Daily Tech Digest by Kannan Subbiah

April 18, 2014

Icehouse: New OpenStack cloud arrives
"Everyone we talk to wants cloud resources that let them move faster," said Jonathan Bryce, executive director of the OpenStack Foundation. "The evolving maturation and refinement that we see in Icehouse make it possible for OpenStack users to support application developers with the services they need to develop, deploy, and iterate on apps at the speeds they need to remain competitive." Approximately 350 new features and 2,902 bug fixes were added this time. The main focus was on testing, maturity, and stability.

Data encryption, notification and the NIST Cybersecurity Framework
As ubiquitous compromise and data theft raise urgent questions about adequate cybersecurity and risk management, are organizations doing enough to protect sensitive information? According to the2013 Global Encryption Trends Study sponsored by Thales e-Security and conducted by the Ponemon Institute, since 2005 more companies are investing in security programs that include enterprise-wide encryption strategies. Adoption of enterprise encryption strategies is highest in Germany, followed by the United States and Japan.

How to speak geek and influence nerds. Wait…what??
Not all creative marketing people are hipsters. In fact, a great many mature companies would avoid hiring firms that appear to be run by undisciplined cooler-than-thou "creatives." There's a tremendous amount of money at stake in marketing and marketing science is as important as artistic skills. ... Next, not all IT geeks are geniuses. Well, actually, that one is true. You're all friction' geniuses. Resolving driver conflicts, porting linux to anything with a display, configuring complex networks, prioritizing public vs. private cloud, and all the rest of the activities you do each day does show a level of smarts we shouldn't discount. Stipulated.

Turning the legal industry tanker around on cloud adoption
Despite adoption levels growing rapidly over the past few years, it is only recently that the legal sector has begun to give cloud services serious consideration. Due to the very nature of law firms, the storage of sensitive information in an external environment has naturally been met with some caution. While early-movers have been experimenting with cloud services for some time now, the majority of the sector has been hesitant to adopt until recently. In order to address the security and functionality concerns some firms still had, support and advice from respected industry bodies was needed.

Big Data Quality: Certify or Govern?
Big data is the catalyst. If you thought your data was challenging before, chaos and messiness takes on a whole other meaning with big data. Scale now forces us to rethink what we govern, how we govern, and yes, if we govern. This is to both better manage and govern process-wise, but it also drives us to ask the questions we didn't ask before. Questions about meeting expectations for data over meeting expectations to fit data into systems. What this means...orient data governance toward data certification.

IT security is national security -- but you're not alone
"If you don't have the support of the CEO, or the board, or the owners ... you will never get anything done. Period. It's amazing," Richey said. No technology alone can make up for attention to security at all levels of the organization, she said. "It's equally a business process problem," Richey said. "You have to be on it seven days a week, 24 hours a day," handling mundane tasks such as access controls, patches and passwords. Then there are those employees who just tend to lose things. "Some people shouldn't really be asked to protect anything," Richey said. If you're one of them, you should deliberately keep as little sensitive data as possible around you, she said.

Can you hear me now? NASA to test laser communication system
With lasercom, data is transmitted via laser beams; the technology potentially offers much higher data rates than the space agency is able to achieve with current radio frequency transmissions. "Optical communications have the potential to be a game-changer," said mission manager Matt Abrahamson, in a statement. "It's like upgrading from dial-up to DSL. Our ability to generate data has greatly outpaced our ability to downlink it. Imagine trying to download a movie at home over dial-up. It's essentially the same problem in space, whether we're talking about low-Earth orbit or deep space."

Exclusive: Google's Project Loon tests move to LTE band in Nevada
Loon is an ambitious attempt by Google to bring Internet access to vast swathes of the planet that currently have little or no connectivity. The project was unveiled last June, and Google said at the time it was experimenting with balloons flying around 20 kilometers (65,000 feet) above the Earth, using radio links in an unlicensed portion of the spectrum at around 2.4GHz. But in late September, Cyrus Behroozi, the head network engineer for Loon, quietly applied to the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) for permission to test Loon across a large portion of Northern Nevada, in two chunks of radio spectrum that are used as a pair for 4G LTE services.

Mobile security: The battle beyond malware
Malware has received a lot of attention from the media and IT professionals alike, as it's a rather familiar foe. Android devices in particular have a reputation for vulnerability thanks to their ability to run applications delivered outside the Google Play store. Malicious actors have also come up with clever ways to bypass Google's security. Android malware dubbed BadNews was spotted in 32 Android apps available for download in Google Play last April. It circumvented Google's Bouncer server-side scanning and its local Verify Apps feature on Android devices because it was distributed to mobile devices "at a later date" via an ad network.

Connected devices will reach 6.5 times world population by 2020 (infographic)
This infographic looks at the growth of this internet of things and explores the barriers to its integration. The internet of things (IoT) is a concept first coined by Kevin Ashton, co-founder and executive director of the Auto-ID Centre at MIT, in 1999. As advanced technology can be packed into smaller and smaller spaces, chips and sensors can be added to all sorts of devices to track and measure data. This data can either be simply relayed back to users or can even trigger a device to take action. From smart home appliances to citywide infrastructure, the application of the internet of things knows no bounds – much like its forecasted growth.

Quote for the day:

"If you decide to go for it, do it with spirit: Sometimes success is due less to ability than to zeal. " -- Charles Buxton

April 17, 2014

A simple cure for the cybersecurity skills shortage
People constantly bemoan the dearth of skilled cybersecurity personnel, especially after a high-profile breach. And we hear a lot of proposals for fixing the problem: more certifications, more training, more research. All of these solutions amount to lobbying; they come from certification bodies, training companies and university researchers. I don't deny that those proposed solutions are useful for improving some aspect of cybersecurity knowledge, skills and abilities. But taken all together, they won't give you a skilled practitioner. They won't even give you a competent practitioner. The best of these suggestions might be certification, but not all certifications are created equal.

IT Leader or IT Manager? How to Be the Best of Both
"Once you've made your user interfaces as good as they can possibly be and eked out every last bit of operational efficiency from your processes, what do you have left? You have your people. You have your ability to inspire your employees to be engaged, productive and motivated," says Rajat Paharia, founder and chief product officer of Bunchball, a company that specializes in gamification. "Smart companies are figuring out that by tapping into this employee motivation, they have a sustainable, repeatable and efficient way to drive business results," Paharia says.

