Expert Kevin Beaver explains how. Find out more[SEARCHSECURITY.TECHTARGET.COM]

EVASION DETECTION: How Malware Bypasses Our Most Advanced Security Measures. Virtually every week a new report surfaces about a large, blue chip company with deep financial resources that has been breached. These companies typically invest in and deploy state-of-the-art security tools, yet attackers are still able to penetrate their lines of defense.Find out more[DARKREADING.COM]

For the CTO, CIO & CISO

MULTI-CLOUD: CloudLock Takes People-Centric Approach To Security. Shadow IT, the use of IT solutions and systems by workers without an employer’s approval, is a big problem for many businesses; however, Gil Zimmerman, CEO of CloudLock, said he believes taking a “people-centric” approach to shadow IT could help companies mitigate this issue. Read more[TALKINGCLOUD.COM]

OPERATING SYSTEMS: Office for Windows 10 is Not Free for Everyone. Microsoft will license some of the touch-based Office for Windows 10 apps in the same way it now handles those for iOS and Android. That means the same policy holds for business as before: Office still costs money. Read more[CIO.COM]

MULTIFACTOR AUTHENTICATION: Twitter CFO’s Account Compromised. Looks like somebody forgot to turn on their two-factor authentication. Twitter’s chief financial officer, Anthony Noto, had his Twitter account compromised. Read more

[USATODAY.COM]

For the CTO, CIO & CISO

DIGITAL SERVICES: Federal IT Playbook Looks to Avoid Healthcare.gov Redux. In the push to improve the delivery of government services while keeping costs in check, federal CIOs need to reevaluate the way the traditional ways they plan and implement new IT projects, senior administration and industry officials say. Read more[CIO.COM]

CISCO: Cloud, Software-Defined Networking Strategies. Cloud computing and software Relevant Products/Services-defined networking have been two major areas of focus for Cisco as the company works to grow beyond its traditional realm of routers and switches. And those new targets appear to be paying off, according to Cisco’s latest quarterly earnings report. Read more[CIO-TODAY.COM]

For the CTO, CIO & CISO

ESTIMATION: When to Say “No” to #NoEstimates – A Case Study. Recent traction around the #NoEstimates debate suggests the development community is looking to break free from traditional agile techniques like relative and t-shirt sizing. This lust for more freedom is not unwarranted. Many developers do their best work when constraints like timelines and documentation are removed. So, should you explore the benefits of #NoEstimates? In the complex world of enterprise software development, we say no. Read more[CIODASHBOARD.COM]

EDUCATION: Is Student Data at Risk Due to Out-of-Date Privacy Laws. Members of Congress warn that an aging privacy statute hasn’t kept pace with technology in the classroom and urge that restrictions be placed on third-party use of student data. Read more[CIO.COM]

For the CTO, CIO & CISO

MOBILE SECURITY: Information Disclosure Flaw Exposes Netgear Wireless Routers To Attacks. Several wireless routers made by Netgear contain a vulnerability that allows unauthenticated attackers to extract sensitive information from the devices, including their administrator passwords and wireless network keys. Read more[CSOONLINE.COM]

LEADERSHIP: Is Project Manager An Actual Title? Apparently, “Project Manager” means different things to different people. I came across a post in my LinkedIn feed from a PM from Bahrain, Eman Deabil, who sparked a healthy debate about whether “Project Manager” is a real title and “Project Management” is a real profession.Read more[BUSINESS2COMMUNITY.COM]

For the CTO, CIO & CISO

MANAGEMENT: Former (ISC)2 Exec Shares Thoughts on FISMA, IT Architecture. Hord Tipton says recently passed cybersecurity legislation will take a lot of criticism away from the Federal Information Security Management Act. Read more[FEDTECHMAGAZINE.COM]

CIOs: The Top 10 Strategic CIO Issues For 2015. Throughout 2014, the CIO profession was subjected to a baffling series of apocalyptic forecasts and dire predictions that have proven to be laughably wrong. Where did all these distortions and misperceptions about the stewards of IT strategy and execution come from? Read more[FORBES.COM]

For the CTO, CIO & CISO

CLOUD COMPUTING: How a Hybrid IT Cloud Service Helped Findly Reach New Heights. Since 2002, when Amazon Web Services (AWS) initiated its suite of cloud-based solutions, the real-time cloud environment including managed services has become a worldwide phenomenon. It’s so widely implemented, in fact, that The Channel Company publishes an exclusive list of the top 500 managed service providers every year. Read more[CIO.COM]

SECURITY AWARENESS: Millennials Becoming Known As Generation Leaky. Millennials, by some accounts, have plenty of tech savvy but not much when it comes to security. What should your organization do about that? Read more[CSOONLINE.COM]

For the CTO, CIO & CISO

HADOOP: IBM Unveils Hadoop Analytics Tools. While more companies are using the open source tool for collecting and storing a very large sets of variable data, IBM argues companies are struggling “to realize its full potential in every part of their business”. Read more[ZDNET.COM]

BIG DATA: Oracle Steps Up Its Big-Data Push With New Products. One of the core challenges in any big-data effort is combining data from multiple sources and turning it into something useful. Your company’s transactional systems might be able to show you what customers are buying, for instance, but the keys to other aspects of their behavior—their browsing patterns and their loyalty information, say—could lie in other systems altogether. Read more[CIO.COM]

For the CTO, CIO & CISO

MOBILE: CIO Council To Approve One Standard For Mobile App Vetting. The federal Chief Information Officer’s Council’s Mobile Technology Tiger Team is recommending the use of the Defense Department’s standard for vetting the security of mobile applications. Read more[FEDERALNEWSRADIO.COM]

ALIGNING BIG DATA: Is Microsoft Still The CIO’s Best Friend? When Microsoft makes a move, people sit up and take notice. The tech giant recently provided detailed information on a series of upcoming releases and updates, such as operating system Windows 10, personal assistant Cortana, and head-mounted computer HoloLens. Read more[ZDNET.COM]

For the CTO, CIO & CISO

MALWARE: New Tools Can Detect Hidden Malware. We tested new security appliances from Damballa, Lancope and LightCyber that are designed to detect the latest cyber-attacks by monitoring network traffic and identifying when a piece of malware is communicating back to its command and control center. Read more[CIO.COM]

CIO INNOVATION: The CIO Dilemma: What New Surveys Say About IT’s Declining Strategic Role. With the rise in the importance of information technology (IT) for all organizations, you would think that the stature of the function and that of its head—the Chief Information Officer (CIO)—will also rise. Instead, two new surveys report that IT and CIOs are trending downward. Read more[FORBES.COM]

