Microsoft Teams has finally been restored after suffering a massive outage that lasted many hours!
Here was what happened…
Microsoft Teams Suffers Massive Outage!
On Wednesday, 20 July 2022, thousands of users were unable to access Microsoft Teams, and it continued into Thursdays, 21 July 2022.
This was a big problem, because Teams had become an integral part of daily operations for many businesses that had adapted to a hybrid work pattern during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Microsoft Teams users relied on the service to organise their workflow and communicate internally like making calls and messaging each other.
The MS Teams problem also affected other services downstream, with some users reporting issues with Microsoft Office 365 as well.
Microsoft acknowledged the downstream impact to multiple Office 365 services with Teams integration, like Microsoft Word, Office Online and SharePoint Online.
Why Microsoft Teams Suffered Such A Massive Outage!
After 1.5 hours after Teams went down, Microsoft announced that they found the root cause – “a recent deployment contained a broken connection to an internal storage device, which result in impact“.
That’s tech-speak for “we installed a system upgrade that pointed to a storage device that does not exist, so MS Teams stopped working“.
They quickly redirected traffic to “a healthy service to mitigate impact“, which have allowed unaffected users to continue using MS Teams, but it did not seem to help those who lost access.
Although they identified the root cause, restoration appears to be taking time. Two hours later, they could only report that “Microsoft Teams functionality is beginning to recover“, which they repeated two hours later.
In the meantime, affected MS Teams users are creatively expressing their “frustration” on social media…
Update @ 3:56 PM (GMT+8) : The Microsoft 365 team announced that Teams availability has “mostly recovered“, but “a few service features” still required attention.
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Dr. Adrian Wong has been writing about tech and science since 1997, even publishing a book with Prentice Hall called Breaking Through The BIOS Barrier (ISBN 978-0131455368) while in medical school.
He continues to devote countless hours every day writing about tech, medicine and science, in his pursuit of facts in a post-truth world.
The Malaysia Ministry of Health has clarified that the MySejahtera app and its data was not sold to any private company.
Here is what you need to know!
Claim : MySejahtera Was Sold To Private Company!
Malaysian opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim claimed that MySejahtera will be sold to a private company – MySJ Sdn. Bhd. through direct negotiation.
The MySejahtera application was rolled out in April 2020, under the Malaysia Ministry of Health (KKM). It was built by KPISoft (now Entomo) as a corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiative.
According to his statement, the government appointed MySJ Sdn. Bhd. through direct negotiation to take over MySejahtera on 26 November 2021.
Then in December 2021, the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) proposed that the government should take over MySejahtera since it is now “an integral part of the national health system”.
KKM : MySejahtera Was NOT Be Sold To Private Company!
On 27 March 2022, the Malaysia Health Minister Khairy Jamaluddin issued a press statement, clarifying that the government did not sell MySejahtera to any private company.
Here are the key points of his statement on the claims that MySejahtera was sold to MySJ Sdn. Bhd. :
On 26 November 2021, the government decided that MySejahtera is owned by the government, and the Ministry of Health (KKM) was appointed as the main owner of the application.
The government did not pay KPISoft any money for the development of MySejahtera, which was carried out from 27 March 2020 until 31 March 2021.
This was based on the company’s offer to let the government use the app for one year for free, as a Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiative.
After the CSR period ended on 31 March 2021, the government agreed to extend the use of MySejahtera, and work with KPISoft to expand its features.
On 26 November 2021, the government ordered KKM to form a Price Negotiation Committee comprising of stakeholder agencies to negotiate the purchase and service maintenance of MySejahtera for two (2) years.
The scope of the procurement and management of the MySejahtera app included operating MySejahtera, system development including additional modules, maintenance, datacenter management and third-party services like Google Map and Places API, as well as SMS services.
On 28 February 2022, the Ministry of Finance approved KKM’s procurement of the MySejahtera app.
MySejahtera data has been under KKM’s supervision from the first day it was used, and the data is processed according to KKM procedures.
KKM does not share MySejahtera data with any government agency, or private companies.
All data from the MySejahtera app are uploaded to a cloud server network, and can only be accessed by the MySejahtera app only.