Enterprise Wearables Will Avoid BYOD Pitfalls
Wearables aren't just a consumer trend; they have the potential to change the way companies conduct business. Perpetually connected wearables will allow workers, partners, and customers to experience more immediacy, simplicity, and context in their work. Field workers and surgeons can do their jobs better while using hands-free smart glasses. Police departments know immediately if the gun lock on any individual firearm in the entire police force has been released via remote sensors. Across a long tail of wearable devices, new enterprise scenarios are emerging.

How a cyber cop patrols the underworld of e-commerce
When I initially joined Payza, I received in-depth training on how the company functions, and started in customer service. The Merchant Risk department is cross-trained in CS, Fraud, and Risk, which are vital to understanding how someone might try and take advantage of our system. However, as industries and trends are always evolving it’s important to keep up to date. Having good analytical skills, and a general curious nature is key to mitigating. That said, while it has prepared me for the reality of the job, I am still sometimes surprised at what you can find online. Some other skill sets that prove vital for this role are a good understanding of web technologies and a strong investigative drive.

The insatiable desire to control
Make no mistake. It will destroy you and your organization even while it parasitizes your values and harms the spirits of those who once willingly followed you, but who now trudge along like sheep going to slaughter. “Why aren’t our employees more innovative?” you exclaim, and the question “Why must I carry the burden of being all things to all people?” is keeping you up at night. You’re blind to it when it surfaces, this thing named control. Yet it makes you feel powerful. The desire to control will surface throughout your leadership career. The trick to keeping control at bay is be aware when it surfaces and to let go of it (this is the hard part) when it’s appropriate.

IBM Looks To The Cloud To Fight Disruption
It appears that IBM’s strategy could be working if today’s earnings report is any indication. Although as TechCrunch’s Alex Wilhelm reported, the company’s overall revenue failed to meet investor’s expectations, there was a bright spot with cloud-related revenue up 50% and “the company indicating that on a run-rate basis, cloud-as-a-service is up to $2.3 billion per year, an increase of more than 100%.” Of course, IBM is hardly alone among big tech companies when it comes to making a push to the cloud. In fact, Microsoft, Dell, Red Hat, HP, Cisco, Google and others have all made big cloud announcements recently and it’s hardly a coincidence. The technology world is tilting and this requires these companies, including IBM, to adjust.

Why You Need A Chief Information Security Officer
CISO’s retain accountability and responsibility for the success of their information security program and provide the focus and strategic presence necessary for the program to achieve its objectives. By coordinating all information security activities under the guidance and leadership of a CISO, healthcare organizations can significantly improve their security posture while reducing the risk of issues not being effectively addressed. The role of the CISO is strategic and tactical while acting as a conduit between the clinical, business and IT operations. Accomplishing the mission of an information security program requires a CISO with strong leadership skills, executive presence, security knowledge and effective placement within the organization.

Building Individual and Organizational resilience
In leadership terms, we define resilience as the ability to adapt in the face of multiple changes while continuing to persevere toward strategic goals. In the current environment where change is the norm and time to bounce back between stressors is minimal at best, we, as leaders, need to think about how we manage our personal resilience and also how we support our organization in adapting to the changes it is facing. We break resilience into four primary categories: Maintain physical well-being; Manage thinking; Fulfill life purpose using emotional intelligence; and Harness the power of human connection

Microsoft Azure Intelligent Systems: 4 Facts
Edson described Intelligent System as a cross-platform companion to Microsoft's recently-announced Windows for IoT platform, a statement that seems to reaffirm that Azure has become more important than Windows to Microsoft's future. The same engineering team works on both products, she said, but "we're a cross-platform company. This is a cloud-first strategy: Connect to any device, anywhere, get data off that device." With Windows for IoT, "we want developers to know Windows will play in that space," Edson said. "But at the same time, we also realize you are going to have devices on Linux or whatever, and we need to work with that."

Google algorithm busts CAPTCHA with 99.8 percent accuracy
The algorithm developed by Google researchers is being used by its Street View team to improve Google Maps, by helping to recognising characters in natural or blurry images — for example, the house numbers captured by the Street View cars in the course of gathering imagery for the mapping service. According to the company, the algorithm can now accurately recognise 90 percent of street numbers, meaning Google Maps users looking for a particular building are likely to get a more specific result. But, given the nature of that challenge, it turns out that the algorithm is also well-suited to solving CAPTCHA puzzles designed to fox spammers using bots for services like Gmail.

Quote for the day:

"Real generosity is doing something nice for someone who will never find out." -- Frank A. Clark

April 16, 2014

The road to the 60TB hard drive
While capacity on hard disk drives has been doubling every 12 to 18 months -- faster than Moore's Law and integrated circuits -- there is a coming sea change that will drive the capacity up 10-fold, according to hard drive maker Seagate. While that is remarkable, past changes and recent technology breakthroughs have led us to today's 6TB data center drives and 4TB desktop drives. Data storage is among the few techological advances that has actually surpassed our current needs.

Linux is about to take over the desktop but not like you think it will
For years I've heard that year X is the year of the Linux desktop and I've always scoffed at it. I scoffed because it's ridiculous to think that Linux or Mac OS X or anything could supplant Windows on the desktop. That is until now. And don't get me wrong, it won't happen for at least another year in businesses but for personal computing and BYOD, it's already happening. The Linux that's taking over the desktop is called the Chrome OS and it will happen on the Chromebook device.

CIOs should prepare for the battle between old BI and new BI
At MicroStrategy Inc., former COO and co-founder Sanju Bansal left in 2013 only to resurface at startup Hunch Analytics. SAP also signaled a new strategy in 2013, announcing a research-and-development shift away from traditional BI to "advanced analysis and agile visualization." Sommer expects the clash between old BI and new BI to continue. The way he sees it, three tipping points will eventually push the BI and analytics practice out of silos and across the enterprise. In their wake, both the BI and analytics market and the role of IT role will look different.

The Limits of Social Engineering
Deciphering people’s behavior is only the first step. What really excites Pentland is the prospect of using digital media and related tools to change people’s behavior, to motivate groups and individuals to act in more productive and responsible ways. If people react predictably to social influences, then governments and businesses can use computers to develop and deliver carefully tailored incentives, such as messages of praise or small cash payments, to “tune” the flows of influence in a group and thereby modify the habits of its members. Beyond improving the efficiency of transit and health-care systems, Pentland suggests, group-based incentive programs can make communities more harmonious and creative.

