IT News Week 3 Oct 2016

For IT News Week 2 Oct 2016.

For this week / last week, here are / were the biggest news.
  • PR - Oct 14, 2016 - GEMFIVE delivers first iPhone 7 in Malaysia
  • PR - Oct 14, 2016 - Ensuring the Price is Right with Windows 10
  • PR - Oct 14, 2016 - Kaspersky Lab Raises Cybersecurity Issues at its Conference for Asia Pacific Region
  • PR - Oct 13, 2016 - Fujitsu Turns to Brocade Workflow Composer to Enhance the Functionality of its Virtual Desktop Service
  • PR - Oct 12, 2016 - Western Digital Introduces WD Blue and WD Green Solid State Drives
  • PR - Oct 11, 2016 - AccuWeather Launches Exclusive Crowdsourced Weather Feature AccUcast Worldwide in Android App
  • Symantec - Oct 12, 2016 - Multiple Banks Attacked by Carbanak-Linked Group
  • PR - Oct 12, 2016 - Intel Malaysia’s ‘PC Does Better’ Campaign
  • PR - Oct 12, 2016 - Hitachi Enterprise Cloud Changes the Game for Enterprise Cloud Deployment
  • PR - Oct 11, 2016 - Huawei and UC Berkeley Announce Strategic Partnership in Basic Research into AI
  • PR - Oct 10, 2016 - Carbon Black and IBM Delivers Rapid Response Tool to Address Critical Endpoint

PR - Oct 14, 2016 - GEMFIVE delivers first iPhone 7 in Malaysia

GEMFIVE Malaysia today made special delivery for 5 lucky customers who placed pre-orders for the new iPhone 7/7 Plus at the stroke of midnight, ensuring these customers were the first in Malaysia to receive the phones. One surprise delivery was made specially by Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Kwek Kon Chao to Stephenee Won at her residence in Klang.

GEMFIVE's CEO Kwek Kon Chao delivered iPhone 7 to customers


Kwek said of the delivery: “We’ve had a great response to our iPhone 7/7 Plus pre-orders, and so I thought that it would be a nice gesture to personally deliver the first few orders to our valued customers at the stroke of midnight itself!”

PR - Oct 14, 2016 - Ensuring the Price is Right with Windows 10

Malaysia-based ecommerce aggregator site iPrice, taps into Microsoft and Windows to drive rapid growth momentum in a highly competitive e-commerce space. The iPrice Group is Southeast Asia’s largest online shopping website where shoppers can search for products, compare prices and save with great deals. In less than two years, iPrice has the largest product catalogue in the region, consisting of more than 35 million of products.

David Chmelar, CEO of iPrice, said, “We essentially simplify our customers’ shopping journey. Instead of visiting multiple sites and stores, they come to iPrice, where we provide them with the largest selection of products for the best prices. We then filter the products to meet specific preference of our customers, ranging from brand preference to colour preference, for instance, all tailored to meet their specific needs. Once a customer is locked on a product they fancy, we redirect them to the merchant’s site to complete their purchase.”

David Chmelar, CEO, iPrice

n its early days, iPrice was rapidly growing and therefore couldn’t afford to spent significant time and resources to upkeep their IT systems. For the start-up to truly focus on its business of delighting customers, Chmelar decided that iPrice needed a fuss-free solution that minimizes the resources needed to upkeep their computing systems.

iPrice’s digital transformation journey kicked off with the entire team moving to Windows 10. Thanks to the familiarity of Windows, iPrice employees of no less than 22 nationalities were able to hit the ground running from day one, minimizing disruption to their productivity. Despite cultural differences, all employees were fluent in the use of Windows and today it takes less than few hours to train any newcomers on all the apps and software required for their work. Today, iPrice does not have a dedicated IT support team. “Windows runs smoothly and everyone is familiar with it – and as a CEO, it’s great as there’s one problem less for me to worry about,” said Chmelar. As a result, the company can focus all of their attention and resources on delivering a customer-centric experience.

PR - Oct 14, 2016 - Kaspersky Lab Raises Cybersecurity Issues at its Conference for Asia Pacific Region

The annual Kaspersky Lab Cyber Security Weekend for Asia Pacific Countries took place recently in Bali, Indonesia, and gathered industry professionals and journalists with the aim of raising awareness about cybersecurity issues, highlighting the current IT threats affecting the region and sharing advice on how to mitigate them. Special attention was paid to financial threats that are on the rise globally and in APAC, posing a high risk to organizations and individuals.

Kaspersky Security Network (KSN) cloud service statistics for July-September 2016 were unveiled at the event, showing that in selected Asia-Pacific countries (Australia, China, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam), an average of 49% of users encountered security incidents related to local networks and removable media, and 17% of users faced web-related threats that were blocked by Kaspersky Lab solutions.

