Microsoft fixes Internet Explorer Security Flaw

Everyone has been reporting on the issue with Internet Explorer on all versions running on XP, Vista Windows 7 and 8 machines and versions of IE  v6.0 and up. This flaw gave hackers the ability to take over your computer if you click on a bad link. A very serious issue indeed.

This flaw has been fixed, even on your XP machines, but you will need to be on the internet and you need to turn on automatic updates to receive the patch. cNet has reported that:

The patch, delivered at 10 a.m. Thursday, comes out of Microsoft's usual Patch Tuesday cycle because of its severity. It affected IE 6 through 11 and allowed attackers to install malware on your computer without your permission that could be used to steal personal data, track online behavior, or gain control of the computer.

Dustin Childs of Microsoft Trustworthy Computing, the company's security group, said in a blog post.

"If you're unsure if you have automatic updates, or you haven't enabled Automatic Update, now is the time."

Of the decision to fix Internet Explorer 6, 7, and 8, the only versions of the browser that still run on the 12-year-old Windows XP, Childs was terse.

"We have made the decision to issue a security update for Windows XP users," he said, noting that "Windows XP is no longer supported by Microsoft" and that Redmond "continue[s] to encourage customers to migrate to a modern operating system, such as Windows 7 or 8.1."

Of the decision to fix Internet Explorer 6, 7, and 8, the only versions of the browser that still run on the 12-year-old Windows XP, Childs was terse.

"We have made the decision to issue a security update for Windows XP users," he said, noting that "Windows XP is no longer supported by Microsoft" and that Redmond "continue[s] to encourage customers to migrate to a modern operating system, such as Windows 7 or 8.1."

Next Month MS will be pushing silent updates to your IE

Microsoft is auguring that taking the responsibility out of the hands of users will keep the Web safer. This is not a new procedure for browser companies, but is an acknowledgement that Google’s model is proper methodology.

"It's the future ... for all software," said Andrew Storms, director of security operations at nCircle Security. "At this point, at least in the consumer space, people are expecting software to be up to date, and for it to do it itself."

Beginning in January it will roll out automatic upgrades of IE to the newest version suitable for a user's version of Windows. Windows XP users still on IE6 or IE7, for example, will be updated to IE8; Windows Vista or Windows 7 users running IE7 or IE8 will be pushed to IE9.

Previously, Microsoft has asked for user permission before upgrading IE from one version to the next, even if Windows' automatic updates are enabled.

The company will debut the new practice in Australia and Brazil next month, then expand the program gradually to other markets. Microsoft has not set a timetable for U.S. users.

While Chrome is the only browser that currently upgrades to the next version without asking users for permission, Mozilla is working on doing the same with Firefox. Mozilla has pushed back its schedule to release its auto update feature in Firefox 12, which is scheduled for April, 2012.

Microsoft will allow Users to retain control over when they want to update to new versions. So don’t worry about that. Enterprises using WSUS (Windows Server Update Service), or other patch management systems will not be affected. Microsoft is basically saying that if you set group policies through WSUS [to block automatic upgrades] that they are not going to override that.

Companies and individuals can also deploy the blocking toolkits that Microsoft had previously crafted for both IE8 and IE9 to stymie any auto-updating. Those kits can be downloaded from Microsoft's website. In future editions of IE -- meaning IE10 and beyond -- Microsoft will include an opt-out setting that users can select to disable automatic upgrades. While Chrome does not have such a setting, Firefox will when it eventually launches silent updates.

This seems to be a good balance between Microsoft’s desire to get consumers on the newest IE and retain its traditional conservatism where enterprises are concerned.

IE security updates, which are delivered every other month through Windows updates, will not be affected, as they are already silently downloaded and applied if users opt in to automatic updates.

Overall I view this turn of events as positive. Most of the work we do with systems these days are still cleaning systems of Malware, usually caught from visiting websites. So forcing an update to your browser only makes sense in the ongoing battle against the Malware creators. I applaud Microsoft for finally taking this approach.

Sharing Files between all of your devices

I would be interested how you share information between all of your devices. If you are like me you may use more than one device on a moment to moment basis and you may be generating information that you need to share or have access to no matter what device you current have at hand.

I use primarily five devices on a weekly basis. I have desktops at home and at work, a netbook in a backpack to keep me mobile, an iPad and an iPhone. I also have a Kindle that I have used but it isn’t one of these primary devices that I use to share information for personal or company business. When I look at a service or application that I am thinking of using on any one of these devices the first thing I look at is how device independent is it and how available is the program/data that it works with to all of my devices. I have come up with a few that I have found indispensible and I would like to share them with you.

Note Taking – EVERNOTE is my application of choice for this that I use to share information between my iPhone. iPad and computers. I use OneNote a lot on my computer but until recently it was only available on my PC’s and that wasn’t quite flexible enough. Recently Microsoft released an iPhone version of OneNote that can access notebooks that are stored in the cloud (SkyDrive). While this is interesting it isn’t quite as useful as Evernote is for me. The iPhone OneNote application isn’t as functional as the PC version and leaves a lot to be desired. In a pinch it has some use though. If they come out with an iPad version with more of the PC version’s capabilities then I might consider jumping back to this program for more use.

When I am sitting down with a client I am using a program called FastEver XL that allows me to quickly and easily type in text that can be saved to my Evernote account. I then save it and it becomes available no matter which device that I am currently using. So when I am out on the road collecting information at a client’s site that I will need at my desk later on, I am typing that info into FastEver XL and before I get back to the Office it is already waiting for me at my desk.

