My information Resource (blog.mir.net)

ISACA Announces New CRISC Certification for Risk Professionals

Rolling Meadows, IL, USA (13 January 2010)—ISACA, a global association of 86,000 IT audit, risk, governance and security professionals, is responding to market demand by introducing a new risk-related certification. The Certified in Risk and Information Systems Control (CRISC) designation is for IT professionals who identify and manage risks through the development, implementation and maintenance of information systems (IS) controls. These professionals help enterprises accomplish business objectives such as effective and efficient operations, reliable financial reporting, and compliance with regulatory requirements.

A grandfathering program, through which experienced professionals can earn the certification without passing an exam, will open in April. The first CRISC exam will be administered in 2011.

ISACA established CRISC (pronounced “see risk”) to recognize IT professionals with skills and abilities related to:

· Risk identification, assessment and evaluation

· Risk response

· Risk monitoring

· IS control design and implementation

· IS control monitoring and maintenance

“The CRISC designation will demonstrate to employers that the certification holder is able to identify and evaluate the risks unique to a specific organization and help the enterprise accomplish its business objectives by designing, implementing, monitoring and maintaining risk-based, efficient and effective IS controls,” said Urs Fischer, chair of ISACA’s CRISC Task Force. “We conducted an extensive amount of research globally and found that enterprises are becoming more risk-aware and are looking to identify professionals who possess the skills to help them protect their assets and enhance their businesses. CRISC fills a gap that currently exists in the marketplace.”

CRISC complements ISACA’s three existing certifications: Certified Information Systems Auditor (CISA), established in 1978 and earned by more than 70,000 professionals since its inception; Certified Information Security Manager (CISM), earned by more than 12,000 professionals since it was launched in 2002; and the newer Certified in the Governance of Enterprise IT (CGEIT), earned by more than 4,000 professionals since it was developed in 2006:

· CISA is designed for IT professionals who perform independent reviews of control design and operational effectiveness; CRISC is for IT and business professionals who identify, evaluate and manage risk, and design, implement and maintain IS controls.

· CISM is for individuals who manage, design, oversee and/or assess an enterprise’s information security, including the identification and management of information security risks; CRISC is for IT professionals whose roles also encompass operational and compliance considerations.

· CGEIT is for IT and business professionals who have a significant management, advisory or assurance role relating to the governance of IT, including risk management; CRISC is for IT and business professionals who are engaged at an operational level to mitigate risk.

Additional information about the CRISC certification is available at www.isaca.org/crisc.

 

Microsoft has published  many software Virtualization tools, so  a good  understanding which technology is appropriate  is tricky. Yes its MS focused but this explores which solution is best for you.

Microsoft Virtualization

Windows Server® 2008 R2

Windows Server 2008 R2 Hyper-V™

Application Virtualization (App-V) 4.5

Windows Server® 2008 R2 Remote Desktop Services

Virtual Server 2005 R2 SP1

Virtual PC 2007

Go here to learn more

 

In this webcast, we introduce the virtualization world, laying the ground work for the other webcasts in this series. We cover both the Microsoft products and solutions available to create a virtualization environment in your organization and the third-party virtualization options. We also answer the question: Why use virtualization in the first place and why use Microsoft technologies? While we are not aiming to cover every topic in depth in this webcast, you can get an understanding of what all your virtualization options are and understand the concepts discussed in later webcasts in the series.

IT Professional

Duration:
90 Minutes

Date:
Wednesday, January 14, 2009

This is a repost remember that Microsoft in the US give free 7 by 24 support if you computer has any of these issues you just need to call 1-866-pcsafety (yes more that 7 numbers buy you will remember the number that way)

CCleaner is a freeware PC optimization tool.
It combines a system cleaner that removes unused and temporary files from your system and also a fully featured registry cleaner!
CCleaner allows Windows to run faster, more efficiently and gives you more hard disk space.
The best part is that it’s Small, Fast and Free!