For the CTO, CIO & CISO

OPERATION SYSTEM SECURITY: Microsoft: Biometrics Are The Future Of Windows 10 Security. With the use of passwords coming under increased scrutiny, Microsoft is taking steps to move beyond them in Windows 10. Its biggest move: Joining the FIDO (Fast Identity Online) Alliance and adding support for the biometrics technology in the upcoming upgrade of the OS, which has been slated to ship this year. Read more[CSOONLINE.COM]

VIVALDI: Can A Brand-New Web Browser Survive In 2015? In the hierarchy of hot new tech startups, there’s not much love for the lowly web browser. A browser won’t get anyone rich overnight, like a hit mobile app can. Read more[FASTCOMPANY.COM]

For the CTO, CIO & CISO

NETWORKING: How HTTP/2 Will Speed Up Your Web Browsing. When the last version of the Hypertext Transfer Protocol 1.1 (HTTP/1.1) was approved in 1999, fast computers were running 500MHz Pentium III chips, Bill Clinton was president of the United States, and software engineers were working hard at fixing the Y2K bug. As for the internet, the US Federal Communications Commission defined broadband as 200 kilobits per second (Kbps), and most users connected to it with 56Kbps modems. Things have changed, and HTTP, the web’s fundamental protocol, is finally changing with the times, too. Read more[ZDNET.COM]

For the CTO, CIO & CISO

DOWNLOAD: Microsoft Office 365 Cheat Sheet. This Microsoft Office 365 Cheat Sheet covers basic setup and navigating the web-based service, collaborating on projects, creating and editing documents and using OneDrive. Read more[ITBUSINESSEDGE.COM]

MANAGEMENT: Retail CIOs Press the Security Button. Managing data security is the most urgent focus area for retail CIOs, according to a new study from the National Retail Federation (NRF) and Forrester Research Inc. The report, “Retail CIO Agenda 2015: Secure And Innovate,” shows that 97% of the 84 retail CIOs surveyed place that at the top of their 2015 priority lists. Read more[INFORMATION-MANAGEMENT.COM]

Big Data

WORKFORCE: Growth In Big Data Draws Women To Statistics. From 2010 to 2013, the number of people working in statistics grew from 28,000 to 72,000, and about 38 percent of them are women, according to Current Population Survey data. In comparison, women account for about 26 percent of the computer and mathematical occupations category. Read more[FCW.COM]

ASK THE CIO: Commerce To Pilot Big Data Technology. The Commerce Department is assessing new and emerging storage technologies, and analytical tools, to improve how it makes terabytes of data accessible to the public. Read more[FEDERALNEWSRADIO.COM]

SEIZING OPPORTUNITIES: DHS Looks For Big Data Cyber Insights. A Homeland Security Department plan to improve cybersecurity for federal agencies features a significant role for big data, according to a White House report. Read more

[FEDERALTIMES.COM]

Big Data

BEST PRACTICES: 4 Ways Government Agencies Can Overcome Big Data Privacy Concerns. Driven by potentially compelling outcomes, big government data is growing. A 2013 study of federal IT officials by the TechAmerica Foundation, for example, found that big data delivers many benefits, including: Budget cuts and tax savings: Real-time analytics can help the government cut at least 10% annually from the federal budget, or about $1,200 per American, for example by detecting improper healthcare payments before they occur.Read more[BUSINESS2COMMUNITY.COM]

DATABASE MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS: How Do Big Data Analytics Enhance Network Security? Big Data and Big Data analytics have become hot topics in recent years. Unlike traditional methods of cause and effect deduction, Big Data analytics generate predictions based on such enormous volumes of data, that only the tools of association and inference are useful for finding relevance or meaning. Read more[FORBES.COM]

Big Data

ADVICE: The Big Deal About “Big Data”—Your Guide To What The Heck It Actually Means. There are three buzzwords that, if we had our way, would be stricken completely from the world: “cloud,” “the Internet of Things,” and “big data.” Each of them was coined in an attempt to elegantly capture a complex concept, and each of them fails miserably. Find out more[ARSTECHNICA.COM]

Multifactor Authentication

FORECAST: Multi-Factor Authentication Market Will Be Worth US$1.6 Billion By The End Of 2015. Username and passwords have been widely used to authenticate user identity but fail to provide adequate authentication. Authentication-based attacks continue to plague organizations of all sizes with the majority of breaches being attributed to weak or absent authentication. Read more[NET-SECURITY.ORG]

SECURITY: The Top Multifactor Authentication Products. Multifactor authentication can be a critical component of an enterprise security strategy. Here’s a look at the top MFA products in the industry. Find out more[TECHTARGET.COM]

Multifactor Authentication

ONLINE SERVICES: Here’s Why Your Bank Account Is Less Secure Than Your Gmail. Despite being accepted as a simple but effective method of protecting online accounts, several major banks don’t use two-factor authentication to prevent unauthorized logins to your account. Why not? Find out more[GIZMODO.COM]

**

Application Development

APPLE: 3 iOS App Development Trends for 2015. What’s does 2015 hold for the iOS apps market? This is probably one of the most trending topics among enterprises and the overall iOS app development world. There are more than 1.4 million apps on the App Store right now; competition in the apps market is therefore at an all-time high. While the most popular apps (the top 1 percent) enjoy a majority share of the market, a typical mobile app usually gets less than 1,000 downloads. Read more[TECH.CO]

BUSINESS APPS: 2015 Predictions: Enterprises Set To Take App Development In-house. Mobile applications continue to explode, and there is a new trend among enterprise application developers. With the pervasiveness of smartphones and tablets, the delivery vehicle is in place for businesses to expand with new mobile services to reach their customers. Businesses no longer need to engage with costly and lengthy application developer programs since they’re able to build new business and customer applications with a few clicks. Read more[RCRWIRELESS.COM]

Application Development

RAD TOOLS: Rapid Application Development: Moving the Problem to the Right. We hear it all the time: As the development queue grows, so does the pressure on IT to deliver. Managers and executives want mobile applications yesterday, and IT is struggling to simply keep its head above water. As a result, many IT organizations are on a mission to reduce development time. Read more[APPDEVELOPERMAGAZINE.COM]

MICROSOFT: Internal Memo Reveals Plans To Spur Windows App Development. IT pros who use Windows, Azure and Microsoft’s mobile platforms may begin to see far more applications this year. Microsoft is readying a concerted push to capture a wider set of developers over the next year who have yet to deliver applications for the company’s Windows, cloud and mobile platforms, according to a source with knowledge of the plans. Read more[TECHTARGET.COM]

Application Development

TECH: Why Failure is Critical to Mobile Application Development. In the Academy award-winning Best Picture Amadeus (1984), Austrian Emperor Franz Joseph II, portrayed throughout as having a tin ear, addresses conductor Mozart after an evening at the opera. Read more[FORBES.COM]

