My information Resource (blog.mir.net)

On Wednesday Jan 26 I will be presenting 3 sessions, they are;

Presentation Title: Security for the Network Administrator

Date and Time: 01/26/2011, 0830-1020

Location: Great Hall D

Track: Information Assurance

Description: You are a new system administrator and have been trained to maintain that system. But have you been trained to secure it? Many network administrators are assigned the task of securing a network, but they have no idea how to do that.
Do you understand the “Big Picture” and how your actions could compromise the security of your vital data and systems? Most administrators are living in a silo of information and don’t have a real view of the big picture. This results from network administrators thinking “It’s Not My Job”. While true from an evaluation point of view, this can lead to major security issues.
During this presentation, we will help you break out of the silo and get the big picture. We’ll help you identify security issues and how and where to report them.

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Presentation Title: Securing the Weakest Link

Date and Time: 01/26/2011, 1320-1420

Location: Great Hall D

Track: Information Assurance

Description: Network security issues are something organizations are faced with everyday. You can implement technologies such as IDS/IPS and firewalls to help lock down your network. However, have you considered how to protect your networks against non-technical intrusions such as social engineering?
This session will explore 10 things you can do now to help protect and defend your data, network, and personnel against social engineering attacks.
During this presentation, we’ll discuss the following topics:
-How Easy It is to Gain Information That Can Put You at Risk
-How Social Engineering Can Also Be Done via Technology
-Case Studies and Examples of Techniques That Work to Social Engineer Users
———————–

Presentation Title: Understand the Security Concerns Associated with Virtualization

Date and Time: 01/26/2011, 1500-1600

Location: Great Hall D

Track: Information Assurance

Description: Many organizations realize the benefits of implementing virtualization. In fact, by implementing virtualization, you can reduce the physical number of host computers. But does it reduce or add risk to your infrastructure?
The goal of this session is to take a look at all of the issues and identify areas of concern as a cyber specialist.

 

Here is a link to a great article on network security.

Threat Area
Worst Case Scenarios

1. Insider Threat
Enterprise data including backups destroyed, valuable secrets lost, and users locked out of systems for days or even weeks.

2. Tool Bloat Backlash
Decision-makers become fed up with endless requests for security products and put a freeze on any further security tools.

3. Mobile Device Security
A key user’s phone containing a password management application is lost. The application itself is not password-protected.

4. Low Tech Threats
A sandbox containing a company’s plan for its next generation of cell phone chips is inadvertently exposed to the public Internet.

5. Risk Management
A firm dedicates considerable resources to successfully defend its brochure-like, ecommerce-less web site from attack, but allows malware to creep into the software of its medical device product.

6. SLA Litigation
Although the network administrator expressed reservations, a major customer was promised an unattainable service level for streaming content. The customer has defected to the competition and filed a lawsuit.

7. Treacheries of Scale
A firm moves from a decentralized server model to a private cloud. When the cloud’s server farm goes offline, all users are affected instead of users in a single region.

To read the full article go here

 

Brief Overview:

I will be presenting a session on  "Authentication and Cryptography," I will examine the following topics:

• Verifying who is a user and to what they have access
• Different ways a user can be validated to computer and network resources
• How Cryptograph is used to protect data
• Symmetric and Symmetric Encryption
• What are hashes?

In our webinar session on February 23, 2011, we will discuss Using Encryption to Protect Your Data. In the last webinar of this series entitled Disaster Recovery, we will take this information from theory and show you how to use this technology.

