The Time Google Flagged Itself for Potentially Malicious Content
June 13, 2016
Did you know Google recently labeled itself as ‘partially dangerous’? Fortune released a story, Google Has Stopped Rating ‘Google.com’ as ‘Partially Dangerous’, which covers what happened. Google has a Safe Browsing tool which identifies potentially harmful websites by scanning URLs. Users noticed that Google itself was flagged for a short time. Was there a rational explanation? This article offers a technology-based reason for the rating,
“Fortune noted that Google’s Safe Browsing tool had stopped grading its flagship site as a hazard on Wednesday morning. A Google spokesperson told Fortune that the alert abated late last night, and that the Safe Browsing service is always on the hunt for security issues that might need fixing. The issue is likely the result of some Google web properties hosting risky user-generated content. The safety details of the warning specifically called out Google Groups, a service that provides online discussion boards and forums. If a user posted something harmful there, Google’s tool would have factored that in when assessing the security of the google.com domain as a whole, a person familiar with the matter told Fortune.”
We bet some are wondering whether this is a reflection of Google management or the wonkiness of Google’s artificial intelligence? Considering hacked accounts alone, it seems like malicious content would be posted in Google Groups fairly regularly. This flag seems to be a flag for more than the “partially dangerous” message spells out. The only question remaining is, a flag for what?
Megan Feil, June 13, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Axcelerate Focuses on Control and Visibility
June 13, 2016
The article on CMSWire titled Recommind Adds Muscle to Cloud e-Discovery relates the upgrades to the Axcelerate e-Discovery platform from Recommind. The muscle referred to in the article title is the new Efficiency Scoring feature offered to increase e-discovery review process transparency by tracking efficiency and facilitating a consistent assessment. The article explains,
“Axcelerate Cloud is built on Recommind’s interactive business intelligence layer to give legal professionals a depth of insight into the e-discovery process that Recommind says they have previously lacked. Behind all the talk of agility and visibility, there is one goal here: control. The company hopes this release allays the fears of legal firms, who traditionally have been reluctant to use cloud-based software for fear of compromising data.”
Hal Marcus, Director of Product Marketing at Recommind, suggested that in spite of early hesitancy by legal professional to embrace the cloud, current legal teams are more open to the possibilities available through consolidation of discovery requirements in the cloud. According to research, there are no enterprise legal departments without cloud-based legal resources related to contract management, billing, or e-discovery. Axcelerate Cloud aims to promote visibility into discovery practices to address the major concern among legal professionals: insufficient insight and transparency.
Chelsea Kerwin, June 13, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Squiz and Verint Team up to Save the Government from Itself
February 9, 2016
The article titled Verint and Squiz Announce Partnership to Further Enable Digital Transformation for Government on BusinessWire conveys the global ambitions of the two companies. The article positions Verint, an intel-centric company, and Squiz, an Australian content management company, as the last hope for the world’s governments (on the local, regional, and national level.) While things may not be so dire as all that, the merger is aimed at improving governmental organization, digital management, and customer engagement. The article explains,
“Today, national, regional and local governments across the world are implementing digital transformation strategies, reflecting the need to proactively help deliver citizen services and develop smarter cities. A key focus of such strategies is to help make government services accessible and provide support to their citizens and businesses when needed. This shift to digital is more responsive to citizen and community needs, typically reducing phone or contact center call volumes, and helps government organizations identify monetary savings.”
It will come as no surprise to learn that government bureaucracy is causing obstacles when it comes to updating IT processes. Together, Squiz and Verint hope to aid officials in implementing streamlined, modernized procedures and IT systems while focusing on customer-facing features and ensuring intuitive, user-friendly interfaces. Verint in particular emphasizes superior engagement practices through its Verint Engagement Management service.
Chelsea Kerwin, February 9, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Google Drastically Slows Acquisition Spending
December 3, 2015
As Google becomes Alphabet, the company seems to be taking a new approach to its investments. Business Insider declares, “Google Slammed the Brakes on its Acquisition Machine, with the Lowest Deal-Making Since 2009.” The article references Google’s 10Q quarterly earnings report, and compares that quarter’s acquisition total of $250 million to the company’s speeding sprees of years past; see the post for details. Writer Alexai Oreskovic observes:
“The M&A slowdown comes as Google has transformed itself into the Alphabet holding company, which separates various Google projects, such as fiber-based internet access, and Nest into separate companies. It also comes as new CFO Ruth Porat has taken steps to make Google more disciplined about its spending, and to return some cash to shareholders through buybacks. Stock buybacks and slowing M&A — perhaps this is the new Google. Or perhaps Google is just taking a breather on its acquisitions to digest all the companies it has swallowed up over the years. Asked about the slowing M&A, a Google representative responded by email: ‘Acquisitions by their nature are inherently lumpy and don’t follow neat 9 month patterns.’”
