In this week’s newsletter
How safe is video conferencing? More on SMR HDDs. Caution using WordPress e-learning plugins. Don’t throw out that old PC! Zooming through video recordings. COVID Corner – Great spy flics from the 60s and 70s. Plus lots more — read it all, read it here on WServerNews!
Enjoy this week’s newsletter and feel free to send us feedback on any of the topics we’ve covered — we love hearing from our readers!
Got questions? Ask our readers!
WServerNews goes out each week to more than 200,000 IT pro subscribers worldwide! That’s a lot of expertise to tap into. Do you need help with some technical problem or are looking for expert advice on something IT-related? Ask Our Readers by emailing your problems and/or questions to us at [email protected]
Editor’s Corner
This week’s observations and ruminations from Mitch Tulloch our Senior Editor…
How safe is video conferencing?
When you think of the word “secure” do you automatically also think “private”? You probably do since privacy is something that most of us are increasingly concerned about in our high-speed tech-driven world. Since many of us are now working from home and using tools like Zoom holding meetings online, it’s fair to ask whether the video conferencing software is really secure enough to ensure the privacy of sensitive business communications.
Who better then to turn to for recommendations about which conferencing platforms are safe than the intelligence community? I’m being a bit ironic naturally.
Well guess what? ZDNet informs us that the NSA has published some guidance on how to choose a secure online collaboration service for “safe” teleworking:
Safe as in NSA-safe of course. That is, if you trust the NSA then you can trust their recommendations. That’s the NSA who have repeatedly pushed law enforcement to require tech companies to insert backdoors into their software platforms. So whether these “safe” teleconferencing tools also contain no government-mandated backdoors (and I’m not just talking about the U.S. government here) is unfortunately not something you can determine from the otherwise helpful table of features for each product in the above article.
On the other hand if you’re paranoid (or others think you are) then you could opt to use the video conferencing service that’s supposedly been endorsed by NSA-busting hero/traitor Edward Snowden as mentioned recently in the Information Security Newspaper:
Of course you need some open source savvy to use this platform, but those who are truly security-conscious (or paranoid) generally have that skillset. Ultimately I suppose any online collaboration platform is susceptible to undergoing surveillance at some level, whether it’s required by law to be embedded in the software or takes place somewhere along the wires the bits travel over. Holding your conversations in Esperanto may add another layer of privacy I guess…
What do you think? Email me at [email protected] but don’t expect absolute privacy in your communications…
More on SMR HDDs
Adding to last week’s item about SMR HDDs causing problems in NASes designed to only use CMR HDDs, I’ve found out that drive manufacturer Toshiba has published a list of all of their consumer HDDs that use SMR:
https://toshiba.semicon-storage.com/ap-en/company/news/news-topics/2020/04/storage-20200428-1.html
The problem of course is that prior to this HDD vendors were replacing CMR with SMR for some of their drives but without documenting the change publicly. Blocks and Files reported this as happening with both Western Digital and Seagate:
https://blocksandfiles.com/2020/04/14/wd-red-nas-drives-shingled-magnetic-recording/
https://blocksandfiles.com/2020/04/15/seagate-2-4-and-8tb-barracuda-and-desktop-hdd-smr/
This lack of openness by drive vendors is disconcerting given how important HDDs still are for many consumer devices and even enterprise-class systems. Let’s hope they learn their lesson fast and start announcing such changes before they happen.
Caution using WordPress e-learning plugins
Besides using Zoom for business meetings many schools and universities have been using it for online learning during our COVID crisis. Some educational institutions have also started trying out e-learning platforms that run on top of WordPress. Check Point Research points out however that some popular WordPress plug-ins for learning management have vulnerabilities in them:
If you’re using any of these popular Learning Management System (LMS) plugins in the school or college environment you support as an IT professional you may want to take another look at them.
Don’t throw out that old PC!
And finally PC Magazine has this cool article that can help us save the planet — at least for a few more years:
Avoid the Trash Heap: 15 Great Uses for an Old PC (PC Mag)
https://www.pcmag.com/news/avoid-the-trash-heap-15-great-uses-for-an-old-pc
Personally none of those options appeal to me as a business owner, I’d rather write off the remaining depreciated value of old hardware by taking it to a recycling company. And besides, who wants to have fun fiddling around with PCs anymore? That’s so 90s! What’s a PC, anyways?
Got more thoughts about anything in this newsletter?
Email us at [email protected]!
Tell all your friends about WServerNews!
Please let all your friends and colleagues in the IT profession know about our newsletter. Tell them our latest issues can be found at wservernews.com while older issues dating back to 1997 can be found in our archive. And let them know also that they can receive WServerNews each week in their inbox by subscribing to it here. Thank you!
