Today’s topics include the disclosure by image hosting site Imgur of a security breach affecting 1.7 million user accounts; McAfee’s acquisition of cloud security startup Skyhigh Networks; how Microsoft quietly made it’s Office application suite available on Chromebooks that support Android apps; and the launch of StorONE ‘s TRU storage software.
On Nov. 23, Security researcher Troy Hunt informed image hosting site Imgur of a security incident dating back to 2014 that compromised 1.7 million Imgur user accounts.
Hunt said he was pleased with their response time, saying he wanted to “recognize [Imgur’s] exemplary handling of this: that’s 25 hours and 10 minutes from my initial email… mobilizing people over Thanksgiving, assessing the data, beginning password resets and making a public disclosure.”
According to Imgur, only email address and passwords were stolen. Imgur began to notify impacted users on Nov. 24, and required those users to update their passwords. Roy Sehgal, Chief Operating Officer, said their database “may have been cracked with brute force due to an older hashing algorithm that was used at the time.”
McAfee announced on Nov. 27 that it is acquiring privately-held security startup Skyhigh Networks. This marks McAfee’s first acquisition since they were spun out from Intel as a standalone company on April 4.
Skyhigh Networks was founded in 2011 as a Cloud Access Security Broker technology vendor providing access control and visibility for cloud application usage. To date, Skyhigh has raised about $106 million in venture capital funding.
Once the deal closes in early 2018, McAfee intends to use Skyhigh’s technology as the foundation for a new cloud business unit. Steve Grobman, CTO of McAfee, told eWEEK that what Skyhigh brings to the table is the ability to monitor and protect against shadow IT abuse and Software-as-a-Service application usage.
Just in time for the holidays, Chromebook users can now download and run Microsoft Office on most device models provided their hardware can support Android apps to begin with.
Google announced in May 2016 that Chromebooks would run Android mobile apps. However, only select models such as the Asus Chromebook Flip were capable of running Microsoft Office.
Now, according to Chrome Unboxed, Microsoft appears to have quietly lifted that limitation. It looks like Chromebook users are taking Microsoft up on its offer, as Office apps are highly popular on the Play Store. Both Word and Excel carry a 4.5-star rating, and each has been downloaded at least 100 million times.
With IT heavyweights John Thompson and Ed Zander on its board, StorONE on Nov. 21 introduced a new type of storage software called TRU, which stands for Total Resource Utilization.
TRU includes enterprise storage features such as unlimited snapshots; support for all storage protocols on the same drives; and support for all drive types in the same server.
According to CEO and founder Gal Naor, “The problem is with the storage software stack, and we have solved it. While other vendors integrate, we innovate, allowing customers for the first time to benefit from reducing costs and complexity, while getting more enterprise-class features.”
TRU storage can be installed as a physical server or virtual appliance without the need to change the existing virtualization infrastructure. Pricing is based on physical storage consumption through a simple subscription licensing plan, but ranges from two thousandths of a penny to 1 cent per GB.