Smartphone Kill Switches Coming, But Critics Cry Foul
New York attorney general Eric T. Schneiderman and San Francisco district attorney George Gascón, the two officials who have led the charge for improved mobile device security, welcomed CTIA's response but said it falls short of what's necessary to fight rampant cellphone theft. "We strongly urge CTIA and its members to make their anti-theft features enabled by default on all devices, rather than relying on consumers to opt-in," said Schneiderman and Gascón in a joint statement. "The industry also has a responsibility to protect its consumers now and not wait until next year."

Predictive tech is getting smarter and more pervasive — but more controversial, too
“While we are still a long way off from building the omniscient Star Trek computer, the technology is getting better at a surprisingly fast rate,” Tuttle said. “It will start with special-purpose intelligent assistants that let you easily find information you need in specific domains. For example, if you work in sales support, you will likely rely on an intelligent assistant that understands your entire product catalog.” We’ll likely see plenty more predictive-focused products and services soon. Google Now has been a big success on Android; there are a slew of “smart” calendar apps out there trying to make sense of your schedule;

How GE Plans to Act Like a Startup and Crowdsource Breakthrough Ideas
It was a triumph of crowdsourcing—for a nominal price, GE used the knowledge of someone they would have never otherwise met to innovate its way out a design problem. It was also a proof of concept for the engineering behemoth’s new innovation strategy. Under Immelt, GE has invested a sizable chunk of its annual $6 billion R&D funds into taking advantage of a simple, internet-enabled truth: Now, more than ever, it’s possible to connect with people around the world, so why not take advantage of that to solve some engineering problems?

CIOs to Become In-House Brokers -- and That's a Good Thing
The idea of IT as a brokerage is just one aspect of the emerging role of the new CIO, one that looks more like a consultancy to the business rather than the keeper and controller of all things technical. In their new role, CIOs will lose a chunk of their budget. They'll no longer drive initiatives to adopt innovative technology. They'll be asked to maintain legacy systems, in addition to building skills in cloud services and system integration. ... "Successful IT leadership of the future is less about control and more about how you add value to the business," says CIO Chris Miller at Avanade. "We're trading control for new responsibilities."

Hackonomics: Street prices for black market bugs
As RAND explained, the black market for cybercrime, once a "varied landscape of discrete, ad hoc networks of individuals motivated by ego and notoriety, has now become a burgeoning powerhouse of highly organized groups, often connected with traditional crime groups (e.g., drug cartels, mafias, terrorist cells) and nation-states." Perhaps the drug trade analogy works in some aspects of RAND's report, published three weeks ago. However, a better analogy may be found in comparing the global black "cyber" market — and its compelling profitability — to the global market for arms trading, or IP and trade secrets.

Whitelisting: Filtering for advanced malware prevention
The whitelisting filtering approach can be used in every technology area an enterprise uses today. Specific types include application whitelisting, email whitelisting and network whitelisting. With advanced malware attacks increasing and evolving every day, it's a continuous challenge for enterprises to detect them or, ideally, prevent them. Therefore, whitelisting technology can stand out as a choice for an organization looking to add a solid defense layer against evolving threats, particularly zero-day attacks that endpoint antimalware products frequently fail to detect.

Quote for the day:

"It is a fine thing to have ability, but the ability to discover ability in others is the true test." -- Lou Holtz

April 15, 2014

DRaaS pricing lifts the burden of backup responsibilities
Disaster recovery is a topic as old as data centers themselves, but emerging technologies and applications are giving it new life. In particular, disaster recovery as a service, based in the cloud, enables small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) to protect their IT infrastructure without breaking the bank. That's the focus of this month's Modern Infrastructure cover story, which explores the benefits of DR in the cloud, or DRaaS. DR sites used to be reserved for only deep-pocketed companies and IT teams, but the cloud has been a great equalizer when it comes to disaster recovery.

Large Scale Scrum (LeSS) @ J.P. Morgan
Before the adoption of LeSS the teams in Securities were under mandate to adopt certain core building block components. For example all datastore interaction utilised an internal proprietary framework which abstracted the application tier from datastore specific functionality. This API layer was private code owned by a central team. The result was that if any team found a bug or needed a change they would need to persuade the central team to prioritise the work and wait (often, a long time) for the next release cycle. But, after adopting LeSS with feature teams and a more internal open source or collective code ownership approach, a more progressive stance was adopted.

Boom time for digital technologies as CEOs make IT investment top priority for 2014
"If you look at that period from 2003 - 2008, the five year economic boom period before we have a crash, at that point the talk was about offshoring, outsourcing and ERP standardisation projects. In that boom period IT in the business was generally being kept under control, put a lid on, even cut. "There was a sense that IT was a hygiene factor. That you needed to have it but it wasn't differentiating. People had bought into the idea that IT was something of a commodity, that's why we did all that offshoring and outsourcing.

Making room for risk in high-performing companies
Chobani, a relative newcomer in the yogurt industry, is a prime example of differentiation through disruption. One of Chobani’s innovations is a manufacturing process that involves recycling a whey byproduct as supplemental feed for its local farms. This helps foster sustainability as part of a commitment to the environment and the communities Chobani serves. Over time, many growing enterprises will seek to derive more value from their existing systems. This is where the process improvement journey begins. But once those processes are in place, many businesses lose room to maneuver.

Developer Details How He Built Software-Defined Networking App
Pearce, a veteran of 20 years of programming communications and networking technology, has primarily used C++ and C and admitted he didn't have a lot of experience with Java, required for the SDN programming. Pearce particularly noted he had some difficulty using the Maven project management tool, with which he had little experience. He encountered many challenges along the way, he said, but was able to produce a functioning example app on time, with help from some friends more experienced in the technology to smooth over the rough spots.

Farm machines produce privacy concerns, guidelines underway
"Virtually every company says it will never share, sell or use the data in a market-distorting way--but we would rather verify than trust," farmer Brian Marshall of the AFBF told the U.S. House Committee on Small Business in February (as reported in a post in AgProfessional). "The data would be a gold mine to traders in commodity markets and could influence farmland values," writes Karl Plume at Reuters. "While there are no documented instances so far of data being misused, lengthy contracts packed with open-ended language and differing from one supplier to the next are fueling mistrust."