Tip of the Week
>> Got any IT pro tips you’d like to share with other readers of our newsletter? Email us at [email protected]
Zooming through video recordings
Have you ever been frustrated at how much time it takes to watch a recorded webinar or YouTube recording? CyberText Consulting has a tip on some ways you can speed things up:
https://cybertext.wordpress.com/2020/04/04/get-through-a-recorded-webinar-faster/
Admin Toolbox
>> Got any admin tools or software you’d like to recommend to our readers? Email us at [email protected]
WMI Diagnosis Utility can help system administrators diagnose and repair problems with the WMI service:
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=7684
Pssdiag/Sqldiag Manager is a graphic interface that provides customization capabilities to collect data for SQL Server using sqldiag collector engine:
https://github.com/Microsoft/DiagManager
Sysinternals Autoruns now includes Runonce*\Depend entries, adds GPO logon and logoff locations:
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/downloads/autoruns
Mailbag
Last week’s newsletter featured a link to an article about an IT pro who went through an ordeal removing some decommissioned switches from his data center and mentioned some suggestions for how rack manufacturers could improve their products. Longtime reader Wayne Hanks from Australia responded to this with some comments:
Hi Mitch,
Regarding your story about having to destroy the rack brackets on switches to get them out. I don’t know about you but whenever I set up a rack, I make sure that everything is removable from the front. Most enterprise level switches have the rack brackets designed so that they can be screwed on the front or rear of the switch, making it possible to easily remove the switches at a later stage.
As for PDUs, they seem designed to cause the maximum amount of inconvenience. I’ve regularly used the ones in APC racks and found them great, but sometimes the mounting for them is awkward.
Finally, whenever planning a rack, it is vitally important to take decommissioning in to account as you generally do not want to have to completely power down a rack to remove a single server. And to anyone that thinks stacking servers on top of other devices is ok, just don’t!
That last suggestion from Wayne is something IT pros like us should always keep in mind. Namely, whenever you install or deploy almost anything whether it’s hardware or software, always be sure you have a “back-out” plan prepared in case you need it, either right afterwards or sometime down the line. Great tip! 🙂
COVID Corner – Great spy flics from the 60s and 70s
Forget James Bond. The 60s and 70s saw a whole host of spy movies released, many of them terrific and some of them silly. Here are three of them that Ingrid and I love watching over and over again:
Assignment K (1968)
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0062683/
A wonderful look back to times when spies didn’t use computers or cellphones and instead taped a piece of film under the clothes of a Barbie doll. Stephen Boyd and Camilla Sparv shine in this terrific movie as Boyd, a contract secret agent working under the guise of being the boss of a toy manufacturing company, travels between London, Munich and the ski slopes of Kitzbuhel, Austria passing secrets along a chain of operatives. Watching Boyd and Sparv tease each other is a highlight for me and reminds me of those old boy-meet-girl times which were refreshingly innocent compared to what passes today for hooking up.
Night Flight from Moscow (1973)
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0069251/
This hard-to-find DVD, a French-English co-production that is also titled Le Serpent, is actually our favorite Yul Brenner move and a terrific movie about espionage and betrayal. It’s also a bit hilarious in its description of the operations of the CIA at that period of time, though “Mr. CIA” Henry Fonda pulls things back from the brink of farce in this regard. Still, the acting otherwise is excellent and the scenes in France with English subtitles with Philippe Noiret and other French actors (and a short scene with German actress Elga Andersen you won’t want to miss) are an accurate picture of what the mood of the world was like during the 70s. Henri Verneuil was an amazing director and we have several other films by him we may recommend for you in the future.
Three Days of the Condor (1975)
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0073802/
This is one spy movie that many of you may have already seen. If not we highly recommend you take a look at this masterpiece by Sydney Pollack (who also directed The Yakuza which we recommended to you last week). Robert Redford and Faye Dunaway start here with Swedish actor Max von Sydow adding the necessary dark side of things (though he turns out less dark than the CIA itself). I confess I often watch this movie just to see the opening scene with the line printer chugging out line after line of unreadable output. Hey, is that a PDP computer there in the room? Maybe one of our older readers can help us here — email us at [email protected]
In the meantime, enjoy yourself watching movies like these during this COVID crisis, they make the lockdowns and other restrictions easier to bear!
Subscribe to WServerNews!
Subscribe today to our WServerNews newsletter and join 200,000 other IT professionals around the world who receive our newsletter each week! Just go to this page and select WServerNews to receive our monthly newsletter in your inbox!
Conference calendar
NOTE: Because of the concerns surrounding the COVID-19 situation some of these conferences may be moved online or even cancelled. Please check the conference websites for the latest updates.