IT EDUCATION: The Language Of Mobile App Development: Native Or HTML5? It’s a debate that’s been running for several years now: what’s the best platform for mobile app development, native or HTML5? And for now, native seems to be still in the lead. Read more[WHATECH.COM]

APPS & SOFTWARE: Microsoft Has Suddenly Become A Red-Hot Mobile App Developer. Microsoft was slow to get into the mobile world in terms of its own mobile platform but the company is making up for it by diving head-first into the realm of mobile apps. Read more

[BGR.COM]

Application Development

CLOUD TESTING: New Tools Cut App Development Time, Costs. There’s a confluence between cloud and mobile testing and support for it in the cloud because of the ability to create production environments without the need and configuration costs of on-premises infrastructure. Read more[SEARCHCLOUDCOMPUTING.TECHTARGET.COM]

CONNECTED CARE: Epic To Open Its EHR System To Customers For App Development. Epic Systems is in the midst of launching an app store that will allow third-party companies to develop products in tandem with its EHR system, which is the most commonly used across hospitals and physician practices. Read more[MEDCITYNEWS.COM]

ENTERPRISE APPS: Six Things You Need to Know Before Building a Mobile App. Take a look at a few things you need to know before switching the green light on towards your mobile app development efforts. Read more[HUFFINGTONPOST.COM]

Patches & Vulnerabilities

PATCHAPALOOZA: In 2015, Software Patches, Software Security Flaws Surge. An of onslaught Adobe, Oracle, OpenSSL, Chrome and Firefox patches highlights the sad state of software security in 2015. Plus, security budgets increasing; HealthCare.gov security woes; false-positive alerts cost millions annually. Read more[SEARCHSECURITY.TECHTARGET.COM]

CONNECTED DRIVE: BMW Fixes Security Flaw That Left Locks Open To Hackers. BMW has patched a security flaw that left 2.2 million cars, including Rolls Royce and Mini models, open to hackers. The flaw affected models fitted with BMW’s ConnectedDrive software, which uses an on-board Sim card. Read more[BBC.COM]

Patches & Vulnerabilities

MICROSOFT: Internet Explorer Bug Puts Patched Software At Risk Of Being Exploited. Over on the ARS Technica Security and Hacktivism blog Dan Goodin is reporting that a XSS vulnerability exists that could grab login credentials and inject malicious content during an IE browsing session. Read more[WINSUPERSITE.COM]

Programming & Scripting Development Client & Server-Side

DEVELOPER NEWS: PHP Changes IBM i Shops, And They Change The PHP Community. What has PHP done to buck the trend in IBM midrange shops to resist change? Fear of disrupting traditional business policies and procedures is not unusual and it’s not unique to the IBM i community. Change is scary, but it can also be exciting. PHP has brought about a pretty fair share of change. And in the process, PHP has changed. The IBM i PHP community has changed, too. Read more[ITJUNGLE.COM]

AMAZON WEB SERVICES: Five Reasons To Use Go For AWS Cloud Programming. Go is a low-level language designed to be fast and easy to program, especially for concurrent programs. It was originally designed by Google but is becoming more popular as a cloud programming language. Here are five reasons why you should consider using Go for your next AWS project. Read more[SEARCHAWS.TECHTARGET.COM]

Programming & Scripting Development Client & Server-Side

WEBSITE DEVELOPMENT: What’s the Best Programming Language to Learn in 2015? Few developers have the luxury (or tedium?) of working with a single technology. Read more[SITEPOINT.COM]

Cloud

CLOUD: Amazon Web Services Is Building An SDK For The Go Programming Language. Amazon Web Services has built a lot of credibility among developers over the years by providing more and more tools to speed up application development on its public cloud. Today Amazon announced its latest initiative in that vein — a plan to release a software development kit (SDK) for a growing programming language called Go. Read more[VENTUREBEAT.COM]

PARTNERSHIP: Google, VMware Partner for Hybrid Cloud Computing. According to a statement issued by the two companies, VMware is making four Google cloud services available to enterprise customers through its vCloud Air hybrid cloud. The services include Big Query analytics, Google Cloud Storage, as well as Google Datastore and DNS services. Read more[CMSWIRE.COM]

Cloud

DISASTER RECOVERY: A Matter Of Trust: The Importance Of Backups In Cloud Computing. Strong security is a foundational element of every public, private and hybrid cloud implementation and will be a top concern for all businesses as part of a macro trend taking grip in 2015. Research shows that 90 percent of the world’s data has been generated in the past two years – calling into question not only data storage, but also data safety. Read more[CLOUDCOMPUTING-NEWS.NET]

GOVERNMENT IT: CIO Outlines Cloud Environment Goals at Department of Defense. The top technology officer at the Department of Defense (DoD) wants to work more closely with cloud service providers, saying yesterday that he expects to enhance collaboration with the private sector as the Pentagon, like the rest of the federal government, looks to trim IT costs and improve efficiencies. Read more[CIO.COM]

Cloud

SOFTWARE CONTAINERS: IBM Tries to Paint the Computing Cloud Blue. The company recently announced at a conference in Las Vegas a series of technologies and investments designed to win business customers over to IBM’s version of modern computing. As the chief executive Virginia Rometty sees it, the future is about using computers both inside corporations and in remote cloud computing systems. Read more[BITS.BLOGS.NYTIMES.COM]

CLASS DEVIATION: DoD Accelerates Security Rules For Cloud Computing. The Pentagon is already working on changes to federal acquisition rules that would require stepped-up notification procedures when private companies hosting DoD data have their systems penetrated by hackers. Read more[FEDERALNEWSRADIO.COM]

Open Source

OPEN SOURCE: Hadoop Analytics Finds Favor With More CIOs, Deutsche Bank Says. Unlike relational databases, which store pre-defined information in rows and columns on single servers, Hadoop allocates uncategorized data across thousands of cheap computers, making it a more cost-effective way to catalog multiplying data streams. Read more[WSJ.COM]

Federal Agencies

ALERT: FCC Issues Tough Warning Against WiFi Blocking. The Federal Communications Commission has issued a warning that intentional blockage of personal WiFi hotspots was illegal and would be subject to enforcement. The FCC has noticed a “disturbing trend” among hotels and other commercial establishments of blocking consumers’ personal WiFi hotspots on their premises, its advisory notes. Read more[ECOMMERCETIMES.COM]

INTERNET: BroadbandUSA Makes Its Debut. During a kickoff call, BroadbandUSArepresentatives elaborated on the initiative’s main objectives as well as the resources that will be offered to state and local governments seeking to spur economic development and empower their residents, school districts and small businesses through the adoption of broadband services. Read more[STATETECHMAGAZINE.COM]