Why Your Resident Loudmouth is a Big Asset
Expressive employees are your best secret weapon. They are natural leaders and passionate about improvement. So, enlist their help. Put them in charge of committees, seek their advice, and use their insights to make your company better. You will probably find that they start becoming less of a loudmouth as you treat them differently. After all, the best way to make someone stop pushing so hard is to remove the force of resistance. While opinionated and confident employees’ methods can sometimes be problematic, their intentions are often good.

New cloud service uses big data sources to improve emergency response
A platform like TIES can help to make the escalating explosion of online information more useful, Dodge said. "The problem with intelligence is that, 10 years ago, there wasn't enough to make good decisions. Now there is too much information," he said, adding that TIES allows users to take data, pull it into one location and then act on it. "What would have once taken hours and multiple people sorting through multiple sources to find vital information can now be done by a single analyst to put together a security or response plan to address top threats," he said.

USB Type-C: Simpler, faster and more powerful
In fact, the upcoming Type-C plug just might end up being the one plug to rule them all: A single USB connector that links everything from a PC's keyboard and mouse to external storage devices and displays. "The Type-C plug is a big step forward," says Jeff Ravencraft, chairman of the USB Implementers Forum (USB-IF), the organization that oversees the USB standard. "It might be confusing at first during the transition, but the Type-C plug could greatly simplify things over time by consolidating and replacing the larger USB connectors."

SparkCognition: Let machines address security threats
According to Husain, the MindSpark platform is built on patent-pending Pattern Recognition and Machine Learning techniques that enable cognitive capability. He pointed out that MindSpark — when exposed to security data — finds patterns of attack, identifies vectors, models attacker behavior, and much more. Husain also said that MindSpark aggregates its learning at a faster pace than any human or legacy software system. What it learns — the statistics models and base operational data — is offered as a cloud service.

Quote for the day:

"Work like you don't need the money. Love like you've never been hurt. Dance like nobody's watching." -- Satchel Paige

April 14, 2014

Heartbleed bug denial by NSA and White House
"[The] NSA was not aware of the recently identified vulnerability in OpenSSL, the so-called Heartbleed vulnerability, until it was made public in a private-sector cyber security report," NSA spokeswoman Vanee Vines said in an email, adding that "reports that say otherwise are wrong." A White House official also denied the US government was aware of the bug. "Reports that NSA or any other part of the government were aware of the so-called Heartbleed vulnerability before April 2014 are wrong," White House national security spokeswoman Caitlin Hayden said in a statement.

Tech Bytes: IT Governance For Small Businesses - Constraints
There is a perception that IT Governance best suits for large organizations and small organizations tend to ignore it considering the efforts and resources that is required in practicing the IT Governance within. But IT Governance is equally important for smaller organizations as well, so that the IT function however small it is deliver maximum value for the business and at the same time to keep the risk exposure to the minimum. Existing frameworks like COBIT are too extensive for small businesses to use in implementing IT governance. These frameworks however are too complex and costly to implement and small businesses may consider it a bigger battle to implement and manage such framework.

Google quashes 31 vulnerabilities, restores Metro mode 'steppers' with Chrome 34
Chrome 34 also debuted a tweaked version for Windows 8.1's "Modern," née "Metro" mode, responding to critics who had blasted Google for adopting a non-standard scrollbar they said made it harder for them to navigate pages. Those grievances had focused on two: Chrome's scrollbars were significantly thinner, and Google dumped the scroll arrows, also called "steppers," within the scrollbar. Google quickly recanted the stripping of steppers, and just days after the new Metro-mode user interface (UI) appeared, said it would restore them in Chrome 34. The company made good on that promise this week.

Aereo Founder: If We Lose, 'We Have No Plan B'
Chaitanya “Chet” Kanojia is defiant. Losing isn’t even on his radar. He has no Plan B. Maybe he’s in denial, or maybe he’s just that unflinchingly confident. Either way, the serial entrepreneur is dead-set on expanding his controversial Aereo streaming TV service into 50 new coverage areas, even as he braces for a Supreme Court showdown later this month against the major broadcasters who claim the disruptive startup is illegally ripping off their copyrighted content. It’s almost as if he’s acting like it’s not happening, even announcing yesterday that Aereo subscribers, who can already watch and record live broadcast television on their smartphones, tablets, computers, and smart TVs thanks to him, will also be able to do so via Google Chromecast starting on May 29.

The Data Analytics Handbook
“Data Analytics Handbook” is a new resource meant to inform young professionals about the field of data science. Written by a group of students at UC Berkeley: Brian Liou, Tristan Tao, and Elizabeth Lin, Edition One of the book includes in-depth interviews with Data Scientists & Data Analysts at: Facebook, LinkedIn, Yelp, BigML, Cloudera, and many more. Edition Two includes interviews with CEOs and Managers from Y-Hat, BigML, Cloudera, Mode Analytics, Flurry, and many more. This compelling resource answers common questions such as: What exactly do the sexy “Data Scientists” do? We start with this simple question. What other professions are there in Big Data?

Australia depending on vulnerable 'cyber' environment: DSTO
"The program will support the monitoring, management and protection of Australia's cyber enabled enterprise." it said. "It will focus on aiding, enhancing and future-proofing the Australian Cyber Security Centre (ACSC) capability; advanced tools and techniques particularly for ACSC transition of technology and processes to national networks; and establishing national S&T workforce and skills that are relevant and responsive to operational cyber security needs." The new policy is expected to incorporate much of 2009's National Security Science and Innovation Strategy, but provide a greater focus on online security, stronger defence, improvement of foreign affairs and countering terrorism and organised crime.

Tests Confirm Heartbleed Bug Can Expose Server's Private Key
Security experts thought it might be possible that the private key could be divulged by exploiting the Heartbleed flaw, which may have affected two-thirds of the Internet and set off a mad scramble to apply a patch that fixes it. "This result reminds us not to underestimate the power of the crowd and emphasizes the danger posed by this vulnerability," wrote Nick Sullivan of CloudFlare on the company's blog. By obtaining the private key for an SSL/TLS certificate, an attacker could set up a fake website that passes the security verification.

Agile is not Dead, it's Morphing
There is a requirement to articulate the enterprise requirements for agility as a reference architecture for business agility. In today’s fast moving world core architecture for the business, services, implementations, technology and deployments needs to be: under continuous development using Agile principles; derived from the assessment of business needs for response to change, and constantly updated to reflect competitive and technology opportunities and threats; mapped to service architectures, patterns, policies and modernization strategies; and modeled using MDA/MDD to allow delivery as consistent architecture runways for portfolio and demand management, programs and projects.

