Today, global technology company Zoho unveiled its unified communications platform, Trident, and added new capabilities to its virtual office platform, Zoho Workplace.

Trident seeks to help businesses communicate and collaborate more efficiently across channels, reduce tool ambiguity and boost an organization’s digital adoption. The platform combines mail, messages, audio/video calls, calendar, tasks, and more into the same place. Additionally, Trident is Zoho’s first native desktop app for email and chat.

Zoho Workplace also now features a flexible and comprehensive business mail and cloud office suite, built on a common data model and unified through search and AI. 

“The goal of Zoho Workplace is to enable businesses to unify their work to a point where the line between apps disappears. It’s heartening to see so many new businesses join the Zoho family, using Zoho Workplace as their customizable center of gravity,” said Zoho Canada managing director, Chandrashekar LSP.

The company said that Zoho Workplace grew 30 per cent over the 2021-2022 period, and now has more than 16 million users, a growth that it attributes to the increasing demand for streamlined, cost-efficient solutions, as well as higher standards for user privacy. 

Privacy is one of the main reasons that the company runs its services on its own infrastructure operated by Zoho’s IT management division, ManageEngine, which recently opened two new data centres in Canada. 

Having made a promise in 2005 to never show ads or sell data, Zoho differs from large organizations who indulge in “perverted” privacy abuses and “treat any fines and penalties as cost of doing business, because they’ve already made billions,” stated LSP.

Migrations from Google, Microsoft, and from GoDaddy Workspace Email to Zoho Workplace doubled in 2022, the company boasted.

Other new capabilities launched:

Zoho Voice Platform is now a full phone system integrated directly within team collaboration app Zoho Cliq and web conferencing app Zoho Meeting. Employees can make direct line calls, send SMS messages, and pick up inbound calls across apps.
New AI-based grammar tool, BluePencil, that brings writing suggestions and a text editor that can be used on any third-party webpage.
Universal Drag and Drop seeks to help users save time when working across multiple workplace products
Mobile Device Management capabilities and OTP-restricted Emails to enhance security
TrueSync added to Zoho Workdrive for unlimited storage limits. TrueSync also replicates all WorkDrive files and folders on the desktop to enable users to switch between the cloud and computer. Files can be accessed and edited locally, without using up hard drive space.

Zoho Workplace is available in three editions: Standard is C$3.75 per user per month, Professional is C$7.50 per user per month and Zoho Mail is C$1.25 per user per month.

The post Zoho launches new unified communications platform first appeared on IT World Canada.

It’s time to start preparing your personal income tax return in Canada and the U.S. Just remember that crooks are preparing, too.

Researchers at Sophos said on Tuesday that they are seeing email messages to individuals pretending to be from the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA), claiming the person is entitled to a refund from the government. To collect, the individual is asked to create a CRA account. The message includes a link to a fake CRA website; the goal is to get personal information from victims.

There are several versions of the scam. One says recipients can sign up for an Interac e-transfer of funds.

Crooks hope victims will be fooled by the lure of money and copies of government logos. However, there are several clues messages like these are scams. In this scam

— neither the Canadian nor the American government will send a message that you are entitled to a refund;

— some messages are in fractured English. One, for example, asks recipients to deposit their money rather than withdraw it;

— smart people who hover their mouse over the link for signing into or creating an account will see it doesn’t go to a Government of Canada site. Often the link goes to a page created on Amazon Web Services (AWS).

— smart people who have enabled their email to show the sender’s full email address will see it obviously doesn’t come from the government. A hacker can make the sender’s name appear to be from any well-known agency, company or person. But the full email address will show the real sender.

There is a large number of tax scams aimed at American residents as well. These include phone, letter, or email messages claiming you owe taxes. They will demand that you pay the amount immediately, usually with a prepaid debit card or wire transfer. They may even threaten to arrest you if you don’t pay.

Click here for information from the U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) about identifying tax fraudsters.

Click here for advice from the Canada Revenue Agency. See also this page for details on CRA scams.

Be suspicious of any email, text, or phone call from anyone asking for personal information including your birthdate, credit or debit card number, bank account number, or Social Insurance/Social Security number. Crooks will claim they need these numbers from you to verify information.

If you call a government agency on your own — not using a phone number in an email or text — using personal information for verification is safe.

The post Income tax scams targeting Canadians – and Americans – have already started first appeared on IT World Canada.

A website used by Toyota suppliers is hacked, a ransomware gang partner pleads guilty and more.

