All news in category "Vendor and Hyperscaler Watch"

Amazon EC2 R8i and R8i-flex Available in London Region

🚀 Amazon EC2 R8i and R8i-flex instances are now available in Europe (London), powered by custom Intel Xeon 6 processors exclusive to AWS. AWS reports up to 15% better price-performance and 2.5x more memory bandwidth versus previous Intel-based generations, and up to 20% higher performance compared to R7i for many workloads. R8i-flex introduces memory-optimized Flex sizing (large through 16xlarge) for applications that do not fully utilize compute, while R8i offers 13 sizes including two bare-metal options and a new 96xlarge and is SAP-certified. Instances can be purchased via On-Demand, Savings Plans or Spot.

Amazon DocumentDB Planner V2.0 Improves Query Performance

🚀 Amazon DocumentDB (with MongoDB compatibility) introduces PlannerVersion 2.0 for DocumentDB 5.0, delivering advanced query optimization and up to 10x performance improvements for indexed find and update operations. The new planner improves cost estimation, selects more optimal index plans, and adds index-scan support for negation operators such as $neq and $nin, as well as nested $elementMatch. Enabling PlannerVersion 2.0 requires a simple parameter change in your cluster parameter group and does not require a restart or incur downtime; you can revert to the legacy planner if needed.

Amazon EC2 I7ie Instances Now in AWS GovCloud (US-West)

🚀 Amazon Web Services has made Amazon EC2 I7ie instances available in the AWS GovCloud (US-West) Region. I7ie instances, powered by 5th Gen Intel Xeon processors and 3rd-generation AWS Nitro SSDs, are designed for large storage I/O–intensive workloads and offer up to 120 TB of local NVMe, higher vCPU and memory densities, and up to 100 Gbps network bandwidth. AWS cites up to 40% better compute performance and 20% better price performance versus I3en, along with substantial improvements in storage throughput, latency, and latency variability for low-latency, high-random I/O use cases.

X requires re-enrollment of 2FA security keys by Nov 10

🔐 X is asking users who rely on passkeys or hardware security keys (for example, YubiKeys) to re-enroll their devices for two-factor authentication by November 10 or face account lockout. The requirement stems from X’s migration from the twitter.com domain to x.com, as existing keys are tied to the old domain. Users should visit x.com/settings/account/login_verification/security_keys to disable and then re-add keys; a password confirmation is required. Re-enrolled keys will be associated with the x.com domain and will continue to work after the migration.

Windows 11 to Prompt Memory Scans After BSOD Crashes

🔍 Microsoft is testing a new feature in Windows 11 that prompts users to run a memory scan when signing in after a blue screen of death (bugcheck). If accepted, the system schedules an Windows Memory Diagnostic to run at the next reboot, typically taking five minutes or less, and will notify users post-reboot if issues are found and mitigated. Initially all bugcheck codes will trigger the prompt while Microsoft investigates correlations with memory corruption, with targeting to be refined over time.

AWS Payment Cryptography Now Available in Three Regions

🔐 AWS Payment Cryptography is now available in Canada (Montreal), Africa (Cape Town) and Europe (London). The fully managed service centralizes payment-specific cryptographic operations and key management for cloud-hosted payment applications and scales elastically to meet changing workloads. It is assessed as compliant with PCI PIN and PCI P2PE, reducing the need for dedicated payment HSMs. Customers can position cryptographic operations closer to latency-sensitive applications and pursue multi-Region high availability.

PayPal and Google Cloud Launch Agentic Commerce Solution

🛒 PayPal and Google Cloud announced a joint agentic commerce offering that integrates Google Cloud’s Conversational Commerce agent with payments powered by PayPal. The solution leverages the open Agent2Agent (A2A) Protocol and the Agent Payments Protocol (AP2)—which extends A2A and the Model Context Protocol—to enable agent-to-agent payment flows secured by Verifiable Digital Credentials. Merchants can deploy Google’s out‑of‑the‑box conversational agent or build custom agents with the Agent Development Kit (ADK), retaining control over tone, branding, and the customer relationship while benefiting from integrated payment and fraud controls.

X Tells Security Key Users to Re-enroll by Nov 10, 2025

🔐 X is asking users who registered passkeys or hardware security keys (for example, YubiKey) as their two-factor authentication method to re-enroll their key by November 10, 2025. The company says current key enrollments are tied to the twitter[.]com domain and must be associated with x[.]com before the legacy domain can be retired. Accounts not re-enrolled will be locked until users re-enroll, choose a different 2FA method, or opt out of 2FA.

Google Cloud Bigtable Adds Tiered Storage for Hot/Cold Data

🔔 Google Cloud previewed Bigtable tiered storage, which automatically moves less-frequently accessed data from high-performance SSD storage to an infrequent access tier while exposing the same Bigtable API. The fully managed feature integrates with Bigtable autoscaling so applications can read and write across hot and cold tiers via a single interface. Google says the infrequent access tier can be up to 85% less expensive than SSD and that a tiered-storage node offers substantially more usable capacity, making it suited for large time-series and telemetry datasets that require long-term retention for analytics or compliance.

Vertex AI Training Expands Large-Scale Training Capabilities

🚀 Vertex AI Training introduces managed features designed for large-scale model development, simplifying cluster provisioning, job orchestration, and resiliency across hundreds to thousands of accelerators. The offering integrates Cluster Director, Dynamic Workload Scheduler, optimized checkpointing, and curated training recipes, including NVIDIA NeMo support. These capabilities reduce operational overhead and accelerate transitions from pretraining to fine-tuning while improving cost and uptime efficiency.