Cloud security challenges go all the way to the board
So how should businesses go about security risk management when considering cloud service providers? Those considering the cloud can be confronted by providers that only offer opaque visibility into how they manage security and data. But isn't that scenario also true when assessing a provider of closed-source software or an outsourcer that offers assurances based on service level agreements? The customer needs to build a framework to assess a provider and compare them with rivals but not overburden the provider with assurance requirements.

Employers more likely to take on young people with work experience
The survey revealed that almost half (49%) of employers would consider creating new roles for young people who impressed them during work experience placements. Skills and enterprise minister Matthew Hancock said: “Creating more opportunities for young people to gain experience and confidence is crucial if we want to help them secure employment. Traineeships could be the difference which gives these young people their first break, unlocking their potential and giving them the work experience employers are looking for.

Quote for the day:

"There are risks and costs to action. But they are far less than the long range risks of comfortable inaction." -- John Fitzgerald Kennedy

April 13, 2014

MediaFire offers 1TB of cloud storage for $2.50, 50GB for free
As with other file-sharing services, MediaFire allows multiple users to collaborate on projects by sharing folders and files and offering controls on who can edit and who can view content. Users can invite others to connect through the service by sending a link through Facebook, Google+, Twitter, Pinterest, Bloggr or email. There is also embedded-link sharing for online blogging platforms. The application also has an "Activity Feed" that keeps track of a user's activity on MediaFire, including updates to files made by other users, new files received and system status messages.

Five Car Technologies That Will Forever Change How We Drive
Ten years from now, cars may still look and drive just like the cars on the road today. But in between that time and now, we’re likely to see some major changes in automotive technologies being integrated into 2015 models and beyond, redefining the relationship between car and driver beyond hand on wheel, foot to pedal… even relieving us of these current driving responsibilities.

Change Resistance is a Myth!
Yes, that’s right! I believe change resistance is a myth. It’s an easy way for those leading change to blame the organization for not changing. I’m going to suggest that as a change agent, the buck stops with you. To be effective with “Big Change” you will need to be adept at influencing change and make this #BPMshift. If your organization isn’t changing – examine your tactics. If you gave someone in your organization 10 years of salary, do you think they would change? When an employee gets married, has a baby or moves – do they change? Of course they do!

900 Years of Tree Diagrams, the Most Important Data Viz Tool in History
While the impulse to visualize is more alive today than ever, our increasingly technological society may be outgrowing this enduring representational model. “Trees are facing this paradigm shift,” Lima says. “The tree, as a representational hierarchy, cannot accommodate things like the web and Wikipedia–things with linkage. The network is replacing the tree as the new visual metaphor.” In fact, the idea to do a collection solely on trees was born during Lima’s research on his first book–a collection of visualizations based on the staggering complexity of networks.

NSA Secretly Exploited Devastating Heartbleed Bug for Years
And Friday afternoon, Bloomberg reported that the National Security Agency has been aware of and actively exploiting the Heartbleed bug for at least two full years, citing "two people familiar with the matter." Ironically, the report comes on the same day that the U.S. Department of Homeland Security issued a warning about Heartbleed, stating that "While there have not been any reported attacks or malicious incidents involving this particular vulnerability confirmed at this time, it is still possible that malicious actors in cyberspace could exploit un-patched systems."

MapR Adds Apache Spark Stack to Distribution for Hadoop
"It has become clear that Apache Spark offers a combination of high-performance, in-memory data processing and multiple computation models that is well suited to serving as the basis of next-generation data processing platforms," commented Matt Aslett, research director, data platforms and analytics, 451 Research. “MapR's support for the complete Spark stack, combined with its partnership with Databricks, should give Hadoop users the confidence to start developing applications to take advantage of Spark's performance and flexibility."

Werner Vogels: four cloud computing trends for 2014
In 2014 expect a great rise in organisations that are adding media capabilities to their offerings. A good example is sports clubs; all are looking for ways to establish an engagement with their fan base beyond the two hours on a weekend. A successful way to achieve a weeklong engagement is by daily distribution or fresh, exclusive media content. The subscription revenues for clubs that often have millions of fans around the world are substantial. Cloud based services for pre and post production, as well as distribution, are readily available such that anyone can become an internet broadcaster operating worldwide without any capital investment.

Improving data governance and ensuring data ownership
A powerful tool is currently being developed that will remove the ambiguity in terminology; called the Financial Industry Business Ontology from the Enterprise Data Management Council. This tool aims to provide a common, standard terminology for all data for the financial industry. As standard definitions are released, it will be possible to start using this tool to reduce the uncertainty as to what the data actually is. The semantic repository of data terms covers a wide range of financial terms and common ones, such as business entities, will be of use to a broad set of financial institutions.

What makes the perfect data scientist?
Forrester Research analyst Mike Gualtieri believes a good data scientist can apply their expertise to any field. He gave the example of the “recommendations” section of Netflix, and said that it was mathematicians who were behind the development– not people with an intimate knowledge of Netflix’s audience. But the president of Hadoop distributor and developer HortonWorks, Herb Cunitz, said that a data scientist should have a good understanding of the sector they are working in. He advised enterprises to get those who understand data science tools to team up with colleagues who know the questions that the organisation wants answered – unless they have people on the payroll who can do both.

Artificial Neural Network based Web Application Firewall for SQL Injection
According to international statistics, SQL Injection is one of the most popular vulnerabilities of web applications. The consequences of this type of attacks are quite dangerous, such as sensitive information could be stolen or authentication systems might be by-passed. To mitigate the situation, several techniques have been adopted. In this research, a security solution is proposed using Artificial Neural Network to protect web applications against this type of attacks. The solution has been experimented on sample datasets and has given promising result.

Quote for the day:

"15% of one's financial success is due one's technical knowledge & 85% is due to skill in human engineering." - - Dale Carnegie

April 12, 2014

3 Trends Driving Big Data Breakthroughs: A CIO's View
By marrying external data with the terabyte of data per day spinning off of each of its sensor-equipped turbines, Fowler said GE is helping customers eke out a seemingly small 1% improvement in output that will translate to $2 to $5 million in savings per turbine, per year. That will net $66 billion in savings over the next 15 years across all 1,700-plus turbines that GE customers have in operation. The second trend changing the game in the use of big data is new platforms such as Hadoop and NoSQL databases, Fowler said. "We've seen the cartel of database vendors broken up, and some great new entrants give us new capabilities that we've never had before at a cost that we've never seen," he said.

