Season’s Greetings from all of us as Thanksgiving and Christmas approach. And, as 2024 comes to a close, it’s the perfect time to focus on end-of-year security preparations. Ensure your systems are protected by implementing our automated security solutions for the holiday season. Messageware Z-Day Guard for Microsoft Servers 15 minute Security Challenge: Get Protected [...]
AD account lockouts can be disruptive and frustrating for users, support staff, and administrators. However, they play a crucial role in security by preventing password guessing through repeated login attempts, such as brute force attacks. Without the protection provided by account lockouts, passwords could eventually be compromised, leading to unauthorized access. This step-by-step guide will [...]
Active Directory (AD) and Azure Active Directory (AAD) are critical components for IT infrastructure: responsible for everything user account based from managing employee onboarding and offboarding, access permissions, network resources, and devices. Due to AD’s crucial role, cyber attacks cause significant disruptions, leading to operational and business outages and losses. As a result of one [...]
The Iranian state-sponsored hacking group known as APT34, also called OilRig or Earth Simnavaz, has recently intensified its cyber espionage activities, targeting government and critical infrastructure entities in the United Arab Emirates and the broader Gulf region. This escalation involves sophisticated tactics and the exploitation of newly discovered vulnerabilities, demonstrating the group's evolving capabilities and [...]
In this quarter's newsletter, we'll dive into the latest cybersecurity news, Microsoft releases, and exciting new Z-Day Guard v1.5 security features for servers. Messageware Z-Day Guard for Microsoft Servers 15 minute Security Challenge: Are Your Servers Properly Monitored? Take just 15 minutes to try Messageware's Z-Day Guard on a Windows or Exchange Server. Z-Day Guard offers [...]
Microsoft has announced significant changes to the Exchange Server roadmap, introducing Exchange Server Subscription Edition (SE) as the next major release. This update brings important implications for organizations currently running Exchange Server 2013 and 2016. Key Points Exchange Server SE will be available for download in early Q3 2025. Exchange 2013 and 2016 will no [...]
TORONTO - Sept. 12, 2024 - PRLog -- Messageware Incorporated, a leader in cybersecurity solutions, announced a new version of Z-Day Guard, their advanced server security product. This update significantly broadens Z-Day Guard's protection to all Microsoft Windows Server platforms. "We've taken our extensive industry expertise and comprehensive understanding of server security to extend our protection capabilities," said Mark Rotman, President [...]
In the wake of a devastating global IT outage caused by a faulty CrowdStrike update, Microsoft is taking proactive steps to address cybersecurity concerns. The tech giant has announced a significant Windows Endpoint Security Ecosystem Summit to be held on September 10th, 2024, at its headquarters in Redmond, Washington. Summit Objectives The primary goal of [...]
As Exchange Server 2016 approaches its end of extended support on October 14, 2025, organizations using Exchange Server 2019 will need to plan for decommissioning their 2016 environments. This guide outlines the key steps and considerations for removing Exchange 2016 from an environment that already has Exchange 2019 installed. Why Decommission Now? If you plan to [...]
Summary: The CrowdStrike outage on July 19, 2024, triggered a massive global IT disruption, affecting approximately 8.5 million Microsoft Windows systems worldwide. The incident, caused by a faulty configuration update to CrowdStrike's Falcon Sensor security software, resulted in system crashes and boot failures across numerous industries and government services. The outage's impact was exacerbated by concurrent issues [...]
Microsoft 365 and Azure services experienced a significant global outage on July 30, 2024, affecting millions of users worldwide. Microsoft has confirmed that the nine-hour outage which disrupted multiple Microsoft 365 and Azure services worldwide, was caused by a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack. The outage impacted critical services including Microsoft Entra, some Microsoft 365 and [...]
Follow this link for an updated and comprehensive analysis of the CrowdStrike Outage. A series of unprecedented IT outages has sent shockwaves through businesses and public services worldwide, highlighting the vulnerabilities of our interconnected digital systems. The disruptions stemmed from two separate incidents: a major Microsoft 365 service outage and a botched update of CrowdStrike's [...]
With the first half of 2024 behind us, it's clear that companies are continuing to prioritize cybersecurity projects to strengthen defenses and enhance operations. In this newsletter, I wanted to share exciting cybersecurity updates from Messageware, as well as important industry news. Z-Day Guard cybersecurity solution New Version Available: We are excited to announce that [...]
A sophisticated keylogger has been found embedded in the main login page of Microsoft Exchange Servers, stealing account credentials from unsuspecting users. The malicious code was discovered by Positive Technologies' Expert Security Centre (PT ESC) during an incident response operation. The keylogger records usernames and passwords entered on the Exchange login page and stores them [...]
Great news! Microsoft has announced exciting developments for the future of on-premises Exchange with the introduction of Exchange Server SE set to launch early in Q3 of 2025. This new subscription edition (SE) will arrive just as support for Exchange Server 2019 concludes on October 14, 2025. Administrators should note the tight timeline for transition [...]
Microsoft has released Hotfix Updates (HUs) that enable support for new functionality and address issues in the March 2024 Security Update (SU). The April 2024 HU is available for the following builds of Exchange Server: Exchange Server 2019 CU13 and CU14 Exchange Server 2016 CU23 New Features The April 2024 HU introduce support for elliptic curve cryptography (ECC) certificates and [...]
In the summer of 2023, Microsoft faced a major cybersecurity crisis when Chinese state-sponsored hackers managed to breach the email accounts of several U.S. government officials and organizations through Microsoft's Exchange Online software. The incident, which affected over 500 individuals and 22 organizations, has been described as a "cascade of security failures" by the U.S. [...]
If you're a Windows administrator, you might want to hold off on installing the latest March 2024 Windows Server updates. Widespread reports have surfaced of domain controllers crashing and restarting after applying these updates, causing headaches for IT professionals and disruptions for businesses. The Culprit: LSASS Memory Leak The root of the problem appears to [...]
Description of Security Update 5 for Exchange Server 2019: March 12, 2024 (KB5036402) The March 2024 SUs address vulnerabilities responsibly reported to Microsoft by security partners and found through Microsoft’s internal processes. Although we are not aware of any active exploits in the wild, our recommendation is to immediately install these updates to protect your [...]
Tens of thousands of Microsoft Exchange servers worldwide could be vulnerable to a recently disclosed zero-day privilege escalation vulnerability that is already being actively exploited by threat actors. The vulnerability, tracked as CVE-2024-21410, allows a remote, unauthenticated attacker to relay a user's Windows NT LAN Manager (NTLM) credentials or "hashes" to impersonate legitimate users on [...]
