All news in category “Vendor and Hyperscaler Watch”

🔎 AWS added source document references to Automated Reasoning policies in Amazon Bedrock, enabling users to trace generated formal rules and variables back to the original documents used to create policies. This improves transparency and makes it easier to review, validate, and refine policy encodings derived from uploaded materials. Test generation for Automated Reasoning checks is now available in multiple US and Europe Regions and can be accessed via the Bedrock console and the Bedrock Python SDK. AWS says the checks use formal verification and can reach up to 99% accuracy in identifying correct LLM responses, helping detect hallucinations and ambiguity.

🔐 Cloudflare One is the first SASE platform to deliver standards-compliant post-quantum encryption across Secure Web Gateway, Zero Trust, and WAN services. It implements hybrid ML-KEM across TLS, MASQUE and IPsec on- and off-ramps and upgraded the Cloudflare One Appliance (v2026.2.0 GA). Cloudflare IPsec support for hybrid ML-KEM is in closed beta—contact pq-wan@cloudflare.com for access.

☁️ Amazon has expanded S3 Tables to AWS GovCloud (US-East) and AWS GovCloud (US-West), bringing integrated Apache Iceberg support and automated table maintenance to regulated cloud regions. S3 Tables continuously optimize storage layout and query performance while leveraging Intelligent-Tiering to manage costs based on access patterns without performance impact. The capability enables querying by popular AWS and third-party engines and reduces operational overhead for data lake teams.

🔐 EC-Council launched the Enterprise AI Credential Suite, introducing four role-based AI certifications alongside an updated Certified CISO v4 to strengthen executive readiness. The programs target a growing skills gap—cited as $5.5 trillion in unmanaged AI exposure and a 700,000-person U.S. reskilling shortfall—and align with U.S. AI workforce priorities. The suite maps to an Adopt. Defend. Govern. framework and includes Artificial Intelligence Essentials, CAIPM, COASP, and CRAGE to operationalize secure, responsible AI.

⚠️ On February 20, 2026, Cloudflare introduced a change to how it manages BYOIP addresses that triggered a cleanup sub-task to erroneously withdraw customer prefixes via BGP, causing connectivity failures for affected customers. About 1,100 prefixes (≈25% of BYOIP prefixes on the peer) were withdrawn, including a subset of one.one.one.one. Engineers reverted the change, restored configurations, and resolved the incident in roughly six hours; Cloudflare confirmed the issue was not due to malicious activity.

🔒 Fortinet’s Education Outreach Program partners with local organizations to expand access to cybersecurity training and industry-recognized certifications. By offering free NSE curriculum and hands-on labs, the program removes cost and access barriers for learners in underserved regions. Partnerships with EduTek in Guatemala and PAICTA in South Africa demonstrate measurable outcomes: participants gain practical skills in firewall management and network security operations, and many progress into employment and improved professional standing.

🚀 Amazon expanded MSK Serverless into Africa (Cape Town), Asia Pacific (Taipei), and Canada West (Calgary), increasing the service's regional footprint. MSK Serverless is a managed cluster option for Apache Kafka that provisions and scales compute and storage automatically, removing the need to manage cluster capacity. The launch aims to simplify deployment of event-driven architectures and lower operational overhead for teams using Kafka. See the developer guide to begin using the service in these regions.

🧰 Cloudflare introduces a new MCP server that uses Code Mode to expose the entire Cloudflare API through just two tools, search() and execute(). By letting agents write compact JavaScript against a typed OpenAPI spec and executing it inside a sandboxed Dynamic Worker, the server dramatically reduces model context token use. The footprint remains fixed regardless of API size, enabling progressive discovery, OAuth 2.1 downscoping, and safe execution for agents.

⚠️ Amazon's Ring has canceled its partnership with surveillance analytics firm Flock, a move that underscores how toxic Flock's reputation has become and spotlights risks in third‑party surveillance integrations. The announcement signals growing reputational and operational exposure for vendors that tie consumer devices to controversial surveillance‑tech providers, including possible feature rollbacks and legal scrutiny. Commentators, notably Hamilton Nolan, have gone further and advised consumers to remove their Ring doorbells. The decision sharpens concerns about vendor due diligence, user consent, and the privacy consequences of embedded surveillance capabilities.

🔐 PayPal announced it will begin removing unencrypted SMS for login MFA starting March 2026 but provided no firm timeline and said SMS will remain in use for fraud-related security checks. The company urged customers to adopt authenticator apps or FIDO2 security keys, though its email contained confusing setup instructions and account pages initially lacked direct update flows. Analysts say the move reflects security pressure, potential cost savings, and adoption friction between business and security teams.