When Machine Learning Isn’t Learning
Like k-means clustering, many algorithms being tagged with the machine learning label today are more iterative in nature than adaptive and learning in nature. I first came across the difference between artificial intelligence and a complex set of rules in high school. For a science fair project, I programmed my computer to play the game Isolation. Isolation is played on an 8 x 6 grid. Players move their piece to an open space and then punch out any space on the board. The idea is to get your opponent trapped on an island with no moves to make before you are trapped.

Is There Anything Beyond Quantum Computing?
While we don’t yet have full answers to these questions, over the past 15 years we’ve accumulated strong evidence that qubit quantum computers are up to the task of simulating quantum field theory. First, Michael Freedman, Alexei Kitaev, and Zhenghan Wang showed how to simulate a “toy” class of quantum field theories, called topological quantum field theories (TQFTs), efficiently using a standard quantum computer. These theories, which involve only two spatial dimensions instead of the usual three, are called “topological” because in some sense, the only thing that matters in them is the global topology of space.

eLearning: Ethiopia, Kenya & Beyond
Technology in schools projects have tended to do extremely well in Kenya. This is partly because the Kenyan government has placed ICT at the forefront of all its on-going initiatives, but it also boils down to a strong spirit of commercialism. This means that the government tends to leap on any available opportunities and promote competition to make them work. ... “This is the pathway to bettering yourself and there is hunger for education that is a lot more apparent within the kids in the school [than you ever see here in the UK]. They want to absorb everything. This differs from country to country in terms of the reason why.”

BPO on the Brink of a New Generation: Technology Transformation
A new research study from HfS Research, sponsored by Accenture, examines the extent to which new technologies and platforms can help companies break out of their current business process outsourcing (BPO) situation, in which BPO is still basically transactional and operational in nature and rarely transformational. The report, “BPO on the Brink of a New Generation: Technology Transformation,” is based on a survey of 773 BPO stakeholders—including enterprise buyers, service providers and advisors.

How Big Data Could Help Law Enforcement Catch Bulk Cash Smugglers
There are exciting developments in an emerging breed of software that can explore and analyze data to help uncover unknown patterns, links, opportunities and insights that can drive pro-active, cause-based decisions. Often referred to as “predictive analytics,” it is now available to help law enforcement sort through large volumes of data to predict the likelihood of targeted activity. A limited pilot program has proved very successful in intercepting narcotics flowing north from Mexico into the United States. I believe this same technology could revolutionize law enforcement decision-making at the border by increasing our odds of identifying, intercepting, and seizing bulk cash.

McKinsey research: IT needs a kick in the keister
A new study from strategy consulting firm, McKinsey, shows “growing dissatisfaction” with IT performance, from both business users and within the ranks of IT itself. The study notes that almost one-third of IT respondents believe replacing their own leadership should be a top priority to improve IT performance. This data signals a growing crisis, in which the CIO and IT are evolving but have not yet found their rightful place during a time in which expectations of IT are changing rapidly. ... For CIOs and IT, the message is clear and definite: being an infrastructure provider is not sufficient to meet expectations of today's business leaders and IT executives.

The DBA Detective: Disturbing Developments
Hell, it must be that new database. I played dumb. "I don't know what you're talking about Mildred. Which server is having trouble?" I tried to sound nonchalant, but my voice came out as a nervous squeak; the disks were her girls and they weren't happy. "There are massive reads and writes going on. My girls are rattling like mice." "I don't know, Mildred. There was a new app released last night, maybe that's it." "Well, ya better find out, and fast. Don't you guys have any monitoring?" Mildred knows how to make a guy feel small. "We're working on it," I lied, smooth as a grifter running twenties on a barman.

The Great Analytical Divide: Data Scientist vs. Value Architect
In hiring the business analyst or value architect, the “hybrid” component would focus on the quantitative/mathematical capabilities of the prospective candidate. For example, is the individual extremely comfortable with numbers? Does the individual know how to apply this knowledge to solve the given business problem. As part of the interview process, data and numbers could be presented to the candidate in order to understand their thought process in terms of identifying the real problem or business issue. Further questions might probe their thinking in how they might solve the problem.

Designing an Event Log API with RAML
Humans are the key ingredients in API design which means that API design tools and documentation formats must be human readable and writeable. Recent API documentation standards strive to be "human-centric." API Blueprint was an early leader in this area adopting Markdown as a format which is familiar to both developers and business analysts involved in the API design lifecycle. Mulesoft released their RESTful API modeling language RAML, late last year. The language could end up being just a proprietary vendor language, but there are a number of reasons why this language is interesting to the broader API community:

Quote for the day:

"The most likely way to reach a goal is to aim not at that goal but at some more ambitious goal beyond it" -- A. Toynbee

April 11, 2014

FTC Can Sue Companies Hit with Data Breaches, Court Says
Security and legal experts saw the case as a landmark test of the agency's authority to enforce data security standards on U.S. companies under a section of the FTC Act that prohibits "unfair" and "deceptive" trade practices. Over the past several years, the FTC has used this clause to force numerous settlements, or "consent decrees," from companies that suffered data breaches. In her 46-page ruling Judge Salas rejected all of the Wyndham's claims and held that the FTC does have the authority to hold companies accountable for breaches resulting from their failure to apply proper security controls.

Bank on Cloud
A Microsoft Asia survey gives some interesting insights on how consumers in Asia use cloud storage services today ... Cloud storage services such as OneDrive, is like a bank. There was time when many people wondered if Banks were safest place for their cash; but most of us safe keep money in our preferred banks. Drawing parallels from history, the perception of cloud storage is changing and consumers are increasingly using it to save, share and access their valuable files and precious moments safely and with ease.

Why Should You Build Your Business Processes in the Cloud?
BPM on Cloud is IBM’s Business Process Management platform available as a fully managed cloud service. The cloud service went live in 2013 as a subscription-based service with the same world-class BPM capabilities available in the licensed product. It includes a BPM development, test and a highly available “Run” environment that is securely hosted in IBM’s SoftLayer data centers around the world. Each company gets their own dedicated BPM environment that is completely isolated from other companies’ data and secured with encrypted access to the service

Privacy authorities across Europe approve Microsoft’s cloud commitments
This is an important week for the protection of our customers’ privacy. The European Union’s data protection authorities have found that Microsoft’s enterprise cloud contracts meet the high standards of EU privacy law. This ensures that our customers can use Microsoft services to move data freely through our cloud from Europe to the rest of the world. Building on this approval, we will now take proactive steps to expand these legal protections to benefit all of our enterprise customers. The EU’s 28 data protection authorities acted through their “Article 29 Working Party” to provide this approval via a joint letter.