Federal Agencies

AGENCIES: VA Dept Plans to Restructure Organizational Map. The Department of Veterans Affairs plans to restructure the agency’s organization into a five-region national framework, GovExec reported Monday. Kellie Lunney writes the VA wants to form an integrated department comprising agencies and offices from different geographical and organizational areas.Read more[EXECUTIVEGOV.COM]

CONGRESS: Surveillance Disclosures Haunt Search For Common Ground On Cybersecurity. The revelations of bulk collection of telephonic and online data by U.S. spy agencies in the Edward Snowden leaks derailed the legislative debate on cybersecurity in 2013. Now the Obama administration and Congress are looking to get a cyber bill back on track. Read more[FCW.COM]

Federal Agencies

OREGON: Network Upgrades Help Oregon Agencies Maintain Productivity. Oregon’s IT staff recently conducted a study that found that 70 percent of the edge devices on the state network were more than 5 years old, says Marshall Wells, sustainability program manager for the state’s Enterprise Technology Services division. Few could deny that Oregon needed to overhaul its equipment, so the state legislature authorized the IT staff to replace nearly 3,000 edge devices at 650 locations statewide. Read more[STATETECHMAGAZINE.COM]

HHS: A Roadmap for National Health Data Exchange. Federal regulators have unveiled a draft roadmap for achieving nationwide secure health data exchange built on interoperable electronic health records systems within the next three years. Read more[GOVINFOSECURITY.COM]

Federal Agencies

DEFENSE: US Military Could Bolster Readiness with Increased Virtual Training. Government Business Council conducted research that indicates the U.S. military could boost its readiness and reduce costs by more than $1.7 billion over five years with virtual training. The report shows that 23 percent of respondents believe they have enough virtual training levels to fulfill readiness requirements.Read more[EXECUTIVEGOV.COM]

CLOUD: DOD Looks to Industry for Cloud Enterprise Email. The Department of Defense is eyeing a commercial solution for the next version of its unclassified enterprise email. That service is currently provided by the Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA), but the promise of significant cost savings is driving DOD to adopt a commercial cloud offering, acting DOD CIO Terry Halvorsen said at the department’s cloud industry event in Washington, D.C. Read more

[FEDTECHMAGAZINE.COM]

Federal Agencies

DEFENSE: Army CIO Unveils New IT Strategy. Army CIO Lt. Gen. Robert Ferrell has released a set of ambitious IT modernization plans that seek to accelerate progress in key areas such as cybersecurity and cloud computing for the service’s more than 1.4 million network users. Read more[FCW.COM]

INFORMATION GOVERNANCE: Nonprofits Offer Help with Agency Records Management. Addressing the confusion over which agency communications must be preserved as federal records, a group of private nonprofits on Monday announced a new coalition to support the federal government’s efforts to modernize its records management infrastructure and implement information governance practices that have proved effective. Read more[GOVEXEC.COM]

Federal Agencies

WEB CONTENT: Why Your Agency Should Be Blogging. Blogging is important for government agencies. The most important reason is that good blogs can humanize the often-impersonal, bureaucratic face of government. Agencies should embrace blogging for this reason alone, and make sure they take advantage of this humanizing ability by personalizing blog posts as much as possible. It’s important to avoid using government-style language usually found elsewhere on agency websites. Read more[FCW.COM]

ST. LOUIS: Missouri Taps S And P Settlement For Tech Partnership. Missouri’s Gov. Jay Nixon has designated $3.5 million in funding for a public-private state technology entrepreneurship partnership using funds flowing to Missouri from a national settlement with Standard & Poor’s. Read more[STATESCOOP.COM]

Federal Agencies

MALWARE: Why Fraud Is Shifting to Mobile Devices. As a result of the explosive growth in worldwide use of smart phones, mobile malware will play a much bigger role in fraud this year, predicts Daniel Cohen, who heads up the anti-fraud services group at security firm RSA, which just released its 2014 Cybercrime Roundup report. Read more[GOVINFOSECURITY.COM]

DOWNSIZING: Budget Cuts Force DHS To Scale Back HQ Consolidation. The Department of Homeland Security has a new plan to consolidate its headquarters – cutting hundreds of millions of dollars in costs while fitting thousands more employees into less space. Read more[FEDERALTIMES.COM]

Federal Agencies

FEDERAL BUDGET: The President’s 2016 Budget Request: Federal Information Technology. President Barack Obama rolled out his fiscal 2016 budget request to Congress on Feb. 2, which includes $14 billion to support cybersecurity programs governmentwide. The administration says the funding will be used to strengthen U.S. cybersecurity defenses and help protect Americans and industry from cyber threats. Read more[FIERCEGOVERMENTIT.COM]

OPEN DATA: Ebola Response By NGA Marks First Step In “Unprecedented” Move Toward Data Transparency. When the U.S. government decided to put boots on the ground in West Africa last fall to help staunch an emerging Ebola epidemic, agencies needed a lot of highly- trained medical and logistics personnel. But they also needed reliable maps — something Liberia didn’t have at the time. Read more

[FEDERALNEWSRADIO.COM]

Federal Agencies

REGULATIONS: Former Microsoft CEO Bill Gates met with China’s technology minister this week, as tensions heat up between the U.S. tech industry and Chinese officials over upcoming cybersecurity regulations. Read more[THEHILL.COM]

INFRASTRUCTURE: White House Says Progress Being Made To Enhance Privacy In Era Of Big Data. The White House released a generally upbeat interim report detailing progress in implementing privacy protections around the ever-increasing collection, use and storage of big data. Read more[FIERCEGOVERNMENTIT.COM]

Federal Agencies

ACQUISITION POLICIES: GSA Seeks to Include Agile Development Services on IT Schedule 70. The General Services Administration hosted an industry day Tuesday to brief contractors about the agency’s new blanket purchase agreement for agile information technology services, Nextgov reported Wednesday. Read more[EXECUTIVEGOV.COM]

HUMAN RESOURCES: How Project Management Can Create A More Efficient Government. Project management refers to the process of planning, motivating, organizing and directing resources, protocols, and procedures to attain particular goals that will help in solving both scientific problems as well as problems in your day-to-day. Read more[GOVLOOP.COM]

Federal Agencies

IRS.GOV: IRS Welcomes Jump in Taxpayers Using Its Website. The Internal Revenue Service announced that visitors to the website IRS.gov have risen by 20 percent over last year’s rate, and that the percentage of taxpayers filing electronic returns climbed to 96 percent.Read more[GOVEXEC.COM]

NET NEUTRALITY: UK Parliament Says Treat Web Like Public Utility. A report in the United Kingdom’s parliament is calling for the government to regulate broadband Internet service like a public utility. Read more[THEHILL.COM]