🔔 AWS IAM Identity Center is now available in the Asia Pacific (New Zealand) AWS Region, expanding the service to 38 AWS Regions globally. The service is the recommended approach for managing workforce access, offering centralized single sign-on and account management by connecting your existing identity source once. IAM Identity Center powers personalized experiences in services such as Amazon Q and enables user-aware access controls and auditing in services like Amazon Redshift. It is offered at no additional cost in supported regions.

🚀 Amazon Web Services has launched EC2 G7e instances in the Asia Pacific (Tokyo) region, powered by NVIDIA RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell Server Edition GPUs. These instances deliver up to 2.3x inference performance compared to G6e, support up to eight GPUs with 96 GB per GPU, and provide up to 192 vCPUs and 1600 Gbps networking. They include NVIDIA GPUDirect P2P and GPUDirect RDMA with EFA in EC2 UltraClusters, and are available as On-Demand, Spot, or via Savings Plans.

🔐 Amazon Web Services announced new Aurora DSQL Connectors for Go (pgx), Python (asyncpg), and Node.js (WebSocket for Postgres.js). The connectors serve as transparent authentication layers that automatically generate IAM tokens per connection, removing the need for manual token handling while preserving full compatibility with standard PostgreSQL driver features. The Node.js connector adds WebSocket support for environments where TCP is unavailable. All connectors accept custom IAM credential providers to match customer credential workflows.

💡Budget Bytes is a new video series that shows developers how to build production-quality AI applications on Azure for under $25. Each episode walks through end-to-end scenarios using the Azure SQL Database Free Offer, with live cost tallies, authentic debugging, and complete GitHub repos you can deploy yourself. Expect practical patterns and demonstrations of tools like Microsoft Foundry, Copilot Studio, and the Model Context Protocol, plus links to Microsoft Learn for deeper dives.

🔒 In 2025 Google reports expanded AI-driven, multi-layered defenses across Google Play and Android, preventing 1.75 million policy-violating apps and banning over 80,000 developer accounts. The company integrated generative AI into review workflows, boosted Play Protect scanning to 350 billion app checks daily, and blocked 266 million risky sideload installation attempts. Developer tools, verification, and pre-review checks aim to reduce friction while raising security and privacy standards.

🔒 Google Cloud argues Europe does not need to choose between digital sovereignty and economic growth. The company promotes a partnership-led model that combines advanced AI capabilities (including Gemma and Gemini-class technology) with flexible infrastructure and multicloud choice. Emphasis is placed on interoperability, local control, and security certifications such as SecNumCloud, along with options like Google Cloud Air-Gapped and Dedicated deployments. The aim is to enable growth while preserving control and resilience.

🎿 Using Google Cloud AI and Gemini-era vision from DeepMind, the Google Cloud Team and U.S. Ski & Snowboard built a tool that extracts full 3D biomechanical pose data from ordinary video to measure rotation, posture, and airtime. The system defines a torso-based Body Frame and uses quaternions to compute true angular travel, producing a new metric called Rotational Degrees. Visual outputs like the Cork Ribbon reveal axis tilt and consistency for coaches and broadcasters, helping quantify efficiency and the physical feasibility of higher-degree tricks.

🚀 Starting in February 2026, Amazon EC2 M7i instances are now available in the Africa (Cape Town) Region, powered by AWS-custom 4th Gen Intel Xeon Scalable processors (Sapphire Rapids). These chips deliver up to 15% better performance than comparable x86 Intel processors and up to 15% improved price-performance versus M6i, targeting sustained CPU-intensive workloads like gaming servers, CPU-based ML, and video streaming. M7i offers larger sizes up to 48xlarge and two bare-metal options (metal-24xl, metal-48xl) that include built-in Intel accelerators for data streaming, in-memory analytics, and cryptographic offload.

📢 Amazon MQ now supports ActiveMQ 5.19, bringing a set of fixes and improvements over prior ActiveMQ releases. Amazon MQ will automatically manage patch-level upgrades for your brokers and apply compatible security patches during your scheduled maintenance window. If you are using older versions such as 5.18, AWS recommends upgrading via the AWS Management Console. This version is available in all AWS Regions where Amazon MQ is offered.

🔁 BigQuery now provides autonomous embedding generation that automatically maintains an embedding column derived from a source column, eliminating manual embedding pipelines and synchronization burdens. The managed column is defined via familiar SQL (GENERATED ALWAYS AS AI.EMBED) and can be stored asynchronously. It integrates with VECTOR_SEARCH and a new AI.SEARCH function, and supports secure calls to Vertex AI models with connection-based permissions. The feature is available in preview.