22 years ago: Windows 2000 released

Posted on 2022-02-18 by guenni

Windows[German]22 years ago, on February 17, 2000, Microsoft released the further development of Windows NT under the name Windows 2000 – internally the part was called Windows NT 5.0. Brings tears to my eyes when I look at the system requirements: Pentium processor with 133 MHz, 64 MB RAM, a 2 GB hard disk with at least 650 MB free space and a CD-ROM drive. And with that part we could somehow just work – no need for online accounts, a start menu that worked, and, and, and. Long time ago. Details have been collected by the guys and gals at Wikipedia.

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Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 22557 brings Start Menu Folders

Posted on 2022-02-17 by guenni

Windows[German]Microsoft has released a new Windows 11 Insider Preview build 22557 in the Dev Channel on February 16, 2022. Normally, I don't discuss Insider Preview builds here anymore. But this new build promises a number of new features, but is not available for ARM64 PCs. When the announcement of the new features was made, I started to wonder. Because it is promised a handful of new features for insiders, including folders in the pinned apps area in the Start menu or new touch gestures. So I put some thoughts together in a blog post.

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Dymo equips paper rolls for thermal direct printers with RFID chips for identification

Posted on 2022-02-17 by guenni

Stop - Pixabay[German]The U.S. civil liberties organization Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) has just made public another case of lockin for printer consumables. Printer manufacturer Dymo has equipped its latest generations of thermal direct printers with a new ruse to force the use of the manufacturer's consumables. Rolls of thermal paper for these printers will be equipped with RFID chips for identification. This prevents users from using third-party thermal paper or labels in these devices. Dymo touts the benefits of automatic detection of label types and automatic counting of remaining labels. The pleasant side effect is that the customer has to buy the thermal papers from Dymo, regardless of the price.

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Cyber attack on Red Cross via Zoho vulnerability, likely by state sponsored attackers

Posted on 2022-02-17 by guenni

Sicherheit (Pexels, allgemeine Nutzung)[German]In January 2022, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) announced a cyberattack on its IT system. The attack stole confidential information on more than 515,000 vulnerable people. Now the ICRC has released more details of its internal investigation. The attack was carried out via an (unpatched) Zoho vulnerability, using specially designed attack methods. This suggests that the attack was carried out by state actors to obtain confidential information on vulnerable individuals. The attackers were able to move around the system undetected for 70 days. The case is one of the rare occasions where more details about the attack came to my attention, so I'm reposting that here for review.

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Edge 98.0.1108.55

Posted on 2022-02-17 by guenni

Edge[German]Microsoft has updated the Chromium Edge browser to version 98.0.1108.55 as of February 16, 2022 (thanks to the reader for pointing this out). This is a maintenance update that fixes vulnerability CVE-2022-0609, according to the release notes. In addition, the vulnerabilities listed in the blog post Chrome 98.0.4758.102 fixes 0-day vulnerabilities. The browser should update automatically, but can also be downloaded here.

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VMware closes critical vulnerabilities

Posted on 2022-02-17 by guenni

Sicherheit (Pexels, allgemeine Nutzung)[German]VMware has released security updates for various products. These should close vulnerabilities that are rated as critical. It affects the products VMware ESXi, VMware Workstation, VMware Fusion and VMware Cloud Foundation. The vulnerabilities could be exploited to execute arbitrary code and cause a denial of service (DoS) condition.

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Windows 10: Update KB5001716 for update service components (Feb. 2022)

Posted on 2022-02-16 by guenni

Windows[German]Microsoft has released the update KB5001716 for machines with older Windows 10 versions. The update updates the Update Service components so that the machine can be updated to a newer Windows 10 build. Here's a brief overview of what the update does and how it gets onto machines.

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Thunderbird 91.6.1

Posted on 2022-02-16 by guenni

[German]The developers of the Thunderbird email client have released Thunderbird 91.6.1 on February 15, 2022. This is a maintenance update for the 91 development branch that makes fixes. Here is a brief overview.

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Google brings Chrome OS Flex to old PCs and Macs

Posted on 2022-02-16 by guenni

[German]Smart move (since invention of sliced bread) by Google compared to Microsoft. Google has just made available a first version of its "Chrome OS Flex" operating system for PCs and Macs. The OS is meant to promote sustainability by allowing existing devices to be upgraded to an easy-to-manage, fast and secure Chrome OS operating system. That's a clear sideswipe and attack on Microsoft's bloated Windows 10/11 concept.

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Windows 11 / Windows Server 2022 Preview Update (Feb. 15, 2022)

Posted on 2022-02-16 by guenni

Windows[German]Microsoft has released optional cumulative (preview) updates as of February 15, 2022 (C-Week). These are intended to fix various bugs in Windows 10, Windows 11 and in the corresponding Windows Server versions. For Windows 11, a number of new features were added with the update. Below I give an overview regarding these updates for Windows 11 and Windows Server 2022.

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