All news in category "Vendor and Hyperscaler Watch"

AWS PCS Adds Slurm Node Reboot, Available in All Regions

🔁 AWS Parallel Computing Service (PCS) now supports rebooting compute nodes using Slurm commands without triggering instance replacement. You can use the scontrol reboot command with options for immediate or deferred reboots to troubleshoot, perform resource cleanup, or recover from degraded states. This capability is available in all PCS-supported AWS Regions and helps teams maintain cluster health more efficiently while reducing costs associated with unnecessary instance replacements.

Cohere Embed v4 Multimodal Embeddings on Amazon Bedrock

🚀 Amazon Bedrock now supports Cohere Embed v4, a multimodal embedding model that generates high-quality embeddings for text, images, and complex business documents. The model natively processes tables, charts, diagrams, code snippets, and handwritten notes, reducing the need for extensive preprocessing and data cleanup. It supports over 100 languages and includes industry fine-tuning for finance, healthcare, and manufacturing. Cohere Embed v4 is available for on-demand inference in select AWS Regions; access is requested via the Bedrock console.

AWS Clean Rooms Adds Data Access Budgets and Limits

🔒 AWS Clean Rooms now supports data access budgets for tables in a collaboration, letting data owners limit how often their data can be analyzed for custom ML training, inference, SQL queries, or PySpark jobs. Administrators can set daily, weekly, or monthly refresh budgets, lifetime caps, or both; once a budget is exhausted the system blocks further analyses until the budget refreshes. Budgets may be edited or reset at any time to suit changing needs. This privacy control reduces unintended data exposure while maintaining collaborative analysis.

Amazon ECS adds one-click event capture and querying

🔎 The Amazon Elastic Container Service (ECS) console now offers one-click event capture and an integrated event history query interface. With a single click the console configures underlying EventBridge rules and CloudWatch log groups and provides pre-built query templates and filters for time range, task ID, deployment ID, stop codes, and exit codes. Available in all AWS Commercial and GovCloud (US) Regions.

AWS PCS Expands Slurm Configuration with 60+ Settings

🔧 AWS Parallel Computing Service (AWS PCS) now supports over 60 additional Slurm configuration parameters, giving administrators finer control of job scheduling, resource allocation, access permissions, and job lifecycle behavior. New options include queue-specific priority policies, preemption rules, custom time and resource limits, and account-level access controls. Per-job execution behaviors and QoS tuning help run multi-team production HPC environments more efficiently. The expanded settings are available in all AWS PCS regions.

AWS PCS allows dynamic Slurm cluster configuration

🔧 AWS Parallel Computing Service (AWS PCS) now lets you change key Slurm workload manager settings on live clusters without rebuilding them. Administrators can update accounting and workload management parameters via the AWS Management Console, AWS CLI, or AWS SDK. This change reduces operational disruption and enables faster adaptation to evolving HPC requirements. Changes are available in all regions where AWS PCS is offered.

Trustworthy Oracle Architecture for Enterprise DLT

🔒 DZ BANK and Google Cloud present a blueprint for delivering trustworthy off‑chain data to smart contracts, addressing a key barrier to enterprise DLT adoption. The design pairs Google Cloud secure global infrastructure with DZ BANK’s deterministic financial protocols to guarantee data correctness at source, integrity in transit, and timely delivery. The Smart Derivative Contract (SDC) use case demonstrates deterministic valuation, automated margining, and cryptographic attestation of oracle outputs. Production controls such as Binary Authorization, Private Service Connect, Confidential Space (TEE), and TLS are used to mitigate software supply‑chain, transport, and runtime threats.

Microsoft: Classic Outlook Crash Requires Support Ticket

🔧 Microsoft is investigating a known issue that causes classic Outlook on Windows to crash at launch for some Microsoft 365 customers. The vendor has not provided a public fix; affected customers must open a support case in the Microsoft 365 Admin portal so Exchange Online support can request a service change. Microsoft notes the error can stem from different causes but recent cases have involved user mailboxes, and it recommends capturing a Fiddler trace for triage. Temporary workarounds include using new Outlook for Windows or Outlook Web Access until mitigation is applied.

FortiEDR Earns AV-Comparatives 2025 EPR Certification

🔒 FortiEDR, Fortinet’s prevention-first endpoint detection and response solution, earned AV-Comparatives’ 2025 Endpoint Prevention & Response (EPR) certification following a hands-on evaluation of multi-stage attack chains. The certification highlights FortiEDR’s strong prevention, precise response capabilities, low false-positive rates, and automation that reduces analyst workload. Reviewers also noted the product’s integration across the Fortinet Security Fabric and support for legacy Windows platforms as meaningful differentiators.

FortiEDR Earns AV-Comparatives 2025 EPR Certification

🔒 FortiEDR was certified in the 2025 AV-Comparatives Endpoint Prevention & Response (EPR) test, an independent, hands-on evaluation that mapped 50 multi-stage attack chains to the MITRE ATT&CK framework. The certification validates FortiEDR's prevention-first design, strong real-time blocking, automated remediation, and extensive forensic capabilities while maintaining low false positives. AV-Comparatives also ranked FortiEDR favorably for total cost of ownership by combining product pricing with operational workload.

