Meltdown and Spectre news round-up for week of February 5, 2018
A running log of Meltdown and Spectre news can be found at Meltdown & Spectre: How to avoid the biggest cyber threat in modern computing. February 5, 2018 - At this point in time, Alvaka Networks is not advising [...]
Private sector’s national cybersecurity strategy contributions lacking
By Kevin McDonald The U.S. government has been very public about its concern for national cybersecurity. There have been grandiose speeches, presidential declarations and several attempts by the legislature to pass new cybersecurity laws. Private companies should be responsible for [...]
Employee training remains the best first line of defense against cybersecurity breaches
If there is one lesson to be learned from the recent mass spate of security breaches, particularly those involving ransomware, it is this: adequate training for personnel can dramatically decrease the likelihood of a successful attack on a business. Unfortunately, [...]
“Are the risks from Meltdown and Spectre overblown?”…asks an IT professional
I participate in IT professional industry forums, where peers ask questions of other peers. Someone in the forum made a somewhat disjointed post questioning the severity for the recent Meltdown and Spectre security vulnerabilities. I paraphrase his long question: About [...]
Meltdown & Spectre: How to avoid the biggest cyber threat in modern computing
For Immediate Release In This Message: What is this threat and why does it affect you? What you need to do.** A special offer for new patch management clients. A dynamic weekly updated list of Meltdown and Spectre solutions [...]
What does a FIPS 199 impact assessment mean to you?
If you are a subcontractor to a prime defense contractor like Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon, Boeing, General Dynamics and others, you need to know about FIPS 199 and why doing a FIPS impact assessment is important to your DFARS [...]
Smoke testing is a term used to describe the testing process for servers after patches are applied. 
Estimating an average time for patching servers and PCs can be a bit tricky. It can vary from one month to the next, depending upon the number and complexity of the patches released by your software vendors. You must consider all versions of operating systems and have a complete inventory of all your application software to do this job correctly. Our experience has shown that manual patching of systems takes on average of about 1.5 hours each.
This is a basic cost calculator for you to compute your typical monthly cost for patching your servers, PCs, laptops, tablets and associated application software. It also forms the basis for you to begin calculating your Return on Investment for software patching, or for comparison with alternatives to the manual process of patching operating systems and application software—such as Patch Management as a Service, also known as Vulnerability Management as a Service.