Well, that’s true, I suppose, as far as it goes. We hope this turn to fiscal discipline does not portend trouble for Google/ Alphabet. What is the plan? We are curious to see where the company goes from here.
Cynthia Murrell, December 3, 2015
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Interview with Informatica CEO
November 26, 2015
Blogger and Datameer CEO Stefan Groschupf interviews Anil Chakravarthy, acting CEO of Informatica, in a series of posts on his blog, Big Data & Brews. The two executives discuss security in the cloud, data infrastructure, schemas, and the future of data. There are four installments as of this writing, but it was an exchange in the second iteration, “Big Data Brews: Part II on Data Security with Informatica,” that captured our attention. Here’s Chakravarthy’s summary of the challenge now facing his company:
Stefan: From your perspective, where’s the biggest growth opportunity for your company?
Anil: We look at it as the intersection of what’s happening with the cloud and big data. Not only the movement of data between our premise and cloud and within cloud to cloud but also just the sheer growth of data in the cloud. This is a big opportunity. And if you look at the big data world, I think a lot of what happens in the big data world from our perspective, the value, especially for enterprise customers, the value of big data comes from when they can derive insights by combining data that they have from their own systems, etc., with either third-party data, customer-generated data, machine data that they can put together. So, that intersection is good for, and we are a data infrastructure provider, so those are the two big areas where we see opportunity.
It looks like Informatica is poised to make the most of the changes prompted by cloud technology. To check out the interview from the beginning, navigate to the first installment, “Big Data & Brews: Informatica Talks Security.”
Informatica offers a range of data-management and integration tools. Though the company has offices around the world, they maintain their headquarters in Redwood City, California. They are also hiring as of this writing.
Cynthia Murrell, November 26, 2015
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Lexmark, a Printer Supply Company, Receives Hold Rating from Analysts
October 20, 2015
The article on Dakota Financial News titled Lexmark International Given Average Recommendation of “Hold” by Brokerages (NYSE: LXK) piles on the bad news for Lexmark, a company best known for its printer supply services. It is a tough time to be in the printing business, and Lexmark has received numerous analyst ratings of “Hold” and “Sell.” The article details the trend,
“Lexmark International (NYSE:LXK) traded down 0.59% during trading on Wednesday, hitting $28.59. The company had a trading volume of 259,296 shares. Lexmark International has a one year low of $27.22 and a one year high of $47.69. The stock has a 50-day moving average of $30.27 and a 200 day moving average of $39.70. The company’s market capitalization is $1.76 billion…The company reported $0.97 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.85 by $0.12. “
Certainly not a vote of confidence in Lexmark, which owns both Brainware and ISYS Search Software. The article goes into some detail about the companies other work beyond printer supplies including enterprise content and process management software and healthcare archive with integration abilities for unstructured patient information. Perhaps these extras are saving the company from falling entirely into the “sell” category and maintaining at “Hold.”
Chelsea Kerwin, October 20, 2015
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Meg Whitman, President of HP, Gets Flack for Partial Follow-Through on Ultimatum
October 14, 2015
The article titled HP Didn’t Actually Fire All the Employees It Threatened to Cut on Business Insider details the management teachings from Hewlett Packard. To summarize, HP recently delivered an ultimatum to several hundred employees that they had to shift off HP’s payroll and become contract workers for significantly lower pay with HP’s partner Ciber. If they refused, they would be let go. Except that the employees mutinied and complained, resulting in HP negotiating for higher salaries from Ciber as well as holding on to a few employees who refused the deal. The article states,
“On top of that, HP is also shipping most of the jobs in this business unit offshore. Whitman wants 60% of the Enterprise Services division jobs to be in low-cost areas of the world, compared to less than 40% today. Employees in this unit fully expect HP to line up more take-it-or-leave it contract jobs, they tell us, so we’ll see how HP handles the next one if it does materialize.”
This is all in the midst of HP’s massive layoffs of over 80,000 employees, 51,000 of whom have already been let go. Morale must be under the building. The non-negotiable ultimatum strategy did not seem to work, and at any rate is bad business, especially when coupled with it being overturned later in a handful of instances.
