Microsoft releases two new PowerToys builds and adds new 'Video conference global mute' utility

PowerToys

It seems like it has been a little while since Microsoft made any significant changes to PowerToys for Windows 10, but now the company has pushed out a pair of new releases.

For people who want to stick with the more stable releases, there is PowerToys v0.21.1 which is largely about bug fixes and addressing stability issues. For anyone looking for new PowerToys utilities, however, there is the "experimental" version 0.22.0 which features a new 'Video conference global mute' tool.

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Cyberattacks and how they work

Cyber attack

Cybercriminals in 2019 managed to expose more than 165 million records of confidential data across 1,365 known breaches.

But how do they get in, how long do they stay and what are they there for? The answers to these questions are in the 2020 Compromise Flashcard produced by compromise assessment company Lumu.

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Why more organizations are choosing crowdsourced security testing [Q&A]

Software testing

During the pandemic, video conferencing app Zoom found itself at the center of several security and privacy issues. In response it has boosted its security program, including aggregating reports from Bugcrowd.

But what's driving organizations like Zoom choose crowdsourced security approaches? We spoke to Ashish Gupta, CEO of Bugcrowd to find out.

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Microsoft releases Windows 10 Build 20206 with an evolved Emoji Picker and other new features

Dev Channel releases are where new Windows 10 features arrive first, and Build 20206 comes with a collection of input extras which Microsoft says will help users better communicate using text and voice on their devices.

This new build sees improvements to the Emoji Picker, unifying features and introducing new capabilities.

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TEAMGROUP QX is a 15.3TB SSD that costs nearly $4,000

When it comes to storage, consumers typically need to choose between a solid state drive for speed and a mechanical hard disk drive for large capacity. Over the years, however, SSDs have gotten bigger capacities, but for the most part, they still trail HDDs in that regard -- particularly in the consumer market..

Today, TEAMGROUP launches a new consumer solid state drive that offers the best of both worlds. Simply called "QX," this 3D QLC SATA 2.5-inch SSD offers an insane 15.3TB capacity. Before you get too excited, you should know the price -- it costs nearly $4,000.

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Dynabook Portégé X30W-J and X30L-J are lightweight Intel Tiger Lake laptops

AMD has owned 2020 with its excellent Ryzen mobile processors, but you didn't expect Intel to remain quiet, did you? With its new 11th gen Core processors (also known as Tiger Lake), Intel is looking to battle back quite strongly -- especially with the new Iris Xe graphics.

Today, Dynabook announces two new durable (MIL-STD-810G) Portégé laptops that are powered by these new Intel chips. Called "X30W-J" and "X30L-J," the former is a traditional clam shell, while the latter is a 2-in-1. Both lightweight laptops have 13.3-inch screens and can be configured with either a Core i5-1135G7 or i7-11-65G7 processor. The X30W-J can be had with up to 48GB RAM (wow), while the X30L-J is limited to 32GB. They both have high-end features like Thunderbolt 4 and Wi-Fi 6 (802.11ax) too.

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A third of companies are exposing unsafe network services to the internet

Network security

New research finds that 33 percent of companies within the digital supply chain expose common network services such as data storage, remote access and network administration to the internet.

The study from RiskRecon and the Cyentia Institute also finds that organizations that expose unsafe services to the internet exhibit more critical security findings.

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61 percent of companies experience insider attacks

insider threat

A new survey from Bitglass reveals that 61 percent of organizations reported at least one insider attack over the last 12 months, with 22 percent reporting at least six separate attacks.

With a whole range of changes happening at the moment securing against insider threats has become increasingly challenging. Most organizations say they can't guarantee that they can detect insider threats from personal devices (82 percent) or the cloud (50 percent), while 81 percent find it difficult to assess the impact of insider attacks.

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Microsoft is bringing the DirectStorage API to Windows 10 to speed up gaming

Game controller

Microsoft is taking steps to improve game performance in Windows 10 by implementing some of the Velocity Architecture used by the Xbox Series X.

Specifically, Microsoft is bringing the DirectStorage API to Windows 10 to help overcome NVMe bandwidth bottlenecks. With compatible hardware, the change will not only mean that games load faster, but also that graphics can be even more detailed.

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UK broadband among the slowest in Europe

Broadband

Analysis of over 557 million broadband speed tests worldwide has revealed that the UK now sits in 47th place, with an average speed of 37.82Mbps.

The research from Cable.co.uk puts the UK ahead of 174 countries, but behind 46 others, coming in behind 21 Western European countries. This puts the UK among the slowest in the region when it comes to average broadband speed, losing 13 places since the measurements were taken last year.

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Ubuntu Linux 20.10 Groovy Gorilla Beta is coming soon

The popular Ubuntu Linux gets two new versions a year, with one coming in April, and the other in October. Its version numbering scheme is based on year (YY), a period, and the month (MM). For instance, the most recent stable version was released this past April and it is numbered as 20.04. In addition, Canonical (the operating system's owner) assigns names -- sequentially and alphabetically. The alphanumeric code name is always based on two words starting with the same sequential letter -- an adjective followed by an animal name. The aforementioned 20.04 is named "Focal Fossa."

Obviously, the next version of Ubuntu will be numbered 20.10, and it will be given a two-word code name based on the letter "G." This time, the operating system will be called "Groovy Gorilla." Thankfully, development of the operating system seems to be on schedule, as it recently received a feature freeze. What does this mean? Essentially, moving forward, Ubuntu 20.10 should only receive bug fixes -- no more features will be introduced unless by exception. It also signals that the upcoming Beta release should be released on schedule as expected.

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Forget Microsoft's Surface Duo, Samsung's Galaxy Z Fold2 is the foldable smartphone you want -- if you can afford it

The launch of the original Galaxy Fold, Samsung’s revolutionary folding smartphone, was nothing short of a disaster with the company being forced to postpone things after models sent out to reviewers were found to be "problematic" and in need of design improvements. Pre-orders in the US even had to be cancelled, which didn’t go down at all well.

Samsung eventually fixed the problems and released the Fold, although problems remained. Today the South Korean tech giant announces a completely re-engineered successor, the Galaxy Z Fold2.

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Cut in TLS certificate life could lead to greater risk of outages

Magnified certificare

As of September 1st, all publicly trusted TLS certificates must have a lifespan of 398 days or less -- roughly half the previous life.

According to security experts from Venafi, a provider of machine identity management, this latest change is an indication that machine identity lifetimes will continue to shrink.

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COVID-19 accelerates cloud migration plans

Cloud growth arrow

More than half of respondents to a new survey are either accelerating their cloud adoption timeline or moving forward as planned during the COVID-19 pandemic, and this number goes up to 59 percent among respondents considering VMware Cloud on AWS.

The study from multi-cloud data service provider Faction finds that among those organizations where COVID-19 has paused or canceled cloud adoption, the top factors cited are budget pressures (75 percent) along with staffing shortages and macro-economic uncertainty (each named by 41 percent of respondents).

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Phishing attacks surge during the pandemic

Phishing

In yet another example of cybercriminals exploiting world events, the frequency of phishing threats has risen considerably since the start of the pandemic, with companies experiencing an average of 1,185 attacks every month.

New research from GreatHorn reveals that more than half (53 percent) of over 300 IT professionals surveyed by Cybersecurity Insiders say they had witnessed an increase in phishing activity since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

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