Friday, June 10, 2016

I have to ask if we have reached a point where hackers are winning the security game.  How can so many large and otherwise well-managed companies fall prey so easily?  And I’m including those large third party providers do.
Wendy's Finds More PoS Systems Hit by Malware
Wendy’s launched an investigation in late January after fraud patterns were discovered on cards used at some restaurants.  The presence of malware was confirmed in February and, in mid-May, the company said hackers had compromised PoS systems at less than 300 of its 5,500 franchised restaurants in North America.
The investigation conducted up until May revealed that unrelated cybersecurity issues had been identified at roughly 50 other franchise restaurants.  As the investigation continued, experts discovered another variant of the malware that was similar to the threat discovered initially, but which had a different execution method.
According to the company, a remote access tool (RAT) had been found on PoS systems that were initially believed to be clean.  As a result, Wendy’s now says the number of affected restaurants is “considerably higher” than 300, although it has not disclosed an exact number.
   “Many franchisees and operators throughout the retail and restaurant industries contract with third-party service providers to maintain and support their POS systems.  The Company believes this series of cybersecurity attacks resulted from certain service providers' remote access credentials being compromised, allowing access to the POS system in certain franchise restaurants serviced by those providers,” Wendy’s said in a statement.
Wendy’s pointed out that the data breach does not appear to impact any of the restaurants it operates.


How bad must you be for politicians to take notice?  Is this posturing?  Will they take action if there is no improvement?  Stay tuned until after the election (and campaign contribution) season.
New York state’s top cop says this cable company misleads consumers about its Internet speeds
The ink is barely dry on Charter's massive acquisition of Time Warner Cable — a deal that just formed the nation's second-largest cable company — but New York's attorney general is wasting no time pressing the firm on customer complaints about their Internet service.
Thousands of Time Warner Cable's customers have written in to the attorney general's office saying they aren't getting the download speeds they paid for as part of an ongoing investigation by New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman into Internet providers' advertised speeds, according to a spokesman.  And on Wednesday, Schneiderman sent a letter to Charter calling for the cable company to "clean up Time Warner Cable's act" in the wake of the acquisition.


I’ve not seen an HBR video before.  Some thoughts for my students?
Can You Entrust That Decision to a Robot?


Could be useful.
Sunlight Foundation is using IFTTT to make the government more open
by Sabrina I. Pacifici on
“Want to know when the president signs a bill into law?  When congress votes on a bill?  When a new legislator is representing you?  Since 2014, The Sunlight Foundation has been connecting its massive trove of government data to IFTTT, the popular web service that connects things on the internet to other things… For those unfamiliar with IFTTT, it works like this: Users create recipes that consist of a trigger (the “IF” portion of IFTTT), such as “If I get a Facebook notification,” and a result, such as “send me an email.”  The idea is to connect up the myriad services and information available on the internet to make them work in concert with one another.  The function of the service is spelled out in its name, which doubles as an initialism: IF This, Then That.  The Sunlight Foundation has put IFTTT to work by bridging its Congress API to various online services.  The foundation automatically pulls in lots of data from the government — the locations and zip codes of congress members, for example, and the crush of information that accompanies the legislature’s routines: floor votes, hearings, bills, amendments and nominations.  With IFTTT, The Sunlight Foundation allows people to automatically get an email when the president signs a bill into law, or save that law to a read-later app like Pocket or Instapaper…”


How can I use this?  I’ll ask my gaming students.
Microsoft launches a free trial of Minecraft: Education Edition for teachers to test over the summer
Following up on its promises from January, Microsoft today released a free trial of Minecraft Education Edition – the version of Minecraft meant for use in the classroom – to educators worldwide.  This “early access” version of the program includes new features and updated classroom content and curriculum, the company also says.
For those unfamiliar with the Education Edition, the idea is to bring the world of Minecraft to the classroom to be used as a learning tool where students can develop skills in areas like digital citizenship, empathy, literacy, and more.  They can use the software as part of a coding camp, study science, learn about city planning, or they can study history by re-creating historic landscapes and events in the program, for example.


In case I ever teach Math again.
Recognize Handwritten Equations with MyScript MathPad
MyScript Mathpad is a handwriting recognition app specialized for mathematics expressions.  MyScript Mathpad automatically converts handwritten mathematical expressions and equations to their digital equivalent.  It can recognize more than 200 symbols and operators.
MyScript MathPad is compatible with iPad, iPhone, and iPod Touch running in iOS 6.0 or later.

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