Chelsea Kerwin, October 14, 2015
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
NTENT Has a New CEO
September 29, 2015
NTENT is a leading natural language processing and semantic search company, that owns the Convera technology, and according to Business Wire Dan Stickel was hired as the new CEO, says “NTENT Appoints Dan Stickel As New CEO.” NTENT is focused on expanding the company with AltaVista and Google. Using Stickel’s experience, NTENT has big plans and is sure that Stickel will lead the company to success.
“CEO, Stickel’s first objective will be to prioritize NTENT’s planned expansion along geographic, market and technology dimensions. ‘After spending significant time with NTENT’s Board, management team and front-line employees, I’m excited by the company’s opportunities and by the foundation that’s already been laid in both traditional web and newer mobile capabilities. NTENT has clearly built some world-class technology, and is now scaling that out with customers and partners.’”
In his past positions as CEO at Metaforic and Webtrends s well as head of the enterprise business at AltaVista and software business at Macrovision, Stickel has transitioned companies to become the leaders in their respective industries.
The demand for natural language processing software and incorporating it into semantic search is one of the biggest IT trends at the moment. The field is demanding innovation and NTENT believes Stickel will guide them.
Whitney Grace, September 29, 2015
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Help Wanted: Chief Marketing Technology Officer
September 28, 2015
A new, indispensable position for companies is the chief technology officer or the chief information officer. Their primary responsibilities are to manage the IT department, implement new ways to manage information, and/or develop software as needed. There is a new position that companies will be creating in the future and the title is chief marketing technology officer, says Live Mint in “Make Way CIOS, CMOS: Here Comes The CMTO.”
Formerly the marketing and IT departments never mixed, except for the occasional social media collaboration. Marketers are increasing their reliance on technology to understand their customers and it goes far beyond social media. Marketers need to be aware of the growing trends in mobile shopping and search, digital analytics, gamification, online communities, and the power of user-generated content.
“The CMO’s role will graduate to CMTO, a marketer with considerable knowledge of technology. The CMTO, according to Nasscom, will not only conceptualize but also build solutions and lay down the technical and commercial specifications while working alongside the IT team on vendor selection.”
It is not enough to know how to market a product or promote an organization. Marketers need to be able to engage with technology and understand how to implement to attract modern customers and increase sales. In other words, evolving the current marketing position with a new buzzword.
Whitney Grace, September 28, 2015
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Watson Still Has Much to Learn About Healthcare
July 9, 2015
If you’ve wondered what is taking Watson so long to get its proverbial medical degree, check out IEEE Spectrum’s article, “IBM’s Dr. Watson Will See You… Someday.” When IBM’s AI Watson won Jeopardy in 2011, folks tasked with dragging healthcare into the digital landscape naturally eyed the software as a potential solution, and IBM has been happy to oblige. However, “training” Watson in healthcare documentation is proving an extended process. Reporter Brandon Keim writes:
“Where’s the delay? It’s in our own minds, mostly. IBM’s extraordinary AI has matured in powerful ways, and the appearance that things are going slowly reflects mostly on our own unrealistic expectations of instant disruption in a world of Uber and Airbnb.”
Well that, and the complexities of our healthcare system. Though the version of Watson that beat Jeopardy’s human champion was advanced and powerful, tailoring it to manage medicine calls for a wealth of very specific tweaking. In fact, there are now several versions of “Doctor” Watson being developed in partnership with individual healthcare and research facilities, insurance companies, and healthcare-related software makers. The article continues:
“Watson’s training is an arduous process, bringing together computer scientists and clinicians to assemble a reference database, enter case studies, and ask thousands of questions. When the program makes mistakes, it self-adjusts. This is what’s known as machine learning, although Watson doesn’t learn alone. Researchers also evaluate the answers and manually tweak Watson’s underlying algorithms to generate better output.
“Here there’s a gulf between medicine as something that can be extrapolated in a straightforward manner from textbooks, journal articles, and clinical guidelines, and the much more complicated challenge of also codifying how a good doctor thinks. To some extent those thought processes—weighing evidence, sifting through thousands of potentially important pieces of data and alighting on a few, handling uncertainty, employing the elusive but essential quality of insight—are amenable to machine learning, but much handcrafting is also involved.”
Yes, incorporating human judgement is time-consuming. See the article for more on the challenges Watson faces in the field of healthcare, and for some of the organizations contributing to the task. We still don’t know how much longer it will take for the famous AI (and perhaps others like it) to dominate the healthcare field. When that day arrives, will it have been worth the effort?
Cynthia Murrell, July 9, 2015
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
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