Federal Agencies

NASA: 6 Simple Fixes For The Federal Procurement Process. As the largest buyer of goods and services in the world, our government has a rigorous procurement process in place to protect the American taxpayer, designed to facilitate helping Uncle Sam buy what he needs to perform his myriad missions efficiently, effectively, and economically. Read more[FEDERALTIMES.COM]

WORKFORCE: Hiring spree: Agencies adding 72,000 employees in 2015. Agencies bouncing back from sequestration cuts and years of hiring freezes are hiring more than 72,000 federal employees in 2015, according to figures from the Office of Management and Budget. Read more[FEDERALTIMES.COM]

Federal Agencies

REMOTE WORKERS: When Telework Really Works. In the nine-month experiment, which involved employees of the company’s call center, staff was divided into two groups — one that continued doing their regular job at the office, and another that did their regular work from home. Read more[FCW.COM]

IT - State & Local Governments

PENNSYLVANIA: Philadelphia Wants 50 Percent of IT Assets in the Cloud by 2016. Adel Ebeid, Philadelphia’s chief innovation officer, wants to manage IT, not build it. Under his leadership, the city has moved 30 percent of its IT footprint into the cloud over the past three years. By the end of 2016, that number is expected to reach 50 percent. Read more[STATETECHMAGAZINE.COM]

MONTANA: Legislators Seek To Curb Federal Snooping. Bills at the state level in Montana are looking to place restrictions on the federal government’s snooping authority, making it harder for “big brother” to watch citizen activity inside the state. Read more[STATESCOOP.COM]

IT - State & Local Governments

NORTH CAROLINA: NCTA Ranks N.C. No. 1 For Women In Tech. The ratio for women in technology represents the best ratio in the country, according to the association, which released the findings at its annual meeting in Charlotte. According to NCTA, women make up more than 36 percent of the state’s information technology workforce. Read more[STATESCOOP.COM]

ALABAMA: 5 Reasons People Are Flocking To Federal Government Small Business Conferences. More than 600 business people signed up for NASA’s Small Business Alliance meeting in Huntsville recently, and another 300 wanted to come but couldn’t fit in the theater at the U.S. Space & Rocket Center. Yes, it was free, but what did all these people want from NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center? Read more[AL.COM]

IT - State & Local Governments

PUBLIC SAFETY: Baltimore Weighs the Hidden Cost of Police Body Cameras. he total cost of body cameras in the first year alone would range from $5.5 million to $7.9 million.. Much of the debate about whether police officers should be required to wear body cameras has focused on the need to increase accountability and transparency. Read more[STATETECHMAGAZINE.COM]

Business Intelligence

CONFERENCES: Gartner Announces Business Intelligence & Analytics Summit 2015. Gartner BI & Analytics Summit 2015 gives you the vital information to remaster your skills and deliver the analytics advantage your organization needs in the digital age in order to succeed. This summit will provide insight around new and emerging technologies to be able to find the BI and analytics solutions in order to cross the analytical divide. Read more[BUSINESSWIRE.COM]

COLLABORATION: SAP Asks Microsoft, Apple to Share Hacker-Fighting Intelligence. The biggest maker of business applications has contacted companies including Microsoft Corp. and Apple Inc. about sharing information on analyses of the weaknesses in open-source code, which is generally free to run and available for the user community to improve, according to Gordon Muehl, chief technology officer for security at Walldorf, Germany-based SAP.

Read more[BUSINESSWEEK.COM]

Technology Careers

TODAY’S WORKFORCE: New Consortium To Focus On Technical Careers For Students. An education partnership has been launched to help high school students in West Fargo, Fargo and Northern Cass school districts prepare for college and 21st century technical careers. Read more[INFORUM.COM]

EMPLOYMENT: These Are The Top 10 In-Demand Jobs Of 2015. The healthcare and technology industries tied for the most openings. And as the economy recovers and with U.S. employment at a nearly six-year high, the report paints a clear picture of what industries need workers most. Read more[FORTUNE.COM]

Technology Careers

EQUALITY: Time For IT Jobs To Be Set Aside For Women. ith women accounting for only a fraction of people studying computer science, there have been calls for gender-related quotas for IT roles. With new figures showing little change in the number of women studying computer science, one industry expert is saying it’s time for radical new measures to address the problem. Read more[TECHREPUBLIC.COM]

IT Security | Cybersecurity

ATTACKS/BREACHES: ZeroAccess Click-Fraud Botnet Back In Action Again. After six months of silence, the ZeroAccess botnet — aka Sirefet — is back in action. Fortunately, it’s operating at a smaller scale than it was a couple years ago. Read more[DARKREADING.COM]

COMPUTER SECURITY: NIST Security Guide Walks Organizations Through the Mobile App Security Vetting Process. A new publication from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) provides guidance for organizations to improve security as employees move to mobile devices such as phones and tablets for their work and their applications (“mobile apps”). Smart phone and tablet users have access to a great number of installable programs (“mobile apps”) that are designed to make their lives easier, but an employee who downloads an unsafe app may unwittingly expose the organization’s computer network to security and privacy risks. Read more[NIST.GOV]

IT Security | Cybersecurity

THREAT REPORT: FBI Issues Wire Transfer Scam Alert. The FBI has issued an alert about a fraud scam known as Business E-mail Compromise targeting businesses that regularly make wire transfers to foreign companies. Some victims have reported ransomware cyber-intrusions immediately before a scam starts, the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center says in its alert. Read more[GOVINFOSECURITY.COM]

VB.NET: Be Warned: Google Enlists Chrome In Push For Encrypted Web. Google just gave Chrome something of an insecurity complex. Google has added a feature to Chrome that can alert users about unencrypted network connections common on many parts of the Web. The feature isn’t on by default. Read more[CNET.COM]

IT Security | Cybersecurity

ALERT: FCC Issues Tough Warning Against WiFi Blocking. The Federal Communications Commission has issued a warning that intentional blockage of personal WiFi hotspots was illegal and would be subject to enforcement. The FCC has noticed a “disturbing trend” among hotels and other commercial establishments of blocking consumers’ personal WiFi hotspots on their premises, its advisory notes. Read more[ECOMMERCETIMES.COM]

CAREERS: Let’s Improve Cyber Security And Your Job Prospects. It costs governments and companies worldwide over a trillion dollars annually. It can get you arrested. But it can also get you hired. Hacking is a prevalent part of modern technological society, yet at the academic capital of technology, we reduce the topic to just a few academic settings — several courses taught by Professor Dan Boneh, and one by Professor Bahman Bahmani. Read more[STANFORDDAILY.COM]

