Firefox Private Network VPN renamed to Mozilla VPN and priced at $5 per month

VPNs can be wonderful for protecting a user's privacy, but they are not infallible. For instance, while they can hide your activity from your ISP or an unsecured Wi-Fi network, the VPN company can potentially see everything you do. With that said, you'd better be very smart about selecting a VPN provider. Rule number one: Never trust a "free" VPN or one that offers a pay-once "lifetime" subscription, as you simply can't trust their business models to protect your privacy. Instead, splurge a bit and go with a reputable company that requires periodic payments and promises not to keep any logs. Do your homework, folks.

Mozilla is a company that I trust more than some others (I trust no person or company 100 percent, however!) thanks to its respectable data privacy principles. That is why I surf the web with Firefox whenever I can. That company has been beta-testing a VPN service of its own called "Firefox Private Network VPN". Yeah, that name stinks as it is too wordy. Thankfully, the company has wisely decided to rename it to the much cleaner "Mozilla VPN." In addition, we learn how much the VPN service will eventually cost -- $4.99 a month.

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New solution helps enterprises handle sensitive data

folder stack

When looking at adopting a SaaS solution a big concern for enterprises is the risk involved in sending data out to be managed, stored, processed, and analyzed by a third party.

Code analysis and debugging specialist Rookout is launching Data On-Prem, a solution which gives large enterprises the ability to quickly solve complex problems involving sensitive data.

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Small and medium enterprises more likely to adopt cyber insurance

insurance key

Smaller and medium sized companies are more likely to spend on cyber insurance than their larger competitors according to a new report.

The study from US cyber insurance specialist Cowbell Cyber finds 65 percent of SMEs are planning to spend more on cyber insurance as part of their resilience plan in the next two years, compared to 58 percent of large companies.

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Mountain Duck 4.0 adds recently changed files list, sync transfer progress

Swiss developer iterate GmbH has released Mountain Duck 4.0 for Windows and Mac.

Highlights in the new release -- a paid upgrade for all users, including those with licenses for previous versions -- include the ability to view the sync progress for current transfers, and an option to view a list of recently changed files on both computer and server.

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AttackIQ offers free cybersecurity training to boost 'threat-informed defense'

training key

Breach and attack simulation solutions company AttackIQ is offering advanced cybersecurity training with a modularized curriculum and cyber range labs to security practitioners, free of charge.

Learners at the AttackIQ Academy get realistic, hands-on experience via cyber range labs and exercises that are based on scalable, cloud-hosted infrastructure. All Academy participants are eligible for (ISC)2 Continuing Professional Education (CPE) credits.

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Test automation is the future -- but not just yet

Software testing

In a new survey, 55 percent of respondents say test automation would improve software quality, and 51 percent say they're releasing software updates daily or weekly.

But the study of over 350 software testers from mobile testing platform Kobiton also shows automation initiatives are still in their infancy, with 58 percent of survey respondents saying their automation programs are relatively new or at least six months from starting.

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Zoom relents and agrees to give free users end-to-end encryption

Zoom logo on a building

When video conferencing company Zoom acquired Keybase, there was a great deal of excitement about the impending arrival of the much-needed end-to-end encryption. But then there was disappointment when it was announced that only paying customers would be granted access to the extra security feature.

Zoom CEO Eric S Yuan said at the time that free customers were not getting end-to-end encryption "in case some people use Zoom for a bad purpose" -- something many users found insulting. But now the company has backtracked, announcing that users of free accounts will in fact get end-to-end encryption... but there is a slight catch.

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Windows 10 Insider Build 20150 arrives in the Dev Channel, with three new Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) features

Yesterday, Microsoft released the first build from the Windows 10 20H2 branch to the Beta Channel -- what was previously the Slow ring.

Today, the software giant rolls out Windows 10 Insider Preview Build 20150 to the Dev Channel -- that’s what used to the Fast ring. This build comes with a number of changes, but the headline additions are to Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL).

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5 ideas on how to start a contactless business in 2020

Remote working

With COVID-19 in full swing, maintaining a safe distance is everything. This pandemic has brought the global economy and trade to a standstill. However, there are still opportunities available. Those looking to start a business in this climate will need to adapt. Perhaps the most important aspect right now is to start a business that can function without human contact.