Welcome to Cyber Security Today. It’s Wednesday, February 8th, 2023. I’m Howard Solomon, contributing reporter on cybersecurity for ITWorldCanada.com and TechNewsday.com in the U.S.

 
Threat actors are expected to focus this year on compromising supply chains, bypassing multifactor authentication (MFA) and taking advantage of misconfigured APIs. That’s the prediction of analysts at the NCC Group in their annual Threat Monitor Report. Ransomware attacks were down slightly in 2022, the report says. But, it also warns ransomware gangs are effective in finding new ways to squeeze victims.

Speaking of ransomware and supply chains, last week I told you about a ransomware attack on a British-based company, ION Group, that makes applications for banks and financial trading firms. The latest news is a claim by the LockBit ransomware gang that a “very rich unknown philanthropist” paid the ransom demand. Evidence of that, perhaps, is that ION Group’s name has been removed from the gang’s data leak site, says CPO Magazine. The unit of ION Group that was hit supplies solutions for the financial derivatives market. According to the news story, derivative trading has suffered long delays in processing transactions since the attack.

More on supply chain attacks: Supply chains are companies that link to your company’s IT systems. Hack one and access is gained to many other companies. It’s not necessarily hard. This week a security researcher for a company called Eaton Works revealed they were able to hack into the web portal used by Toyota’s parts suppliers. They did it after discovering four critical vulnerabilities. One was a backdoor login mechanism that allowed anyone to log in as a corporate Toyota employee or supplier by just knowing their email address. After finding a system administrator’s email address the researcher was able to log in and take over full control of the entire system. That included access to Toyota projects and accounts of the car maker’s suppliers, such as tire-makers Michelin and Continental, systems supplier Magna and other big-name firms. This is another reason why cybersecurity is every company’s responsibility — and why web designers have to take security more seriously. The researcher found the holes in October and notified Toyota, which quickly plugged them. News was released only this week.

Attention application and web developers: The OpenSSL Project has released a major security update. It closes eight security flaws threat actors can take advantage of. Developers using OpenSSL for secure communications in their applications or websites need to install the update fast.

A Russian man is facing sentencing in the United States after pleading guilty to laundering cryptocurrency received from victim companies hit by the Ryuk ransomware gang. The man was extradited to the U.S. last year after being arrested in Amsterdam in 2021. According to the U.S. Justice Department, the man was one of several who laundered ransom funds through multiple financial transactions. He faces prison time of up to 20 years.

Here are a few consumer-related cybersecurity news items:

It’s time to start preparing your income tax in Canada and the U.S. Crooks are preparing, too. Researchers at Sophos this week tweeted about seeing email messages to individuals pretending to be from the Canada Revenue Agency. The messages claim you are owed a refund. To collect you have to create a CRA account. Smart people who hover their mouse over the link for signing into or creating an account will see it doesn’t go to a Government of Canada site. This is a warning that governments don’t send messages like this. Another tip: The sender’s full email address obviously doesn’t come from the government. For more about protecting yourself against CRA fraud see this article.

Crooks are also sending fake package delivery notices to Canadians. This takes advantage of the fact that many people are expecting packages after making online purchases. City-TV News reports a Toronto-area woman recently received a text supposedly from Canada Post saying it couldn’t deliver a package to her. It needed a debit card payment of $1.25 to reschedule the delivery, plus her date of birth. No legitimate delivery service will demand a delivery fee or your date of birth.

With the Super Bowl coming this Sunday there’s another reminder that crooks will try to take advantage of the event. Researchers at Synopsys looked at 10 popular Android sports and betting apps and found a number have vulnerabilities, including outdated open-source components. These apps aren’t necessarily suspicious. Their developers may be lazy. But these apps are risky. Before you put money down, be sure what you’re betting on.

Valentine’s Day, which is next Tuesday, is another event crooks try to take advantage of through dating apps. The FBI this week warned people that criminals use personal information for fraud and romance scams. The goal is to steal either personal information that can be used for credit card or bank theft, or to get victims to send them money. Beware of meeting people online who promise to meet you in person but give excuses why they can’t. Beware of people you meet online and then ask for money. Take things slow with people you meet online and ask a lot of questions.

Follow Cyber Security Today on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts or add us to your Flash Briefing on your smart speaker.

The post Cyber Security Today, Feb. 8, 2023 – Toyota supplier website hacked, ransomware gang partner pleads guilty and more first appeared on IT World Canada.

More than half of cyberattacks will not be prevented by zero trust, 2,400 VMware servers hit in a ransomware attack, and a new app to fight digital amnesia.