Outline:

In this session we will cover:

• Identification:
  • Something a user knows
  • Something a user possesses
  • Something a user is or does
• Issues
  • Distribution
  • Cost
  • Tracking
• Elements
• Password Protocols
• Hashes
• Kerberos
• Cryptography Benefits
  • Confidentiality
    • Encryption
  • Integrity
    • Message digests
  • Authentication
    • Public-key cryptography
  • Non-repudiation
    • Digital signatures
• Symmetric Encryption
• Asymmetric Process
• Digital Signatures
• Certificate Authorities
• Models
• Lifecycle
• Distribution

To attend this session on  2/9/2011 at  Time: 12:00 PM ET

Click Here

Then on February 23, 2011, I will discuss Using Encryption to Protect Your Data. In the last webinar of this series entitled Disaster Recovery, we will take this information from theory and show you how to use this technology.

Other session that you may want to look at include

Cyber Security Part One: Identity Theft

Understanding Cyber Security Physical Security

Understanding Cyber Security Risk Management

 

Active Directory Federation Services 2.0 helps IT enable users to collaborate across organizational boundaries and easily access applications on-premises and in the cloud, while maintaining application security. Through a claims-based infrastructure, IT can enable a single sign-on experience for end-users to applications without requiring a separate account or password, whether applications are located in partner organizations or hosted in the cloud.

The Windows Server 2008 R2 setup package for AD FS 2.0 was updated on 1/5/2011. This updated package contains hotfixes that will prevent the errors described in the following support articles from occurring whenever AD FS 2.0 is installed on a server running the Windows Server 2008 R2 operating system:

• http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2254265
• http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2272757

Get the update here

 

The current deal is if you buy a netbook with starter you can upgrade to Home Premium  for only 19.95 !  You just need to purchase Windows anytime upgrade at the same time !

Windows Anytime Upgrade?

With Windows Anytime Upgrade: Windows 7 Starter to Home Premium, your customers can upgrade their new netbook PC safely, quickly, and easily. Then they can customize it with themes and photos and enjoy entertainment anywhere. By taking advantage of this offer, customers get everything in Windows 7 Starter, plus more:

• Live Preview – See lots of open programs and windows at a glance with live taskbar previews.
• Netflix – Customers can watch what they want in one place. With Windows Media Center and a Netflix account, they can stream thousands of movies and TV shows directly from Netflix.
• Internet TV – Use Windows Media Center to find and watch a variety of TV shows on the Internet.
• Remote Media Streaming – Customers can go on the road without taking all their entertainment. They can enjoy music, photos, and videos from their home PC with remote media streaming in Windows Media Player.
• Desktop Personalization – Help your customers make their PC look the way they want. They can personalize their desktop with their own photos, themes, and sounds.

* For Internet TV, you’ll need Internet access. Free Internet TV content varies by geography. Some content may require additional fees. Internet TV is not available in all countries.

 

Offer is good Nov 7 to April 2 while supplies last

Is a cell a phone was just a phone?

The current cells phone today is smart phones with more power that you desktop that 7 years old. Think of what you keep on your phone, Mail Contact, Schedules, and other data what would happen if that device was lost or stolen or compromised and theft or you competing got that information

Here are some simple things to do.

Don’t Lose Your Phone – Know where you phone is at all times and do not leave it out at bars and public places, Keep it with you. Do not leave it in you parked car.

Lock you phone and set a password (a strong one not 1111, 1234 etc.)

Here’s how to find time-out settings on various smartphone OSs:

• Android: now supports PINs and passwords
• BlackBerry: enable the password, and set the security time-out options.
• Windows Phones: can set or change the password, and also set the screen time-out.

Remote wipe means that if your phone is lost or stolen, you can remotely clear all of your data–including e-mail, contacts, texts, and documents–off of the handset, thus keeping that information out of the wrong hands. Check with you Company or Phone provide about this service

Trojan Horses, Malware, and Viruses and Third-Party Apps

• Software protection: like Lookout that can protect the Phone and the anti-viruses manufacture have software as well.
• Third-Party Apps can become an issue, once an apps is installed it can access to your personal data and location. You need to think or ask what the app does and what information will it share?

I found this resource list, it show the State Breach Disclosure Laws, you can search this site for your state and what you need to do or what your legal responsibilities are.