Heartbleed Bug hits at heart of many Cisco, Juniper products
So far, Cisco has carved out a list of about a dozen products listed as confirmed “vulnerable” to exploits based on the Heartbleed Bug, plus another list of over 60 products considered “affected” because of OpenSSL but still being investigated. About two dozen products have been confirmed to be “not vulnerable,” as well as the hosted Cisco service called Cisco Meraki Dashboard. Cisco also says its Webex service was vulnerable to the Heartbleed Bug but has been fixed. This long list made by Cisco is subject to change and updates and at any moment, no specific software security updates have been made available, though could change at any time.

Nearly 100% Are Open To Outside Help From Trustworthy Sources

"Given how vitally important it is for the CEO to be getting the best possible counsel, independent of their board, in order to maintain the health of the corporation, it's concerning that so many of them are 'going it alone,'" says Stephen Miles, CEO of The Miles Group. There are many fee-based CEO peer groups (also known as 'executive roundtables' or 'mastermind groups') across the country offering opportunities for owners, presidents, and CEOs to gather with their peers and have dialogue in a confidential open table format. Some are regionally specific and others are industry specific.

Website admins will be busy dealing with Heartbleed
The first thing website owners should do is determine who is responsible for maintaining the OpenSSL software on the servers that host their sites. "If it is a dedicated server, it is your responsibility," researchers from Web security firm Sucuri said in a blog post. "If you are on a shared hosting platform, contact your hosting provider to remind them to update their servers." Once the OpenSSL installation is patched on the server and attacks are no longer possible, it's time to obtain a new SSL certificate and revoke the old one to ensure that any private key information attackers might have obtained though the flaw won't allow them to decrypt traffic in the future.

Challenge: Keeping the Internet of Things grounded in reality
IoT is one big, complex scenario, and really needs to be toned down to specific functions and applications where it really makes sense, and is straightforward to implement. There are some great feet-on-the-ground examples of where it is creating new business opportunities. In insurance, for example, auto insurers are installing telematics sensors into policyholders' cars (with their consent, so far) to track driving patterns — and offer discounts to good drivers.

Pros and cons of using secure containers for mobile device security
Secure containers are an important part of mobile application management (MAM), along with security policies such as requiring PIN locks and whitelisting specific applications. Containerization provides a balance of security and enhanced productivity to employees, so it’s important that the secure container experience is good enough for employees to keep using it. ... One of the biggest benefits from a management perspective is that this technology allows IT to take a unified security approach and apply policies or actions across multiple devices.

Developers Oriented Project Management
Many agencies have fear of letting the programmers, especially junior programmers talk with the customer. They are not confident in their own programmers communication skills. However there is no other way for them to learn it, but to actively and constantly talk to the client. Engage in the communication to understand the domain of the problem and real business cases that are the reason for the software to be built. After all, that's what Domain Driven Development encourage us to do. To talk to the customer and get to know their domain very well.

Quote for the day:

"A life spent making mistakes is not only more honourable, but more useful than a life spent doing nothing" -- GB Shaw

April 10, 2014

The Search for Creative Destruction
In our view, the process of creative destruction is primarily driven by product or business model innovation – often abetted by technology– that results in a superior value offering for consumers, be it higher performance, greater convenience or lower cost. This enhanced value proposition is the source from which economic benefits then flow, first to the innovator and over time to its consumers and competitors. The new product or model often proliferates into a new paradigm until subsequent innovation in turn threatens its dominant position.

How Tech Can Help Cities Reduce Crime
Camden County Police Chief Scott J. Thomson calls it a "significant departure from policing" in that it moves both toward the future and the past. "With our boots-on-the-ground goals, it's like 1840s policing of having cop building relationships," he says. "What's allowed them to do that is having bleeding-edge technology. It's back to the future technology." ... because cars are GPS-tracked through an Automated Vehicle Locator System, the system automatically locates the two nearest patrol cars to an emergency and directs them via in-car computers to that location.

Stung by file-encrypting malware, researchers fight back
Kevin Haley, director of Symantec's security response team, said Wednesday "it's the perfect kind of criminal scam. You get people scared and not thinking, and you can make a lot of money out of it." Ransomware schemes may be rising due to the sheer profitability and declining effectiveness of Web-based scams such as bogus security programs. Haley said Symantec estimates ransomware perpetrators on an average achieve a 3 percent response rate, and demand payment that is much higher than those peddling fake AV software, typically $50.

Internet Of Things Demands Open Standards
Ashton says the next-generation IoT has the potential to change the world, and I agree. By eliminating human beings as the primary creators and "routers" of information, the IoT becomes an ultra-efficient auto-organizing entity that handles all the myriad mundane details -- liberating human beings to focus on ideas. For this to happen, however, communication must take place on multiple levels, from the hardware that comprises the physical underpinnings of the IoT -- the internal computing parts inside each device -- to the communications protocols and methodologies that links from device to device and from the device to the cloud and back.

How Google Humanizes Technology in the Workplace And You Too, Can
Trends like these not only suggest that we're allowing technology to dehumanize us, our incessant connection distracts us from remaining present with other people, our work, and from sustaining any meaningful flow in our lives. Using the occasion of the Internet’s silver anniversary as an inflection point, I reached out to Google Human Resources Director, Dr. Todd Carlisle, to see if his firm has learned to more successfully utilize and integrate technology and even re-humanize it in their workplace. Here are five of his most useful insights:

eBook: Leveraging Cloud and Mobile
Spend on cloud and mobile will dominate technology investments for finance departments this year, but while the potential ROI in those areas is huge, so are the risks. By now most companies have adopted some cloud systems, and the good news is the process of implementing these solutions has gotten easier and more predictable. Unfortunately, for some organizations the process still has unexpected but significant complexities. Mobile is also on track to reach new productivity heights over the next two years, but CFOs still have concerns, particularly about device security management.

Big Data: A Misguided Critique
Here are the "problems" they have with big data, along with my responses. Although big data is very good at detecting correlations, especially subtle correlations that an analysis of smaller data sets might miss, it never tells us which correlations are meaningful. This is the worst. The example offered: From 2006 to 2011, the US murder rate was well correlated with Internet Explorer's marketshare. Correlation, but evidently no cause. Here's a news flash, guys. That's not a problem with big data. If it's a problem at all, it's a problem with statistics. A fundamental challenge in statistics is extracting cause from correlation.

