Archive for September 3, 2025

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NTT DATA and Cisco Partner to Power Networking for the AI Era

Posted in Commentary with tags , on September 3, 2025 by itnerd

NTT DATA and Cisco today unveiled a new co-sponsored IDC InfoBrief, Wired for Intelligence: A CIO Guide to Enterprise Networking for AI. The study shares strategic guidance for organizations seeking to accelerate transformation by modernizing their network infrastructure.

As organizations integrate AI into more applications, from manufacturing and healthcare to financial services, the demand for high-speed, low-latency, and secure networks is surging. Legacy infrastructure is no longer sufficient to support the scale and complexity of AI workloads. NTT DATA and Cisco are responding to this shift by helping clients evolve from outdated architectures to intelligent, adaptive infrastructure that can power AI-driven innovation.

The Critical Foundation Empowering AI-Driven Growth

The study highlights that network modernization is at the heart of AI success. More than 78% of companies say that networking capabilities are either important or very important when selecting providers for GenAI infrastructure — underscoring the need for networks that can handle and secure ever-scaling AI workloads while running complex AI training, inference, and storage clusters with ease. At the same time, modernization also infuses AI into network operations through AI-driven configuration, anomaly detection, self-healing, and intelligent monitoring to accelerate issue resolution and elevate user experience. Already, industries like manufacturing, healthcare, and financial services are leveraging AI in networking to improve operational efficiency, ensure secure connectivity and reduce costs.

NTT DATA is Enabling Network Modernization Through Intelligent Services

NTT DATA’s comprehensive suite of intelligent services helps clients modernize their digital infrastructure and build secure networks. These services span the full lifecycle from advisory to sourcing, professional services, support and managed services to enable organizations to modernize and unlock the full potential of AI. With many companies undergoing hardware refresh cycles due to the emergence of AI, NTT DATA’s services are designed to meet this critical moment:

  • Advisory: Strategic guidance to align network modernization with AI goals.
  • Strategic Technology Sourcing: Recommending and procuring the right technology to transform network to be AI-ready.
  • Professional Services: Architecting and deploying scalable, secure and high-performance networks.
  • Software-Defined Infrastructure Services: Driving business outcomes through adoption of automation and AI agents into infrastructure operations and license optimization.
  • Adoption Services: Maximizing value from infrastructure investments through greater adoption of software, continuous improvement and change management.
  • Managed Network Services: End-to-end network management to ensure seamless data flow from edge to cloud, minimizing latency and enhancing application responsiveness.

NTT DATA recently launched AI-powered Software Defined Infrastructure (SDI) services for Cisco products to deliver intelligent automation and real-time insights to optimize infrastructure, reduce costs, and drive business outcomes.

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378 GB of Navy Federal Credit Union’s Backup Files Exposed

Posted in Commentary with tags on September 3, 2025 by itnerd

A data breach involving Navy Federal Credit Union, a Virginia-based company in the banking and finance industry, was discovered and reported to WebsitePlanet by cybersecurity researcher Jeremiah Fowler.

What happened:
A non-password-protected database containing 378.7 GB of internal records was exposed. The leaked data includes internal email addresses, password schemes, keys, document names, file structures, and more.

Why it matters:
This exposure poses significant security risks, including spear-phishing and social engineering attacks targeting internal users, as well as potential network mapping, unauthorized access, or exploitation of additional vulnerabilities.

Read the detailed report here: https://www.websiteplanet.com/news/navy-credit-union-breach-report/

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An Azure AD Misconfiguration Can Potentially Get You Pwned

Posted in Commentary with tags on September 3, 2025 by itnerd

Here’s another story from the “this is potentially bad” department. Researchers have discovered a critical security vulnerability in Azure Active Directory (Azure AD) configurations that exposes sensitive application credentials, providing attackers with unprecedented access to cloud environments. 

Commenting on this is Martin Jartelius, CTO at Outpost24:

“Security findings are sometimes overstated in coverage. In this case, the penetration testers’ original report was honest and factual, but the article misrepresents it and even links to an unrelated Azure AD vulnerability from 2024 instead of the testers’ actual write-up. The attack is straightforward:

  1. A website or system exposes appsettings.json, which contains tokens similar to API keys or stored credentials.
  2. The exposed application already has permissions granted by the organization.
  3. An attacker can use those credentials.

This is not a vulnerability in Active Directory, permissions management, or the application itself. It is a misconfiguration that exposes sensitive files on a webserver, fileshare, or code repository.

