Microsoft Teams will provide support for multiple users and organizations on its desktop versions, according to the Microsoft 365 Roadmap website. Users will be able to add other accounts, including one personal and one school or work account. These accounts will be able to have separate profile pictures, and users can switch between them through their settings. 

The feature is in development and will arrive to Microsoft Teams commercial and education users worldwide in December. This update applies to the desktop app. The mobile version already supports switching between personal and business accounts.

Microsoft Teams, initially launched in November 2016, is a chat-based collaboration tool within the Microsoft Office 365 suite of services. It gives in-office and remote teams a shared space to collaborate on projects and share information. Teams’ features include one-on-one chat, team chat, document collaboration, and more. Microsoft Teams is also integrated with Skype, SharePoint, Exchange, and Yammer.

Teams app has made several updates recently, including: 

• The ability to appear offline to contacts
• Support for up to 1,000 participants
• Zapier, an automation app, will allow users to connect their apps and create automated workflows, reduce busywork and improve productivity. 

Future features include Together mode (pulling users together into a virtual space), custom layouts, breakout rooms, meeting recaps and improved search results.

The coronavirus pandemic has spurred an increase of corporate and personal Microsoft Teams use, growing from 44 million to 115 million users in just six months.  

Approximately 7.5 million external attacks were recorded against cloud accounts during the second quarter, with over 200,000 of those against UK business, security firm McAfee has revealed.

The findings were based on the aggregated and anonymised cloud usage data from more than 30 million McAfee MVISION cloud users worldwide from all major industries, detailed in a new McAfee Labs Threats Report for 2020.

The UK has been ranked seventh on a top ten list showing the most cloud attacks by region, with just over 200,000. This is followed by Brazil and the Netherlands, at around 250,000, Russia and New Caledonia at just under 300,000, and India at 450,000. Thailand currently experiences the highest number of attacks against cloud accounts, with 625,000.

The report also found that Q2 saw a 605% increase in COVID-19-themed attack detections, following the trend of hackers exploiting the pandemic for criminal activities. Overall, during this past quarter, McAfee managed to observe an average of 419 new threats per minute.

Commenting on the findings, Nigel Hawthorn, data privacy expert for cloud security at McAfee, said that “the fact that there have been nearly 7.5 million attacks on users via cloud services in the second quarter of this year highlights how criminals have been quick to pivot attack methods to take advantage of the pandemic”.

“The move to widespread remote working has required many industries to adopt new cloud services to maintain staff productivity, communication and collaboration. When managed correctly, however, the cloud is the most secure place to do business and an incredible driver of business growth, innovation and resiliency. Incorporating cloud into strong data governance policies and regular staff training are the keys to making this a reality,” he added.

Hawthorn recommended that IT teams should be “able to quickly identify, prioritise and respond to these targeted attacks – across both device and cloud”.

“Technology can play a key role in helping security professionals understand whether their organisation is at risk, what specific threats they are susceptible to, and how they can pre-empt an attack,” he added. “This must go hand-in-hand with a shared responsibility security model. Everyone is accountable in some way and must play their part to protect data against cybercriminals.”

AWS has launched its latest GPU-equipped instances aimed at machine learning and high-performance computing (HPC) workloads.

Called P4d, the new instances come ten years the first set of GPU instances were launched. They feature Intel Cascade Lake processors and eight of Nvidia’s A100 Tensor Core GPUs. These connect via NVLink with support for Nvidia GPUDirect and offer 2.5 PetaFLOPS of floating-point performance and 320GB of high-bandwidth GPU memory.

AWS claimed that the instances offer 2.5x the deep learning performance, and up to 60% lower cost to train when compared to P3 instances.

In addition, the P4 instances include 1.1TB of system memory and 8TB of NVME-based SSD storage with up to 16 gigabytes of read throughput per second. The instances can combine over 4,000 GPUs into an on-demand EC2 UltraCluster. 