Click Here 

Microsoft Security Essentials will become free to use for organizations with up to 10 PCs.

Originally released last year for single-PC use at home, Microsoft Security Essentials was designed as a comprehensive security solution in a lightweight package.

Microsoft Security Essentials can be downloaded, installed and put to work with just a few clicks. Upon installation, it scans the PC to make sure it’s clean from the start. Once Microsoft Security Essentials is working, it downloads updates and schedules scans on its own.

Over the past year, the product has won awards and certifications from a number of independent agencies, such as ICSA Labs, West Coast Labs and PC Advisor, and last January, PC Advisor named Microsoft Security Essentials to its list of the “Best Free Software.”

This is a full-featured, top-tier security solution that Microsoft is offering to small businesses for free. You don’t need a credit card. It requires no registration, no trials, no renewals. It doesn’t collect any credit card information. It runs well on older hardware. It’s easy to use, easy to get, and it’s from a trusted source. Basically, Microsoft Security Essentials just works.”

But if the product is so successful, why offer it for free? According to Microsoft’s internal research, although 80 percent of PC owners in the U.S. say they have the most up-to-date antivirus protection, in reality only half that many actually do. Often they have signed up for free trials or subscription-based services that have lapsed. Others are just using outdated versions of security software on older hardware.

Microsoft Security Essentials is now available in 74 markets worldwide and 25 languages. To learn more about Microsoft Security Essentials and download the product for free, visit http://www.microsoft.com/security_essentials/.

 

A series of Windows Phone 7 updates are coming over the next few months, including adding the copy-and-paste feature and improving the phone’s performance when loading or switching between applications.

Microsoft also is working to make Windows Phone 7 available from Sprint and Verizon in the first half of 2011, and more languages will become available later this year.

 

 

Microsoft Touch Mouse is the new multitouch mouse for Windows 7 that will let you click, flick, scroll and swipe so it’s easy and fun to interact with your PC.

Designed to enhance your Windows 7 usage, the Touch Mouse combines the virtues of a mouse with the rich natural language of gesture to offer a more intuitive way to navigate your PC. Touch Mouse also features BlueTrack Technology so you can track virtually anywhere, anytime.¹

Top Features and Benefits

· New! Multitouch surface lets you use natural gestures to snap, navigate and control content with a touch of a finger.

· New! Flick scrolling functionality lets you quickly scroll and pan through windows and documents.

· New! Improved task switching on Windows 7 gives you superior mouse performance and experience on the PC.

· BlueTrack Technology allows you to ditch your mouse pad and mouse on virtually any surface,¹ including granite, marble, carpet and wood.

· Snap-in Nano transceiver gives you the option to leave the transceiver plugged into the computer or conveniently store it in the bottom of the mouse.

· 2.4GHz wireless technology gives you a confident wireless connection.

· Ambidextrous design for use with either hand.

See the Difference

Touch Mouse Gestures — Easy as 1, 2, 3

Touch Mouse lets you do everything you’re used to doing with a mouse, such as point and click, but also adds gestures with one, two or three fingers to amplify the Windows 7 operating system by creating simple shortcuts to the tasks you want to do most.

Shorter Shortcuts for Windows 7

With the Touch Mouse, you can use your mouse to do tasks that normally involve the keyboard.

Availability and Pricing

Touch Mouse will be available in June 2011 for the estimated retail price of $79.95 (U.S.).² It will be available for presale starting today at Amazon.com and the Microsoft Store online.

Touch Mouse is backed by a worldwide three-year limited hardware warranty. The limited warranty and license agreement are available at http://www.microsoft.com/hardware/warranty.

Some information in this fact sheet relates to pre-release products, which may be substantially modified before they are commercially released. Microsoft makes no warranties, express or implied, with respect to the information provided here.

¹ BlueTrack Technology does not work on clear glass or mirrored surfaces.

² Estimated retail price. Actual retail price may vary.