There will soon be no escape from Microsoft Teams, even in the office

Microsoft is doubling down on efforts to drive the adoption of collaboration platform Teams in conference room settings.

As per two new entries to the company’s product roadmap, users will soon be able to perform a wider range of actions via Microsoft Teams panels, the touchscreen devices mounted outside of meeting rooms.

For example, Microsoft Teams users will be able to “check out” of conference rooms if their meetings end earlier than expected, as a courtesy to colleagues who might need the space. In a similar vein, it will also be possible to extend existing reservations via Microsoft Teams panels, provided doing so does not create a clash.

Microsoft Teams in the office

Both updates are still currently under development, but should roll out to all Microsoft Teams panel users by the end of May.

With the majority of experts predicting a widespread transition to hybrid working once the pandemic recedes, Microsoft is eager to position its collaboration and video conferencing platform as the go-to choice for in-office deployments too.

The company faces stiff competition from the likes of Zoom, which has its own range of conference room solutions, but Microsoft is putting in the legwork with a series of updates of its own.

In addition to the new functionality set to land in the spring, Microsoft recently announced a feature to help companies monitor and limit the capacity of meeting rooms, to facilitate social distancing (if it’s still required in future). 

The desired room capacity is set by the administrator and overcrowding is detected using cameras with people-counting functionality. If a room is over capacity, an alert will appear on the in-room display and Microsoft Teams panel outside.

Microsoft will hope that features such as these, in addition to a roster of intelligent meeting room hardware (displays, webcams, microphones etc.), will help build on the strong foundation established during the pandemic.

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There are more malicious domains online than ever before

Thousands of new domains are registered everyday so that businesses and individuals can build websites but new research from Palo Alto Networks has revealed that cybercriminals often register malicious domains years before they intend to actually use them.

The cybersecurity firm's Unit 42 first began its research into dormant malicious domains after it was revealed that the threat actors behind 2019's SolarWinds hack used them in their attack. To identify strategically aged domains and monitor their activity, Palo Alto Networks launched a cloud-based detector in September of 2021.

According to the findings of the firm's researchers, 22.3 percent of strategically aged domains pose some form of danger with a small portion being straight-out malicious (3.8%), a majority being suspicious (19%) and some being unsafe for work environments (2%).

The reason cybercriminals and other threat actors let a domain is age is to create a “clean record” so that their domain will be less likely to be blocked. Newly registered domains (NRDs) on the other hand are more likely to be malicious and for this reason, security systems often flag them as suspicious. However, according to Palo Alto Networks, strategically aged domains are three times more likely to be malicious than NRDs.

Detecting malicious domains lying dormant

When a sudden spike in traffic is detected, it's often the case that a strategically aged domain is actually malicious. This is because normal websites typically see their traffic grow gradually from when they're created as more people visit a site after learning about it through word of mouth or advertising.

At the same time, domains that aren't intended for legitimate purposes often have incomplete, cloned or questionable content and usually lack WHOIS registrant details as well. Another sign that a domain was registered and intended to be used at a later time in malicious campaigns is DGA subdomain generation.

For those unfamiliar, DGA or domain generation algorithm is a method used to generate domain names and IP addresses that will serve as command and control (C2) communication points used to evade detection and block lists. Just by examining sites using DGA, Palo Alto Networks' cloud-based detector was able to identify two suspicious domains each day.

During its investigation, the cybersecurity firm discovered a Pegasus spying campaign that used two C2 domains registered in 2019 that finally became active two years later in July of 2021. Palo Alto Networks' researchers also found phishing campaigns that used DGA subdomains as well as wildcard DNS abuse.

We've also highlighted the best web hosting, best endpoint protection software and best malware removal software

Via Bleeping Computer

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AMD’s Wraith coolers for Ryzen CPUs haven’t been upgraded – there are fakes out there

AMD’s Wraith Prism cooler, which comes bundled with some of its latest 3rd-gen Ryzen processors (and the Ryzen 7 2700X), is suffering from a surprising problem – namely fakes of the cooling solution are floating around.

Initially, it was thought that the respected RGB stock cooler had been upgraded by AMD, and just not announced yet, when photos of a very similar-looking model to the Wraith Prism emerged over at XFastest – except this one had six heat pipes, rather than the four that the standard model has.

However, AMD quickly took to Twitter to clarify that these cooling solutions with six heat pipes are illegitimate fakes designed to look like the Wraith Prism, and that they (obviously) have not been tested and validated by AMD.

Thermal trickery

So instead of speculation about how good this six pipe cooler might be, now the speculation is about what on earth is going on here. And indeed if this cooler is bundled with an AMD CPU, could there be something amiss with the chip itself?

Obviously something shady is happening, and it raises the prospect of an operation perhaps buying OEM chips, and pairing them with the fake cooler, to sell at full retail price (or possibly even fake chips – which we’ve seen in the past with Ryzen – with the fake cooler).

Although if this is the idea, quite why the cooler would be slightly different with the additional heat pipes, well, that’s anyone’s guess (in terms of not raising the profile of this counterfeiting).

Regardless, obviously you should be careful about this new counterfeit product. While it might be tempting to think that with the two extra heat pipes, this could be a better cooling solution than the official AMD-produced Wraith Prism, if it’s been made as a third-party knockoff, there’s every chance there could be all manner of things amiss in terms of the innards. Even if externally, it looks like a good copy of the original.

Via PC Gamer

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