DISH introduces Google Nest Hello to the Hopper platform, directly sends notifications to connected TVs

DISH announces that its Hopper and Wally receivers now support the Google Nest Hello Video doorbell. When the doorbell rings, Nest Hello sends on-screen notifications directly to the television. 

DISH is the first pay-TV provider to integrate a Google Nest device into its ecosystem with the Device Access program. The Nest Hello announcement is the first in a series of Google Nest integrations coming to the Hopper platform. 

After pairing their Google Nest account with their DISH Hopper or Wally receiver, customers will receive on-screen notifications, including an image, when their Nest Hello has been pressed.

The whole-home Hopper platform leads the industry in DVR features and functionality. Hopper 3 boasts 16 tuners, two terabytes of DVR storage, live and on-demand 4K compatibility, PrimeTime Anytime, AutoHop and integrated apps like Netflix, YouTube, YouTube Kids, Pandora and Amazon Prime Video. 

Voice-control capabilities through Amazon Alexa, Google Assistant and the DISH voice remote give customers easier access to their favorite programming. Hopper (all generations) gives customers access to live, on-demand and recorded content on DISH's online streaming app, DISH Anywhere. 

DISH's Hopper platform becomes a whole-home solution with the company's line of Joey client receivers, delivering the best in technology and value.

"Google Nest on Hopper is about giving our customers added choice and control over their home environment — with the subtle on-screen alerts delivered by the Nest Hello, customers are better equipped to hit pause and take action right away," said Rob Sadler, DISH director of product management. "This is just the beginning of a powerful relationship with Google Nest and their vast portfolio of products." 

In 2018, DISH introduced the ability for Google Assistant to control its Hopper receivers. It expanded that capability earlier this year, with the introduction of the Google Assistant-enabled DISH Voice Remote.

The Nest Hello feature is available to all broadband-connected Hopper and Wally receivers. Support for Joey (all clients) will begin rolling out in the following weeks. Nest joins DISH's suite of smart-home control options, including Google Assistant, Amazon Alexa and Josh.ai.

Keyfactor researchers discover RSA certificate vulnerability, break nearly 250,000 distinct RSA keys

Keyfactor released research findings identifying a vulnerability across active RSA certificates. RSA certificates and the RSA algorithm are commonly used to securely transmit data to a remote source. Using minimal computing resources, researchers were able to collect and analyze 175 million RSA certificates and keys used to protect real-world Internet traffic.

The active and publicly available RSA keys (which consist of the product of two large, randomly chosen primes) were mined to identify common factors. Any keys sharing one of their prime factors with another key are compromised by this technique. The analysis found over 435,000 certificates with a shared factor, with researchers able to rederive the private key.

“The findings are alarming,” said Ted Shorter, chief technology officer and co-founder at Keyfactor. “The research finds inordinate rates of compromise impacting IoT devices with design constraints and limited entropy. These devices could include cars, medical implants and other critical devices, that if compromised, could result in life-impacting harm.”

“In a real-world attack scenario, a threat actor with a re-derived private key for an SSL/TLS server certificate could impersonate that server when devices attempt to connect,” said JD Kilgallin, senior integration engineer and researcher at Keyfactor. “The connecting user or device cannot distinguish the attacker from the legitimate certificate holder, opening the door to critical device malfunction or exposure of sensitive data.”

When these devices include medical implants and cars, the impact of the malfunction can be devastating. The research stresses the importance of security best practices, random number generation for connected systems and use of cryptography to securely install firmware and software updates through the lifecycle of the device.

“Security at design is paramount for device manufacturers,” said Shorter. “Current-generation connected devices and systems must be equipped to defend against a new generation of security risks. Cryptography is essential in ensuring new and emerging devices are able to adhere to and scale with security best practices.”

Researchers built a database of 75 million active RSA keys using Keyfactor’s proprietary SSL/TLS certificate discovery capabilities. The dataset was augmented using 100 million certificates available through certificate transparency logs and analyzed on a single virtual machine in Microsoft Azure, using Keyfactor’s scalable GCD algorithm to find shared factors. 

The findings were released at the initial IEEE Conference on Trust, Privacy and Security in Intelligent Systems and Applications.

Symantec releases its Holiday Wishlist, with key cyber safety tools making it to the Holiday Shopping listing

As consumers head into the end-of-year holiday celebrations, they are expected to go shopping. But as they trek to the malls or go online, shoppers need to consider the security implications of the vast array of cool, connected devices now on the market.

After a hacker accessed a security camera and harassed an 8-year-old, the chilling recording of the encounter sends a clear warning to shoppers this holiday season. This could happen with anyone using smart-home devices can potentially be hacked or modified to lock out. General device privacy and security concerns apply here to protect users from the misuse of their data.