Among the use cases touted by AWS for these instances include supercomputer-scale machine learning and HPC workloads: natural language processing, object detection & classification, scene understanding, seismic analysis, weather forecasting, financial modelling, etc. 

The P4 instances are available in one size (p4d.24xlarge) and can be launched in the US East (N.Virginia) and US West (Oregon) Regions with immediate effect.

Among the companies that have already been working with the P4 instances include Toyota Research Institute (TRI), GE Healthcare and Aon.

“At TRI, we’re working to build a future where everyone has the freedom to move,” said Mike Garrison, technical lead, Infrastructure Engineering at TRI.

“The previous generation P3 instances helped us reduce our time to train machine learning models from days to hours and we are looking forward to utilizing P4d instances, as the additional GPU memory and more efficient float formats will allow our machine learning team to train with more complex models at an even faster speed.”

Its on-demand price will be $32.77 per hour, going down to approximately $20 per hour for one-year reserved instances, and $11.57 for three-year reserved instances.

Intel has reportedly acquired Israeli data science startup Cnvrg.io in a bid to strengthen its artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning credentials.

In a statement given to TechCrunch, Intel confirmed the deal and said in a short statement that “Cnvrg will be an independent Intel company and will continue to serve its existing and future customers”. The company did not disclose any terms of the deal. 

Cnvrg.io was started in 2016 and runs a data science platform aimed at helping enterprises to manage and build up AI efforts. It claims that it is a pioneer in building cutting-edge machine learning development solutions to help customers rapidly build machine learning models.

The platform offers paid and free tiers and works in on-premise, cloud and hybrid environments.

Among the Israeli firm’s partners include Red Hat, NetApp and Nvidia, while its customers include Lightricks, ST Unitas and Playtika.

In a recent blog post, co-founder and CEO Yochay Ettun said that its machine learning dashboard could improve visibility and increase machine learning server usage by up to 80%. Its dashboard helps IT teams see allocation and utilisation of different jobs, clusters, by user and by job.

Admins can monitor and compare overall capacity versus allocation and utilisation with graphs to identify gaps in efficiency.

Recently, Cnvrg.io raised $8 million in venture capital funding from investors such as Hanaco Venture Capital and Jerusalem Venture Partners. 

Barely a week ago, Intel made another acquisition in the AI sector with the purchase of SigOpt for an undisclosed amount. The company provides a software platform for research groups such as OpenAI to increase AI model performance.

Smart manufacturing looks set to drive growth in the industrial IoT market over the next five years.

According to a recent study by Jupiter Research, the number of Industrial IoT connections will increase from 17.7 billion in 2020 to 36.8 billion in 2025, representing an overall growth rate of 207%. 

The new research, Industrial IoT: Future Market Outlook, Technology Analysis & Key Players 2020-2025, predicts that 5G and LPWA (Low Power Wide Area) networks will play vital roles in creating service offerings to the manufacturing industry.

These technologies will also enable the realisation of the ‘smart factory’ concept, in which real-time data transmission and high connection densities allow highly autonomous operations for manufacturers, researchers said.

Private 5G services will also be a crucial step in maximising the value of a smart factory to service users, by leveraging the technology to enable superior levels of autonomy amongst operations. These networks should be valuable to manufacturers when used for the transmission of large amounts of data in environments with a high density of connections, Juniper said, and where significant levels of data are generated. 

The report said that this would enable large-scale manufacturers to reduce operational spend through efficiency gains.

The research predicts that over 80% of global Industrial IoT market value will be attributable to software spend by 2025, reaching $216 billion. Software tools leveraging machine learning for enhanced data analysis and the identification of network vulnerabilities are now essential to connected manufacturing operations.

“Manufacturers must exercise caution when implementing IoT technology; resisting the temptation to introduce connectivity to all aspects of operations. Instead, manufacturers must focus on the collection of data on the most valuable areas to drive efficiency gains,” said research author Scarlett Woodford.