IT Security | Cybersecurity

AGENCIES: Pay for Mid-Level Cybersecurity Talent Is Soaring. Today’s security talent crunch has its own trickle-down effect with salaries increasing for ‘mid-tier’ hires. The demand is making it harder for chief information security officers to attract and retain seasoned engineers who can detect and neutralize threats. CISOs capped by salary constraints must offer the opportunity to cross-train employees using cutting-edge security technologies, experts say.Read more[BLOGS.WSJ.COM]

IT SPENDING: Cybersecurity Gets Big Boost in 2016 Budget. Recognizing the increasing breadth and depth of attacks on government IT systems, the Obama administration has allocated more money for cybersecurity in its 2016 budget in an effort to strengthen defenses and make cyberspace more secure. Read more[GCN.COM]

IT Security | Cybersecurity

CFAA: Experts Speak Out About Proposed Changes To Hacking Law. President Obama is proposing changes to the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, but will they do more harm than good? Experts are starting to weigh in on the topic, and the reviews so far are mixed. On one side, the administration has made some concessions, which are useful. Yet, some of the punishments are overly severe and the wording in the proposal is vague in parts. Read more[CSOONLINE.COM]

MARKET FORCES: 3 Cyber Security Lessons From Super Bowl XLIX. Super Bowl XLIX was full of surprises. As anyone in IT can attest, cyber criminals are full of surprises too — and proper preparation is key to fending off their attacks. Below are three lessons one can draw from this year’s Super Bowl to better inform one’s own cyber security policies and practices. Read more[INFORMATIONWEEK.COM]

IT Security | Cybersecurity

TODAY’S HACKER: Today’s Hackers Are Way More Sophisticated Than You Think. Defense against intrusion is no longer enough. While the modern always-on, data-fueled environment spells opportunity for the enterprise, it also makes an attractive target for hackers. And the proliferation of such environments has turned hacking into a profession. Read more[READWRITE.COM]

MOBILE APPS: Android Adware Raises Google Play Security Concerns. Google has suspended three applications from the Play Store after being alerted to the presence of malicious adware. A security firm revealed the infected apps to Google and believes they’ve been installed on many millions of phones and tablets. Read more[INFORMATIONWEEK.COM]

IT Security | Cybersecurity

SECURITY CONTROLS: Why The 80-20 Rule Is Only Half The Cyber Battle. The 80-20 rule of information security is now widely accepted not only among cyber security professionals but among high-level executives as well. And that’s certainly a sign of progress. It means that organizations are waking up to the importance of cyber hygiene, much like the medical profession realized more than 100 years ago that the vast majority of hospital-acquired infections could be prevented if doctors simply washed their hands. Read more[FEDERALTIMES.COM]

MAC ATTACKS: Apple iOS Now Targeted In Massive Cyber Espionage Campaign. Attack campaign tied to Russia now zeroing in on mobile user’s iPhones, iPads. An extensive and sophisticated cyber espionage operation targeting mainly Western military, government, defense industry firms, and the media, now has a new weapon: a spyware app for Apple iPhones and iPads. Find out more[DARKREADING.COM]

IT Security | Cybersecurity

CYBERCRIMINALS: Report Claims Russians Hacked Sony. Russian hackers, using spear-phishing attacks, successfully breached the network of Sony Pictures Entertainment in November 2014, and continue to have on-demand access to Sony’s network, according to a new report from cybersecurity firm Taia Global. But it’s not clear if those hackers unleashed the malware attack and data leaks for which the “Guardians of Peace” hacking group has taken credit, or if the Russian team was operating independently. Find out more[INFORISKTODAY.COM]

IT Security | Cybersecurity

VULNERABILITIES: When Security Breaches Come From Within. Although a majority of businesses worldwide admit their vulnerability to insider data breaches and expect to maintain or increase their IT security and data protection budgets, the logic underlying their solutions is unfocused, according to a new survey. They are spending hard-won budget dollars to protect relatively small amounts of sensitive data accessible through BYOD initiatives when the greatest concern should be monitoring privileged inside users, contractors and partners the report states. Find out more[CIOINSIGHT.COM]

IT Security | Cybersecurity

MOBILE: Apple iOS Now Targeted In Massive Cyber Espionage Campaign. An extensive and sophisticated cyber espionage operation targeting mainly Western military, government, defense industry firms, and the media, now has a new weapon: a spyware app for Apple iPhones and iPads. Read more[DARKREADING.COM]

DATA BREACH: Phishing Campaigns Now Targeting Anthem Members. The Anthem breach is being investigated by the FBI, together with digital forensic investigation and breach-response firm Mandiant, a FireEye company. Meanwhile, state insurance commissioners and attorneys general have launched investigations into the cyber-attack against Anthem, and a U.S. Senate committee is also examining the healthcare industry’s preparedness for mitigating cyberthreats. Read more[INFORISKTODAY.COM]

IT Security | Cybersecurity

INTERNET OF THINGS: Smart Cars, TVs Show Privacy Risks. Privacy once felt guaranteed at home or in the car, but new disclosures about Internet-connected “smart” devices that can eavesdrop on conversations raise consumer fears about how the growing sector known as the Internet of Things. Find out more[USNEWS.COM]

NATIONAL SECURITY: New Agency To Sniff Out Threats In Cyberspace. The Obama administration is establishing a new agency to combat the deepening threat from cyberattacks, and its mission will be to fuse intelligence from around the government when a crisis occurs. Read more[WASHINGTONPOST.COM]

IT Security | Cybersecurity

IDENTITY GOVERNANCE: IBM Security Is a Leader, Again, in the New 2015 Gartner IGA Magic Quadrant. IBM Security has made its way back into the Leaders quadrant in the newly published Magic Quadrant (MQ) for Identity Governance and Administration (IGA). When the latest report was published in 2014, IBM was in the Visionary quadrant and had been a Leader in the 2012 MQ. So, it’s been a journey, to say the least. Find out more[SECURITYINTELLIGENCE.COM]

SECURITY: Bug Bounties Entice Researchers to Don White Hats. Bug bounty programs are used by individual software makers to improve the quality of their products, but they can have incidental benefits for all software makers, too. One of those is to encourage bug hunters to wear a white hat instead of a black one. Find out more[TECHNEWSWORLD.COM]

IT Security | Cybersecurity

WEBINAR/TRAINING: How to Implement the NIST Cybersecurity Framework Using COBIT 5. Get an introduction to the NIST Cybersecurity Framework (CSF) and ISACA’s forthcoming CSF Implementation Guide via this on demand webinar. Learn how organizations can successfully implement CSF using the globally recognized business framework – COBIT 5. Gain insights and strategies to use in improving your enterprise’s cybersecurity defenses. Find out more[GOVINFOSECURITY.COM]