Consumers must make purchases from reputable manufacturers, and make sure to change the default passwords that these devices come with and don’t forget to use security software to help prevent malware from infecting devices on home network. 

Smart watches and activity trackers are soaring in popularity with nearly 85 million people around the world last quarter discovering the convenience of having the power of the internet within reach. But these accessories don't stand alone. Rather, they serve as extensions of smartphones and collect personal information. So, carefully read the privacy policies regarding the information that the user intends to share, including reviewing geographical location settings.

Increasingly, smart watches are gaining access to certain functions in smart homes, such as the ability to remotely unlock the front door. That sounds great until the device gets lost or stolen. If it does, review all passwords to make sure they’re protected with two-factor authentication. Even though some accessories include security settings that ought to help protect users in case of loss or theft, be sure to understand the tradeoffs of convenience.

Any internet-connected, voice-enabled TV has the capability to track what you are searching and watching. What’s more concerning is attackers can hack into smart TV webcams for spying or capitalize on software vulnerabilities to insert malware that can move through  connected devices. Also, when shopping for a unit, don’t forget to ask whether it has a camera. Also, does it come with a physical cover or is there one that can be added?

It’s worth researching whether the brand has a good or bad reputation when it comes to privacy and data collection. Once the user brings it home, think about whether they want to be tracked for advertising purposes. Most smart TVs do come with an option for users to turn off such tracking, but it may not be the default setting. So, check the fine print before turning on or turning off features on the smart TV.

A general rule with Smart TV software (and any computing device), to keep the software up to date or turn on automatic updates if there’s such an option.

Another great convenience of the last few years, robot vacuum cleaners have become a must-have appliance for many. Independent research finds that the devices enjoy off-the-chart loyalty with 89 percent of people who own robot cleaners saying they would recommend them to friends and family.

But don’t ignore the privacy implications. Many robot cleaners have cameras to map the house floor layout and optimize operation. This poses potential areas of concern if the robot is connected to the internet. Ensure the manufacturer is protecting the mapped layout data and that it is not shared. Also ensure the cameras are not capturing additional data from within the home.

Another point to consider is that unlike most other devices users may own around the house, this is a machine that physically moves inside the home. As such, a compromised vacuum potentially can enable other types of creepy activity.

So again, ask whether the user trust the manufacturer and whether the company not only can build a vacuum, but also safeguard data. If the answer to that question is yes, also inquire how they go about doing it. Don’t take “why, of course we protect you” as the final answer. Do the research and focus on reputable manufacturers. 

NPR and Edison Research estimates that there are now about 120 million smart speakers in U.S. homes, representing 78 percent year-over-year growth. But most of these devices have “always on” speech listening and recognition features so that they can identify the “wake word” — even while they are standing by?

It’s no longer exceptional to read about people complaining that their private conversations somehow triggered the device’s wake word to start eavesdropping. So, before buying a smart speaker for the home, ask whether they are comfortable with this?

Many of users see this as a small price to pay for the convenience being offered. But always-on listening means that such devices can not only listen to what the user says (and potentially use it — for advertising, for instance), but they can also capture ambient noise that reveals a lot of other things about the user.

The electronic/computing system of a car controls most of its operation and is far more vulnerable than, say, a gas-guzzling station wagon from yesteryear. Increasingly, our cars are turning into the equivalent of iPads on four wheels as vehicles incorporate more and more electronic gadgetry each year to add customer convenience.

But as with any technology device, it’s wise to take precautions that mitigate security risks. For instance, in this case the USB ports in certain newer cars might be manipulated to read files on the cell phone or install malware on the device. This is the latest practice known as Juice Jacking, where malware gets installed onto a device or information and can be stolen via the USB charging port.

Also, hackers may be able to launch attacks against audio systems in a bid to control the vehicle remotely. Similar vulnerabilities have also been found with key fobs and certain apps that get used to communicate with the cars. Users must take basic precautions, and be extremely careful with car port dongles that are plugged into the car control port. As with any other computing devices, it is vital to apply software updates in a timely manner and fix any potentially relevant recalls. Don’t make an attacker’s job any easier for them.

Every year more devices become part of the Internet of Things, and that includes children’s toys. But now that digital toys and devices come with built-in cameras and GPS trackers, users need to consider benefits with the potential security risks. Some toys may interact with smart speakers, which introduces a new category of threats.