Welcome to Hashtag Trending – today’s top tech news stories for Wednesday, February 8, 2023.

Zero trust is an emerging concept in cybersecurity that promises to reduce threats and make successful attacks less damaging. At its essence, zero trust takes the point of view that all network activity is untrusted until proven otherwise.

It calls for strict verification and authentication of all devices, users, and services trying to access an organization’s network, regardless of whether they are inside or outside the network perimeter. 

The idea behind zero trust is to minimize the risk of data breaches and unauthorized access to sensitive information by constantly verifying the trustworthiness of entities accessing the network.

As companies try to survive in what feels like a continual cyber war, hopes for zero-trust architectures as a solution remain high. A report published by Microsoft in 2021 found that 96 per cent of security leaders considered zero trust as critical to their success. Indeed, all large enterprises have some sort of zero-trust project going on.

But according to industry experts at Gartner, only one per cent of organizations have a mature security model that can be qualified as zero trust and by 2026, this will only go up to 10 per cent. By that time, more than half of cyber threats will target vulnerabilities that zero trust doesn’t even cover, given the ever-growing enterprise attack surface and the creativity of attackers.

Despite the abysmal projections of success in adopting zero trust hopes for this security architecture remain high.  A report published by Microsoft in 2021 found that 96 per cent of security leaders considered zero trust as critical to their success.

But while companies struggle with adoption, attackers look to target areas not well covered by zero trust programs, such as public-facing APIs, social engineering, or vulnerabilities created by employees trying to bypass stringent zero-trust policies.

Gartner acknowledges that zero trust is no panacea. It may not stop all attacks but it can reduce the risk and limit the impact of an attack.

Gartner calls on CISOs to develop an effective zero trust strategy, to secure their most critical assets and run continuous threat exposure management and look to areas outside the scope of zero trust architectures.

Source: CPO Magazine and Data Center Knowledge

More than 2,400 VMware servers were hit worldwide with a ransomware campaign over the weekend. VMware has more than 400,000 customers, and according to analysts, 80 per cent of virtualized workloads run on VMware technology.

Reportedly, the ransomware targeted a two-year-old vulnerability in VMware’s popular ESXi machines.

According to Reuters, the largest number of affected servers is in France, followed by the U.S. and Germany. Regardless of location, companies who use VMware and who have not yet applied the necessary updates, should immediately patch their systems.

Virtualization and cloud migration has the promise of improved security, but this ransomware attack showed that the best security still requires that administrators properly keep their software up to date by applying the latest upgrades and software patches.  

Source: Axios and Reuters

Microsoft’s Outlook.com has recovered after a major outage that began late Monday night. Users in North America were the ones who were primarily affected. Outlook.com covers approximately three per cent of global email traffic.

The company said at the time of the outage that it identified a recent change that may be causing issues with send, receive, or email search within Outlook.com, but later revealed that functions such as Calendar were also impacted, which in turn affected products such as Microsoft Teams.

All services were recovered late afternoon yesterday and Microsoft identified the root cause as a “subset of infrastructure responsible for routing traffic that unexpectedly stopped responding to traffic requests.”  

Source: IT World Canada

A Synergy Research Group report detailed the revenue growth rate for global cloud infrastructure services spanning the three-month period ending Dec.31, 2021 

It shows a slowing cloud sector with Microsoft, AWS and Google Cloud taking the top three spots as market leaders – not much of a surprise.

But what was a surprise was Microsoft gaining ground over AWS – that did raise some eyebrows. 

As a matter of fact, Microsoft had 23 per cent of the market share a gain of two percentage points from the previous two quarters. In contrast AWS’ share was 33 per cent, down one percentage point from the prior quarter.

All three leading companies are reporting dips in revenue from the slowdown in the cloud sector. 

“Pandemic restrictions in China, the strength of the dollar as well as increasingly cost-conscious consumers are to blame,” according to John Dinsdale, chief analyst at Synergy Research Group.

Source: CIO Dive

Smartphones have reduced the need to remember things, like phone numbers, directions to get to various places or your shopping list. If you forget it, you can google it. An epidemic of poor concentration and divided attention also comes along with cell phone use.  

For many of us, cameras have become memory replacement. I can’t be the only one who takes a picture of his car to remember where I parked in a large underground facility. 

All of this has led researchers to claim that smartphone use is increasingly linked to decreased memory skills.

But University of Toronto researchers might have a fix for us. Meet the HippoCamera app.

With this app, instead of randomly taking photos throughout the day, you choose one event that you are going to document, you record the event and the scene on video and explain, in an audio, why this is important to you. Later, the app combines the audio and video and then prompts you to watch and listen, which helps you form a stronger memory.