In short, the MySejahtera app was not sold to any private company, and was purchased by the Ministry of Health with approval from the Ministry of Finance on 28 February 2022.
Please Support My Work!
Support my work through a bank transfer / PayPal / credit card!
Name : Adrian Wong Bank Transfer : CIMB 7064555917 (Swift Code : CIBBMYKL)
Credit Card / Paypal : https://paypal.me/techarp
Dr. Adrian Wong has been writing about tech and science since 1997, even publishing a book with Prentice Hall called Breaking Through The BIOS Barrier (ISBN 978-0131455368) while in medical school.
He continues to devote countless hours every day writing about tech, medicine and science, in his pursuit of facts in a post-truth world.
Secureworks just launched Red Cloak TDR at Dell Technologies World 2019 in Las Vegas! Here is a primer on the Secureworks Red Cloak TDI cybersecurity service!
SecureWorks Launches Red Cloak TDR
At Dell Technologies World 2019, Secureworks, a Dell Technologies subsidiary, unveiled Red Cloak TDR, their software-as-a-service (SaaS) app that allows companies to securely manage their own cybersecurity measures.
Developed with over 20 years of field experience in cybersecurity, Red Cloak TDR offers a new way for companies to detect, investigate and respond to online threats such as malware, ransomware etc. Unlike other cybersecurity services, it is aided by deep learning, and machine learning.
The AI assistance helps it quickly detect new and unknown online threats, while reducing false alarms. It also helps cybersecurity teams focus on the real or high-risk threats.
How Secureworks Red Cloak TDR Will Transform Cybersecurity
Cybersecurity threats can go undetected for hundreds of days in the gaps and disconnected layers of security products. This is particularly problematic with apps and services that are not updated on a daily or even hourly basis.
Red Cloak TDR Is Cloud-Native
As a cloud-native application, it can be quickly updated after investigations revel a new threat. In addition, the service includes the following features :
Intuitive workflows
Automation
Chat feature
Access to Secureworks’ cybersecurity team and network
Software-as-a-Service
As a software-as-a-service (SaaS) app, there is no hassle of installing on-site hardware or software system version upgrades. All updates, back-ups and tuning will be covered by the Red Cloak TDR app.
The app does not charge by data consumption like some apps, so users are free to process and manage all the security data they need to protect their organisation. The app is also designed to integrate into the organisation’s own control framework.
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Freshworks just announced that their Omniroute and Proximity software have added support for WhatsApp Business to better deliver online customer support for businesses.
Here is a quick primer on what they did, and what it means for Omniroute and Proximity users!
Freshworks Omniroute
Freshworks Omniroute is a customer engagement software that helps businesses manage and direct user customer conversations. It gives their customer service agents a unified view of customer inquiries across multiple channels
Integrating Omniroute with WhatsApp Business was a logical move, allowing Omniroute to cover the massive network of 1.5 billion WhatsApp users.
This integration will make Omniroute more compelling, by giving their users the ability to directly and quickly contact their customers via WhatsApp.
“Users no longer have to jump through hoops to reach out to a business – all they have to do is flip out their mobile and engaging with their favorite brand is just a message away on WhatsApp,” says Girish Mathrubootham, CEO of Freshworks.
Freshworks Proximity For Freshchat
Freshworks Proximity has also added integration with WhatsApp Business. Proximity allows businesses to send our messages to their customers on a large scale.
Adding WhatsApp Business support will mean adding another avenue to reach out to that massive 1.5 billion user pool.
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David Rajoo, Director of Systems Engineering, Symantec Malaysia, reveals the Symantec 2018 Cybersecurity Predictions. They will help CIOs and cybersecurity experts prepare for the onslaught of cybersecurity threats in 2018.
The Symantec 2018 Cybersecurity Predictions
This past year, cyber criminals caused major service disruptions around the world, using their increasing technical proficiency to break through cyber defenses. In 2018, we expect the trend to become more pronounced as these attackers will use machine learning and artificial intelligence to launch even more potent attacks.
Gear up for a busy year ahead. Incidents like the WannaCry attack, which impacted more than 200,000 computers worldwide in May, are just the warmup to a new year of more virulent malware and DDoS attacks. Meanwhile, cyber criminals are poised to step up their attacks on the millions of devices now connected to the Internet of Things both in offices and homes.