The case does highlight the risk of over-permissioned applications in Azure AD. Tools requesting broad access to calendars or email put sensitive data at risk, where more granular permissions (such as availability only) would not. Organizations should require approval for new apps, minimize their number, and only allow them when clearly justified.

And most importantly: never leave passwords or tokens in files that can be accessed publicly. That is basic security hygiene.”

Misconfigurations are as bad as outright vulnerabilities. Thus you have to make sure that you don’t leave out the red carpet for threat actors because you did not set your environment up with security in mind.

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Palo Alto Networks data breach exposes customer info, support cases

Posted in Commentary with tags on September 3, 2025 by itnerd

To say that this is not good is an understatement. News is out that Palo Alto Networks suffered a data breach exposing customer data and support cases via a Salesforce exploit. Just think of what a threat actor can do with all of that information.

Lidia Lopez, Senior Threat Intelligence Analyst at Outpost24, had the following commentary: 

“The case of Palo Alto data breach demonstrates the modus operandi of the threat actor is not stagnant, and they are capable of implementing other attack techniques to compromise as many victims as possible. This time they have used compromised OAuth tokens from the Salesloft Drift integration to query Salesforce data at scale. This is potentially affecting other clients using Salesloft Drift integration, for instance, Google and Cloudflare have already reported related exposure.”

“This represents a shift in modus operandi compared to previous intrusions of the threat actor, in which they used social engineering skills via phone phishing to trick them into revealing login credentials or installing malicious versions of Salesforce tools.”

I suspect that Palo Alto isn’t the last organization to be a victim of this Salesforce exploit. Which means that this is going to get real ugly for those who are trying to keep the bad guys out.

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Windows 10 custom support costs estimated to be in excess of $7bn

Posted in Commentary with tags on September 3, 2025 by itnerd

Nexthink is warning that the cost of custom Windows 10 support could reach upwards of $7.3bn based on market share data and business usage estimates.

Of the 1.4 billion devices powered by Windows, Nexthink estimates that approximately 30% are in use by commercial or public sector organizations, equating to around 420 million enterprise Windows devices. The latest market share data shows Windows 10 still has a 43% market share, which is equivalent to roughly 181 million devices.

According to Nexthink analysis of customer endpoints, there has been a 33% decrease in Windows 10 devices between 19th May and 1st August. Assuming a further 33% reduction by the 14th October, that would leave around 121 million Windows 10 PCs. At $61 per device for the first year of custom support, organizations could collectively be facing a bill of just over $7.3 billion.

Nexthink’s analysis of the digital experience across Windows 10 and Windows 11 shows that Windows 11 devices are currently experiencing a higher level of instability, with more frequent system crashes (1.2% vs 0.6% for Windows 10) and hard resets (9.9% vs 8.5% for Windows 10). While not unexpected in the early years of a new operating system, the findings highlight how factors such as hardware compatibility, drivers and system configuration can impact the employee experience during an OS migration. These risks can be anticipated and mitigated with tailored library packs, which give IT teams ready-to-use insights and guidance to smooth the transition.

Organizations must take a proactive, data-led approach to migration planning, ensuring they understand both the technical requirements and potential impact on the employee experience. To do this, organizations should:

  • Pinpoint remaining Windows 10 devices and assess hardware readiness for Windows 11.
  • Plan for post-deadline risks, as unsupported devices face greater exposure to malware, phishing, and ransomware.
  • Check application compatibility to prevent software issues or loss of support.
  • Factor in device performance, as older hardware may slow productivity and limit upgrades.
  • Consider IT resource impact, as unsupported OS devices may require more IT support.
  • Avoid ‘AI FOMO’ by guiding employees on how they can access and use tools like Copilot, improved multitasking, and enhanced UI features.
  • Reduce friction across teams by avoiding inconsistent experiences between Windows 10 and Windows 11 users.

Methodology

The full workings for the Nexthink calculation are as follows:

  • There are 1.4 billion devices powered by Windows, of which Nexthink estimates that around 30% of these are in use by commercial or public sector organizations
  • This leaves 420m million enterprise Windows devices. If 43% of these are Windows 10 devices, that leaves 180,600,000m Windows 10 enterprise devices
  • Assuming a 33% reduction in the 74 days from 1st August to 14th October (59,598,000), this will leave 121,002,000 devices due to be upgraded
  • At $61 per device, this makes the cost of Windows 10 custom support worldwide to be $7,381,122,000

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HappyRobot raises $44M to build a digital workforce for the real economy

Posted in Commentary with tags on September 3, 2025 by itnerd

The operations of most organizations still rely on high-volume manual labor – millions of conversations, documents,  and updates every day just to keep things moving. For decades, this work has been handled by overwhelmed teams or outsourced to call centers, with inefficiencies and crucial tasks slipping through the cracks amidst the chaos. HappyRobot is changing that. The San Francisco-based startup’s $44 million Series B funding will scale their platform to build & deploy AI workers, bringing the next generation of automation to the backbone of global trade. 

