From The Blog
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NetSPI’s Offensive Security Offering Leverages Subject Matter Experts to Enhance Pen Testing
Written by Sean KalinichBlack Hat 2023 Las Vegas. The term offensive security has always been an interesting one for me. On the surface is brings to mind reaching…Written on Tuesday, 12 September 2023 17:05 in Security Talk Read 1225 times Read more...
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Black Kite Looks to Offer a Better View of Risk in a Rapidly Changing Threat Landscape
Written by Sean KalinichBlack Hat 2023 – Las Vegas. Risk is an interesting subject and has many different meanings to many different people. For the most part Risk…Written on Tuesday, 12 September 2023 14:56 in Security Talk Read 735 times Read more...
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Microsoft Finally Reveals how they Believe a Consumer Signing Key was Stollen
Written by Sean KalinichIn May of 2023 a few sensitive accounts reported to Microsoft that their environments appeared to be compromised. Due to the nature of these accounts,…Written on Thursday, 07 September 2023 14:40 in Security Talk Read 1109 times Read more...
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Mandiant Releases a Detailed Look at the Campaign Targeting Barracuda Email Security Gateways, I Take a Look at What this all Might Mean
Written by Sean KalinichThe recent attack that leveraged a 0-Day vulnerability to compromise a number of Barracuda Email Security Gateway appliances (physical and virtual, but not cloud) was…Written on Wednesday, 30 August 2023 16:09 in Security Talk Read 903 times Read more...
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Threat Groups Return to Targeting Developers in Recent Software Supply Chain Attacks
Written by Sean KalinichThere is a topic of conversation that really needs to be talked about in the open. It is the danger of developer systems (personal and…Written on Wednesday, 30 August 2023 13:29 in Security Talk Read 975 times Read more...
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Leaked Data from Duolingo incident Shows US is most Impacted
Written by Sean KalinichDuolingo, is a language learning site (not to be confused with an LLM) and has a very large base of users. The site is a…Written on Tuesday, 29 August 2023 19:12 in Security Talk Read 1388 times Read more...
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We talk about the Ransomware Threat Landscape with SecureWorks at Black Hat 2023
Written by Sean KalinichBlack Hat 2023 – Las Vegas, NV – One of my personal focuses is understanding the “Why” behind changes in the threat landscape. In simple…Written on Tuesday, 29 August 2023 18:26 in Security Talk Read 986 times Read more...
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Now Patched Flaw Leverages Abandoned Reply URL found in Entra ID allows for Privilege Escalation
Written by Sean KalinichMicrosoft has not been having the greatest of months. First it was identified that a stollen MSA signing key was used by a Nation State…Written on Monday, 28 August 2023 15:39 in Security Talk Read 1604 times Read more...
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Qrypt Looking to Attack the Inefficiencies in Quantum Encryption to make Quantum Secure Communication a Reality Today
Written by Sean KalinichBlack Hat 2023, Las Vegas – At Black Hat one of my favorite things to do is see what the latest buzzword(s)/phrases are. One of…Written on Monday, 28 August 2023 12:53 in Security Talk Read 1098 times Read more...
Recent Comments
- Sean, this is a fantastic review of a beautiful game. I do agree with you… Written by Jacob 2023-05-19 14:17:50 Jedi Survivor – The Quick, Dirty, and Limited Spoilers Review
- Great post. Very interesting read but is the reality we are currently facing. Written by JP 2023-05-03 02:33:53 The Dangers of AI; I Think I Have Seen this Movie Before
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Displaying items by tag: Metro UI
Could Windows 8 Destroy the PC Market as We Know It?
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Believe it or not, thanks to Windows 8, PC sales have just gone through the biggest decline in the past 20 years. These sales, combined with the increasing popularity of tablets, beg the question: is Windows 8 going to destroy the PC Market?
I own a PC that came with Windows 8, and I can tell you, I wasn't pleasantly surprised when I began to use the operating system. Lets take a look at why or why not PCs might be on their way out.
Microsoft Fail - Start Button Back in Windows 8.1 But No Start Menu
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Windows 8.1 is coming out soon and Microsoft is detailing some of the changes that are going to be present. One of the most looked for changes is a return of the start button. This one feature is so missed by users that a booming trade in third party software for add-in start buttons has developed. The problem is that the start button Microsoft is putting back does not mean the start menu is back. Instead clicking this button will only get you back to the Modern UI. This makes the change cosmetic in nature and does not actually address the issue that most people have with Windows 8 and the Modern UI. This is the same as the option to boot to the desktop, if you do not have a real start menu, what is the point. People were not looking just to get the start button back, but the actual start menu with the ease of access that it brought. The rest of the improvements all appear to be related to the Modern UI and show that Microsoft is simply not read to listen to reason or even the consumer.
