In an earlier post, I talked about how some vendors tend to push enterprises into a weaker security posture. In this post, I continue with information relating to Office 365. Microsoft’s cloud implementation of the Office suite is mind boggling in its complexity and sheer want of native connectivity.

In the past, I have criticized Microsoft for the privacy invasive defaults of Win10. I failed to mention a feature that sheds a bit of light on what they collect. Beyond changing many of the settings using tools (which I highlighted here), you can actually review and delete some of the metadata being collected. If you are not already aware of this feature… read on.

One of my part-time hobbies is pushing to professionalize the Information Security profession. Admittedly, it is a lonely pastime and not nearly as exhilarating as it sounds. I wrote a multi-part article about the topic called “What does Information Security have in common with Eastern Air Lines Flight 401?” Allow me to quote myself:

Attacks come from many angles in the Information Security game. To wit, a spat between two security vendors – Carbon Black and DirectDefense. DirectDefense released a report on Carbon Black’s Cb Response product. In a report titled “Harvesting Cb Response Data Leaks for fun and profit,” DirectDefense uncovered some disturbing data leakage.

When scanners attack, it just makes you WannaCry. So we had WannaCry, DoublePulsar, Petya – the whole EternalBlue exploit release. EternalBlue exploits a vulnerability in Microsoft’s implementation of the Server Message Block (SMB) protocol. The vulnerability exists because the SMB version 1 (SMBv1) server in various versions of Microsoft Windows accepts specially crafted packets from remote attackers, allowing them to execute arbitrary code on the target computer.

Soon coming to the Internet of Things (IoT) is the Injunction of Technology (IoT). In another post I
noted that my WiFi router’s power brick had a UL certification, yet the actual WiFi router had nothing similar stating it was safe to use on the Internet. In addition, nothing to ensure it would not hurt other’s use of the Internet.