“We’re trying to mimic how the hippocampus stores memories. So it’s not about trying to capture beautiful photos or beautiful videos, it’s about making a memory cue.”  That’s according to Morgan Barense, one of the researchers.

The HippoCamera isn’t available for download yet, but you can sign up for an email notification once it’s released – if you remember. 

Source: Toronto Star

And that’s the top tech stories for today.  Hashtag Trending is produced by the ITWC podcast network and is heard Monday to Friday with a special weekend edition hosted by me where we feature interviews on key subjects in technology.

Follow us on Apple Podcasts, Google, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.  

If you follow stories about cybersecurity, why not check out our sister podcast CyberSecurityToday.

You can find all our podcasts and the text versions as well as more in-depth coverage itworldcanada.com  and on technewsday.com in the US. You can also find instructions on how to get us on your smart speaker.

I’m Jim Love – talk to you tomorrow with the top tech news stories on Hashtag Trending.

The post Hashtag Trending Feb.8th-Most cyberattacks not prevented by zero trust; VMware servers hit; new app to fight digital amnesia first appeared on IT World Canada.

Want to stop hackers from using phishing as leverage to get into your IT environment? Start using phishing-resistant multifactor authenticators such as hardware keys and identity verification cards.

That’s the advice of the U.S. National Institute for Standards in Technology (NIST).

“Not every transaction requires phishing resistant-authenticators,” the agency said in a blog last week. “However, for applications that protect sensitive information (such as health information or confidential client data), or for users that have elevated privileges (such as admins or security personnel) organizations should be enforcing, or at least offering, phishing-resistant authenticators.”

These tools are often easier, faster, and more convenient than the multifactor authentication procedures – such as text-based SMS codes – that employees may currently be using, the agency added.

What’s a phishing-resistant authenticator? Anything that doesn’t let an attacker use phishing to get an authenticator — like an MFA code — that goes along with users’ credentials for accessing IT systems or facilities.

That’s because threat actors are increasingly finding ways to trick employees into accidentally giving up their codes. One trick is getting victims to unwittingly install malware allowing a man-in-the-middle attack to steal the authentication code. The attacker  pretends in an email to be an IT staffer with a password verification app the employee has to download. An important part of the scheme is creating a web page that looks like it was created by the employer where the app is to be downloaded. The app intercepts the employee’s username, password and authenticator code.

One of the most common examples of a phishing-resistant authenticator is the Personal Identity Verification (PIV) card used by government employees and contractors. The card has a user’s photo and biometric information like a fingerprint that are protected with public-key cryptography. Insert the card in a reader and access is granted.

Commercial examples of phishing-resistant authenticators are USB, Bluetooth or NFC-based hardware keys like the YubiKey, Google Titan key and others for multi-factor authentication. These use the FIDO Alliance U2F Open authentication standard. As a physical key, there is nothing an attacker can intercept. The user inserts the key into a USB slot on the registered device (or the device is wirelessly recognized) and then presses a button on the key — or use the included fingerprint reader — for authentication.

Any phishing-resistant authenticators must address these attack vectors associated with phishing, says NIST:

Impersonated websites – Phishing-resistant authenticators prevent the use of authenticators at illegitimate websites (known as verifiers) through multiple cryptographic measures. This is achieved through the establishment of authenticated protected channels for communications and methods to restrict the context of an authenticator’s use. For example, this may be achieved through name binding – where an authenticator is only valid for a specific domain (I can only use this for one website). It may also be achieved through binding to a communication channel – such as in client authenticated TLS (I can only use this over a specific connection).
Attacker-in-the Middle – Phishing-resistant authenticators prevent an attacker-in-the-middle from capturing authentication data from the user and relaying it to the relying website. This is achieved through cryptographic measures, such as leveraging an authenticated protected channel for the exchange of information and digitally signing authentication data and messages.
User Entry – Phishing-resistant authenticators eliminate the need for a user to type or manually input authentication data over the internet. This is achieved through the use of cryptographic keys for authentication that are unlocked locally through a biometric or PIN. No user-entered information is exchanged between the relying website and the authenticator itself.
Replay – Phishing-resistant authenticators prevent attackers from using captured authentication data at a later point in time. Supporting cryptographic controls for restricting context and preventing attacker-in-the-middle scenarios also prevent replay attacks, particularly digitally signed and time-stamped authentication and message data.

