GOODBYE TWENTY SEVENTEEN, HELLO TWENTY EIGHTEEN.

~ Ulv Bjørnsson ~ Leave a comment

January has gone by fast, feels like New Year’s Eve was just yesterday. I’m writing this to catch up with all of you and to officially say welcome 2018!

Some highlights for me this year has been to increase the number of certifications I hold the most noteworthy being:

MCSE: Cloud Platform and Infrastructure — Certified 2018
MCSE: Productivity — Certified 2018
MCSE: Mobility — Certified 2018
MCSA: Windows Server 2016 – Certified 2018
MCSE: Cloud Platform and Infrastructure — Certified 2017
Certified Ethical Hacker

I’ve travelled extensively! going to Seoul in Korea and later to VMworld Barcelona in Spain as well as the World Blockchain Forum in London and to Singapore during Christmas, for vacation and meet-ups.

Continue reading “GOODBYE TWENTY SEVENTEEN, HELLO TWENTY EIGHTEEN.” →

Artificial intelligence and Cloud computing: Real-time fraud detection in online banking application within the cloud

~ Ulv Bjørnsson ~ 4 Comments

Over the last few years, cloud computing has been the buzz. Cloud computing services offer an infrastructure that is highly scalable and supports high-performance computing. With high adoption by businesses of all sizes. Development and deployment of applications within the cloud platform are easy and time to market is done in a fraction of the time.

Artificial intelligence is not a new technology. It has been here for a long time and has helped develop computers and software that perform tasks that are associated with intelligence. Machine learning and deep learning are subsets of artificial intelligence that involve the development of algorithms that learn from data inputs and give intelligent output based on that data and the learned patterns.

A lot of research has been done and still is being done on implementing artificial intelligence into cloud computing. Cloud service providers such as Amazon, Google and Microsoft have already integrated AI into their clouds to improve service delivery. AI brings about capabilities such as machine learning, recognition of patterns and robotics to the cloud. On the other hand, the cloud is able to provide a wide range and large volumes of data since these capabilities are largely dependent on data as input so as to produce the desired output. The cloud also allows the systems to open-access and open-source data which is very crucial in facilitating collaborative learning.

Continue reading “Artificial intelligence and Cloud computing: Real-time fraud detection in online banking application within the cloud” →

Aww ye, I can now call myself a Certified Ethical Hacker

~ Ulv Bjørnsson ~ 1 Comment

Busy days! Reading, exams, a lot of exciting features coming out into the market from a myriad of different vendors and gigantic leaps being made every day.

I wanted to share the news, I am now a Certified Ethical Hacker!

What does that mean? Just that I now am certified to attest that I have a baseline knowledge when it comes to how to go about penetrating a network or a computer system but with the purpose of finding and fixing security vulnerabilities within an ethical framework.

There is a progression learning track so the next step would be to study to be a Certified Security Analyst or a Licensed Penetration Tester.

To summarize what the CEH exam tests you on it is broken up into these sections:

I. Background

II. Analysis/Assessment

III. Security

IV. Tools/Systems/Programs

V. Procedures / Methodology

VI. Regulation/Policy

VII. Ethics

If you are curious about what the exam objectives are in detail, check out this blueprint.

You can connect with me on Twitter @UlvBjornsson, on this blog, or in the comment section below.

See you around!

Ulv
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I’m going to VMworld 2017 Barcelona!

~ Ulv Bjørnsson ~ 1 Comment

Trip is booked and I’m leaving on Sunday for VMworld 2017 in Barcelona, woho!

I’ll be blogging each day and I’ll try to include pictures and information for those not able to attend.

A lot of exciting sessions, I can’t wait to hear more about Horizon in the Public Clouds or the exciting breakout sessions about the Digital Workspace, Security Transformation and especially the many roundtable sessions. If you are curious about the sessions check out the tracks here.

Looking forward to meet up with many of you, and hitting up vendor booths and just theory-crafting ideas, and concepts to come.

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If you are going to VMworld 2017 next week and want to meet up, hit me up on here, message me on Twitter or LinkedIn.

If nothing else make sure you’re signed up for the variety of events available after hours. If you know me you call me or mail me. You got my digits.

Stay tuned for my updates on VMworld 2017 over on Twitter @UlvBjornsson and thanks for tuning in!