Like other connected digital devices, they are potentially vulnerable to hacks and any data they collect may not be private — or secure. The threat is not theoretical. Symantec has seen instances in which companies neglected to protect their online storage system and hundreds of thousands of records, including childrens’ names, ages and voice recordings, got exposed.

That puts the onus on parents to use complicated passwords for every connected toy they buy for their kids. Also, never let children access the internet from an unsecure Bluetooth or Wi-Fi connection.

Many wireless headphones now come with integrated voice assistants and involve security issues with which users are familiar. Also, if users can connect over Bluetooth, there’s always the risk it may not be secure, especially outdated versions of the protocol which likely have unpatched security holes. One easy precaution: Just turn off Bluetooth when the users are not using it, or near anyone who do not trust.

Gartner finds that 22 percent of CFOs are personally effective; most are overinvested in finance tasks

Gartner research shows that a mere 22 percent of CFOs achieve a high degree of personal effectiveness, while using a limited set of activities and successful relationships outside the finance department are the biggest contributors to a CFO’s personal effectiveness.

The research was based on more than 100 CFO interviews and it assessed CFO personal performance and effectiveness across 231 attributes to reveal what the most effective CFOs do differently with their time, relationships and teams.

“CFOs tell us they have more demands than ever, but the surprise in this research is just how few activities differentiate the most successful operators from the rest of the pack,” said Peter Nagy, research vice president in the Gartner Finance practice. “The most important relationships that drive high performance in the CFO role are found in the boardroom and where the customers are, not in the finance department.”

Gartner determined CFO personal effectiveness based on how closely a CFO’s organization aligned to efficient growth behaviors, such as positive risk taking to drive long-term growth, as well as the CFO’s ability to meet CEO expectations around revenue growth, margin expansion, return on invested capital and balance sheet health.

As part of the analysis, Gartner studied the average weekly activities of CFOs and found that the average CFO lost one full day of work per week to ineffective activities. The largest misallocation was in how much time CFOs spent working within their own departments.

“CFOs want to reinvent their departments, keep their talent pipelines full and provide services more efficiently to internal business partners, so it’s not surprising that most respondents noted that managing these activities were a huge demand on their time,” said Nagy. “However, none of these activities, even if mastered, ultimately impacted how effective a CFO was in their overall job performance.”

Gartner found that there was no correlation between an organization’s size or industry in how effectively their CFO performed. Within the finance department, a CFO taking personal ownership of finance talent acquisition, mergers and acquisitions strategy, cost management or digital transformation also had no material impact in how effective the CFO was rated in overall job performance.

While time allocated to, and relationships created within, the finance department did not drive CFO personal effectiveness, Gartner identified three key groups of relationships which the most personally effective CFOs focused on nurturing.

The most effective CFOs succeed in constructively challenging their CEOs to achieve better decision-making outcomes. CFOs reported that they were underinvested in time allocated to both overall corporate and finance strategy, potentially negatively impacting their ability to play this role effectively.

Personally effective CFOs are customer-centric and spend more time with external customers than their peers. CFOs surveyed by Gartner reported time spent with customers was the single activity they felt most underinvested in. CFOs who exhibit strong customer relationships are also deeply connected with their sales leaders and play an active role in owning pricing strategy.

The most effective CFOs are plugged into business unit performance. Levers that can be used to achieve this are having business unit CFOs as direct reports, maintaining strong relationships with business unit general managers and a deep involvement with business unit performance metrics.

“While it may be discouraging that just one in five CFOs currently meet the Gartner standard for a high level of personal effectiveness, the good news is that just focusing on a few key relationships outside of finance can drive significant gains in this area,” said Nagy. “The key for CFOs is to be mindful about where they invest their time and with whom, and then develop strategies for protecting those time investments from their many other day-to-day demands.”

Infortrend incorporates DaVinci Resolve project server into its scale-out shared storage offering

Infortrend Technology releases on Tuesday its highly scalable shared storage EonStor CS that supports NLE software, such as DaVinci Resolve, Adobe Premiere Pro, and Final Cut Pro to facilitate collaborative editing of 4K and above ultra-high resolution videos. EonStor CS supports over 100 GB/s performance and 100 PB capacity, making it an ideal storage solution for large-scale post-production studios with more than ten workstations. 

In a traditional architecture, the database project server, which contains reels, edited files and timeline, is deployed on a dedicated workstation and connects to other workstations in a peer-to-peer network for editors, colorists, and animators to work together on the same project. Any single point of failure, however, will pose a threat to the project. 

In light of this issue, Infortrend integrates DaVinci Resolve Project Server into the shared media storage and provides RAID protection to guarantee high data availability. The simplified network architecture also makes deployment and management easier for video professionals to focus more on content production.

