Revenue Takes a Backseat to Patent Filings at IBM
September 9, 2016
The post on Slashdot titled IBM Has Been Awarded an Average of 24 Patents Per Day So Far in 2016 compares the patent development emphasis of major companies, with IBM coming out on top with 3,617 patent awards so far in 2016, according to a Quartz report. Patents are the bi-product of IBM’s focus on scientific research, as the report finds,
The company is in the middle of a painful reinvention, that sees the company shifting further away from hardware sales into cloud computing, analytics, and AI services. It’s also plugging away on a myriad of fundamental scientific research projects — many of which could revolutionize the world if they can come to fruition — which is where many of its patent applications originate. IBM accounted for about 1% of all US patents awarded in 2015.
Samsung claimed a close second (with just over 3,000 patents), and on the next rung down sits Google (with roughly 1,500 patents for the same period), Intel, Qualcomm, Microsoft, and Apple. Keep in mind though, that IBM and Samsung have been awarded more than twice as many patents as Google and the others, making it an unstoppable patent machine. You may well ask, what about revenue? They will get back to you on that score later.
Chelsea Kerwin, September 9, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
There is a Louisville, Kentucky Hidden Web/Dark Web meet up on September 27, 2016.
Information is at this link: https://www.meetup.com/Louisville-Hidden-Dark-Web-Meetup/events/233599645/
More Variables Than Technology for Enterprise Security to Consider
June 29, 2016
For all the effort enterprises go to in securing data through technological solutions, there are also other variables to consider: employees. Business Insider released an article, 1 in 5 employees are willing to hand over their work passwords for money, that shares survey research from SailPoint. 20 percent of 1,000 respondents, from organizations with over 1,000 employees, would be willing to sell their work passwords. US employees win the “most likely” award with 27 percent followed by Netherlands with 20 percent, and then UK and France at 16 percent. The article tells us,
“Some employees were willing to sell their passwords for as little as $55 (£38) but most people wanted considerably more, with $82,000 (£56,000) being the global average amount required,according to figures cited by Quartz that weren’t in the report. Unauthorised access to a company’s internal systems could provide a treasure trove of valuable data for criminals. They may be targeting individual user accounts, or they could be after intellectual property, or corporate strategy data.”
Undoubtedly, search and/or cybertheft is easier with a password. While the survey reports findings that may be alarming to organizations, we are left with the question, ‘why’. It may be easy to say morality is the dividing line, but I think this article wrestling with the morality question is on the right track pointing to considering sociological implications, for example, employee engagement and satisfaction cannot be discounted as factors in a decision to sell a password.
Megan Feil, June 29, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Parts Unknown of Dark Web Revealed in Study
May 13, 2016
While the parts unknown of the internet is said to be populated by terrorists’ outreach and propaganda, research shows a different picture. Quartz reports on this in the article, The dark web is too slow and annoying for terrorists to even bother with, experts say. The research mentioned comes from Thomas Rid and Daniel Moore of the Department of War Studies at King’s College London. They found 140 extremist Tor hidden services; inaccessible or inactive services topped the list with 2,482 followed by 1,021 non-illicit services. As far as illicit services, those related to drugs far outnumbered extremism with 423. The write-up offers a few explanations for the lack of terrorists publishing on the Dark Web,
“So why aren’t jihadis taking advantage of running dark web sites? Rid and Moore don’t know for sure, but they guess that it’s for the same reason so few other people publish information on the dark web: It’s just too fiddly. “Hidden services are sometimes slow, and not as stable as you might hope. So ease of use is not as great as it could be. There are better alternatives,” Rid told Quartz. As a communications platform, a site on the dark web doesn’t do what jihadis need it to do very well. It won’t reach many new people compared to “curious Googling,” as the authors point out, limiting its utility as a propaganda tool. It’s not very good for internal communications either, because it’s slow and requires installing additional software to work on a mobile phone.”
This article provides fascinating research and interesting conclusions. However, we must add unreliable and insecure to the descriptors for why the Dark Web may not be suitable for such uses.
Megan Feil, May 13, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Google Decides to Be Nice to
March 18, 2016
Google is a renowned company for its technological endeavors, beautiful office campuses, smart employees, and how it is a company full of self-absorbed and competitive people. While Google might have a lot of perks, it also has its dark side. According to Quartz, Google wanted to build a more productive team so they launched Project Aristotle to analyze how and they found, “After Years Of Intensive Analysis, Google Discovers The Key To Good Teamwork Is being Nice.”
Project Aristotle studied hundreds of employees in different departments and analyzed their data. They wanted to find a “magic formula,” but it all beats down to one of the things taught in kindergarten: be nice.
“Google’s data-driven approach ended up highlighting what leaders in the business world have known for a while; the best teams respect one another’s emotions and are mindful that all members should contribute to the conversation equally. It has less to do with who is in a team, and more with how a team’s members interact with one another.”
Team members who understand, respect, and allow each other to contribute to conversation equally. It is a basic human tenant and even one of the better ways to manage a relationship, according to marriage therapists around the world. Another result of the project is dubbed “psychological safety,” where team members create an environment with the established belief they can take risks and share ideas without ridicule.
Will psychological safety be a new buzzword since Google has “discovered” that being nice works so well? The term has been around for a while, at least since 1999.
Google’s research yields a business practice that other companies have adopted: Costco, Trader Joes, Pixar, Sassie, and others to name a few. Yet why is it so hard to be nice?
Whitney Grace, March 18, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Hey Google Doubters, Burn This into Your Memory
August 6, 2015
It has been speculated that Google would lose its ad profits as mobile search begins to dominate the search market but Quartz tells a different story in the article, “Mobile Isn’t Ruining Google’s Search Business After All.” Google’s revenue continues to grow, especially with YouTube, but search remains its main earner.
According to the second-quarter earnings, Google earned $12.4 billion in Google Web sites, a $1.5 billion increase from last year. Google continues to grow on average $1.6 billion per quarter. Being able to maintain a continuous growth proves that Google is weathering the mobile search market. Here is some other news, the mobile search revolution is now and not in the future.
“That is, if mobile really was going to squeeze Google’s search advertising business, we probably would have already seen it start by now. Smartphone penetration keeps deepening—with 75% saturation in the US market, according to comScore. And for many top media properties, half of the total audience only visits on mobile, according to a recent comScore report on mobile media consumption.”
There are new actions that could either impede or help Google search, such as deep linking between apps and the Web and predictive information services, but these are still brand new and their full effect has not been determined.
Google refuses to be left behind in the mobile search market and stands to be a main competitor for years to come.
Whitney Grace, August 6, 2015
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
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