What’s New

• We’re Hiring – Do you know someone that’s looking for a career in technology that may have what it takes to work at Cyber Tech Cafe?  If so, send them our way.  We are currently looking for a Systems Support Specialist and have a full job description and application online.  
• Stay up-to-date with our Facebook Page, Support Center and email list- Technology moves fast and often new threats and attacks are at
  the forefront of that movement, with everything else basically evolving around it.  Like us on Facebook, bookmark the Support Center and join the mailing list (the subscribe link is at the top left) to get near-real-time updates on the latest in technology.
  
• Buyer Beware, scammers will be out in force this holiday season – The holiday season is upon us.  
• Hosted Exchange, SPAM Filtering and More – This has been in the works for some time now but we can finally announce that we are*officially* offering Hosted Exchange, SPAM and Virus filtering and more through our partnership with AppRiver.  If your company or organization is considering a hosted Exchange option or just needs a robust, effective and easy-to-manage Virus and SPAM filtering solution, contact us for more information and a free 30 day trial to see if it’s a good fit.
  
• Happy Thanksgiving!!  This is the last scheduled newsletter that will go out before Thanksgiving and we want to wish you and yours a Happy Thankgiving.

Updates

Microsoft – According to the Advanced Notification, there are 8 bulletins again this month including 3 critical and 5 important.  All of the 3 critical bulletins address remote code vulnerabilities and affect Windows.  One of the critical vulnerabilities also affects Internet Explorer.  The remaining 3 important bulletins address problems with Windows and Office with vulnerabilities including Denial of Service, Information Disclosure, Privilege Elevation and Remote Code Execution.

Microsoft releases regular updates the second Tuesday of each month, often referred to as ‘Patch Tuesday’.  These updates are categorized as Low, Moderate, Important or Critical.  Details on the categories is available here.  The updates can include any *supported* Microsoft product from Windows (Windows XP, Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows 8, Windows Server, etc.) to Office (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Publisher, OneNote, and even MS Office for Mac) to Internet Explorer to server products like Exchange, SQL Server and more.  If you have one of these products installed, especially if the update is listed as Important or Critical, it’s important that the update be installed. 

Additional details are available from Microsoft here.  

 

Adobe – The biggest news out of the Adobe camp has still gotta be the network breach that we reported back on 3 October.  The numbers keep changing but it’s safe to say that several MILLIONS of accounts were exposed and the spearphishing attacks have bene rampant since on Adobe customers. 

Like Microsoft, Adobe now releases updates to their products on the second Tuesday of each month.  Adobe will also release ‘out of band’ updates if necessary to address critical vulnerabilities in their products.  Adobe products include Adobe Reader (for viewing PDF files), Adobe Flash Player (often used to watch videos like YouTube and in interactive web content like games) and Adobe Shockwave.  

Additional details and downloads are available from Adobe here. 

 

 

Java – It’s weird, but things are still very quiet out of the Java camp.  The latest update is now Java 7 update 45 but there hasn’t been a lot of activity over there.  One thing to note though is that we are *still* seeing a lot of computers with Java 6 and some that even have earlier versions.  Unless you *have* to have these older versions of Java on your computer, get it off.  It’s worth noting that we’re seeing most of these because they are in the shop for virus removal.

Java is a tool that’s widely used by Banks, online service providers and even security companies for VPN connections.  Java’s ‘official’ release cycle is approximately quarterly but Java updates have been ‘fast and furious’ for the past several months.  It’s worth noting again that, if you don’t absolutely need Java on your computer, it’s worth removing it altogether (this can be done from Add / Remove programs). 

Additional details and downloads are available from Oracle here.     
 

 

 

Monthly Update Clients
* If you are not currently taking advantage of our monthly update service and would like more information or to sign up, additional information is available here. 
 
For our Monthly Update clients, if a date and time hasn’t already been scheduled to install your updates, we will be contacting you shortly to schedule.   

If you aren’t already taking advantage of our monthly update service, there’s no time like the present to get started.  We offer a monthly update service to keep all of your computers up-to-date for a low monthly fixed price with no long-term commitment.  Additional information is available on our website.