Using Amazon Web Services' new Server Side Encryption feature, enterprises will at no extra cost be able to encrypt data stored on the company's Simple Storage Service (S3), Amazon said on Tuesday.
The Server Side Encryption feature has been added to simplify the process of protecting data stored on S3. Previously, enterprises had to choose an encryption algorithm, create and store keys, and adapt applications to ensure that all data was encrypted and decrypted for every operation. Now users can leave that to Amazon. The Server Side Encryption feature handles all encryption, decryption and key management transparently, according to a blog post.
The data is encrypted when an extra header is added when writing an object to S3. Each object is encrypted with a unique key. As an additional safeguard, this key itself is encrypted with a regularly rotated master key. The encryption algorithm Amazon uses is AES-256, it said.
Enterprises can start to take advantage of Server Side Encryption using Amazon's Management Console and the S3 API.
That Amazon added encryption on its servers isn't terribly exciting, according to Swedish security expert Jakob Schlyter. The feature would help protect data if someone managed to break into one of Amazon's data centers, and steal a disk that stored company data. That has to be weighed against what would happen if something went wrong with Amazon's key management, and data was lost because of that, Schlyter said, and added that he would still use client-side encryption.
On Tuesday, Amazon also said that the number of objects stored on S3 increased to 566 billion during the third quarter of this year, after reaching 262 billion objects during the last quarter of 2010.
The company is also hiring new staff to the S3 team, including a software development manager, development engineer and business development representative, who will all be based in Seattle.
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Apple iPhone 4SAfter more than a year with the iPhone 4, the iPhone 4S--announced Tuesday by Apple CEO Tim Cook--seems a bit, well, underwhelming.
Apple iPhone 4S camera featuresApple isn't the only tech company that loves to tick off specs and claim its products are the first to market with a certain technology. Most companies that do so rely on consumers' failure to understand the technology or know what the specs mean. Such confusion frequently happens with camera specs, so I asked my colleague Tim Moynihan, PCWorld’s camera editor, to decipher some of the specs announced for the iPhone 4S’s camera.
Apple’s latest iPhone doesn't look all that different on the surface from the iPhone 4 it replace. But the iPhone 4S unveiled by Apple at a press event Tuesday promises an improved processor, new wireless system, and more powerful camera, along with voice control capabilities.
The iPhone 4S’s camera system gets a significant upgrade over the iPhone 4’s, too, according to Apple. Schiller said that Apple “set out to create an all new camera,” with the aim of challenging point-and-shoots. The iPhone 4S’s camera offers an eight megapixel sensor, with 3264x2448 resolution. Said Schiller, “You can print out an 8x10 glossy photo that’s pixel perfect.” The iPhone 4S’s rear camera offers 60 percent more pixels than iPhone 4’s camera sensor. The new sensor is a state of the art CMOS backside illumination sensor, which affords 73 percent more light per pixel, which Schiller says means richer colors and better lowlight performance. The camera also takes pictures 33 percent faster than the iPhone 4.
And Siri doesn’t just listen—it also speaks. You can ask Siri to read your messages from the Notification queue to you hands-free, so that you’re not glancing at your phone when you should be, say, driving the car. You can even use Siri to reply to messages, Forstall said. If need be, you can tell Siri to check your calendar and then schedule a meeting.
Schiller also mentioned that companies have create watchband cases for the nano so people can wear them on their wrists, and that the latest nano features 16 new clock faces for those people.
Apple Game CenterThe "world's most popular gaming platform" just got better. On Tuesday, Apple unveiled new features appearing in their iOS 5 update, including some much-needed upgrades for their Game Center mobile gaming service. The changes include friend suggestions, photos, and achievement points.
Apple iPhone 4If history is any guide, the advent of the iPhone 4S will soon render the iPhone 4 both significantly less sexy and significantly less valuable on the resale market. But the good news for early adopters is that Apple will pay them up to $200 to buy back their mint-condition iPhone 4.
If you had trouble getting updates on this morning’s Apple keynote, you weren’t alone. Almost every major tech news site suffered at least some downtime during the introduction of the new iPhone 4S.
Image courtesy of MacworldPalumbo also says it helps to have experience with these kinds of issues. Obviously an easy way to do that is to team up with a company like Rackspace that’s been through days like this before, it's easier for sites like Rackspace which have a lot of extra server cycles to use but even smaller companies can learn the ins and outs of avoiding down time.
Apple iPhone 4SWith all the big Apple news on Tuesday, you'll be forgiven if you missed a change the company made to its AppleCare extended-service offering for the iPhone. But that change is significant and will make the plan more appealing to some users.
Piracy is less of an issue for the movie industry than is the dominance of the digital distribution channel by a single company, such as Apple.
“Piracy really is not the bigger issue for our company or for our library," he said. "It’s been lack of exploitation, just not getting it out there."
In June, Miramax inked an agreement with Hulu that allowed the streaming service to show hundreds of Miramax movies on Hulu Plus, without commercials, and to rotate 15 movies a month, with commercials, through Hulu.com.
CEO Steve BallmerMicrosoft CEO Steve Ballmer received compensation valued at $1.38 million this year, according to documents filed this week with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. His total package is up roughly 2% compared to 2010, when he received compensation valued at $1.35 million.
In a note posted to its website, Mozilla said that the add-on "causes a high volume of crashes," and is "strongly encouraging" users to disable the software. The warning applies to all users of version 14.4.0 and below of the plugin, Mozilla said.
Left: Earth’s Ozone levels in mid-March 2011. Purple and grey colors represent very small ozone amounts. Right: Dark blue and black colors represent very large amounts of chlorine monoxide, ozone destroying chemicals. [Photo: NASA/JPL-Caltech]Scientists have discovered an unprecedented depletion of the Earth’s ozone layer in the Northern Arctic region. A NASA-led study released on October 2 in the journal Nature reports that a loss of ozone similar to the one found in the Antarctic has begun to develop due to a prolonged period of low temperatures.
Apple iCloud 
The Panasonic Viera TC-L42D30 LED HDTV provides great simulated surround sound, yet we found its image quality to be somewhat lacking (read our review for details)--especially for the high $1079 at launch this past June. Right now, though, 
[Photo: 'Plum B' on MOCpages]Halfway through Gears of War 3, I realized that a Lancer assault rifle would be a very effective tool for keeping the raccoons out of my garbage can. It all made sense. Then I realized that the technology doesn’t exist, and more problematic, PETA wouldn’t be too happy about it.
Self-service procurement. Self-service business intelligence. Self-service recovery. User provisioning in private clouds. It's a wondrous world for end users these days as IT departments roll out tools that hand them the reins to the data and services they desire, whether it's instant access to their employee benefits account or a deep dive into corporate data stacks that were once off-limits.
Kentucky Community and Technical College System: Broad swath of users
The ideal information security environment is different depending on who you talk to. Your typical security engineer may say it must have firewalls, intrusion detection or any number of security focused technologies. Meanwhile a security tester may suggest that it is conducting penetration testing to provide assurances that security widgets are working well.
Reporting provides a "heartbeat" for information security across an organisation. It ensures the right people remain up to date on the latest incidents, threats and initiatives that will influence the security posture. Regular reporting ensures those that are accountable for securing information assets are aware of the risks they may have inherited and the rigour in the controls that protect them.
Security initiatives require a vehicle to carry them through design, build and implementation. Grouping them all in a single program of work allows for budgets to be managed more easily and ensures the investment in information security is transparent. Upgrades of security devices such as firewalls and antivirus may be included in the programme, as well as any capital investment in information security, such as an identity and access management system.