Vitaly Kamluk, Kaspersky Lab’s Director of Global Research and Analysis Team in APAC at the annual Kaspersky Lab Cyber Security Weekend for Asia Pacific Countries

“At Kaspersky Lab we believe that understanding of computer attacks is crucial to prevent them. We spend all our time carefully analyzing, classifying and investigating attacks that expand in quantity, diversity and complexity. With support of our guests at the event, we hope to share our knowledge and expertise to all the people who need it, raise awareness of others and make this world a safe place. Confidential and personal data, finances and reputation of organizers as well as home users can be secured by their responsible attitude to IT, strong security solution and willingness to learn more,” said Vitaly Kamluk, Kaspersky Lab’s Director of Global Research and Analysis Team in APAC.

PR - Oct 13, 2016 - Fujitsu Turns to Brocade Workflow Composer to Enhance the Functionality of its Virtual Desktop Service

Brocade today announced that IT solutions and services giant Fujitsu has successfully deployed Brocade® Workflow Composer to enhance the functionality of its virtual desktop-as-a-service (V-DaaS) offering.

The network automation platform increases the agility and security of Fujitsu’s V-DaaS operations by aligning the network with IT operations and tool chains. As a result, V-DaaS customers can streamline their digital transformation while increasing business innovation and gaining a competitive advantage.

Brocade Workflow Composer is based on the StackStorm open source project, which provides a streamlined method for apps, services, and workflows to be combined.

Thanks to this strong ecosystem of innovation, the product features nearly 2,000 pre-wired integrations for popular cross-domain platforms and technologies. This includes Brocade VDX® 6740 switches with software-defined network (SDN) capabilities that form an intelligent fabric at the heart of V-DaaS, giving Fujitsu developers and customers a powerful foundation for event-driven automation.

PR - Oct 12, 2016 - Western Digital Introduces WD Blue and WD Green Solid State Drives

Western Digital Corporation today announced WD Blue® and WD Green® solid state drives (SSDs), the first WD-branded SATA client SSDs. The new SSDs complement the company’s industry leading family of hard drives for PCs and workstations, providing a full portfolio of WD storage devices for virtually any application.

The ultimate solution for building DIY PCs, extending the life of current PCs or upgrading existing storage, the WD Blue and WD Green SSDs boast near-maximum speed of SATA drives, best-in-class endurance and MTTF and WD Functional Integrity Testing (F.I.T.) Lab certification, resulting in quick boot times and increased program responsiveness. Consumers benefit from the combination of reliable storage with an industry-leading 1.75M hours MTTF, coupled with reduced power and less heat when compared to HDDs. Both include free, downloadable, WD SSD Dashboard software, which allows continuous performance and capacity monitoring. For consumers who are looking for instant-on responsiveness, durability, low power consumption, and ultra-thin, ultramobile form factors, the WD Blue and WD Green SSDs are the perfect options.
  • WD Blue SSD

    For customers looking for enhanced SATA performance, WD Blue SSDs are optimized for multitasking and resource-heavy applications. Perfect in either a notebook or desktop PC, WD Blue SSDs are available in 250GB, 500GB, and 1TB capacities, and in both 2.5-inch/7mm case or M.2 2280 form factors. The WD Blue SSD offers up to 545MB/s and 525MB/s sequential read and write speeds, and endurance up to 400 TBW. WD Blue SSDs will be available starting end-October 2016 and is distributed by Eternal Asia (M) Sdn Bhd in Malaysia.


  • WD Green SSD

    WD Green SSDs deliver essential-class performance, and are a great option for everyday use. Available in 120GB capacity, and in both 2.5-inch/7mm case or M.2 2280 form factors, WD Green SSDs deliver an ultra-low power-draw, enabling PC users to work longer between battery charges. WD Green features sequential read and write times of up to 540MB/s and 405MB/s and endurance up to 80TBW. WD Green SSDs will be available starting November 2016 and is distributed by Eternal Asia (M) Sdn Bhd in Malaysia.

Both WD Blue SSDs and WD Green SSDs are protected by a 3-year limited warranty.

Both WD Blue SSDs and WD Green SSDs also come with one year complimentary data recovery service from Kroll Ontrack


Symantec - Oct 12, 2016 - Multiple Banks Attacked by Carbanak-Linked Group

Since January 2016, discreet campaigns involving malware called Trojan.Odinaff have targeted a number of financial organizations worldwide. Attackers used the Odinaff Trojan and a range of other tools to heavily infiltrate targeted organisations and appear to be extremely focused on organizations operating in the banking, securities, trading, and payroll sectors. Unless these organizations have good operational security in place, the attackers can gain a lot of control over the banks’ systems and networks.

Odinaff is notable for a number of reasons:
  • Symantec has found evidence of tools capable of manipulating SWIFT customer’s transfer logs and wiping computers to hide traces of activity.
  • The targets are mostly banks and other financial institutions, which means that attacks require a high degree of expertise to perform, but the outcome can be highly lucrative.
  • The Odinaff attacks share a number of links with Carbanak, who is also known for attacking banks and believed to have stolen hundreds of millions in recent years.