>> Got an IT conference or event happening that you’d like to promote in our newsletter? Email us at [email protected]
Microsoft Build
May 19-21, 2020 in Seattle, Washington
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/build
Microsoft Inspire
July 20-24, 2020 in Las Vegas, Nevada
https://partner.microsoft.com/en-us/inspire
Microsoft Licensing Boot Camps
For dates and locations see https://www.directionsonmicrosoft.com/training
Cyber Security Summits
For dates and locations see https://cybersummitusa.com/summits/
Other conferences
Future Tech Summit – May 15 in Santiago, Chile
https://www.collabsummit.eu/en/
PowerShell Conference Europe – June 2-5 in Hannover, Germany
European Collaboration Summit – June 8-10 in Wiesbaden, Germany
https://www.collabsummit.eu/en/
Evolve – June 8-10 in Las Vegas
https://evolvetechconference.com/
RSA Conference Asia Pacific & Japan – July 14-16 in Singapore
https://www.rsaconference.com/apj
VMworld – Aug 30 – Sept 3 in San Francisco
https://www.vmworld.com/en/us/index.html
Interop – Sept 21-24 in Austin, Texas
European SharePoint, Office 365 & Azure Conference (ESPC20) – Nov 9-12, 2020 in Amsterdam
https://www.sharepointeurope.com/
DevOpsCon – Nov 30 – Dec 3 in Munich, Germany
Podcast Corner
Azure DevOps for Ops with Michael Levan (RunAsRadio)
A Decade of Network Podcasting (Heavy Networking)
https://packetpushers.net/series/weekly-show/
vSphere 7 Core Storage (Virtually Speaking)
https://www.vspeakingpodcast.com/
6GHz PSD & AFC with Chuck Lukaszewski (Clear To Send)
Go passwordless with Okta, why Crowdstrike customers need Airlock (Risky Business)
https://risky.biz/netcasts/risky-business/
File Shares for Clients in the Cloud with Azure Files (Microsoft Cloud IT Pro Podcast)
https://www.msclouditpropodcast.com/
Microsoft Smashes Q2 Results + M365 and Azure News (Microsoft Cloud Show)
http://www.microsoftcloudshow.com/podcast
New on Techgenix.com
For your information: Why your business needs a CISO
A growing number of enterprises are contemplating hiring a chief information security officer. But how do you know whether your business needs a CISO?
https://techgenix.com/your-business-needs-a-ciso/
Android malware Banker.BR Trojan targets users via phishing messages
A new Android malware dubbed Banker.BR is targeting Spanish and Portuguese speakers. Spread through a phishing campaign, it is able to steal credentials.
https://techgenix.com/android-malware-banker-br-trojan/
How to resend an invitation to Azure Active Directory guest user
As an Azure admin, there may be times when you have to resend an invitation to a guest user. This Azure Quick Tip walks you through the process.
https://techgenix.com/resend-invitation-active-directory-guest-user/
Microsoft simplifies Defender ATP deployment for macOS
Good news for organizations that allow their Mac-owning employees to use their own devices as they work from home during the coronavirus pandemic. Microsoft has simplified the deployment.
https://techgenix.com/microsoft-defender-atp-for-macos/
Review: CoreView CoreSecurity for Microsoft Office 365
CoreSecurity is aimed at helping companies understand where potential vulnerabilities exist within their Office 365 configurations. Here’s our review.
https://techgenix.com/coreview-coresecurity/
Fun videos from Flixxy
Chase Her – Tomomi Nishikubo
A beautiful woman drops her handkerchief and mountain bike rider Tomomi Nishikubo tries to catch up with her in this amazing freestyle video shot in Tokyo.
https://www.flixxy.com/chase-her-tomomi-nishikubo.htm
Funniest 10 Second Video
If you find a funnier video on as short as or shorter than 10 seconds, please let us know!
https://www.flixxy.com/funniest-10-second-video.htm
Girl Switches Outfits At Impressive Speeds
Solange Kardinaly (27) – magician and singer from Valencia, Spain impresses the judges and audience with her ‘quick change’ act.
https://www.flixxy.com/girl-switches-outfits-at-impressive-speeds-spains-got-talent-2019.htm
8-year-old Elisey Mysin Plays Mozart’s Concerto No.3
8-year-old Elisey Mysin plays Mozart’s Concerto No.3 in D major with the Igor Lerman Chamber Orchestra.
https://www.flixxy.com/8-year-old-elisey-mysin-plays-mozarts-concerto-no-3.htm
More articles of interest
COVID-19 remote work forces shift on SecOps strategy
Security risk was mostly an afterthought as businesses scrambled to support remote work in response to COVID-19, but SecOps is now at the top of IT shops’ priority lists.
Learn to manage Office 365 ProPlus updates
The traditional Microsoft Office applications you get from Office 365 might appear to be the same on the surface, but how you administer them differs in several key ways.
Prepare for serious health threats with a pandemic recovery plan
COVID-19 has become a serious global threat and is rapidly becoming an issue for business continuity. Pandemic planning can help mitigate disruptive effects of disastrous events.
Cameyo NoVPN removes a remote work bottleneck
Cameyo’s NoVPN provides secure employee access to internally hosted apps without taxing corporate VPNs that are already strained by the remote work explosion.
Send us your feedback!
Got feedback about anything in this issue of WServerNews? Email us at [email protected]