Start button is back
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According to unnamed sources close to Microsoft, Redmont giant will in the coming update of Windows 8, colloquially called Windows 8.1, restore the Start button to its original position - first spot in the taskbar. Ejecting the Start button from the taskbar has been one of the most controversial releases of Windows 8, and in parallel with the release of a new version of Microsoft operating system appeared a great number of applications that have brought it back (Start8, StartIsBack, Pokki, StartMenu8 and others).
Did Microsoft Steal The Live Tile design?
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Microsoft is being sued over the ideas behind the company's entire visual identity, which is the base functionality of their new operating systems. The lawsuit is about the "live tiles" on the Windows Phone and Windows 8 interface. Two years ago, while advertising Windows Phone 7, Microsoft introduced the concept of "live tiles" that were used as a building block of the mobile interface of the OS and associated applications. The concept has now been extended to both Windows 8 and Microsoft's entire visual identity is based on the principle of simplicity, promoting "live tiles“.
Microsoft Moves Hotmail And Live To New Metro Themed Outlook.com Webmail Service
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Microsoft is working very hard to make a fresh start of things. After announcing that they were doing away with their Zune player and eventually their music service (both of which were arguably better than their Apple counter parts, but Microsoft failed to market them properly) they are now moving in on Hotmail. Today they launched their replacement for the Hotmail service called Outlook.com. This is not the first time that Microsoft has tried to rebrand Hotmail though and might not be the last. Before they tried to change Hotmail into Windows Live mail (which failed) as a way to remove the old outlook express application from Windows and provide it as a service to those that wanted it (in a bundle with a bunch of other Microsoft apps). Still Hotmail survived and continued to be one of the most popular free webmail services in the market.
Microsoft Claims Windows 8 Is Better Than Windows 7, But Fails To Provide Reference Data And Hardware Specs
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Gamers there is great news for you! According to Microsoft your text will now render up to 336% faster than in Windows 7! This means that if you are playing a text based game you are going to get blazing fast performance. Although not related to gamers the announcement that Windows 8 now renders text faster than Windows 7 due to DirectWrite has been used to create headlines that read Windows 8 Smokes Windows 7. Unfortunately Microsoft is only talking about 2D graphic and the user interface. Microsoft has also done something that is very disingenuous; they used percentages instead of raw numbers.
Micrsoft Announces the Release of Visual Studio 2012 Express For Desktop, Finally
It seems that Microsoft might actually be listening to some of the criticism that has been flowing about their next generation operating systems. A few days ago we reported that Microsoft had made the decision to ship Visual Studio Express 2012 with support for Metro Apps only. This upset a large portion of the development community and was lambasted across the internet as a very dumb move.
Microsoft Locks Visual Studio Express 11 to Metro Only Apps
This just in from the Microsoft is being foolish again desk. We have told you that Microsoft is seriously pushing their vision of the PC again. They have dropped all pretenses that the PC is all about you and are now rushing headlong down the tunnel with the thought of monetizing your PC usage with the cloud. To do this they are shoving their new UI Metro down your throat whether you like it or not. There have been some that like Metro calling it sleek and slick. However, while Metro is manageable it is also very dull and lacks any kind of elegance or class. It looks like a kid designed it and like XP brings images of Fischer Price to mind instead of a high-performance operating system.
Microsoft Tries to Explain the Lack of DVD Playback and Media Center in Windows 8
So Microsoft is trying to defend their decision to cripple Windows 8 right out of the box. We told you a few days ago that Microsoft has chosen not to include Media Center or DVD playback support in the shipping version of Windows 8. To get either of these you will have to pay for some sort of upgrade. If you have the standard version of Windows 8 you will need to buy an upgrade to Windows 8 Pro and if you already have Pro you will need to buy the Media Pack upgrade.
Microsoft to Partner with Dolby for Windows 8 Audio?
After our initial story of Microsoft’s idea to remove DVD playback and Media Center support from core installations of Windows 8 (you can still get it with an upgrade purchase) we find out a bit of news that simply makes no sense in light of what we are hearing about its crippled media playback functions. It appears that Microsoft is going to lean on Dolby Laboratories for enhanced audio in Windows 8.