Microsoft adds policy to remove preinstalled Store apps

🛠️ Microsoft now enables IT administrators to remove selected pre-installed Microsoft Store apps on Windows 11 Enterprise 25H2 and Education 25H2 devices using a new app management policy. The policy can be applied via CSP, Group Policy, or the Microsoft Intune settings catalog and is disabled by default until explicitly enabled by admins. Once enforced, targeted packages and associated local app data are deprovisioned and deleted from devices, removing the need for custom Windows images or brittle scripts.

Amazon Cognito Adds Resource Indicators for OAuth 2.0

🔐 Amazon Cognito now accepts resource indicators in OAuth 2.0 access token requests, enabling app clients to request tokens targeted to a specific protected resource rather than a broad service audience. After authenticating the client, Cognito issues an access token with the aud claim set to that resource. This replaces prior workarounds that relied on non‑standard claims or custom scopes and simplifies issuing resource‑specific tokens for agents and other clients. The capability is available to Cognito Managed Login customers on Essentials and Plus tiers in Regions where Cognito is offered, including AWS GovCloud (US).

Amazon Location Service adds granular API key restrictions

🔒 AWS has introduced enhanced API key restrictions for Amazon Location Service to help developers secure location-based applications. Keys can now be bound to specific Android applications using package names and SHA-1 certificate fingerprints, or to iOS apps using Bundle IDs, enabling separate keys for testing and production. The feature is available in multiple AWS Regions and is configurable via the console or APIs. This reduces the risk of key misuse and enforces app-level access control.

Cloudflare Speed Test: Measuring Real-World Internet Quality

⚡ Cloudflare’s Speed Test measures the quality users actually experience rather than peak bandwidth. It sends predefined data blocks via the Network Quality API from the user’s browser to Cloudflare Workers routed by anycast, recording idle and loaded latency, jitter, packet loss, and throughput across sizes. Results appear live and culminate in an AIM score summarizing suitability for streaming, gaming, or conferencing.

Introducing TLD Insights on Cloudflare Radar Dashboard

📊 Cloudflare Radar now offers a dedicated Top-Level Domain (TLD) landing page and per-TLD reports that aggregate popularity, activity, and security signals. The new pages rank TLDs using a DNS Magnitude score based on unique client networks querying 1.1.1.1, and provide DNS, RDAP/WHOIS, Certificate Transparency, and registration information where available. Interactive charts, maps, and API access help TLD managers and site owners monitor visibility, abuse trends, and certificate issuance.

Cloudflare Radar's Evolution: Expanding Internet Observability

📡 Since its 2020 debut, Cloudflare Radar has evolved into a comprehensive observability platform that aggregates Cloudflare telemetry to illuminate security, performance, and usage trends. Initially centered on Radar Internet Insights, Domain Insights, and IP Insights, the service has grown to include Certificate Transparency metrics, TCP reset/timeouts visibility, post-quantum adoption tracking, and AI-focused crawler analytics. Radar also added routing tools such as route leak and origin hijack detection, real-time BGP views, AS-SET monitoring, and notifications, while improving programmatic access via the Radar API and an MCP server for LLM integration. Popular utilities like the URL Scanner, expanded search and date-range options, and internationalized interfaces reinforce Radar's mission to make the Internet more observable and resilient.

SageMaker Unified Studio adds searchable match context

🔍 Amazon SageMaker in Unified Studio now surfaces additional search context that clarifies why each result appears by showing which metadata fields matched a query. Inline highlighting emphasizes matched terms and an explanation panel details matches across name, description, glossary, schema, and other metadata. The enhancement reduces time spent evaluating irrelevant assets by presenting match evidence directly in search results, enabling quicker validation without opening individual assets. The capability is available in all AWS Regions where SageMaker is supported.

Amazon Redshift Serverless Now in Osaka and Malaysia

🚀 Amazon Redshift Serverless is now generally available in the AWS Asia Pacific (Osaka) and Asia Pacific (Malaysia) regions. It enables data analysts, developers, and data scientists to run and scale analytics without provisioning or managing clusters by automatically provisioning and intelligently scaling compute capacity. You pay per-second for compute and can query data in-place from Amazon S3 (including Apache Parquet), use Redshift data shares, restore provisioned snapshots, or work through the Query Editor V2 or existing BI tools.

Amazon ECS Managed Instances Now in All Commercial Regions

🚀 Amazon ECS Managed Instances is now available in all commercial AWS Regions as a fully managed, EC2-based compute option that reduces infrastructure management overhead while retaining the full capabilities of Amazon EC2. Managed Instances dynamically scales EC2 capacity, continuously optimizes task placement, and applies security patching on a 14-day cadence. You specify task requirements such as vCPU, memory, and CPU architecture, and Amazon ECS provisions and operates optimal instances in your account. Management fees apply in addition to regular EC2 charges.

CrowdStrike Named Leader in 2025 Frost Radar for SSPM

🔒 CrowdStrike was named the Growth and Innovation Leader in the 2025 Frost Radar for SaaS Security Posture Management. The recognition highlights Falcon Shield, a fully native extension of the unified Falcon platform that correlates SaaS, endpoint and identity telemetry to deliver identity-centric detection, attack-path visualization and automated remediation. Frost & Sullivan cited >219% year-over-year growth and praised integrations such as Falcon Fusion SOAR and the Charlotte AI agentic system. Falcon Shield also offers 180+ prebuilt connectors and a no-code Integration Builder to scale protection and reduce mean time to remediation.