PR - Oct 12, 2016 - Intel Malaysia’s ‘PC Does Better’ Campaign

Intel Malaysia recently embarked on a campaign entitled ‘PC Does Better’ in August and September 2016, asking their Twitter fans on their preferred devices in everyday situations – both work and play.

The objective of the survey was to create a greater appreciation of the value of the PC in the context of today’s mobile-driven world. Despite our obsession with mobile phones, there are still some things that the PC naturally does better. Across the survey period, an average of almost 7,000 people responded across a total of 11 questions.

Refer to the results in an infographic. Below are some key results to highlight:
  • 65% of Intel Malaysia fans chose their laptops for work
  • 61% of Intel Malaysia chose their laptops to produce videos
  • 74% of Intel Malaysia fans chose their mobile phones to play music

PR - Oct 12, 2016 - Hitachi Enterprise Cloud Changes the Game for Enterprise Cloud Deployment

Hitachi Data Systems today announced three new ways to improve and accelerate digital transformation initiatives, including Hitachi Enterprise Cloud (HEC) for organisations that choose private and hybrid cloud to automate data centre operations and application delivery, Hitachi Management Automation Strategy, which helps organizations simplify the management of their infrastructure; and enhancements to Hitachi Unified Compute Platform (UCP) 2000 and UCP HC for organizations that want to transform and modernise their IT infrastructure with economical and open converged and hyperconverged systems.

The application-specific, ready-to-use HEC platform combines pre-engineered, pre-built service catalogues with a dedicated converged platform, software and HDS- and/or partner-delivered services, helping users reduce operational costs and accelerating private and hybrid cloud deployments.

The new Hitachi Management Automation Strategy delivers modern infrastructure management software that meets the simplification imperative driven by cloud adoption, and significant new enhancements to Hitachi Unified Compute Platform’s (UCP) performance, scale and ecosystem support create valuable new options for customers.

PR - Oct 11, 2016 - AccuWeather Launches Exclusive Crowdsourced Weather Feature AccUcast Worldwide in Android App

AccuWeather, the global leader in weather information and digital media, today introduced AccUcast™, the only crowdsourced weather feature that provides current weather conditions and hazards submitted by users in a real-time global animation map display, in the AccuWeather Android app. AccUcast, also available in the AccuWeather iOS app, enables users worldwide to take part in local weather updates and help others make the most informed decisions, saving lives and preventing property damage.


To share their weather experiences, users simply go to AccUcast, located on the AccuWeather Android app maps screen and main home screen, and submit their local weather and hazard condition observations for their GPS location. Weather conditions users can report include clear, partly cloudy, cloudy, rain, snow, ice, or hail, and hazards include damaging winds, slippery roads, flooding, fog, thunderstorms, and reduced visibility. Each user's submission is easily identifiable on the animated map display, as their reported weather condition drops as a pin onto the map in real-time, while other users' submissions appear as static icons. Users can interact with the detailed, appealing map display to view breaking weather conditions and hazards around the world.

The award-winning AccuWeather app with AccUcast is free and available for download at the Google Play store and iTunes.

PR - Oct 11, 2016 - Huawei and UC Berkeley Announce Strategic Partnership in Basic Research into AI

The Noah's Ark Laboratory of Huawei and the University of California, Berkeley, today announced a strategic partnership in basic research into artificial intelligence (AI). Huawei will provide a US$1 million fund to UC Berkeley for research into many subjects of interest in AI, including deep learning, reinforcement learning, machine learning, natural language processing, and computer vision.

Through close cooperation, the R&D teams of Huawei and the Berkeley Artificial Intelligence Research (BAIR) Lab will strive to make significant breakthroughs in AI theories and key technologies. The two parties believe that this strategic partnership will fuel the advancement of AI technology and create completely new experiences for people, thus contributing greatly to society at large.

PR - Oct 10, 2016 - Carbon Black and IBM Delivers Rapid Response Tool to Address Critical Endpoint

Carbon Black today announced an expansion of its partnership with IBM Security to deliver a unique technology, which empowers customers to patch, within seconds, the most pervasive and critical vulnerabilities affecting an enterprise’s security. IBM will also deliver Carbon Black directly to customers as part of the expanded relationship.

The new, integrated offering correlates Carbon Black’s endpoint activity data with public Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE) databases to deliver a prioritized list of actively exploited vulnerabilities tailored to each organization. The combination of IBM Big Fix and Carbon Black increases enterprise-wide visibility, speeds response time and is further bolstered by IBM QRadar, which, together with BigFix, provides threat prioritization of vulnerabilities at the network level. The most pressing alerts can now be escalated for security professionals to immediately remediate, delivering the most comprehensive threat-based patching and remediation solution.

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