As such, here are five contactless business ideas that you can use to launch your very own venture. They cover a wide variety of niches and would still be sustainable once normal business activity resumes. 

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Extreme weather will inflict chaos on infrastructure

Weather cloud

In the coming years, extreme weather events will become more frequent and widespread, devastating areas of the world that typically don’t experience them and amplifying the destruction in areas that do. Exposing deficiencies in technical and physical infrastructure, these events will cause major disruption and damage to IT systems and assets. Data centers will be significantly impacted, with dependent organizations losing access to services and data, and Critical National Infrastructure (CNI) will be put at risk.

Widespread droughts will force governments to divert water traditionally used to cool data centers, resulting in unplanned outages. In coastal areas and river basins, catastrophic flooding, hurricanes, typhoons or monsoons will hit key infrastructure such as the electrical grid and telecommunication systems. Wildfires will lead to prolonged power outages, stretching continuity arrangements to breaking point. The impact of extreme weather events on local staff, who may be unwilling or unable to get to their workplace, will put operational capability in jeopardy. The magnitude of extreme weather events -- and their prevalence in areas that have not previously been prone to them -- will create havoc for organizations that have not prepared for their impact.

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Three ways to automate business processes with no-code solutions

process automation

Business process automation has become a strategic enabler of business agility for present-day organizations, from helping to speed up business processes and reduce errors, to eliminating repetitive work. It has quickly become an essential tool that an increasing number of CIOs are utilizing across their organizations. Automation helps mid- to large-sized enterprises, dealing with various interrelated processes, to unify and streamline day-to-day work internally. The right automation tools can not only save time and money, increase productivity and enhance quality of work, but also streamline communication, improve management and retain customers.

The difference between no-code versus low-code solutions is that the latter requires technical "know-how" of the product and is extremely difficult for regular business employees to use. No-code solutions provide your average business employees the ability and independence to build solutions based on their own needs, without dependency on the IT staff. Below are three ways to automate business processes with no-code solutions:

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The fax reborn: How COVID-19 gave new life to an unlikely technology

With stay at home orders and the sudden need to securely share sensitive documents from employee’s homes, there has been a significant demand for a surprising technology: the digital fax. Despite industry-wide efforts to digitally transform, the physical fax is still a very common and necessary piece of technology for many organizations.

In fact, 89 percent of small to medium-sized businesses still use faxes in one form or the other, and faxing still dominates communication in several fields. For example, faxing accounts for 79 percent of all communication in the medical industry. These same organizations have been scrambling to support the abrupt shift to remote work and have had numerous roadblocks in the process.

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Open services leave business networks exposed

network connections

As cloud environments become more and more common the extra risks are mostly well understood but a new blog from Orca Security shows that businesses could be leaving their networks open via common configuration errors.

The use of external CI/CD (continuous integration/continuous delivery) services means access control lists (ACLs) are often changed but this can inadvertently leave internal services open to the world argues Avi Shua, CEO and co-founder of Orca Security.

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Lexar is making its own DDR4 RAM

We recently told you that Synology is selling its own solid state drives -- a surprising move. Today, another company is getting into a new market, and it is also quite unexpected. You see, Lexar is now manufacturing its own-branded DRAM (computer RAM). Seriously? Yup!

The company is offering both laptop and desktop memory, but none of it seems very impressive. Don't get me wrong, I am sure the RAM is fine, but it is nothing an enthusiast would get excited about. All of the memory is DDR4 2666 with a CAS latency of 19, which is passable, but nowhere near the fastest. There are no fancy heat-spreaders or RGB lighting either. With all of that said, pricing starts below $20. Ultimately, Lexar seems to be making basic memory that is affordable. And yes, there is absolutely a place for that.

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Business email compromise attacks spike in March

Email fraud

In yet another sign that cybercriminals are keen to exploit the current world situation, in the second and third weeks of March business email compromise (BEC) attacks increased more than 430 percent according to email security specialist Abnormal Security.

In the early part of the year attacks on C-Suite executives decreased by 37 percent from Q4 2019 to Q1 2020, while the focus shifted to finance employees, attacks targeting them increasing 87 percent in Q1 2020 against Q4 2019.

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