Phishing-resistant authenticators are a critical tool in personal and enterprise security that should be embraced, says NIST. “They are not,” the blog adds, “a silver bullet. Phishing-resistant authenticators only address one focus of phishing attacks – the compromise and re-use of authenticators such as passwords and one-time passcodes. They do not mitigate phishing attempts that may have alternative goals such as installing malware or compromising personal information to be used elsewhere.

“Phishing resistant authenticators should be paired with a comprehensive phishing prevention program that includes user awareness and training, email protection controls, data loss prevention tools, and network security capabilities.”

The post Use these phishing-resistant authenticators, says NIST first appeared on IT World Canada.

Another Canadian hospital has been hit by a cyber attack, the second in three months.

Ross Memorial Hospital in the eastern Ontario community of Lindsay, Ont., said in a statement today that, on the evening of Sunday, Feb. 5, it had to declare an IT emergency — called a Code Grey — because of a “suspected cyber incident.”

“The hospital has retained third-party cybersecurity resources to work with our technical experts to investigate the incident according to industry best practices,” the statement said. “Our systems restoration plan is also ongoing, and we are communicating with our local, regional, and provincial partners regarding next steps.”

In the meantime, it is trying to maintain delivery of critical hospital services. But patients with less urgent conditions are encouraged to consider alternate options for care, such as their primary health care provider, pharmacist, after-hours clinic, virtual care, or by calling the Telehealth Ontario line. After-hours clinics can often treat non-urgent and minor illnesses and ailments, such as earaches, sore throats, or provide prescription refills, the statement says.

The hospital is part of the Central East Local Health Integration Network in the Kawartha Lakes district. It serves an area with 100,000 residents. Lindsay is the largest community in the City of Kawartha Lakes.

A local news service, Kawartha411, calls the incident a suspected ransomware attack. People in the hospital’s emergency ward told it hospital staff can’t access the systems needed for treatment, while visitors and patients can’t use the parking machines.

The attack on Ross Memorial follows the December ransomware attack on Toronto’s Hospital for Sick Children. The LockBit gang apologized for that attack, saying its affiliates aren’t allowed to go after hospitals and certain critical infrastructure, and sent the hospital a data decryptor.

Last November, an expert panel on cybersecurity warned the provincial government that some parts of Ontario’s broader public sector — which includes hospitals — struggle to keep their IT systems secure.

Its report noted that the provincial health ministry has established six Regional Security Operation Center (RSOC) pilots for co-ordinated cybersecurity operations.

The post Ontario hospital recovering IT systems after cyber incident first appeared on IT World Canada.

Coffee Briefings are timely deliveries of the latest ITWC headlines, interviews, and podcasts. Today’s Coffee Briefing is delivered by IT World Canada’s editorial team!

Missed last week’s Coffee Briefing? We’ve got you covered.

What’s new this week

Galaxy Broadband to deliver OneWeb’s LEO satellite services across Canada

Ontario-based satellite service company Galaxy Broadband has announced a US$50 million multi-year deal to deliver OneWeb‘s low Earth orbit (LEO) connectivity solutions to Canada, including a new Internet service to Nunavut.

OneWeb is a communications company based in London, UK that provides broadband satellite internet services.

This partnership aims to connect and support the digital transformation of the remotest Canadian enterprises, communities, and governments by giving them high-speed internet access.

“Access to broadband internet is an essential service that supports education, healthcare, commerce and general well-being,” said Rick Hodgkinson, founder of Galaxy Broadband. “There are numerous communities throughout Canada that do not have access to broadband internet, with the challenge in Nunavut being particularly acute, as the territory is 100 per cent dependent on satellite connectivity services.”  

Hodgkinson added that Galaxy’s roll-out of OneWeb services is underway, with a target to have all 25 communities in Nunavut connected by the end of 2023.

Galaxy Broadband has already deployed to over 75 locations throughout Canada, connecting from 30 to 800 users at each site.

Staples and Bell announce multi-year partnership

Starting late spring 2023, customers can shop for Bell, Virgin Plus, and Lucky Mobile products and services at in-store kiosks within Staples locations, staffed by Staples sales associates. 

“We are pleased to partner with Bell, bringing together two exceptional Canadian brands to support consumers and businesses across the country,” said David Boone, chief executive officer of Staples Canada. “In working together, we will strengthen and grow our product and services offering, creating game changing value and convenience for consumers and businesses.”

Mobility services will be available in 300 Staples locations across Canada, while internet, TV and phone services will be available in the majority of Staples locations within Bell’s wireline footprint.

As a result of this partnership, Staples will hire 800 full-and part-time employees across Canada to sell Bell’s communication services.