Cleans the following Windows components:

• Internet Explorer
  Firefox
• Google Chrome
• Opera
• Safari

Advanced Options allow cleaning of:

• Menu Order cache
• Tray Notifications Cache
• Window Size and Location Cache
• User Assist history
• IIS Log Files
• Custom Folders

Application Cleaning:

As well as cleaning up old files and settings left by standard Windows components, CCleaner also cleans temporary files and recent file lists for many applications. Including:

• Firefox, Opera, Safari, Media Player, eMule, Kazaa, Google Toolbar, Netscape, Microsoft Office, Nero, Adobe Acrobat Reader, WinRAR, WinAce, WinZip and more…

Registry Cleaning:

CCleaner uses an advanced Registry Cleaner to check for problems and inconsistencies. It can check the following:

• File Extensions
• ActiveX Controls
• ClassIDs
• ProgIDs
• Uninstallers
• Shared DLLs
• Fonts
• Help File references
• Application Paths
• Icons
• Invalid Shortcuts and more…

Safety:

CCleaner was designed from the ground to be safe and secure to use. It has multiple levels of checks in place to ensure that it cannot delete any useful information or documents you may still need. We also certify that it contains no Spyware or Adware.

High Security:

For the super cautious users we also offer secure file erasing. By overwriting the files before deleting them, making it impossible to recover the data.

The product is free and you can download it here

Accidentally deleted an important file? Lost something important when your computer crashed? No problem! Recuva recovers files deleted from your Windows computer, Recycle Bin, digital camera card, or MP3 player.

So this will recover from all storage devices, USB sticks, Compaq flash drives etc.

Undelete files on your computer

Deleted a file by mistake? Recuva brings lost files on your computer, USB drive, camera or iPod.

Recovery from damaged or formatted disks

Even if you’ve formatted a drive so that it looks blank, Recuva can still find your files on it.

Recover deleted emails

Emptied your email trash and need it back? Recuva’s got you covered with full support for Microsoft Outlook Express, Mozilla Thunderbird, or Windows Live Mail.

Recover deleted iPod music

Deleted music from your iPod or MP3 player? No problem, Recuva will get this back for you along with any additional track data.

Restore unsaved Word documents

Did Microsoft Word crash or did you forget to save that important Word document. No problem with Recuva! As it can intelligently rebuild Word documents from their temporary files.

Quick-Start Wizard

If you need your files back right away without fiddling with options, Recuva’s Quick-Start Wizard is the answer.

Deep Scan

Recuva can find most files within a minute. Or, set the Deep Scan to look for more deeply-buried results.

Securely delete files you want to erase forever

Want to protect your deleted files? Recuva also allows you to permanently erase any traces of deleted files.

Portable version

Take Recuva with you wherever you go with the portable version.

Full Windows OS support and many languages

Recuva has support for every modern version of Windows and 37+ languages.

And it’s free

Download it here

Do  you want to know information about your cpu ? what about the Bios is the hardware ready for virtualization

HWiNFO™ and HWiNFO32™ are professional hardware information and diagnostic tools. Both tools are designed to collect and present the maximum amount of information possible about computer’s hardware which makes them suitable for users searching for driver updates, computer manufacturers, system integrators and technical experts as well. Retrieved information is presented in a logical and easily understandable form and can be exported into various types of reports.

You can get them here

HWiNFO™ – A powerful system information tool for DOS is free for 14 days then is shareware get it here

HWiNFO32™ – A powerful system information tool for Windows FREEWARE get it here

 

Meanwhile the Office 2010 beta is generating record interest and use, surpassing the previous Office 2007 beta download rate. In just seven weeks, more than two million people around the world have downloaded and are using the Office 2010 beta. To get a better appreciation for that number, it’s a rate of more than 40,000 downloads per day. That’s approximately twice the number of people who run the Boston Marathon each year, or the entire population of Olympia, WA, or Annapolis, MD, downloading the Office 2010 beta every day!