The cybersecurity landscape in 2018 is sure to surprise us in ways that we never imagined. As 2017 draws to a close, here is what you can expect over the course of the upcoming year:
The Symantec 2018 Cybersecurity Predictions Part 1/3
Blockchain Will Find Uses Outside Of Cryptocurrencies But Cyber criminals Will Focus On Coins and Exchanges
Blockchain is finally finding applications outside of crypto-currencies, expanding its functions in inter-bank settlements with the help of IoT gaining traction. However, these use cases are still in their infancy stage and are not the focus for most cyber criminals today.
Instead of attacking Blockchain technology itself, cyber criminals will focus on compromising coin-exchanges and users’ coin-wallets since these are the easiest targets, and provide high returns. Victims will also be tricked into installing coin-miners on their computers and mobile devices, handing their CPU and electricity over to cyber criminals.
Cyber criminals Will Use Artificial Intelligence (AI) & Machine Learning (ML) To Conduct Attacks
No cyber security conversation today is complete without a discussion about AI and ML. So far, these conversations have been focused on using these technologies as protection and detection mechanisms. However, this will change in the next year with AI and ML being used by cyber criminals to conduct attacks.
It is the first year where we will see AI versus AI in a cybersecurity context. Cyber criminals will use AI to attack and explore victims’ networks, which is typically the most labour-intensive part of compromise after an incursion.
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The Symantec 2018 Cybersecurity Predictions Part 2/3
Supply Chain Attacks Will Become Mainstream
Supply chain attacks have been a mainstay of the classical espionage and signals-intelligence operators, compromising upstream contractors/systems/companies and suppliers. They are proven to have a high-level of effectiveness, with nation-state actors using a mix of human intelligence to compromise the weakest link in the chain.
These attacks are moving into the cybercriminal space, becoming mainstream. With publicly available information on suppliers, contractors, partnerships and key-people, cyber criminals can find victims in the supply chain and attack the weakest link. With a number of high profile successful attacks in 2016 and 2017, cyber criminals will focus on this method in 2018.
File-less and File-light Malware Will Explode
2016 and 2017 have seen consistent growth in the amount of file-less and file-light malware, with attackers capitalising organizations that lack in preparation against such threats. With fewer Indicators of Compromise (IoC), use of the victims’ own tools, and complex disjointed behaviours, these threats have been harder to stop, track and defend against in many scenarios.
Like the early days of ransomware, where early success by a few cyber criminals triggered a gold-rush like mentality, more cyber criminals are now rushing to use these same techniques. Although file-less and file-light malware will still be outnumbered by orders-of-magnitude as traditional style malware, they will pose a significant threat and lead to an explosion in 2018.
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Organisations Will Still Struggle With Security-as-a-Service (SaaS) Security
Adoption of SaaS continues to grow at an exponential rate as organizations embark on digital transformation projects to drive business agility. This rate of change and adoption presents many security challenges as access control, data control, user behaviour and data encryption vary significantly between SaaS apps. While this is not new and many of the security problems are well understood, organizations will continue to struggle with all these in 2018.
Combined with new privacy and data protections laws adopted by regulators across the world, these will pose major implications in terms of penalties, and more importantly, reputational damage.
Organisations Will Still Struggle With Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) Security – More Breaches Due to Error, Compromise & Design
IaaS has completely changed the way organisations run their operations, offering massive benefits in agility, scalability, innovation and security. It also introduces significant risks, with simple errors that can expose massive amount of data and take down the entire system.
While security controls above the IaaS layer are customer’s responsibility, traditional controls do not map well – leading to confusion, errors and design issues with ineffective or inappropriate controls being applied, while new controls are ignored. This will lead to more breaches throughout 2018 as organizations struggle to shift their security programs to be IaaS effective.
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The Symantec 2018 Cybersecurity Predictions Part 3/3
Financial Trojans Will Still Account For More Losses Than Ransomware
Financial Trojans were some of the first pieces of malware to be monetised by cyber criminals. From simple beginnings as credential harvesting tools, they have since evolved to advanced attack frameworks that target multiple banks, and banking systems that send shadow transactions and hide their tracks. They have proven to be highly profitable for cyber criminals.