I have also been playing with an application called aNote (Awesome Note) that also integrates with  Evernote. It synchronizes with the Evernote folders so that you can use it’s capabilities It is meant to be used as a To-Do List manager with hooks to both Google and Evernote.

Document Access – I store many of the documents that I need to have access to using either Microsoft’s Skydrive or Dropbox. Skydrive gives you 25GB’s storage for free and this is where I put data like my OneNote Notebooks so that they are synchronized between all of my systems. However, Dropbox is the storage are that I primarily use because it is compatible with many iPad/iPhone applications for document storage. A Dropbox account comes with 2GB’s of storage for free and you can purchase upgrades to the service as you necessary. I have increased my storage to 50GB’s at a cost of $99/year and you can increase that to 100GB’s for $199/year. I also have storage over with mobileme and Google docs so there is plenty of places I can drop a file and have it available. I opened up my subscription to mobileme only because I decided to play with Pages and Keynote which are Apple applications that I am using on the iPad. I am not a big Google docs user but I know that it is there if I need it.

So what kind of information do I store in Dropbox. Most of it is temporary but some of it includes documents that I am constantly sharing with my clients. Things like product brochures can easily be shared through email on the fly when I am at a client’s site. I also create and store reports that I use when I am at a client’s site. This gives me instant information wherever I am. I will also store an office document here if I need to continue working on it from home. That way I can pick up right where I left off without having to save it off to a flash drive. I seem to be constantly losing those anyway. I have also stored program files here so that when I go to a customer’s site I can download those onto their machine quickly and easily. There is no concern of malware contamination because I’m not using hardware to transfer between systems.

Research – I use Instapaper quite a bit as I am going through my RSS feeds and from my internet browser. If you haven’t used this internet service before you will really love it once you do. One of the biggest benefits is that it will strip out most of the unwanted material from the website that it is pulling the article from and makes it much easier to read. I can access this information from my iPhone, iPad or any of my computers. It is easy to organize and I do this mainly from my computers. The browser based controls are much easier to use to organize my captured documents and once I have them there they are very easy to share with others as well. One of the ways that I am using this is to allow me to collect information from different photography blog sites that I am putting together as a self-help guide in MS Word. I have set it up with a table of contents and then saved it as a PDF file. I then send it up to my iPad and store it in the iBooks application. The articles in the document are then accessible using the table of contents to jump to the page that it is located on in the document. This makes it very easy to move around in the document using either the TOC or using the search feature to find keywords about something that I am searching for.

Photo’s -  If you have been following me at all on any of my blogs, you know that I love to take photos. The one thing that a photographer loves better than the taking of a photograph is the ability to share it with someone. I do this in a number of ways but the two primary ones are using my iPad as a presentation device and a website called SmugMug as my online gallery. SmugMug is accessible from most any device that has internet access and allow you a pretty large number of choices to separate you pictures and to be able to document them. It’s a great way to backup your pictures from your local storage and it allows you setup several layers deep of gallery settings. But the ability for me to point friends and family to this site easily and for them to self navigate makes for a great experience for them or for me when I am showing them using my devices as well.

I hope this article has given you some ideas of how you can set yourself up to be as productive and satisfied with all the programs and data that you want at your fingertips when you want it.

Instapaper Updates Its Product to include new Sharing Options

Instapaper is one of my key applications that I use to capture articles for websites and RSS feeds for later reading and archival library storage. I am quietly putting together a wonderful library of photographic and photo editing application articles and notes that I am acquiring daily. I don’t know how I would do this without the use of this wonderful program. The great thing about it is the acceptance that it has received in the community and the other support programs that use its API to grab info on the fly for me.

The New released update provides several User Interface improvements and adds new sharing options as well. This new version adds preview text to the list view on the iPhone and iPod Touch similar to the iPad capabilities. If you are not using this application on your mobile devices and your PC you are missing a great tool to add to your arsenal to crate your own personal research library.

Hulu Plus is now out of preview with new $7.99 subscription cost!

I am an active user of the free Hulu product on my computer at home, but I really wanted the offer of anytime/anywhere access that Hulu Plus promised on my iPhone and iPad devices. Have I been using this service? Yes, but I am not as happy with the selection as compared with what is available on my computer.You would think that with word PLUS in its name, there would be more, but that doesn’t seem to be the case. The list seems to be getting better but not fast enough to suit me. Is it something that will cause me leave the service? Not yet. But it is nice that the price has dropped to $7.99 and that we should be seeing some credits back for us earlier adopters.

Here is a quick breakdown from Hulu that shows the differences between the two services:

Whether the $2 per month savings will be enough to spark a new wave of subscribers is hard to say—the service is still pricey for a somewhat limited selection of popular shows. Then again, Hulu Plus does offer complete seasons for current shows (something free users won't get), but unless you're the type to blow through whole seasons of recent shows, it may be a better use of your money to subscribe to Netflix instead.

IE8 Error when doing Microsoft’s Automatic Updates

Scott has noted that if you are updating XP and have selected IE8 as one of the downloads, you will most likely get a run.dll error after you reboot and you will still have IE6/IE7 on your system.

You have to do yet another update and reinstall IE 8 again and this should resolve the error.

This does not happen if you run IE8 from a standalone install, only through Windows Updates.

Hope This Helps

Scott