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Email: support@cnpintegrations.com
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Joomla is standing tall as the most secure open source platform and the community continues their proactive response to keeping this a priority. Today Joomla released an important security patch and all Joomla users should immediately upgrade. This is a security release for the 3.x series of Joomla which addresses a critical security vulnerability. All of us here at CNP and throughout the Joomla community recommend that you update your sites immediately. This release only contains the security fixes; no other changes have been made compared to the Joomla 3.4.4 release.
What's in 3.4.5
Version 3.4.5 is released to address three reported security vulnerabilities and includes additional security hardening of the UploadShield system.
Security Issues Fixed
High Priority - Core - SQL Injection (affecting Joomla 3.2 through 3.4.4) More information »
Medium Priority - Core - ACL Violations (affecting Joomla 3.2 through 3.4.4) More information »
Medium Priority - Core - ACL Violations (affecting Joomla 3.0 through 3.4.4) More information »
The impact of cyber crime is by far the most significant this year and could surpass a combination of years past. Since privacy laws have laxed in recent years and emerging technologies are putting more power in the hands of mischievous hackers or criminals the challenge of protecting from cyber crime has also increased multi fold. If you think about it a “hacker” (generic sense because not all hackers are back guys) wants to get into your web site or IT infrastructure they often only need to find one vulnerability out of a huge well known and very available “catalog” of vulnerabilities and techniques. In contrast you as a protection agent need to protect from all known vulnerabilities as well as perhaps some yet to be discovered. In addition you need to have a data recovery and risk management strategy even if you have a small web site or infrastructure.
You might think “ I have a small website with no sensitive information” why would anyone want to hack me. Well you are perhaps one of the best candidates for a thrifty hacker since it could be easy to get in and stay stealth in your site without you even knowing they are there. Kind of like a perfect hiding place for them to launch attacks or host files used in what are called phishing schemes. For example they can have a replicat of a banking site with login fields directing username and password emailing after a long path of encryption and passing back and forther over to their email. They would send out scary emails telling you your back account is in jeopardy and that they need you to immediately log in to verify and update their account information.
So with that in mind if you are online you have the same responsibilities and liabilities as much larger organizations with significant IT budgets. The troubling and not so talked about fact is that the ultimate liability will fall on the origination of the hack. So in the Phishing example above as the owner of the site where the hacker breached or collected the information used for illicit purposes, you would ultimately be the one liable. In addition your accounts would be suspended and you could have all of your online content seized or prohibited access to it. Remember those long hosting agreements and terms of service contracts you never read but eagerly in haste agree to? Well most often this is where the hosting companies push the responsibilities on to you. This is in part why you are getting your hosting space in many cases for so cheap since the cost is not in the hardware and disk space they allocate you but in the administration and threat prevention systems the hosting companies need to employ. They pass the potential liabilities on to their customers to avoid potentially extensive legal and administrative costs. It is also often not an area they have under their control since ultimately you are the one responsible for keeping your site secure and up to date.
The conclusion here is that regardless of how big your site is you need to make sure you are paying attention to the security aspects of your environment. Most of the time this means to have a professional team behind you and making sure you keep your online environment current and up to date. While there is no such thing as a guarantee when it comes to security having a dedicated team available to advise, monitor and ready to respond when an incident arises could protect you from serious liability and significant costs.
It is summer again and that for me means at least one grand road trip. I will be hitting the road today for a couple weeks to get back to my hometown of St. Paul MN. After a week with family and friends I will be giving a presentation on Artificial Intelligence July 18th at JoomlaDay MN to be held at the Mall of America http://joomladay.mn. Though I am not a computer scientist by any stretch nor an expert on AI, my passion for technology and the Joomla CMS project have led me on a fantastic journey of exploration in this subject. Hanging out with so many smart folks from the community has inspired me to dig in on this new trek of reading to prepare and share what I hope to be an interesting topic for the folks that attend.
I can say that the 12 books thus far and endless web searches and research into the world of AI (and related topics) has truly opened my eyes and scared the shit out of me just a bit. I am though an optimist and excited about the possibilities this new order of technical wonder can offer us. There is so much going on these days and from so many different directions it is almost impossible to keep up on all of the advances in technology, threats to our security, effects on economies and the way all of these things are going to change our entire society.
The exponential rate at which all of the next gen technologies are growing is going to make a very different world. So the challenge for me with this upcoming presentation is first, that there is so much to cover and second, that I have to tie it all back to Joomla. Humm, well for that you are going to have to get to MN for the event or check out my recap when I return. I will also do some follow up presentations at our Business Innovation Center in August http://businessinnovation.center.
JoomlaDay MN event on July 17, 18 & 19 will include some great leaders from the Joomla community and a chance to learn from some of the best in the business. There is a great trek for beginners and a bug squashing event to help make the next version of Joomla even better than the last. I have not gone to a JoomlaDay event yet where I did not walk away with new friendships, golden nuggets of information and plenty of ideas to feed my curious mind.