Additionally, Staples and Bell will partner to sell Bell wireless and wireline services directly to small and medium businesses through the Staples professional sales team, backed by Bell’s communications team.

UST acquires Prodigy Labs

California-based provider of digital transformation solutions UST has acquired IT consulting and staffing firm TCB Corporation, a Toronto-based technology service company that operates under the name of Prodigy Labs.

Part of a deal with Prodigy Ventures Inc., worth up to C$12.5 million, this partnership seeks to capitalize on Prodigy Labs’ experience in helping financial services firms drive digital transformation campaigns in order to strengthen UST’s position in the financial sector. UST also aims to expand its presence in the Canadian market with this acquisition.

“The Canadian financial sector is evolving in a number of exciting ways, and the acquisition of Prodigy Labs will position UST for long term success in a growing market,” said Mehmet Pasa, general manager for Banking and Payments of UST. “Adding the cutting-edge solutions developed by Prodigy Labs will enhance UST’s services portfolio, improving our ability to deliver end-to-end digital transformation in the financial services industry.” 

VentureLAB announces 5th Hardware Catalyst Initiative Cohort

Markham-based tech hub VentureLAB has announced the 5th Cohort of the Hardware Catalyst Initiative.

The Hardware Catalyst Initiative is an intensive two-year incubator program funded partly by the Federal Economic Development Agency for Southern Ontario (FedDev Ontario) to support companies involved in the development of hardware and semiconductor-focused products and services.

The companies in the program’s Cohort 5 are Whenergy, Studio 1 Labs, Daanaa, Reeddi, McGuire Aero Propulsion Solutions (MAPS), AIM Colours, AfimaCheck, AiimSense, Pocket Clinic, Attest Laboratories, and Neoglacia.

The companies made it into Cohort 5 following a competitive selection process, as well as participating in the Hardware Catalyst Initiative bootcamp, aimed at helping applicants to map out their expected client journey and coordinate with the founders, ventureLAB team, and partners.

The program’s pillars are geared towards raising capital, retaining talent, commercializing technology and IP (intellectual property), and customer acquisition.

Montreal firm acquires CompuOffice Software Inc.

Montreal-based Equisoft, an insurance and investment software solutions provider, has acquired Canadian tech firm CompuOffice Software, Inc. 

With this acquisition, Equisoft seeks to enhance its end-to-end advisor technology capabilities by leveraging CompuOffice’s suite of products as well as its deep market penetration in Canada

Equisoft will integrate CompuOffice’s ecosystem, including 28 Canadian insurance carriers, more than 50 specialized insurance agents, and thousands of new advisors into its own, to create a strong network in Canadian insurance distribution.

Equisoft also seeks to add CompuOffice’s LifeGuide product, which collects product data from every Canadian carrier, to the Equisoft/connect CRM tool, to create an integrated and seamless experience for advisors.

“We have always recognized and valued the contributions and support of carriers and our subscribers resulting in a mutual benefit to us all,” said CompuOffice chief executive officer, Joey Strasberg. “We are pleased to have found a company that shares our vision and our mission to continue to enhance the capabilities of all stakeholders in the Canadian life and annuities industry.”

More to explore

New CIOCAN chapter in Atlantic Canada to hold debut event Wednesday

Anyone who visits the website of the CIO Association of Canada (CIOCAN) today and lands on the page enumerating the group’s various chapters will notice a key region of the country missing.

Rogers confident to face increased competition after robust Q4 earnings

Last week, Rogers announced its fourth quarter earnings, reporting a 25 per cent increase in net income to C$508 million, up from C$405 million in the same quarter a year earlier.

Samsung unpacks new devices

Samsung yesterday unveiled the latest in its Galaxy flagship phones, a trio known as the Galaxy S23 series, all available for pre-order now, and for purchase in stores on Feb. 17.

Dell to cut 6,650 jobs as PC market faces unprecedented decline

Dell is slashing 6,650 jobs, or about five per cent of its workforce, as it faces plunging demand for PCs and economic uncertainty, the company announced in a regulatory filing, seen by news site Bloomberg.

Microsoft to permanently disable Internet Explorer on Windows 10 on Feb. 14

On Feb. 14, an update to Microsoft Edge will permanently disable the desktop version of the company’s long-retired browser, Internet Explorer 11 (IE11), on most versions of Windows 10, according to an updated FAQ. The change, Microsoft says, will not be reversible, and any calls to IE11 will be redirected to Microsoft Edge, which includes an IE mode.

