Sofia Elizabella Wyciślik-Wilson

Security researchers have managed to use the encryption algorithm used by the Hive ransomware to determine the master key needed to decrypt files for free.

Ordinarily, victims of a Hive ransomware attack would have to pay up to receive their individual decryption key. But a team of researchers from the Department of Financial Information Security, at Korea's Kookmin University, have been able to calculate the master key. This has then been used in what is believed to be the "first successful attempt at decrypting Hive ransomware"

SwiftOnSecurity has stirred up a huge level of interest and excitement after suggesting that Microsoft is already busily working on Windows 12.

The rollout of Windows 11 may have gone well, but the cyber security expert and Microsoft MVP tweeted saying that the successor is already in the pipeline. A tweet reading "according to a source at Microsoft, Windows 12 is already under development and it's going to require two TPMs" appeared over the weekend. What is going on?

For as long as most users can remembers, Skype has come with a warning that it cannot be used to place 911 calls. Microsoft has just announced that this is now changing for users of the Windows 10, Windows 11, macOS, Linux, Android and iOS versions of the app.

The application is now labelled as offering "Limited emergency calling". What this means, for now, is that Skype users in the US are able to place 911 calls using the app, bringing it in line with a handful of other countries. More than this, Skype can help emergency operators to locate you if necessary -- but there are some limitations to the new functionality.

Whether Linux distributions are more secure than Windows or macOS is the source of on-going debate, but Google's Project Zero has some interesting findings relating to the patching of security holes.

The security research program at Google has published information relating to security flaws found in software over the course of two years. Between January 2019 and December 2021 the Project Zero team found that Linux developers addresses problems far faster than Apple, Microsoft or Google itself.

Microsoft has been pouring a lot of love into Windows 11 of late, and understandably so -- but this does not mean that people who have decided to stick with Windows 10 have been forgotten. And to prove this, the company has just released the significant KB5010415 update, introducing new features and options, as well as fixing various issues.

For now, KB5010415 is only a preview, meaning that it is an update that gives an early taste of the full launch next Patch Tuesday. The update is available to anyone who wants to install it, and it includes a number of compelling reasons to do so.

If you're using Windows 11, there is a reasonable chance that you have a Microsoft account -- but it is not necessarily the case. While there are various advantages to signing into Windows using your Microsoft account, it is not something everyone feels entirely comfortable with.

So it will come as bad news to such hold-outs that Microsoft is going to force some users to create such an account. The change is coming to Window 11 Pro, meaning that home users who have opted for this version of Windows, in addition to the organizations, businesses and enterprises that use this edition of the operating system are affected. But there is some good news.

Cast your mind back, and you will recall the Millennium Bug, or the Y2K problem. There were fears that planes would fall from the sky, bank machines would fail, and chaos would ensure as computer systems did not know how to properly interpret the two-digit date 00 (did it mean 1900 or 2000?). Now there is a comparable problem on the horizon for web browsers.

Version 100 of the major web browsers are not far from being released, and this presents something of a problem. When Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge and Mozilla Firefox hit three-digit version numbers, many websites will not know how to deal with user-agent strings that are made up of trio of numbers.

The latest update for Windows 11 is a big one -- and we're not just talking about the size of the download. The update in question is KB5010414, and it's something we have already touched on a couple of times.

Much of the focus has been, entirely understandably, on the new features the update brings; KB5010414 is about much more than this. Yes, the arrival of support for Android apps is nice, but it's certainly not something everyone is interested in. What is more impressive and interesting about the KB5010414 is the laundry list of changes, tweaks and fixes Microsoft has introduced. This is what makes this the most significant update to Windows 11 yet.

In theory, the fact that Google Chrome can warn you if any of your saved passwords have been involved in breaches is a good thing. In theory. In practice, it can be a different story. There may be a very good reason for no wanting to change a particular saved password, rendering warnings nothing more than irritating.

You could, of course, disable password warnings completely, but this is clearly something of a security risk. But if an experimental setting Google is working on in Chrome makes its way to the release version of the browser, you could soon have finer-grained control over password warnings -- meaning that you could stop Chrome pestering you about passwords you won't want to change or can't change.

The CISA (US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency) has published a list of 15 actively exploited software vulnerabilities, encouraging users of Windows and macOS to install the available patches.

Included in the list is the SeriousSAM vulnerability that is also known as HiveNightmare affects Windows 10 and 11. Tracked as CVE-2021-36934, this is a local privilege escalation vulnerability that makes it possible for an attacker to grab password hashes from the registry and gain admin privileges.

Following the release of Windows 11 Build 22000.526, also known as the KB5010414 update, users are complaining of various problems with their computers.

The update was released to the Beta and Release Preview channels just a few days ago, and it introduced various changes and improvements to the Windows 11 taskbar. But it also seems that the update introduced problems with printing, and high CPU loads leading to overheating.

There have been some great new utilities added to Microsoft's PowerToys collection recently, and now Microsoft has released another update to its much-loved software.

While PowerToys v0.55.2 is not quite an exciting as previous releases, it is no less important. Having identified a bug affecting the installer, Microsoft has fixed the issue and is rolling out this important patch.

Microsoft has issued a warning -- or reminder, depending on your perspective -- about the impending end of support for Windows 10 20H2.

Also known as Windows 10 October 2020 update, this is not the first time Microsoft has urged people to upgrade their operating system to a version that will be supported for longer. The deadline is just three months away, so what are your options?

When Google announced the death of G Suite legacy free edition in the hope of getting users to pay for Google Workspace, there was understandable annoyance. The company later launched the fee-free Workspace Essentials Starter Edition to appease disgruntled G Suite users but for many the damage was already done.

Microsoft is taking full advantage of the irritated Google userbase. The company has revealed a special offer that it hopes will entice small businesses that have been using Google legacy G Suite into using Microsoft 365. The incentive? A hefty 60 percent discount.

We've already written about the release of Windows 11 Build 22000.526 to testers on the Beta and Release Preview channels, but this update warrants further investigation. With the release of the KB5010414 update, Microsoft not only fixes a lot of Windows 11 problems, it also introduces some important tweaks to the taskbar that will delight users of Microsoft Teams, as well as people with more than one monitor connected to their computer.

There are various important additions to the taskbar as well as changes to functionality. These changes, such as the decision to (finally!) include the clock in all taskbars on multiple monitors, represent a pleasing evolution of a staple feature of Windows and are likely to be well-received -- but there is still room for improvement.