Oracle has been forced to issue an out-of-band patch to fix a critical remote code execution (RCE) flaw affecting multiple Oracle WebLogic Server versions.

The vulnerability, tracked as CVE-2020-14750, could enable hackers to remotely exploit the server via an HTTP GET through the server’s console component, without any user interaction and may be exploited over a network without the need for a username and password.

“Due to the severity of this vulnerability and the publication of exploit code on various sites, Oracle strongly recommends that customers apply the updates provided by this Security Alert as soon as possible,” Oracle explained in an https://www.oracle.com/security-alerts/alert-cve-2020-14750.html advisory.

The advisory said that the supported Oracle WebLogic Server versions that are affected by CVE-2020-14750 include 10.3.6.0.0, 12.1.3.0.0, 12.2.1.3.0, 12.2.1.4.0, and 14.1.1.0.0.

Proof-of-concept code that could exploit the bug was made public on GitHub. According to security firm Spyse, around 3,300 WebLogic servers are exposed at the moment and could be vulnerable to the flaw.

In a blog post, Eric Maurice, director of Security Assurance at Oracle, shared a link to help users harden affected servers.

He also said that the vulnerability is related to CVE-2020-14882, which was addressed in the October 2020 Critical Patch Update. That particular flaw could enable hackers network access via HTTP to achieve total compromise and takeover of vulnerable Oracle WebLogic Servers.

The US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) also warned users about the dangers of the vulnerability and encouraged administrators to apply the patch as soon as possible. 

​Welcome to the tenth issue of IT Pro 20/20, our digital magazine that brings all of the previous month’s most important tech issues into clear view.

The coronavirus has forced every single company to re-evaluate how they do business. Strategies, verticals, and even the way employees work have all been disrupted, and the tried and tested products and services that have likely come to define your business may be in jeopardy.

It’s important to remember, however, that disruption is not inherently a bad thing. Being forced to reshape your business to fit the current climate presents an opportunity to demonstrate resilience. Businesses have spent months in damage mitigation mode – it’s now time to grow once again.

In this issue, we show that a business is only as agile as the data centre it relies on, and how new designs that embrace cutting-edge computing are providing the flexibility businesses need to enter new markets quickly. We also assess the volume of options available on the cloud market and whether this is causing fatigue for customers. You’ll find a handy guide to managing all the various risks associated with employees working outside the company firewall, and a run-through of some of the technology your business should consider investing in to really hit the ground running in 2021.

We appreciate you taking the time to download IT Pro 20/20, and we hope you enjoy this month’s issue.

The next IT Pro 20/20 will be available on Monday 30 November – previous issues can be found here. If you would like to receive each issue in your inbox as they release, you can subscribe to our mailing list here.

Amazon Web Services (AWS) has struck an agreement with the UK government to accelerate the public sector’s digital transformation drive, boost digital skills and raise the level of participation among smaller cloud providers.

The ‘One Government Value Agreement (OGVA)’ is a three-year memorandum of understanding (MoU) between AWS and the Crown Commerical Service (CCS) that spans two tiers for both smaller and larger organisations. 

Cloud services will become available to the public sector as a single client, offering more cost savings for deployment against organisation-by-organisation deals. AWS will also establish a digital skills fund, which will train more than 6,000 civil servants in cloud computing free of charge.

The first tier supports organisations at the beginning of their cloud journeys, allowing them to conduct their first cloud projects with support such as bespoke training, workshops, and “cloud credits” for new research projects. The second tier, aimed at larger organisations already well underway in terms of using cloud services, offers various additional services they can take up and advantageous pricing structures. 

“CCS provides commercial agreements which help organisations across the entire public sector save time and money on buying everyday goods and services,” said chief executive of the Crown Commercial Service, Simon Tse. 

“This agreement with AWS demonstrates excellent value for the public sector organisations we serve, and supports them in their drive to improve services for citizens across the UK.”

