While a great deal of news articles, white papers, and security solutions are focused on 0-days and vulnerabilities, the core vulnerability of all of our information technology is people. Our entire tech stack makes it easy for users to make mistakes because the fundamental problem is that there is no good way to authenticate anyone or anything online. In 1993, a comic in the New Yorker famously said, "On the Internet, nobody knows you’re a dog", and not much has changed in 28 years.

One of the key ways attackers get an initial foothold into organizations is by tricking users to compromise themselves, often using brand impersonation. A recent study stated that there were 88 instances where malicious mobile apps attempted to impersonate TikTok. The reason, people share TikTok videos, it’s immensely popular, and it has a trusted brand-name, so people feel safe.

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While the past 18 months or so have focused on providing business continuity in the midst of a crisis, the next year is set to bring another shift. As organizations around the world gear up to return the office -- at least in a hybrid capacity -- businesses need to make a seminal decision: should they go back to old ways of working? Or can firms take this opportunity to fundamentally review their practices and reduce the inevitable complications that have arisen throughout the pandemic?

Given that firms have experienced some teething problems implementing new approaches, I would urge organizations to take the latter course. In a world where workplace communication between customers and colleagues is becoming increasingly frayed, now is the perfect time for businesses to rethink whether their chosen solutions fit their needs.

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Windows 11 is currently rolling out to users with compatible hardware, but if you don't want to wait you can jump the queue. You can even install it on PCs without the TPM 2.0 requirement using this hack. Although it’s early days, a number of users have reported problems with the OS, which is to be expected.

If you upgrade to Windows 11 and encounter problems -- or decide it’s simply not for you -- you might want to go back to Windows 10, and wait until the new OS is a bit less buggy. The process is straightforward enough, although there are some downsides to be aware of.

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A new survey of over 700 small and medium businesses shows that 80 percent say they feel more secure now than they did last year in spite of increasing levels of cyberattacks.

The study from network security specialist Untangle shows security budgets increasing over 2020 levels too.

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The switch to remote and hybrid working has seen 76 percent of enterprises report increased use of Apple devices, according to a new study from device management company Kandji.

Mac notebook computer use is up the most with a 63 percent reported increase. Additionally, over half (53 percent) of respondents report that requests for Apple devices have increased in the past two years, and far more report bigger increases in requests for Apple (42 percent) than any other device (11 percent).

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Research Vice President with analyst firm Gartner has said that Windows 11 could have been released as a feature update for Windows 10 rather than a whole new version of the operating system.

While Stephen Kleynhans praises the removal of Internet Explorer, the addition of Android support and welcomes what he describes as an "overdue facelift", he feels that releasing this as an upgrade rather than just an update is simple marketing by Microsoft. He also advises business and enterprise uses against rushing into adopting Windows 11 and predicts low usage numbers even by 2023.

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As more data moves to the cloud, platforms like AWS are becoming an increasingly attractive target for ransomware operators.

A new study by cloud infrastructure company Ermetic finds that 70 percent of environments studied had machines that were publicly exposed to the internet and were linked to identities whose permissions could be exploited to allow the machines to perform ransomware.

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A browser-based endpoint solution created to address the unique threats imposed by the hybrid workforce and designed with employee experience in mind is being launched today by Talon Cyber Security.

TalonWork can be deployed across the organization in less than an hour, allowing security leaders to make the browser their first line of defense with minimum complexity, cost and without additional hardware.

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Windows 11 is here! Well, it is for some people. If you’re currently running Windows 10 and you navigate to Settings > Update & Security > Windows Update, you’ll have already verified whether your PC meets the system requirements to receive the update.

Assuming it passes muster, Microsoft would like you to wait for the update to be offered to you. But what if you can’t wait, or want to use the opportunity to create a clean install of Windows 11? What options are available to you?

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A new survey from automation platform Ivanti reveals that 71 percent of IT and security professionals find patching to be overly complex, cumbersome, and time consuming.

In addition 57 percent of respondents say that remote work has increased the complexity and scale of patch management.

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Reports are coming in about a strange bug in Windows 11 that results in the Windows 10 taskbar being displayed instead of the updated versions. The same issue was reported by Windows Insiders in the build up to the launch of Windows 11, and it seems that Microsoft has not been able to get things fixed.

In addition to problems with the old taskbar showing up, users are also reporting that the Start menu is not working. Microsoft is yet to acknowledge the problems, but workarounds have been uncovered.

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With Windows 11 now publicly available the time has come for problems to start surfacing. We have already had reports of reduced performance in games as well as File Explorer using large amounts of memory; now AMD has issued a warning that Windows 11 users with certain processors can expect reduced performance.

The chipmaker has provided information about "known performance impacts reported on Windows 11 when running compatible AMD processors on certain applications". Affected processors include Ryzen 3, 5, 7, 9 and Threadripper (plus Pro variants), and the impact means that performance is reduced by as much as 15 percent.

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Windows 11 is officially here, but not all new Windows computers will ship with that version of Microsoft's desktop operating system. Understandably, for a little while at least, some machines will still come with Windows 10... they will have the ability to upgrade to Windows 11, however.

Today, ADATA unveils such a laptop under its XPG gaming brand. Called "XENIA 15 KC," it comes with Windows 10 Home, but you can absolutely install Windows 11 when you want to. This gaming notebook is downright drool-worthy. It is powered by a very modern 8-core Intel Core i7 11800H CPU and super-powerful NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 GPU. The other components are impressive as well, including 32GB of DDR4-3200MHz RAM, a 1TB PCIe 4.0 SSD, RGB optical mechanical keyboard, and a 15.6-inch display with 165Hz refresh. It's a beast!

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UK businesses faced a new cyberattack every 47 seconds over the summer as the volume of attempts to breach their systems online increased following an earlier slowdown.

Analysis of commercial internet traffic from business ISP Beaming shows that the attack rate increased by four percent between July and September, having fallen in the second quarter.

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Recent trends such as cloud, open-source software and low-code platforms have led to radical changes in the role of developers.

But what exactly is the effect of these changes and how can development teams prepare for them and take advantage of the opportunities they offer? We spoke to Bob Quillin, chief ecosystem officer at modernization platform vFunction, to find out.

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