Cyber attacks work because CISOs don’t do basic security: Microsoft

Infosec leaders are still behind in cybersecurity basics, leaving their organizations unnecessarily open to attacks, says the vice-president of Microsoft Security.

D&H Canada reports growth last year in the double digits

D&H Canada, a provider of SMB, mid-market, and consumer technologies to the channel, said yesterday it has “kicked-off 2023 building on double-digit year-over-year (YOY) growth of between 20 and 40 per cent in key focus areas.”

Customer database of Canadian mortgage broker left open on internet

A Canadian mortgage broker’s database containing personal information on thousands of people was left open on the internet, according to security researchers.

Channel Bytes February 3, 2023 – SAP layoffs; Aptum earns Azure Expert MSP status; Broadvoice names VP of channel; and more

Staying informed is a constant challenge. There’s so much to do, and so little time. But we have you covered. Grab a coffee and take five while you nibble on these tidbits.

Listen to the latest episode of Hashtag Trending

Hashtag Trending Feb. 7-Google reveals AI projects, including a chatbot, surge in supply chain attacks and fake news on Twitter

Listen to the latest episode of Cybersecurity Today

Cyber Security Today, Feb. 6, 2023 – Ransomware is targeting VMware’s hypervisor, hospitals are attacked and more

Listen to the latest episode of Hashtag Tendances

If you live in Québec, or prefer to consume the latest technology news in French, our sister publication Direction Informatique has you covered. Follow them on Twitter as well.

The post Coffee Briefing Feb. 7 – Galaxy Broadband to deliver LEO satellite services, Bell and Staples partner; VentureLAB announces 5th cohort of Hardware Catalyst Initiative; and more first appeared on IT World Canada.

Microsoft Outlook.com is slowly recovering after a major outage that began late last night. Microsoft’s status page said at the time, “we’ve identified a recent change that may be causing issues with send, receive, or email search within Outlook.com. We’re working to identify the next steps to restore access to the service.”

Shortly thereafter, the company reported that users in North America were primarily affected, and that it was “working to restart portions of the affected infrastructure”. Its next update revealed that functions such as Calendar were also impacted, which in turn affected products such as Microsoft Teams.

As of 9:30 a.m. EST, Microsoft said, “we can see from telemetry that the majority of impact has been remediated, with service availability at 99.9 per cent. We’re continuing to monitor the environment and perform targeted restarts on back-end mailbox components which show residual impact to ensure recovery for all users.” However, as of 10:30 a.m., Downdetector was still reporting outages.

Source: Downdetector.com

We will update this story as more details become available.

The post Microsoft suffers Outlook.com outage first appeared on IT World Canada.

Google jumps on the conversational AI frenzy, software supply chain attacks surge, and
an Ohio study finds Reddit’s readers favour stories that are more accurate, while Twitter
users seem to prefer fake news.

Welcome to Hashtag Trending – today’s top tech news stories for Tuesday, February 7,
2023.

Google issued a code red last week to boost the company’s AI strategy following
Microsoft’s C$10 billion investment in the chatbot, ChatGPT.

Google desperately needs to take a bite out of the buzz surrounding conversational AI
technology, driven by OpenAI’s ChatGPT and its wild popularity. The tech giant
announced three AI-related projects, including Bard, a conversational system
conceptually similar to ChatGPT and based on Google's LaMDA large language model,
trained on dialogue to allow free-flowing, open-ended conversations. Google also
announced plans to integrate LaMDA alongside search results to help offer a narrative
response to queries that do not have one clear answer. Finally, Google will develop
APIs that will allow users to dive into its large language model, starting with LaMDA.

These announcements though potentially visionary, still seem timid and almost late to
the game, given how OpenAI confidently leapfrogged Google, ironically, by using the
very technology that Google pioneered.

Up until now Google has been cautious, despite pressures to move fast. There have in
the past been embarrassing episodes with AI. Microsoft pulled an earlier experiment with
a twitter bot called Tay when the programming gave some very disturbing misogynist
and racist remarks it apparently learned from Twitter users.

TechCrunch suggests that Google will likely record conversations with users “to make
sure Bard’s responses meet a high bar for quality, safety, and groundedness in real-
world information.”

As big companies tread lightly, smaller AI companies, with a clean slate and lower
accountability are gaining traction. Investors are flocking to AI stocks following
ChatGPT’s viral success. Software firm C3.ai rose 11 per cent, analytics firm BigBear.ai
jumped nearly 21 per cent and conversational artificial intelligence company
SoundHound surged 40 per cent In recent trading.