EonStor CS is a scale-out shared storage solution that allows enterprises to address the sheer volume of data via its scalable capacity and linear-increasing performance. The scalability through a scale-out expansion offers an easier and more cost-effective way of managing growing data in the agile enterprises while reducing consequent performance bottlenecks. 

EonStor CS also improves data utilization and simplifies data management by integrating data from all nodes into one cluster system. The superior performance and scalability make CS suitable for a wide range of data-intensive industries and applications such as media and entertainment (M&E), high-performance computing (HPC), video surveillance, file sharing and backup. 

With EonStor CS, enterprises gain speedy process for storage expansion and data migration. EonStor CS can keep up as the business grows, making it the optimized data storage and management solution.

Moreover, the shared media storage comes with user-friendly management software that is also designed to simplify the deployment. The EonOne software offers two accounts to separate different management roles. One account is for M&E User Administrator, who uses EonOne to set up user accounts and storage quota. The other account is for System Administrator, who is in charge of advanced configurations and maintenance.

In addition, Infortrend develops a client-based utility EonView, which is installed on Windows and macOS workstations to automatically detect the connected storage system and mount the assigned file folder according to the user credentials. This smart utility simplifies the complexities of storage system deployment and network setup, especially for video professionals who are not familiar with IT setting.  

“Infortrend offers comprehensive storage solutions for today’s M&E, no matter the business scale,” said Thomas Kao, senior director of Product Planning. “Besides its highly scalable performance and capacity for large workgroups to fulfill simultaneous workflows, CS supports high density 4U 60-bay form factor to deliver optimized size for massive data storage requirements. With the launch of CS, we aim to serve M&E customers with smarter, easier, and more flexible solutions,” 

NTT forms alliance with Microsoft to enable new digital solutions that help enterprise customers accelerate their digital transformations

NTT and Microsoft announced on Tuesday a multi-year strategic alliance aimed at delivering secure and reliable solutions that help enterprise customers accelerate their digital transformations. The alliance will bring together NTT’s ICT infrastructure, managed services and cybersecurity expertise, with Microsoft’s trusted cloud platform and AI technologies. 

Key initiatives of the alliance include the creation of a Global Digital Fabric, development of digital enterprise solutions built on Microsoft Azure, and co-innovation of next-generation technologies in the area of all-photonics network and digital twin computing.

As one of the world’s largest global technology and business solution organizations, NTT provides integrated services that include digital business consulting and managed services for cybersecurity, applications, cloud, data centers and global networks in over 190 countries and regions. 

As part of the alliance, NTT has chosen Microsoft Azure as its preferred cloud platform for modernizing its global IT infrastructure and customer solutions in the areas of advanced analytics for cybersecurity threat intelligence and the hybrid-IT management platform.

The alliance has announced formation of a Global Digital Fabric that weaves Microsoft Cloud and NTT’s globally connected ICT infrastructure, by combining the strengths of the two companies in the areas of productivity solutions, public cloud, global datacenter and network infrastructure. The Global Digital Fabric aims to create a highly sustainable, secure and robust environment for enterprises to accelerate their digital ambitions around the world.

The alliance also covers the development of digital solutions built on Microsoft Azure to empower enterprises to accelerate their digital transformation and to operate more securely from the enterprise to the edge to the cloud. Key initiatives include advanced analytics for cybersecurity threat intelligence, social robotics with relational AI for digital companions, digital workplace solutions, as well as knowledge discovery and management.

The alliance will also explore research and development of all-photonics network and digital twin computing as part of NTT’s Innovative Optical and Wireless Network (IOWN) concept. The goal is to provide a more natural interaction between people, nature and technology, and to support sustainable growth with an optical-based networking and information processing platform of the future.

Furthermore, NTT and Microsoft are committed to harnessing the power of technology for a more sustainable future. The companies intend to work together to invest in innovative projects that leverage technology to build on NTT’s sustainability initiatives and Microsoft’s AI for Earth grants.

“NTT is committed to helping enterprises realize their digital transformation initiatives to help create a smarter world. We believe that the combination of the Microsoft Azure platform along with NTT’s connected infrastructure and service delivery capabilities will accelerate these efforts,” said Jun Sawada, president and CEO of NTT. “Additionally, the companies will collaborate on IOWN, including areas such as all-photonics network and digital twin computing.”

“Our strategic alliance combines NTT’s global infrastructure and services expertise with the power of Azure,” said Satya Nadella, CEO, Microsoft. “Together, we will build new solutions spanning AI, cybersecurity and hybrid cloud, as we work to help enterprise customers everywhere accelerate their digital transformation.”