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Microsoft Security Intelligence Report Volume 8

The Microsoft Security Intelligence Report (SIR) is a comprehensive and wide-ranging study of the evolving threat landscape, and addresses such topics as software vulnerability disclosures and exploits, malicious software (malware), and potentially unwanted software.

Volume 8 of the Security Intelligence Report (SIR v8) covers July 2009 through December 2009. It includes data derived from more than 500 million computers worldwide, each running Windows. It also draws data from some of the busiest services on the Internet, such as Windows Live Hotmail and Bing.

In this volume, the analysis is from the perspective of the three Microsoft Trustworthy Computing Security Centers in addition to several Microsoft product groups.

via microsoft.com

Microsoft has released volume 8 of their Security Intelligence Report. 248 pages of in-depth information about malware, spam, malicious Web sites, vulnerabilities, and exploits with Mitigation Strategy, advice and best practices from Microsoft’s own IT organization. Should make for some good weekend reading.

Posted via web from Ed’s Posterous

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FTW – Netflix takes a proactive approach, steps up and owns it.

I signed up for a Netflix account recently after purchasing a new Blu-ray player that supports Netflix movie streaming. I figured "Wow, this is great. I can watch movies when I want from my netflix queue." My only worry was, would my current internet connection be able to sustain a quality viewing experience. I still have Verizion DSL. My town does not have FiOS available (and no plans to), and my location has an effect on overall DSL speeds. I've learned to live with it.

So when I had some intermittent problems accessing and watching movies via netflix, I assumed it was due to my connection. That is, until I received an email from Netflix that stated:

"Recently, you may have had trouble instantly watching movies or TV episodes via your Netflix Ready Device due to technical issues.

We are sorry for the inconvenience this may have caused. This is not a great way to begin your Netflix membership. So that you can properly experience Netflix, we would like to extend your free trial.."

I did not complain about the service, and in fact attributed it to my sometimes questionable DSL connection. But Netflix was right there to voluntarily step up, take the initiative and say oops, we goofed. It's refreshing to see a company take responsibility for their service without being prompted.

There is the argument that I am still on a trial membership basis, and they are just trying to initiate some damage control to keep me on as a paying user when the trial expires. Maybe, but it's good to know they are keeping tabs on the service and own it when something goes wrong.

Posted via email from Ed’s Posterous

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Beer O’Clock Friday Selections! Now On Posterous

As some of you may already know, I like Beer!! And if you didn’t, well, you do now! Not just any beer, but good quality microbrews, craft beers, and foreign treats. You’ll never find Budweiser mentioned here – well… except for that, but it won’t happen again.

A little more than a year ago, I decided to start a weekly Beer O’Clock ritual by selecting a different brew each Friday to feature and share thoughts about it with friends online. Let me state from the start that I am in no way a beer snob, expert, aficionado or anything else along those lines. I just like beer and want to experience as many different kinds as I can and try to learn a little more about the different types of brew along the way. I’ve even tried adding my incredibly amateur opinions / reviews with selections when I can.

Up till now, I used flickr, twitter and facebook to post weekly selections. But now it’s time to graduate to something a little more permanent, so I have set up a posterous page to post weekly selections to. The good thing about posterous is that the Flickr, Twitter, and Facebook updates will still continue.

So, if you like beer and want to check out what’s being featured each week and share your own thought and opinions about them, head over to http://beeroclock.posterous.com

Posted via web from Friday Beer O’clock Selections

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Cheap & Easy Social Media Management? Really?

Saw an email today soliciting “Cheap & Easy Social Media Management”

For the most part I don’t pay too much attention to these claims, but this one hit a nerve. Below is a the excerpt that sums it up.

… Most of you are too busy to do it all yourself and don¹t want the hassle of fussing with the technology. Some of you have thrown up your hands in despair.

So here’s the good news: We’re going to do it for you, and it’s not expensive. For a limited time, you can start for as little as $XXX.xx [edit] a month. Our new business, [removed] , will review and setup all the components of your social media infrastructure. We’ll even extract and write your blogs, or edit your original blog posts. We’ll twitter for you and maintain your connections. Without breaking a sweat, you’ll be a master of the new social media.

The Bold parts are what I have a problem with. The Red Bold part is what put it over the edge for me. Really? I can be a Social Media Master by letting someone else pretend to be me and do all the work? Who knew it was that easy?

I was always under the impression that this Social Media thing was about being a real person, with a real voice, with real ideas and opinions. Conversing, interacting, engaging with and getting to know other real people. Is it possible that I had this all wrong the whole time?

Is this sort of thing now common practice? I would think there are a great number of risks involved if your exposed, or when the service agreement ends. What happens then? The more I think on this, the more questions I have about it.

I don’t claim to be a Social Media expert or even a “Master” and I know there are legitimate business out there that help other businesses and brands build and create Social Media profiles and identities, but their claims just seem wrong regarding Social Media.

Posted via web from Ed Stafford – Mobile Mutterings

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In The Beginning…

Well here it is. My first post to this blog. I just finished installing WordPress to my server after using Blogger for quite a while. Why the change? Well, I like having control over my own “stuff”. Don’t get me wrong. Blogger is a fine platform, but I prefer to have my things organized under the same roof and not have to manage a handful of different services across the web.

After searching for a new blogging solution, I looked at a number of different releases for both Windows/IIS and Linux/Apache platforms. I finally decided on WordPress for a number of reasons.

1. Support and stability – WordPress is a proven solution and has a large user base, which also means a lot of peer support.
2. Ease of use – It was easy to set up and ran on my server without any additional requirements.
3. Control – WordPress has built in controls for managing posts and comments, and they’re easy to use. I don’t have to fuss over design and (X)HTML if I don’t want to and still get a nice clean page. On the other hand, If I do want to get into altering page design and (X)HTML, I can do that to through the built-in CMS tools.
4. Organization – One of the features I like best is the categories. Categories allow me to organize posts into groups and categories/sub-categories making it easy to find the topics that interest you most.

All in all, The set up was actually pretty simple and I had a working blog in a matter of minutes. The next step is getting the layout and visual appeal to my liking.