Creating a Load Balancer in the Microsoft Cloud: Azure

~ Ulv Bjørnsson ~ Leave a comment

WHAT IS AZURE LOAD BALANCER?

Azure Load Balancer secures high availability and network performance to your applications/frontend/backend.

It is a Layer 4 load balancer (TCP/UDP) that distributes traffic among instances of services defined in the load-balanced set.

You can load-balance web applications, Virtual Machines, and so-on by routing traffic based on NAT rules that you configure on the load-balancer.

Continue reading “Creating a Load Balancer in the Microsoft Cloud: Azure” →

Security baseline for Windows 10 v1703 now out!

~ Ulv Bjørnsson ~ Leave a comment

Microsoft just published the security baseline for Windows 10 “Creators Update” v1703!

Now you might ask, why should I use a security baseline? First off – it’s for OS hardening, and it saves you a lot of manual work by having ready made settings setup and gives you the importable GPOs, as well as a multitude of custom ADMX files with them visually laid out for you in a spreadsheet.

This allows you to tweak your settings to what best suits your environment.

It’s an incredibly helpful tool for image building, particularly for those of us in verticals that require constant vigilance.

Now if you are new to OS hardening and security baselines, you really should check out Microsoft’s Security Compliance Toolkit!

You can get the Security baseline for Windows 10 “Creators Update (v1703) from here.

See you at the World Blockchain Forum in London!

~ Ulv Bjørnsson ~ 3 Comments

Event ticket is booked, and plane tickets are locked-in!

Who else is going to the World Blockchain Forum? It’s being held in London from September 25th to the 26th, and also the Dash Conference is on the 24th of September!

It’s a very exciting time, with the increased adoption of blockchain technology, the pace of innovation and the amount of money being thrown after ICOs. This conference will have a wide array of exciting topics from blockchain, bitcoin, ethereum, ICOs and investing, regulations, startups and disruption and so much more!

Some of the biggest personalities, developers and minds in the industry will be speaking and presenting in 20-minute time slots throughout the two-day conference.

Continue reading “See you at the World Blockchain Forum in London!” →

VMware AirWatch PowerShell Integration for Mobile Email Management and more

~ Ulv Bjørnsson ~ 11 Comments

AirWatch, it’s here to stay.

So let’s talk about AirWatch, Office 365 and Powershell.

Objective: To enable integration between Powershell and Office 365 to facilitate; AirWatch Mobile Email Management (MEM).

 

“Mobile Email Management (MEM) functionality in AirWatch delivers comprehensive security for your corporate email infrastructure by allowing only compliant users and devices to access email.”

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Now to getting this up and running

The steps we will be taking are

  • Integrate PowerShell with AirWatch
  • Setting up a PowerShell Admin User
  • Enable Powershell Integration in AirWatch
  • Configure Exchange to Block or Quarantine Devices
  • Email Management
  • Cmdlets Executed by AirWatch

Continue reading “VMware AirWatch PowerShell Integration for Mobile Email Management and more” →

Microsoft new bug bounty program will pay up to $250,000

~ Ulv Bjørnsson ~ Leave a comment

To some it may have passed under the radar, for others it might be of interest.

Microsoft has released a bug bounty program for hackers, white hats, bug hunters and security researchers alike to discover, find and report vulnerabilities to Microsoft to strengthen the Microsoft portfolio.

Microsoft having dominated the market for home users and business computers have long been a favored target for cyber criminals, hobby hackers and other nefarious operatives. Meaning that just a zero-day vulnerability or any breach can cause a crisis like the recent WannaCry ransomware attack.

 

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Microsoft has previously had bug bounty programs, but mostly they have been limited in time, or for specific suites.

Continue reading “Microsoft new bug bounty program will pay up to $250,000” →

Connect to Microsoft Azure with Powershell

~ Ulv Bjørnsson ~ 1 Comment

In this article I’ll walk you through the steps needed to connecting to your Microsoft Azure environment, as well as giving you a glimpse of how you can manage it by starting up a IaaS virtual machine.

There is endless potential, to what you can manage and automate of Azure resources with PowerShell, but from here to there, first step is connecting it!

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Installing Azure PowerShell Module

First off we are going to install the Azure PowerShell module

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The installer takes a few minutes, once installed we will connect to your Azure subscription.

Continue reading “Connect to Microsoft Azure with Powershell” →