OPERATIONS: Bridging the Cybersecurity Skills Gap: 3 Big Steps. The stakes are high. Establishing clear pathways into the industry, standardizing jobs, and assessing skills will require industry-wide consensus and earnest collaboration. Find out more[DARKREADING.COM]

IT Security | Cybersecurity

USER ACCESS: The Secret Question Threat. When it comes to security it can be hard to strike a balance between infrastructure safety and user convenience. A security professional’s life is never easy and definitely never boring. This is because at its core, security is all about allowing convenient access to a system for all those who have legitimate access to it. Yet, at the same time, that convenience, in turn, also creates security risks. Find out more[GFI.COM]

DRIVERS AT RISK: Car Hacking Report Explores Lack Of Real-Time Response Capabilities. A senator has released a report on security and privacy concerns facing U.S. drivers, which includes a troubling, though not surprising, finding that most automakers lack the ability to respond to intrusions in real-time. Find out more[SCMAGAZINE.COM]

IT Security | Cybersecurity

SURVEY: Surge in IT Security Measures Anticipated in 2015. Chief information officers (CIOs) are taking a multipronged approach to protecting sensitive company information, a new survey from Robert Half Technology shows. The majority of CIOs interviewed are currently taking or planning to take steps in the next 12 months to improve information technology (IT) security at their firms. Read more[PRNEWSWIRE.COM]

PRESIDENTIAL TALKS: Obama Heads to Tech Security Talks Amid Tensions. President Obama will meet with the nation’s top technologists on a host of cybersecurity issues and the threats posed by increasingly sophisticated hackers. But nowhere on the agenda is the real issue for the chief executives and tech company officials who will gather on the Stanford campus: the deepening estrangement between Silicon Valley and the government. Read more

[NYTIMES.COM]

IT Security | Cybersecurity

FEDERAL SPENDING: Feds Wasting At Least $35 Billion on IT and Security. A new report, Understanding the Federal Government’s ‘IT Insecurity’ Crisis, released by the International Association of Information Technology Asset Managers (IAITAM), has the group claiming that “half or more of the $70-$80 billion the U.S. government spends each year on Information Technology (IT) and IT Security is wasted.” Read more[WEEKLYSTANDARD.COM]

PRIVACY INVASION: Drones Are Intercepting Cell Phone Signals in L.A. Even before the Federal Aviation Administration unveiled its proposed regulations for commercial drone flights in the United States last week, one company was already at work, using drones to collect data from unsuspecting citizens in Los Angeles. Read more[FORBES.COM]

IT Security | Cybersecurity

VULNERABILITIES: Hackin’ At The Car Wash, Yeah. Drive-through car washes can be hacked via the Internet, to wreak physical damage or to get a free wash for your ride. Turns out those drive-through car washes have public Web interfaces that easily can be accessed online, and used to cause physical damage, manipulate or sabotage mechanical operations, or just score a free wash for your vehicle. Read more[DARKREADING.COM]

PATCH MANAGEMENT: Older Vulnerabilities A Top Enabler Of Breaches, According To Report. Organizations are not properly patching their systems and networks, according to the HP Cyber Risk Report 2015, which took a look back at the threat landscape in 2014 and noted that 44 percent of known breaches were possible due to vulnerabilities identified years ago. Read more[SCMAGAZINE.COM]

IT Security | Cybersecurity

THE OSCARS: Blackhat, The Movie: Good, Bad & Ridiculous. It didn’t take home an Oscar, but in some instances Blackhat was right on point. Still, a white-hat hacker with the skills to take out armed opponents? Find out more[DARKREADING.COM]

Application & Software Patches

MICROSOFT: Patch Tuesday: Are Those Critical Patches Really Critical? Downtime. One word to strike fear into the hearts of even the hardiest of IT manager. Avoiding downtime at pretty much all costs is the name of the game now. Read more[THEVARGUY.COM]

CLOUD PATCHES: Google Cloud Security Scanner, AWS Tag Management. The latest updates and additions for Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud Platform. Azure Active Directory already offers the ability to manage shared social networking accounts on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn — useful for shared corporate resources. That feature is now even more secure, since you can enable automatic changing of the passwords on a fixed schedule. Read more[LIFEHACKER.COM.AU]

Databases

TITAN: Working With Graph Databases And AWS. Facebook and LinkedIn use graph databases for social applications. But enterprises should look into how a database like Titan can work with AWS. Read more[TECHWORLD.COM]

ORACLE: Why Cloud Databases Are In Your Future. The cloud has gotten pretty complicated—and crowded. There are more new “as a service” offerings popping up lately than reality TV shows. Yet, one of those offerings in particular has a great shot at becoming an enterprise staple, and a long-term platform for IT innovation—database as a service. Read more[FORBES.COM]

Databases

OPEN SOURCE: Security Gaps Discovered in 39,890 Online Databases. Due to a misconfigured open source database upon which millions of online stores and platforms from all over the world base their services, anyone had the ability to call up or modify several million pieces of customer data online including names, addresses and e-mails. According to the Center for IT-Security, Privacy and Accountability (CISPA) in Saarbrücken, Germany, three of its students were able to demonstrate this vulnerability for 40,000 online databases in both Germany and France. Read more[SCIENTIFICCOMPUTING.COM]

NoSQL: 3 Security Pain Points NoSQL Must Remedy. Word broke recently that 40,000 instances of MongoDB that were found to be almost completely unsecured, among them a database for a French telecom with millions of customer records.Find out more

[INFOWORLD.COM]

Software & Operating Systems

VB.NET: 14 Top Improvements in Visual Basic 14. Visual Basic 14 is the newest version of Visual Basic, and it will ship as part of Visual Studio 2015. This version has been rewritten from scratch in about 1.3 million lines of VB code—earlier versions were actually written in C++. Read more[MSDN.MICROSOFT.COM]

WINDOWS 10: Windows 10 Technical Preview for Phones. We’ve already had a first look at Windows 10 for the desktop, but now we finally get to see it in action on the phone. tWindows 10 Technical Preview for Phones is a very early release. According to Microsoft General Manager Gabe Aul, it is the earliest build of a mobile OS we’ve seen from the company. Usually only internal engineering folks get to see OS builds this early. Read more[PCMAG.COM]

Software & Operating Systems

VULNERABILITY NOTIFICATION: Google May Go Public With Software Flaws Of Others. Google has given fellow tech companies an ultimatum: Patch your software vulnerabilities within 90 days or we’ll make them public. Read more[DISPATCH.COM]

Personal Tech

FYI: Wi-Fi Woes? Time to Upgrade Your Wireless Router. Your home wireless network doesn’t have to be slow and hard to manage. WSJ’s Joanna Stern takes a look at the latest Wi-Fi routers,and offers tips for making the most out of your broadband connection. Read more[WSJ.COM]