The $44 million Series B financing round was led by Base10 Partners with participation from existing investors, a16z, Array Ventures, and YC. New investors include Samsara Ventures, Tokio Marine, WaVe-X, World Innovation Lab (WiL) and other industry operators and global logistics funds. This financing follows a $15.6 million Series A financing round raised in late 2024, which was led by a16z and included investment from YC and Carles Reina’s Baobab Ventures. The company will use the capital to grow its product engineering, forward-deployed engineering, and go-to-market teams; enhance its platform’s functionality; and continue building the AI workforce.

HappyRobot gives enterprises a new kind of teammate: AI workers that can handle end-to-end tasks, communicating over the phone, email, and chat, parsing documents, browsing sites, and logging crucial data. Designed to handle the messy, dynamic workflows of  real-world operations, these workers are handling critical tasks – negotiating rates, booking appointments, collecting payments, recruiting staff, and keeping stakeholders updated – without relying on brittle rules or rigid scripts. The impact goes beyond cost savings, with organizations boosting revenue generating activities and infinitely increasing their velocity. 

The returns are already visible across the company’s 70+ enterprise supply chain customers like DHL, Ryder, and Werner. In appointment scheduling, the platform has reduced resolution times from over a week to under 30 minutes. In collections, customers report returns exceeding 119 times their initial investment. In outbound sales, HappyRobot agents are delivering over 19 times ROI, while carrier sales operations have seen returns north of 5x – all while freeing up human operators to focus on relationship-building and strategic work.

As adoption grows, so does the sophistication of the AI workforce, expanding into modalities like browser agents and advanced reasoning, and building a robust platform. That includes the AI Auditor, an automated agent designed to review the activity of AI workers, flag exceptions, and ensure compliance. The AI Builder will allow operators to deploy new workers with a prompt, making automation configurable by the teams closest to the work. And the HappyRobot operating system gives teams a centralized interface to monitor, manage, and coordinate operations with an AI workforce at their fingertips.

Unlike generic copilots or point solutions, HappyRobot is a vertically integrated orchestration platform. It combines multiple AI models (transcription, LLMs, voice generation, optical character recognition, AI browsing and more) with deep integrations (TMS, ERP, CRM, APIs) and a robust infrastructure layer built for production reliability at enterprise scale. Every deployment is supported by a dedicated forward-deployed engineer (FDE) who customizes and maintains the AI workflows on site – a model that accelerates time-to-value and ensures operational readiness.

The company’s origin story is personal. Co-founders Pablo Palafox, Luis Paarup and Javier Palafox started working together years before incorporation, bonding over robotics projects, deep learning projects, and a shared ambition to build something foundational in AI. After stints in cloud architecture, AI research, and corporate finance, the trio launched HappyRobot in 2023, having built a voice AI that could hold a natural phone conversation – and found its first commercial application in a fractured world of freight communication. 

As supply chains grow more complex and customers demand faster, more reliable service, the pressure on human teams has intensified. Meanwhile, call center burnout, labor shortages, and software fragmentation are driving up costs. By automating frontline communication with domain-specific AI workers, HappyRobot offers a scalable, efficient, and auditable alternative. 

With this new funding, HappyRobot plans to scale hiring across engineering, deployments, and product, while making their AI workers more robust. The long-term vision is clear: to build the digital workforce that powers operations. 

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Hisense Tops Large-Screen TV Market Again

Posted in Commentary with tags on September 3, 2025 by itnerd

Hisense continues to strengthen its leadership in premium display technology. According to the latest data from international market research firm Omdia, Hisense ranked No. 1 worldwide in shipments of 100-inch and above TVs in the first half of 2025, capturing 58% global volume share.

This milestone underlines Hisense’s long-term investment in large-screen innovations and its pivotal role in shaping the future of home entertainment.