Most importantly, 9 out of 10 beta users feel that the Office 2010 beta is an improvement over their current productivity suite.

How much will Office 2010 cost?

In addition to the great momentum statistics, we are also releasing Office 2010 U.S. retail pricing today. Office 2010 will be offered in four versions, to make it easier to choose a version of Office that’s best for you – Office Home and Business, Office Professional, Office Home and Student, and Office Professional Academic.

Office Home and Student boxed product is available in a Family Pack, allowing usage on three PCs in one house

• Purchase rights for Office Home and Business, Office Professional, and Office Professional Academic boxed product allow for usage on two of your PCs.
• The Product Key Card is valid for a single installation of the product.

Go Here for more information

The maker of a great screen capture program for Windows has just announced Snagit for Mac beta . This should be in ever Mac user computer ! We’re working hard to make sure Snagit for Mac is everything you want and more, but we can’t do it without your help. Check out the beta version for Snagit for Mac and let us know what you like, what you don’t like and everything in between…

To download the beta go here

As part of the Blue Coat Community Outreach Program, K9 Web Protection is free for home use.

Blue Coat® K9 Web Protection is a content filtering solution for your home computer. Its job is to provide you with a family-safe Internet experience, where YOU control the Internet content that enters your home. K9 Web Protection implements the same enterprise-class Web filtering technology used by Blue Coat’s Fortune 500 customers around the world, wrapped in simple, friendly, and reliable software for your Windows 2000, Windows XP or Windows Vista computer.

Blue Coat’s unique Web filtering technology divides Internet content into 60 distinct categories. These categories are stored in the master Blue Coat database, through which we maintain and update more than 15 million ratings of websites and domains. A Web site will fall into one or more of these categories, based on the content of the site. To meet your particular needs and preferences, you can configure the software to block or allow specific categories.

 

K9 Web Protection is different from other solutions for the home in several important respects:

• Service-based filtering – Blue Coat’s filtering database operates as a service. It receives and rates over 80 million requests every day, making it the most accurate content filtering database available. This accuracy is important in protecting your family, given the Internet’s rapid changes and growth. Plus, there is no database to download. K9 Web Protection won’t clog your Internet connection, get "stale" or out of date, or slow down your computer like other products do.
• Dynamic Real-Time Rating™ (DRTR) – Blue Coat’s patent-pending DRTR technology is a very powerful element in our solution, and is vastly different from the old-fashioned "key word filtering" that is so frustrating to users. Using a method of statistical analysis and artificial intelligence to rate new or previously unrated Web pages, DRTR can determine the category of a URL on the fly, without human intervention. However, DRTR only renders a rating when it is confident that it has reached an accurate conclusion.
  We’ve focused DRTR on recognizing the kinds of categories most likely to be blocked. In particular, DRTR is highly accurate in blocking pornography and other "adult content" sites. This focus for DRTR is particularly important because these kinds of sites are constantly – daily and even hourly – popping up on the Internet, and no static database can keep up.
• Automatic updating – Automatic updates of the K9 Web Protection application ensure that you are always protected by the latest features. For example, in Spring of 2005, we added two new categories to our solution: Spyware/Malware Sources, and Spyware Effects/Privacy Concerns. By electing to block sites in these categories, your computer’s rate of infection by unwanted software can be reduced dramatically. We have a variety of new features planned, and your K9 installation will automatically receive updates that include them.
• Efficient caching – K9 Web Protection is a product from Blue Coat. Blue Coat is recognized world-wide as expert in high-performance caching and secure proxy technology. We take advantage of that expertise in K9, so your Internet experience is as fast, reliable, and safe as we can make it.

Unlike other filtering solutions, K9 Web Protection ensures the highest level of protection by building the most relevant ratings database available. Its effective coverage reaches more than one billion Web pages. With K9 Web Protection, you finally have a chance to build a family-safe Internet experience for your home, simply and easily.

This is great software to protect families with young children from bad or not appropriate sites.

 

To download the free software for home use please go Here