If you can make it to JoomlaDay.mn I hope to see you there.
There is a well-known concept in the technology world called Moore’s Law which predicts, correctly, that technology advances at a pace where it more than doubles in capability every 18 months. Not that I am old but the internet and the cell phone did not happen until after I was out of high school. I think back about my humble beginnings in technology with Macromedia Flash and how it significantly disrupted a slice of the web and then seemed to dissipate into a nearly invisible niche. Then Joomla among other open source technologies revolutionized content management systems and how people interacted with the web. Now Joomla is growing up and will be 10 years old this year and poised to continue as a relevant force for online technologies. However, like any evolving technology platform it will need to remain innovative and disruptive to stand out in the crowd.
Recently, I have been trying to get my head wrapped around the question of where is technology going to be in 5 or more years. So much has changed in the past 5-10 years and with rapidly emerging technologies such as robotics, the internet of things (IoT), big data, predictive behaviors and artificial intelligence emerging and integrating so much into our daily lives we are truly at a point of convergence that will change society in the most profound ways.
Announcing the birth of CNP Integrations Business Innovation Center
As a small but global web tech Service Company we felt the need to expand our thinking and to be more inclusive of a broader range of technologies and thus the idea of opening the CNP Integrations Business Innovation Center was formed. In addition to being our new home office, this will be a coworking space, host a variety of lab programs focused on new technology, an academy for STEAM education and offer many training initiatives around professional development for entrepreneurs. Officially our doors are open to the http://businessinnovation.center on Tuesday June 9th with our kickoff event for the new Fall River Toasmasters club which offers a curriculum for effective public speaking.
While we are opening our doors to accept membership for the coworking space and beginning to host seminars and training events, we will be working towards some type of a grand opening celebration later this fall once our lab programs have had a chance to get further along and our education initiatives can have time to evolve and organize.
Creative Labs will spur innovation and economic opportunity
We love all of the great tools Joomla as a web platform and framework offers and we still are evangelists for this great software solution. However, we also wanted to build research labs to explore ways of incorporating Joomla with many of the technologies listed above such as robotics, internet of things and artificial intelligence. Our goal with the Business Innovation Center is to create a hub of inspired folks to spark innovative ideas not only from a technological perspective but as they relate to creative business solutions and professional development for our team and community at large.
The Business Innovation Center hopes to connect us with a broader community and empower a new base of customers with the many options for applying successful content management strategies. We are hoping our research labs will also incorporate new ways to use Joomla as a tool to integrate effective business solutions. One of the biggest concerns we have and others should have with all of the technological advances is how to secure our business information and personal data. As part of the Business Innovation Center initiative we are planning to start a cyber-security lab & strike team to help combat and protect our customers from the storm of threats prevalent on the web and beyond. Having dedicated labs focused on new technologies will give us the insights we need to prepare next generation proactive security solutions. We have already started mapping out ideas for developing a catalog of smart security related software protection programs.
For the past 10 years CNP Integrations has been able to offer great value through a careful blend of outsourcing. This has allowed us to build a global network of talent and resources which has not only severed our customers well but allowed us to carve out a good reputation within the industry. With the rabid changes in technology and decline of our local economies we felt compelled to reintegrate and train a local workforce that can complement our highly skilled global teams. Our hope is to stimulate a wave of innovation while sparking a new level of creativity in the services we offer. With a growing decline across the US in STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Mathematics) skills, we wanted to take a bold step by offer relevant and targeted education and training that could contribute to a resurgence of new opportunities for our local workforce.
Innovation becomes a core value “Because what you do is important”
A big part of our new mission and vision going forward is to help grow and benefit our local economy while taking on and attracting cause worthy projects with a global impact. This all starts with doing things for the right reasons and having purpose with how you deploy technology is no exception. While our mantra of “making your success our success” is a noble cause it does not get to the real reason we are here. Our new way forward is all about “Why”! That is “Because what you do is important!”. We felt this statement transcends synergy across all of our core values as a company and as global citizens.
“Because what you do is important!” is our purpose and why we feel the new CNP Integrations Business Innovation Center and local workforce revitalization programs will help us make a greater impact in our local community, increase collaborative synergy with our global networks, give back to Joomla and offer significantly more to the customers we serve.
Let’s innovate, captivate, educate, collaborate and see what we can build together.
The impact of cyber crime is by far the most significant this year and could surpass a combination of years past. Since privacy laws have laxed in recent years and emerging technologies are putting more power in the hands of mischievous hackers or criminals the challenge of protecting from cyber crime has also increased multi fold. If you think about it a “hacker” (generic sense because not all hackers are back guys) wants to get into your web site or IT infrastructure they often only need to find one vulnerability out of a huge well known and very available “catalog” of vulnerabilities and techniques. In contrast you as a protection agent need to protect from all known vulnerabilities as well as perhaps some yet to be discovered. In addition you need to have a data recovery and risk management strategy even if you have a small web site or infrastructure. 
Innovation is the foundation of a secure future
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