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Microsoft announced yesterday that firmware security advisories are now available for the Microsoft Defender Vulnerability Management service. The new feature enables organizations to continuously monitor firmware security advisories based on information from vendors’ websites and inventories as well as third-party websites. Microsoft Defender Vulnerability Management is a service that allows customers to discover critical vulnerabilities…

The European Commission (EC) has launched a formal probe into Microsoft’s bundling of the Teams app with Office 365 and Microsoft 365. The EU regulators plan to conduct an in-depth investigation into whether Microsoft violated the EU’s competition rules “as a matter of priority.” Microsoft’s rival Slack lodged a complaint with the European Commission back…

In this episode of First Ring Daily, Brad Sams and Paul Thurrott discuss Microsoft’s financial results for the last quarter of its fiscal year 2023, and they take a closer look at the company’s Windows and Surface businesses.

An Office 365 tenant to tenant migration can be a complex undertaking that requires careful planning and execution. Whether due to mergers, acquisitions, or organizational restructuring, a tenant to tenant migration project involves transferring data, applications, and configurations while ensuring minimal user disruption. In this article, I will guide you through the essential steps to…

Microsoft has announced the general availability of improved company branding functionality for enterprise customers. The new feature launched in preview last year, allowing organizations to customize the sign-in experiences of Microsoft Entra ID (Azure AD) and Microsoft 365 apps. “With enhanced company branding, you’ll be able to create a custom look and feel for the…

Microsoft Teams is getting a new Meet app that should make it easier for users to track and manage meeting activities and content. The company announced the new app on its Microsoft 365 Admin Center yesterday, and it will exclusively become available for customers on the new Microsoft Teams (preview) client next month. The Meet…

Microsoft has launched a URL page for its Microsoft 365 Defender solution. The new page provides a unified hub that lets security teams investigate URLs and domains as well as take remediation actions. “Whether it’s pivoting to emails, user clicks, or devices associated with URLs and fully qualified domain names (FQDNs), the enhanced functionality of…

Tavis Ormandy, a Google Security researcher has discovered a new vulnerability affecting AMD’s Zen 2 processors. Dubbed Zenbleed, the security flaw could let attackers steal passwords, cryptographic keys, and other sensitive information from software running on vulnerable machines. In a recent blog post, Ormandy detailed that the Zenbleed vulnerability (CVE-2023-20593) was first reported to AMD…

Microsoft has released a new firmware analysis feature for Microsoft Defender for IoT. The new capability conducts an automated analysis of a binary firmware image that runs on an IoT device to identify potential security threats and vulnerabilities. With firmware analysis, IT admins can view a detailed listing of open-source packages found in the firmware…

Microsoft has recently disclosed a security breach that allowed Chinese hackers to access the email accounts of around two dozen organizations. Now, security researchers have found that the stolen security key provided access to far beyond Outlook and Exchange Online email accounts. According to Microsoft, the Chinese hacking group (dubbed Storm-0558) used forged authentication tokens…

Last month, Microsoft unveiled its plans to replace Windows 11’s Mail and Calendar apps with the new web-based Outlook for Windows client in September 2024. The company later detailed that it’s re-evaluating the timeline and implementation of this change. In a recent update posted on the Microsoft 365 Admin Center, Microsoft indicated that it would…

Microsoft provides a comprehensive suite of tools for effectively administrating and managing various aspects of the Microsoft 365 platform. There’s not just one Office 365 portal, IT pros actually have access to various admin centers, each tailored to manage specific aspects of the platform. In this article, we will explore the key admin centers available…