To demonstrate its position at the forefront of display technology, Hisense will showcase its newest RGB Mini-LED technology at IFA 2025 in Berlin starting this week. The centrepiece of Hisense’s exhibit will be the company’s latest version of the world’s largest RGB Mini-LED TV, a striking 116-inch display that brings images to life with purer colours, exceptional brightness and precise contrast, achieving 100 per cent BT.2020 colour gamut coverage for a truly lifelike viewing experience. Beyond the technical performance, Hisense’s RGB Mini-LED is designed to bring users closer to reality, transforming every viewing moment into an emotionally compelling experience.

RGB Mini-LED, along with other display technologies and AI-powered home appliances, will be the focus of Hisense’s media event at IFA 2025. The event will take place on September 5, 2025, from 11 a.m. to 12 p.m. at the City Cube Berlin (Lower Level) under the theme Own the Moment.

Visitors to IFA can explore Hisense’s full range of premium visual and smart home products at Hall 23a of Messe Berlin from September 5–9.

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Zoho Builds on 40% YoY Small Business Customer Growth by Expanding Toolkit for SMBs

Posted in Commentary with tags on September 3, 2025 by itnerd

Zoho Corporation, a global technology company, today announced 40% YoY customer growth from global small businesses in the first half of 2025. Zoho’s broad, deep, and integrated product ecosystem uniquely addresses critical technology needs of SMBs: usable, scalable, affordable, and contextual tools. To further support this segment, Zoho is also releasing new developments across its SMB tech portfolio designed to improve productivity, revenue optimization, and operations for customers, allowing them to focus on future growth and opportunity.

In order to boost productivity, alleviate operational pain points, and encourage growth, Zoho is introducing the following developments to six key SMB solutions: Bigin by Zoho CRM, Zoho Commerce, Zoho Solo, Zoho Contracts, Zoho Start, and Zoho Notebook.

New Revenue Optimization Capabilities  

Bigin by Zoho CRM was launched in 2020 as a unified platform that small business owners can use to keeps track of customers and sales, regardless of their familiarity with CRM systems. New capabilities to Bigin include built-in booking management, integrations with Quickbooks Online, Shopify, as well as 10+ payment gateways, including Stripe and PayPal. This is in addition to Bigin’s pre-built integrations with Zoho Books and Zoho Payments, which enable businesses in the Zoho ecosystem to manage their finances seamlessly. The platform features on-device AI assistance for mobile apps, powered by Gemini Nano, Apple Intelligence, and Galaxy AI. It supports lead capture from Google Ads, WhatsApp, TikTok, and Meta Ads.

Several new Bigin capabilities will be rolling out in the coming months. They include:

  • Integration with Zoho MCP, allowing users connect their Bigin account with LLMs like Claude to get contextual insights around their CRM data. 
  • Integration with Zia AgentStudio, allowing users to build custom AI agents for Bigin
  • Three prebuilt AI agents—Reply Assistant, Cross-sell Genie, and Churn Analyzer
  • AI-powered writing assistance, live translation, record summary, and dashboard creation
  • Automated chart and KPI creation powered by Zia

Zoho Commerce—part of the broader Zoho’s Finance platform—helps businesses build, market, and manage their storefronts, allowing users to maximize revenue intake.

With the recently enhanced version of Zoho Commerce, businesses are enabled to sell digital downloads along with physical products, manage loyalty point programs to attract more customers, and prevent revenue leakage by tracking and recovering cart abandonment. It also focuses on end-to-end order lifecycle management and workflow automation, allowing retailers to streamline their entire internal process.

Additional key updates from Zoho Commerce include:

  • More than 15 new store templates for faster online store creation
  • Native mobile applications for iOS and Android phones
  • Social selling is now supported, allowing retailers to sell using multiple channels including WhatsApp. This allows customers to view the catalogue from the business profile, add items to cart, and automatically transition to the online store for a smooth checkout experience.
  • Businesses who operate in B2B and wholesale can now manage quote requests, price negotiations, and set credit limits.

Zoho Solo is a unified application that allows “solopreneurs” to perform essential business functions such as client management, expense tracking, invoicing, payments, task management, and reporting—all from within a single solution. Zoho Solo is mobile-first and completely optimized for iPads and Android tablets. The app now supports timesheets, notes, reminders, mileage tracking, events, financial reports, and card scanning. There will be more Zoho Solo capabilities rolling out in the coming months, including, multi-currency support, inventory management, and AI insights to help users drive revenue.

New Operations Capabilities  

Zoho Contracts streamlines the contract lifecycle, improves compliance, mitigates risks, and now includes an AI assistant to help with every stage of the contract process. Small businesses have access to self-service templates, automated approvals, online negotiations, and built-in e-signatures that accelerate the contract turnaround.