NASA Releases 1,000 Apps To Public
Software makes up about a third of reported NASA inventions each year, and by publishing a software catalog the agency hopes to increase the ability of others to make use of its software significantly, said Daniel Lockney, who manages NASA's Technology Transfer Program. The TTP, which oversees the agency's intellectual property and the transfer of technology for commercialization and public use, is part of the agency's Office of the Chief Technologist. "Traditionally our [apps] were distributed at different offices and labs around the country. So we needed to gather everything in one place," said Lockney in an interview with InformationWeek Government.

The onus is on IT to improve perceptions around IT culture
"The culture surrounding how IT and the rest of the business relates to one another is becoming increasingly divided," said panel member Vivek Bhaskaran, founder and executive chairman of web-based research technology company, Ideascale & Survey Analytics. "We still have way too many companies that view IT as a set of administrative tasks that they are spending way too much of their budgets on." ... The disconnect between these perceptions and what departments think IT is in the business of, can stand in the way of innovation, Bishof said.

Law Firm CIO Makes the Case for Microsoft Lync
"People don't even realize it's a Lync phone system," he says. "The core infrastructure is functional. We've had over 30,000 minutes of conference calls on those phones without people realizing it." It is what Leung calls the "phone+" features - like the capability to seamlessly go from a call to a conference call to a video call to whiteboard functionality - that still need work, he notes. The features work, but are not always easy to find without some training. "The phone+ functionality, it's not as intuitive as I would have wanted," he says.

Quote for the day:

"I never learned from a man who agreed with me." -- Robert A. Heinlein

April 09, 2014

Plenty of drivers to craft a hybrid cloud strategy, but caveats too
Unless an organization's systems of record and systems of engagement are fully on-premises or completely in the cloud -- and few are strictly one or the other at this point -- that organization is operating in an environment that requires a hybrid cloud strategy. Hybrid cloud management -- a balancing act that combines the safety of keeping sensitive data on-premises and taking advantage of scalability and agility -- is becoming increasingly important to IT leaders.

Users face serious threat as hackers take aim at routers, embedded devices
Routers and other embedded devices have not been on attackers' radar until now, at least not on a significantly large scale. That's starting to change and if the attacks observed this year are any indication, it might be happening at a faster pace than manufacturers can react. Because routers can affect all other local devices that access the Internet through them, they are a rich target, said Trey Ford, global security strategist at security firm Rapid7, via email.

Eight (No, Nine!) Problems With Big Data
Is big data really all it’s cracked up to be? There is no doubt that big data is a valuable tool that has already had a critical impact in certain areas. For instance, almost every successful artificial intelligence computer program in the last 20 years, from Google’s search engine to the I.B.M. “Jeopardy!” champion Watson, has involved the substantial crunching of large bodies of data. But precisely because of its newfound popularity and growing use, we need to be levelheaded about what big data can — and can’t — do.

The IT operations side of acquisitions: Look to the cloud for ERP alternatives
The plot thickens when you are talking about disharmony in major systems that engage every level of a company, such as enterprise resources planning (ERP). ERP is a corporate "drive chain" system starting with the planning of product requirements in sales and engineering, which in turn dictate the activities of purchasing and manufacturing, which are then linked back into corporate financial and service functions. When two organizations operate two different ERP systems, achieving a "smooth operational landing" in a merger can quickly turn into a nightmare.

Why Every Data Architect Should Be An Analyst First
Data architects need to walk in the shoes of an analyst. Data architecture is no longer only about the technology you implement, it is about creating solutions for analysts and consumers of data. If you can’t think like an analyst or business user, you can’t know what they need. It is time to get educated on using data vs. educating the business on data technologies. The best way to do this is to experience what it takes to be a data scientist, business or operations intelligence analyst, or customer analyst.

3 Compelling Steps to Align Business Strategy with IT
IT managers do comply with the constantly changing external environment that keeps the organisation on its toes, demanding continuous evolution to adapt to the growing market demands. Besides this, the change should be in sync with the regulatory compliance framework. IT managers agree that technology plays an important role in driving competitive advantage; and that it is the only lever available to the enterprise that helps it scale up its business. But the big question is: ‘How does an enterprise extract the most out of IT? And why is it important to align IT with business?

After HIPAA Omnibus Rule 2013: How to implement continuous compliance
To create a culture of continuous compliance, healthcare organizations need to build comprehensive compliance plans based around any relevant HIPAA obligations, which means getting a grip on documenting compliance controls and figuring out how to maintain that documentation. Outlining each element of the HIPAA Security Rule and documenting specific business practices will hopefully develop a shared understanding within the organization of the processes that enable HIPAA compliance.

The 'always-on' IT culture: Get used to it
Not every IT professional is as accepting as Meadows of the growing demand for around-the-clock accessibility, whether the commitment is as simple as fielding emails on weekends or as extreme as attending an impromptu meeting in the middle of the night. With smartphones and Web access pretty much standard fare among business professionals, people in a broad range of IT positions -- not just on-call roles like help desk technician or network administrator -- are expected to be an email or text message away, even during nontraditional working hours.

Freescale Unveils ARM-Based SoCs for SDN, NFV
The demands these trends are putting on networks create the need for SoCs that are programmable, armed with accelerators and can support such protocols as OpenFlow for SDN, according to Freescale officials. SDN and NFV offer the promise of networks that are more programmable, flexible and automated by putting much of the network intelligence now found in the hardware into software. However, just as important is having hardware that is optimized for these new models, according to Tom Deitrich, senior vice president and general manager of Freescale's Digital Networking group

Distributing Complex Services in Cross-Geolocational IDCs
All distributed systems with data in different areas face challenges in data consistency, availability and partition tolerance, and according to CAP theorem we cannot satisfy all three. We do single write multiple read: we have pre-defined master write nodes, and we make all the write nodes in one SET - we call it the data source SET. Whenever a data source is generated, a sync is triggered in our distribution system (we call it the sync center), which syncs the write operation to all other IDCs in China, and this same operation gets executed in every single SET, too. So we are not syncing data, but duplicating user operations, so the process would be faster.

Quote for the day:

"An overburdened executive is the best executive, because he or she doesn't have the time to meddle" -- Jack Welch