NEW TECH: Bill Gates Working On New Microsoft Personal Agent Technology? When Microsoft founder Bill Gates moved from his Chairmanship of the Microsoft Board to his new role as “Technology Advisor,” he committed to spending up to a third of his time working on Microsoft-related projects. Read more[ZDNET.COM]

Personal Tech

EXERCISE: Test of Strength: Fitness Apps vs. Personal Trainers. ACTIVITY trackers. Calorie counters. Phones with heart monitors.Technology companies are clearly fascinated with fitness and health these days. As technology starts pushing us to be healthier and fitter, some apps are even trying to replace the personal trainer or the gym entirely. Read more[NYTIMES.COM]

Data Centers

DATA CENTERS: Why The Pentagon CIO Hates The Term Data Center. Rarely has the Defense Department dedicated the kind of time and resources to talking emerging technologies as it did Jan. 29 at an industry-day event, parading a who’s-who of top tech officials to explain the Pentagon’s plans for cloud computing. Read more[NEXTGOV.COM]

NETWORKING: The Rise Of The Cloud WAN. Cloud technology is pushing WAN technology toward the consumer paradigm, as a raft of new startups make it easier to provision and deploy WAN services in the cloud with a software-only model. The WAN functionality moving into the cloud includes business-class Internet, security, WAN optimization, and application policy control. Read more[NETWORKCOMPUTING.COM]

Data Centers

LETTER TO THE EDITOR: Moving State Data Center To Groton A Bad Idea. Two weeks and two major snowstorms tore through Connecticut. Just wait until next year when the state’s information technology data center will be based in Groton, a facility that will be well over 50 miles from the Capitol, the Hartford Armory, and the Department of Emergency Services and Public Protection command center. Read more[COURANT.COM]

CAMPUS TECH: Texas Christian U Deploys Module Power System for Data Center. Texas Christian University (TCU) in Fort Worth, TX has implemented a modular electrical infrastructure system to support its new data center hall. The university had limited space for its new data center, and the repurposed building in which it’s housed “was not structurally designed to support the weight of a conventional data center electrical room,” said Travis Cook, deputy CTO at TCU, in a prepared

statement. Read more[CAMPUSTECHNOLOGY.COM]

Sharepoint

SHAREPOINT: Optimizing and Accelerating Your SharePoint Farm. You may be planning to establish or upgrade a new SharePoint installation. Or perhaps your SharePoint farm isn’t as fast or reliable as it used to be. Either way, there are things you can do to accelerate the performance of your SharePoint farm. Read more[WINDSOWSITPRO.COM]

From the Blue Mountain Data Systems Blog

Weak Patch Management Strategy Leads to Epic Security Failurehttps://www.bluemt.com/weak-patch-management-strategy-leads-to-epic-security-failure/

How To Ace the IT Security Professional’s Interviewhttps://www.bluemt.com/how-to-ace-the-it-security-professionals-interview/

Does BYOD Guarantee Employee Satisfaction?https://www.bluemt.com/does-byod-guarantee-employee-satisfaction/

Security Tools Are An Absolute Necessity For Agency Social Mediahttps://www.bluemt.com/security-tools-are-an-absolute-necessity-for-agency-social-media/

From the Blue Mountain Data Systems Blog

Clear Definition of Roles is Key to Cloud Adoptionhttps://www.bluemt.com/clear-definition-of-roles-is-key-to-cloud-adoption/

Security Awareness Tactics On a Shoestring Budgethttps://www.bluemt.com/mfa-to-reach-billion-dollar-status-in-2015/

MFA To Reach Billion Dollar Status in 2015https://www.bluemt.com/mfa-to-reach-billion-dollar-status-in-2015/

Penetration Test Tips for Federal Agencieshttps://www.bluemt.com/penetration-test-tips-for-federal-agencies/

From the Blue Mountain Data Systems Blog

NoSQL Is On the Move In the Relational Database Markethttps://www.bluemt.com/nosql-is-on-the-move-in-the-relational-database-market/

Completion of HTTP 2.0 Means Big Changes for the Webhttps://www.bluemt.com/completion-of-http-2-0-means-big-changes-for-the-web/

Firewalls: Still Alive and Kickinghttps://www.bluemt.com/firewalls-still-alive-and-kicking/

CIO March Madness: In It To Win It!https://www.bluemt.com/cio-march-madness-in-it-to-win-it/

From the Blue Mountain Data Systems Blog

C-Suite Peer Pressurehttps://www.bluemt.com/c-suite-peer-pressure/

Analytics: The Big Picturehttps://www.bluemt.com/analytics-the-big-picture/

Pay for Mid-Level Security Professionals Is On the Risehttps://www.bluemt.com/pay-for-mid-level-security-professionals-is-on-the-rise/

Smart Devices and Wearables: The CSO’s New Headachehttps://www.bluemt.com/microsoft-has-your-back-in-the-cloud/

From the Blue Mountain Data Systems Blog

CIO & CSOs: Think Like A CPOhttps://www.bluemt.com/cio-csos-think-like-a-cpo/

Tips for Successful Mobile App Developmenthttps://www.bluemt.com/tips-for-successful-mobile-app-development/

Understanding Data Breach Notification Standardshttps://www.bluemt.com/understanding-data-breach-notification-standards/

Chicago Police Department Falls Victim to Crytoware Schemehttps://www.bluemt.com/chicago-police-department-falls-victim-to-crytoware-scheme/

From the Blue Mountain Data Systems Blog

Without C-Suite Support, Your SharePoint Project Is Bound To Failhttps://www.bluemt.com/without-c-suite-support-your-sharepoint-project-is-bound-to-fail/

Cisco Releases Its Annual Security Reporthttps://www.bluemt.com/cisco-releases-its-annual-security-report/

Telework Experiment Yields Surprising Resultshttps://www.bluemt.com/telework-experiment-yields-surprising-results

From the Blue Mountain Data Systems Blog

Federal IT and Security – $35 Billion Wasted?https://www.bluemt.com/federal-it-and-security-35-billion-wasted

ABOUT US

Blue Mountain Data Systems Inc.

Blue Mountain Data Systems Inc. is dedicated to application and systems development, electronic document management, IT security support, and the automation of workflow processes.

Read more about our experience here:>> http://bluemt.com/experience

MANAGEMENT

Paul T. VeselyFounder, President, CEO and Principal Architect

Mr. Vesely is a recognized thought leader in systems architecture and delivery, having designed and delivered many enterprise wide information and document management solutions. Mr. Vesely’s history includes 33 years experience in the information systems industry, with Unisys, Grumman, PRC and a host of clients in both government and private sectors.

CONTACT US

Contact Us Today to Discuss Your Next IT Project

HEADQUARTERS

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