Today the move to mobile application-based banking has curtailed some of the effectiveness, so cyber criminals are now moving their attacks to these platforms. Cyber criminals’ profits from Financial Trojans is expected to grow, giving them higher gains as compared to Ransomware attacks.
Expensive Home Devices Will Be Held To Ransom
Ransomware has become a major problem and is one of the scourges of the modern Internet, allowing cyber criminals to reap huge profits by locking up users’ files and systems. The gold-rush mentality has not only pushed more and more cyber criminals to distribute ransomware, but also contributed to the rise of Ransomware-As-A-Service and other specializations in the cyber criminal underworld.
These specialists are now looking to expand their attack reach by exploiting the massive increase in expensive connected home devices. Smart TVs, smart toys and other smart appliances can run into thousands of dollars and users are generally not aware of the threats to these devices, making them an attractive target for cyber criminals.
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IoT Devices Will Be Hijacked and Used in DDoS Attacks
In 2017, we have seen massive DDoS attacks using hundreds of thousands of compromised IoT devices in people’s homes and workplaces to generate traffic. This is not expected to change with cyber criminals looking to exploit the poor security settings and management of home IoT devices.
Furthermore, the inputs and sensors of these devices will also be hijacked, with attackers feeding audio, visual or other faked inputs to make these devices do what they want rather than what users expect them to do.
IoT Devices Will Provide Persistent Access to Home Networks
Beyond DDoS attacks and ransomware, home IoT devices will be compromised by cyber criminals to provide persistent access to a victim’s network. Home users generally do not consider the cyber security implications of their home IoT devices, leaving default settings and not vigilantly updating them like they do with their computers.
Persistent access means that no matter how many times a victim cleans their machine or protects their computer, the attacker will always have a backdoor into victims’ network and the systems that they connect to.
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27 July 2016 — Canvas by Instructure , a leading software-as-a-service (SaaS) technology company that makes software that makes people smarter, announced recently at InstructureCon the Canvas integration with Microsoft Office 365 to provide instructors and learners around the world with an improved educational experience.
“Teachers need these new capabilities for their education platforms, and we have continuously focused on providing the best technology we could design and build,” said Mitch Benson, Vice President of Canvas Product. “What happened next was that two of edtech’s most established forces connected and worked together to meet the expressed needs of these educators. We’re extremely proud of the result and can’t wait to roll it out to our robust, global list of educational institutions.”
Responding to the needs of educators, representatives from the Canvas Platform Team collaborated with Microsoft to help develop improvements to the Canvas base platform that facilitate the best integration experience possible for their millions of users. The Canvas Platform Team believes this integration will be both a model and a catalyst for change to propel greater innovation to rusty technology in edtech.
“Across the Asia Pacific region, schools rely heavily on Canvas and Microsoft for their daily educational functions, and these platforms have grown essential to the learning process of our K–12, further and higher education teachers and students,” said Troy Martin, Director, Asia Pacific, Instructure. “The integration of two of our most prominently used technologies will only help further streamline and enhance learning development within each classroom.”
Canvas has millions of active users and is employed by hundreds of universities and colleges in 40 countries. Canvas combines innovative education tools, a platform for hosting those tools and institutions using the platform to transform learning and teaching in the classroom. The Canvas integration with Microsoft follows other critical Canvas innovations, including a transformation of their user interface.
“Our relationship with Canvas helps us bring the best tools for learning into the classroom. We know teachers and students are strapped for time and we want to help them focus on what’s really important: teaching and learning,” said Eran Megiddo, Corporate Vice President of engineering, Education at Microsoft. “By integrating Office 365 with Canvas, teachers and students can now collaborate online with Office 365, including OneNote Class Notebooks, Word, Excel and PowerPoint directly within their Canvas LMS, saving valuable time so the teachers can remain focused on their students, and students can leverage the best tools available and focus on learning.”
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Canvas Integration With Office 365
Canvas and Microsoft provide seven main points of interoperability that make using the Canvas integration with Office 365 seamless. Those points are:
Submit files directly from Office 365 into Canvas Assignments.
