Alexander’s Blog

Microsoft yesterday announced a Blue Hat Prize which is designed to generate new ideas for defensive approaches to support computer security. The goal is to inspire security researchers to develop innovative solutions intended to address serious security threats.

Here are the details. The inaugural Microsoft BlueHat Prize contest challenges security researchers to design a novel runtime mitigation technology designed to prevent the exploitation of memory safety vulnerabilities. The solution that is considered to be the most innovative by the Microsoft BlueHat Prize board will be presented the grand prize of US $200,000.

• Entries will be accepted and must be received by email to bluehatprize@microsoft.com between August 3rd 2011 to midnight Pacific Time on April 1st 2012.
• The winning entry will be announced at Black Hat USA 2012.
• For full details, see rules and regulations.

First prize: $200,000 (USD)
Second prize: $50,000 (USD)
Third prize: MSDN Universal subscription valued at $10,000 (USD)

According to a CNNMoney.com report, IT Systems Engineer is the best job in United States. The report listed top 50 Best Jobs in America and the Systems Engineer job came on top with the highest aggregate score based on Satisfaction, Pay, Stress, Stability, Growth, Flexibility, and Benefit to Society.

The source of this 2009 report is listed as PayScale.com, Bureau of Labor Statistics, Conference Board Help Wanted Online Data Series, and MONEY research. The 2009 report is the latest report. The 2010 report is not posted yet. Interestingly, there were 3 IT jobs in the top 10 category on this list.

1. Systems Engineer

5. IT Project Manager

8. Computer/Network Security Consultant

You can check out the complete list of the top 50 best jobs at CNNMoney.com.

Thanks to Microsoft, they have not raised their certification prices for a long time, until now. Effective July 1, 2011, the retail price of Microsoft Certifications will increase worldwide, except for India where the increase will be in effect on August 1, 2011.

Although some of the prices for Microsoft Certification exams for students and academic institutions will increase, according to Microsoft, the discount will remain significant. This is because Microsoft wants to help students become more employable for entry jobs in the IT industry. IT Academy members, high school, college, or university students enrolled in a degree or diploma program will continue to receive a discount off the retail price of select Microsoft Certification exams.

When Federal Trade Commission (FTC) came out with the Do Not Call list idea, everyone loved it. Okay, may be not everyone. I am sure the telemarketers didn’t like the fact that they can’t pick up the phone and start calling anyone they want. But I bet they like it when they themselves don’t receive these uninvited calls. The Do Not Call list is by far one of the most popular successes FTC ever had. Now FTC wants voluntary ‘Do Not Track’ for the Web. The details are posted on the FTC site in this 122-page PDF file. The document was posted on December 1, 2010 and is essentially a Do Not Call list for online behavioral advertising.

Just three days ago on January 24, 2011, Mozilla and Google announced their browser Do Not Track features. You can read more about their approach here. There are pros and cons to the way different companies will implement their features. For example, adding a Do Not Track HTTP header in the browser like Mozilla’s plan for the Firefox browser seems to have an advantage in the sense that even if the user clears the browser cache, the opt-out setting will remain in place. If the feature is implemented as opt-out cookies or an opt-out registry, the results will be different and the setting may be lost. Once the dust settles we will know exactly how different browsers will end up implementing this feature. Frankly, at this point it’s too early and as some wise guy/gal once said, the proof is going to be in the pudding.

Microsoft has already announced in the first week of December that it would add a new Tracking Protection feature to Internet Explorer (IE) 9. This feature is expected to show up in IE9′s release candidate (RC) version sometime in Q1 2011. This is good news because according to some reports Microsoft removed similar features from IE8 because of the pressure from online advertisers.

According to netmarket.com, here is the latest operating system market share breakdown. If it weren’t for Mac’s 5% market share, Windows (91.09%) would pretty much be the only OS used around the world. With all the press Linux gets, it’s practically non-existent at 0.86% and has almost the same market share as Android (0.27%)…..less than 1%. Keep in mind, Android is used on mobile devices and is not a desktop OS.

Out of the Windows operating systems, Windows XP is still the most widely used OS. However, Windows 7 is moving up pretty quickly and have already moved ahead of Windows Vista.

Windows XP = 60.03%

Windows 7 = 17.10%

Windows Vista = 13.35%

Mac OS X 10.6 = 2.72%

Mac OS X 10.5 = 1.67%

Java ME = 0.95%

Other = 4.02%