Amazon GameLift Streams Adds IPv6 for Windows Streaming

📡 Amazon GameLift Streams now supports IPv6 for streaming applications hosted on Windows-based stream groups, enabling dual-stack connectivity (IPv4 and IPv6) for streamed Windows applications. This enhancement gives customers additional addressing options and helps meet IPv6 compliance requirements while preserving compatibility with existing IPv4 deployments. Note that Linux runtime applications will continue to require IPv4 for streaming; the capability is available in all AWS Regions where GameLift Streams is offered.

F-Droid: Google developer verification may end project

⚠️ F-Droid warns that Google’s planned Developer Verification rule — requiring identity verification for all developers on certified Android devices starting in 2026 — could effectively end the project and restrict access to many free, open-source apps. F-Droid, which builds reproducible packages, checks for trackers and allows anonymous downloading without accounts, says many open-source authors will refuse to register or pay fees and that F-Droid cannot seize app identifiers on their behalf. Google says sideloading will remain possible for verified developers, with exemptions for hobbyists and no change to Android Studio workflows.

Microsoft to Force-Install Microsoft 365 Companion Apps

📌 Microsoft will automatically install the Microsoft 365 companion apps on Windows 11 devices that have the Microsoft 365 desktop apps, beginning in late October 2025 and completing by the end of December 2025. The suite — People, Files, and Calendar — integrates Copilot for contextual AI assistance from the taskbar. IT admins can opt out via the Microsoft 365 Apps admin center or disable app auto‑launch in each app's Settings.

Amazon Keyspaces Adds IPv6 Dual-Stack Endpoints Support

🌐 Amazon Keyspaces now supports IPv6 through new dual-stack endpoints that accept both IPv6 and IPv4 connections, expanding available address space while preserving compatibility with existing IPv4 applications. The enhancement enables gradual migration strategies for critical database services and reduces disruption during transition. IPv6 access is also supported via PrivateLink interface VPC endpoints for private connectivity without traversing the public internet. This capability is available now in all AWS Commercial and AWS GovCloud (US) Regions where Keyspaces is offered, at no additional cost.

Amazon MWAA Announces Support for Apache Airflow 3.0

🚀 Amazon Managed Workflows for Apache Airflow (MWAA) now supports Apache Airflow 3.0, enabling easier authoring, scheduling, and monitoring of complex workflows. The release introduces a redesigned UI and an event-driven scheduler that can trigger workflows directly from external events. The new Task SDK and Task Execution API reduce boilerplate, improve isolation, and limit direct metadatabase access. MWAA also adds Python 3.12 support and security fixes to enhance reliability.

Microsoft Advances Sentinel with Agentic AI Upgrades

🔒 Microsoft announced major AI upgrades for Sentinel SIEM and Security Copilot, positioning them as agentic platforms. The update makes Sentinel data lake generally available and introduces public-preview releases of Sentinel graph and the Sentinel Model Context Protocol (MCP) Server so AI agents can access and act on SIEM data. Customers can now build custom agents with natural‑language prompts and discover third‑party agents via a revamped store. Microsoft positions agents to automate investigation and response but warns of increased noise, false positives and a new attack surface.

Cybersecurity Awareness Month: Security Starts With You

🔐 As Cybersecurity Awareness Month begins, Microsoft emphasizes that cybersecurity is both a personal and organizational responsibility. The post spotlights the Microsoft Secure Future Initiative (SFI), which has mobilized more than 34,000 engineers to reduce risk and implement protections such as phishing-resistant multifactor authentication on 100% of production system accounts and 92% of employee productivity accounts. It highlights new resources — including the Be Cybersmart Kit and SFI patterns and practices — plus learning paths, scholarships, and programs to help organizations and students improve security skills.

Gemini CLI Brings Natural Language to PostgreSQL Workflows

🔎 The Gemini CLI extension for PostgreSQL brings natural-language queries and command-line convenience directly to database tasks. It can detect required tools (for example, pg_trgm for fuzzy search), check whether they are installed and install them automatically, and suggest performance improvements such as creating GIN or GIST indexes. The extension also generates schema-derived code snippets and supports lifecycle actions like creating instances, users, and permissions, streamlining development workflows.

Google Drive for Desktop Adds AI Ransomware Detection

🔒 Google has begun rolling out an AI-powered ransomware detection feature for Google Drive for desktop. The feature automatically pauses syncing of affected files on Windows and macOS when it detects signs of ransomware, protecting cloud copies though it does not prevent local file encryption. Administrators may disable detection or file restoration via the Admin console, and alerts require Drive version 114 or later.

Amazon Connect Adds Agent Time-Off Balance Data to Analytics

🔍 Amazon Connect now surfaces agent time-off balance data in the analytics data lake, enabling managers and analysts to generate reports and insights from both current and historical balances across categories such as paid time-off, sick leave, and leave of absence. The capability includes a chronological transaction log that shows each adjustment and its impact on balances, removing the need for manual reconciliation and improving manager productivity and response to agent inquiries. It is available in all AWS Regions where Amazon Connect scheduling is supported.