This is an agreement in the same mould as those struck earlier this year between the government and major cloud providers such as UKCloud, Google Cloud, and Oracle.

IBM, for example, struck an agreement that would allow public sector organisations to benefit from ‘preferential commercial terms’ when moving their workloads to the cloud. HPE, meanwhile, struck a deal with the UK government to provide hybrid cloud services on a pay-per-use model. 

In addition to the skills find, the AWS agreement specifically contains an element that hopes to encourage the uptake of services by smaller cloud providers and AWS partners. More than 150 members of the AWS Partner Network would be able to pitch their own services to public sector organisations, including many cloud-based small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs). 

AWS has announced it will be launching a new Europe region in Zurich, slated for opening in the latter half of 2022.

Zurich will be the firm’s eighth region in Europe, alongside those Dublin, Frankfurt, London, Paris, Stockholm, Milan, and Spain.

AWS currently has 77 Availability Zones across 24 regions worldwide with today’s announcement bringing the total number of global regions (operational and in the works) up to 27. AWS has already announced plans for 12 more Availability Zones and four more AWS Regions in Switzerland, Indonesia, Japan, and Spain.

AWS said that the new region will give Swiss customers the ability to run applications that must comply with strict data sovereignty requirements in Switzerland. It will also enable customers to run apps from data centres in the country, lowering latencies in applications across the region.

“For more than 14 years, AWS has supported organisations across almost every industry in Switzerland to speed up innovation, lower their IT costs, and transform their operations,” said Peter DeSantis, senior vice president of Global Infrastructure and Customer Support at AWS.

“AWS is excited to announce our upcoming region in Switzerland and help Swiss institutions, innovative startups, and world-leading pharma companies deliver cloud-powered applications to fuel economic development across the country.”

AWS opened its first Swiss office in Zurich in April 2016 and in 2017 it announced an Amazon CloudFront Edge Location and Direct Connect location in Zurich as well as a second office in Geneva.

AWS said it would continue to build up a team of account managers, technical account managers, partner managers, systems engineers, solutions architects, professional services to help customers in the country move to the cloud.

Microsoft Teams users will soon be able to hold interactive meetings with up to 1,000 participants.

The update, which was first announced in August, is now scheduled to become available in December 2020. It will allow users to add up to 1,000 participants in a meeting, allowing greater online collaboration across enterprises as numerous countries, including the UK, head for another lockdown.

Users will also be able to hold Teams meetings for 1,000 participants while also enabling up to 20,000 participants in a view-only meeting experience.

According to Microsoft’s 365 Roadmap, the feature is currently “In Development” and will be ready by the end of the year.

Users will be able to access the feature using the Advanced Communications add-on which was launched on 1 August 2020. The license costs $12 (£9.28) per user a month and is available as a free trial for 60 days.

With a 20,000-participant capacity, the plan made it possible for large enterprises to host meetings for the entirety of their staff, allowing Microsoft to take advantage of the heightened demand for video conferencing.

Microsoft Teams general manager Nicole Herskowitz said that the tech giant put emphasis on users’ meeting experience when developing the capability, “making sure that even as the meeting scales it is still easy to manage and listen to the speakers”

“Therefore, we limited the size of interactive meetings to 1,000 participants, with a seamless shift to a ‘view only’ mode after the limit is met,” she added.

Microsoft Teams has enjoyed an exceptional increase in popularity since the start of the pandemic, as many organisations moved to remote working environments due to lockdown restrictions.

On 28 October, Microsoft announced that the platform’s number of daily active users surpassed 115 million, a staggering increase of 95 million since the year prior.

Commenting on the announcement, corporate VP for Microsoft 365 Jared Spataro said that the growth “reflects the continued demand for Teams as the lifeline for remote and hybrid work and learning during the pandemic, helping people and organizations in every industry stay agile and resilient in this new era”.