Mentions: ulvbjornsson

Cybersecurity for Smart Cities: Challenges, Risks, and Security Best Practices

Ulv BjørnssonLeave a comment

Smart cities have become a reality today, with governments, businesses, and residents, making use of advanced technology to increase productivity and efficiency at home and the workplace and make lives better. However, the challenges to ensuring safety, security, and data privacy have risen proportionately, leading to the requirement for a unique cybersecurity model for smart cities.

A city using advanced technology infrastructure and other cutting-edge solutions to improve its operational efficiency, provide better services, and improve the lives of its citizens qualifies as a smart city. The technology ecosystem often consists of ICT (Information and communication technology),  IoT (Internet of Things), AI/ML (Artificial Intelligence/Machine Learning), Blockchain, Cloud computing, etc. However, using the latest technologies has its challenges of cybersecurity risks, compromising the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of PII (Personally Identifiable Information) of its citizens. Below is a closer look into cybersecurity risks in smart cities, their challenges, the threats they are exposed to, and the potential solutions to overcome such hurdles.

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Microsoft Azure: Azure PowerShell – ForbiddenError: The server failed to authenticate the request.

Ulv Bjørnsson1 Comment

Hey, so if you are getting this error I’ll walk you through the easiest ways to remedy it.

powershell_2017-07-03_13-53-48.png

PS C:\> Get-AzureVM
Get-AzureVM : ForbiddenError: The server failed to authenticate the request. Verify that the certificate is valid and i
s associated with this subscription.
At line:1 char:1
+ Get-AzureVM
+ ~~~~~~~~~~~
+ CategoryInfo : CloseError: (:) [Get-AzureVM], ComputeCloudException
+ FullyQualifiedErrorId : Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Commands.ServiceManagement.IaaS.GetAzureVMCommand

or

Set-AzureSubscription : ForbiddenError: The server failed to authenticate the request. Verify that the certificate is valid and is associated with this subscription.

The solution often is easier then you’d think, just like how browsers have their cache so does your Microsoft Azure PowerShell so you’ll want to input this:

Clear-AzureProfile

powershell_2017-07-03_13-58-31.png

This will clear your current Azure profile.

You should also consider deleting the content of this folder:

C:\Users\%USERNAME%\AppData\Roaming\Windows Azure Powershell

After which you can run

Add-AzureAccount / Login-AzureRMAccount

and then you can execute any Azure PowerShell commands that you’d like to run. For a more detailed walkthrough check my article on connecting and managing Microsoft Azure via PowerShell.

 

PS: If you are still getting errors, you should check whether the mode you are running in is incorrect you can input 

Switch-AzureMode AzureResourceManager

Important to note that “Switch-AzureMode” is deprecated and will be removed in a future release. However doing so seemed to import the certificate and removed the “ServiceManagement” modules that were loaded with this install and installed the correct certificate.

So now to see if it’s working we can run Get-AzureVM or Get-AzureRMvm

which outputs:

powershell_2017-07-03_15-20-32.png

 

chrome_2017-07-03_15-22-47

As always, you can follow me on Twitter at @UlvBjornsson or follow me on here, if you have tips for articles you’d like to read or topics you want to hear more about, hit me up.

Ulv