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Gartner expects that by 2025, 45 per cent of organizations globally will have
experienced a software supply chain attack, a three-fold jump from 2021.

The historic SolarWinds hack in 2020, put supply chain attacks at the forefront of
security conversations, but today the threat is at an all-time high.

The thing with these attacks is that, when one system is hit, a chain of customers and
organizations linked to it get compromised, making it extremely lucrative and more
damaging than any other type of cyberattack.

Plus the definition of supply chain attacks is no longer limited to malware being injected
into a compiled object or deliverable, but also into the tooling used to build them, as
seen with recent attacks on code repositories like GitHub.

Fairly or not, open source software has taken a real hit to its reputation as a result.

But there are some organizations attempting to fight back.

Neatsun Ziv, CEO of startup Ox Security, launched OSC&R (Open Software Supply
Chain Attack Reference) to give enterprises a common framework, language and tools
to measure the risk to supply chains, understand attack tactics and track threat group
behavior.

The framework encompasses 9 key areas including and outlines the techniques and
processes used by attackers, from initial access to defense evasion.

Supply chain security vendor Chainguard and CISA have also taken steps to address
growing supply chain attacks.

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Dell Technologies has slashed 6,650 jobs as it faces plummeting sales of PCs.

The company announced the shakeup in a blog post yesterday, saying that impacted
employees will hear from their leaders and that they will receive support as they
transition to their next opportunities.

It is not clear yet which departments have been impacted, nor the extent of support that
laid off employees will receive.

Among major companies, Dell has been suffering the most with the slump in the PC
market, facing a 37 per cent decline in sales in 2022.

In comparison, rival HP saw a 29 per cent decrease in sales and announced plans to
lay off 4000-6000 workers in November of last year.

Dell’s round of layoffs are just more bad news for the the tens of thousands of
employees that have been affected by the spate of big tech layoffs.

_______________

Samsung Electronics has shifted production of its Galaxy S23 flagship smartphone and
other high-end models to India, despite fierce competition from Chinese manufacturers.

Samsung is another of a increasing number of high tech companies moving from China
to India and that strategy appears to be paying off, not only by appeasing a US market
increasingly suspicious of, or reluctant to buy, Chinese technology.

In the 24 hours after the launch of Samsung Galaxy S23 series, Raju Pullan, the
country’s president of Samsung’s mobile business, said the company got orders for
about 140,000 devices for around 14 billion rupees or $169 million USD.

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The post Hashtag Trending Feb. 7-Google reveals AI projects, including a chatbot, surge in supply chain attacks and fake news on Twitter first appeared on IT World Canada.

On Feb. 14, an update to Microsoft Edge will permanently disable the desktop version of the company’s long-retired browser, Internet Explorer 11 (IE11), on most versions of Windows 10, according to an updated FAQ. The change, Microsoft says, will not be reversible, and any calls to IE11 will be redirected to Microsoft Edge, which includes an IE mode.

There are a few exceptions. The FAQ says that the IE11 desktop application remains in-support on these products:

Windows 8.1 (note: Microsoft Edge version 109 will be the last supported version on Window 8.1
Windows 7 Extended Security Updates (ESU) (note: Microsoft Edge version 109 will be the last supported version on Windows 7)
Windows Server Semi-Annual Channel (SAC) (all versions)
Windows 10 IoT Long-Term Servicing Channel (LTSC) (all versions)
Windows Server 2022
Windows 10 Enterprise LTSC 2021
Windows Server LTSC (all versions)
Windows 10 client LTSC (all versions)
Windows 10 China Government Edition

In addition, Internet Explorer mode in Microsoft Edge, and Internet Explorer platform (MSHTML/Trident), including WebOC and COM automation, will continue to be supported.

What Microsoft refers to as “IE11 visual references”, such as icons on the Start Menu and taskbar, will be removed in the June 2023 Windows security update. However, the company warns users not to uninstall IE11, since its functionality is needed for Microsoft Edge IE mode.

The FAQ cautions, “If your organization still has dependencies on IE11, you must take steps now to complete your transition before February 14, 2023, or risk business disruption at scale when users lose access to IE11 dependent applications.”

And, it adds, “If your organization has legacy browser dependencies, you’ll need to set up IE mode in Microsoft Edge before upgrading to Windows 11 to avoid business disruption.”

It advises companies needing help in the transition to either open a support ticket for assistance with technical issues, or request help from the Microsoft App Assure team for app compatibility issues.

The post Microsoft to permanently disable Internet Explorer on Windows 10 on Feb. 14 first appeared on IT World Canada.