New additions to Zoho Contracts include:

  • Deeper integration with Zoho CRM
  • Enhanced digital signature capabilities
  • Multi-organization support
  • Integration with ChatGPT
  • Ability to manage counterparty-initiated contracts

New Productivity Capabilities, Powered by Zia

Zoho Notebook, the company’s note-taking app, has seen regular feature updates to centralize information across teams to better serve SMBs. Notebook provides shared workspaces for teams, projects, or departments, a whiteboard feature that includes not just text, but images, drawings, and shapes, and contextual integrations across the Zoho ecosystem, including CRM, Projects, and Mail, allowing Notebook to be the single source of documentation within an organization.

Notebook AI, utilizing the capabilities of Zia, Zoho’s in-house AI engine, is now available within Zoho Notebook. Other new features include:

  • AI Transcription – automatically converts audio into structured, time-stamped notes with speaker labels and summaries
  • AI Mind Maps – turns long notes into clean, visual mind maps with a single clickAI writing assistant – summarizes, rewrites, fixes grammar, and changes tone across any note
  • AI-generated Smart Tags – assists the user in organizing notes faster
  • Voice Search & Translation – easily find and convert content across languages
  • In the coming months, Notebook will be rolling out new capabilities, including meeting notes intelligence, integration with Bigin, and a deeper integration with Zoho CRM to provide sales teams with contextual insights.

Pricing and Availability

All apps are immediately available.

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Lumenix and McGill University Health Centre Collaborate to Enhance Patient Safety and Support Care Staff Using Ambient Perception-Action AI Platform Technology

Posted in Commentary with tags on September 3, 2025 by itnerd

Lumenix today announced a groundbreaking multi-year collaboration agreement to deploy its Artificially Intelligent Monitoring System (AIMS) at the McGill University Health Centre (MUHC). The objective of this collaboration is to improve patient and staff safety, support workers, and contribute to the foundation for a personalized, inclusive, and innovative approach to healthcare delivery.

AIMS is an ambient sensing platform designed specifically for clinical use. Using a network of ceiling-embedded devices and infrared-based 3D sensors, the system anonymously perceives human behaviour and positioning, while remaining incapable of recognizing any personal information. AIMS delivers real-time, actionable intelligence that allows healthcare teams to proactively prevent adverse events, such as missed hand hygiene compliance, fall prevention and detection, and patient wandering, which leads to enhanced safety and improved patient outcomes.

This initiative supports the strategic vision of the IMPACT Centre (Initiatives and Methods for Partnerships, Analytics and Clinical Transformation), the MUHC’s AI Centre of Excellence, to accelerate the benefits derived from data and digital technologies. Central to that goal is the integration of novel technologies, such as AIMS, that can improve care outcomes at every stage of life.

The MUHC – Lumenix collaboration includes both the implementation of AIMS and the development of additional applications. These innovations will solve real clinical challenges providing immediate value to patient care and clinical staff at the MUHC, and create scalable solutions for healthcare systems worldwide.

AIMS has been clinically validated through multiple deployments and clinical trials, including a successful comprehensive clinical trial led by the Government of Canada. AIMS’ hand hygiene application has delivered sustained improvement in hand hygiene compliance and significantly reduced outbreaks.

The MUHC – Lumenix collaboration is an investment in the future of healthcare and creates a model for how healthcare systems can advance technology through innovation, shared values and teamwork.

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Over 250M identity records exposed across 7 countries in a massive leak

Posted in Commentary with tags on September 3, 2025 by itnerd

Cybernews researchers have uncovered a massive data exposure affecting more than 250 million identity records across seven countries, including Turkey, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Mexico, South Africa, and Canada.

Three misconfigured servers — hosted on IP addresses in Brazil and the UAE — contained detailed personal information, resembling government-level identity profiles, now confirmed to have been publicly accessible.

What data was exposed? 

The leaked information included ID numbers, full names, dates of birth and gender, contact details, and home addresses.

Record numbers exposed:

  • Turkey (88,396,572 records)
  • Egypt (77,744,912 records)
  • Saudi Arabia (26,827,301 records)
  • UAE (4,856,942 records)
  • Mexico (8,740,000 records)
  • South Africa (44,472,288 records)
  • Canada (9,322,549 records)

Cybernews contacted the hosting providers, and as of now, the data is no longer publicly accessible.

To read the full research, please click here.

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