Access Office 365 documents through SpeedGrader to add feedback.
Link Office 365 documents anywhere you use the Rich Content Editor.
Create Collaborations using any type of Office document.
Create and grade assignments in your Microsoft OneNote Class Notebook, then push those grades to Canvas.
Sign in to Canvas with your Office 365 login using single sign-on.
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28 APRIL 2016 – Instructure, a software-as-a-service (SaaS) company and creator of the Canvas LMS (learning management system), announced today that it has grown its operations in the Asia-Pacific (APAC) region by doubling its staff. Additionally, four prestigious customers in the APAC region have selected Canvas as their LMS of choice, bringing a modern learning platform to schools and universities across the region.
Canvas was recently implemented by SCEGGS Darlinghurst in Sydney, The Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts, SIM University in Singapore, and University of Auckland in New Zealand. In addition to the four customer wins, Canvas has more than doubled its headcount within the sales, marketing, and customer success functions across APAC over the past 12 months.
Troy Martin, Director of APAC for Canvas said of the LMS’ momentum within the region: “The success that Canvas has seen over the past 12 months in the APAC region indicates that there is a growing and real need for cutting edge technology that becomes an enabler, allowing the institutions we work with to deliver the best and most compelling learning experience possible.
“We’ve seen how progressive Asia-Pacific can be when it comes to driving innovation in education and student-centred learning, and Canvas is uniquely placed to facilitate that transition towards a digital teaching model. Our APAC customers, including SCEGGS, Hong Kong Academy of Performing Arts, SIM University and University of Auckland have selected Canvas as their LMS platform partner of choice to tackle head-on the challenges and opportunities presented by the global education marketplace. We are delighted to be working with them moving forward.”
SCEGGS Darlinghurst, an independent Anglican girls school of 920 students based in Sydney, is planning to roll out Canvas to the school in May 2016. Ken Emeleus, Director of ICT said that the school had selected Canvas LMS due to the platform’s solid feature set, user experience, and manageability.
“A significant number of our staff were not engaging with our previous solution. They felt it was inefficient and provided a poor user experience.” said Emeleus. “The team at Canvas really recognised the need for schools to follow their own processes when choosing technology solutions.”
Following years of using its homegrown LMS, the University of Auckland – New Zealand’s most highly ranked university – recognized the need to find a modern platform that would provide greater usability and functionality for its faculty and students. Specifically, the university – which boasts over 33,000 students and nearly 5,000 staff – wanted a system that would integrate seamlessly with external tools and applications that the faculty use, while also working across operating systems and devices that students expect to use in conducting their learning.
Dr. Kevin Morris, Director of Teaching and Learning at University of Auckland notes that “the shift to Canvas LMS is an important part of our plan to enhance the learning experience, by providing our staff and students with a flexible, modern tool to support student success.”
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For The Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts (the Academy), which has a 1,500-strong staff and student body, selecting Canvas was an integral part of meeting the academy’s 10-year strategic plan, in which they sought new technologies that would ‘enrich educational opportunities for students, enhance international engagement, and improve operational efficiency.’
Head of the Academy’s Innovation Hub (iHub), Peter Duffy, says, “The Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts chose Canvas LMS for a two-year trial because of its ease of use and intuitive design, as well as the high quality of technical support provided. We were also particularly impressed with Canvas’ ability to demonstrate how its platform excelled by providing a benchmark across other performing arts institutions.”
SIM University (UniSIM) in Singapore, which has 13,600 students, also chose Canvas as its LMS of record. UniSIM’s Director of Learning Systems and Applications, Chye Seng Lee shared that the University has been using the incumbent LMS since 2006, and had started to evaluate and identify a future-ready LMS platform that can better meet the University’s teaching and learning needs for the years ahead in January 2015.
“’Future-readiness’ refers to the teaching and learning requirements required by the new and modern online learning environment that we envisage our students and faculty to be using in the near future. We chose Canvas because it is more forward-looking and future-ready, and matched our key teaching and learning requirements in the areas of ease of use, mobile learning, social earning, outcomes assessment, learning analytics and learning personalisation,” says Lee.
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