Sean's IT Blog

In the topic of antivirus software, firewalls, and viruses themselves, I figured I would take this last opportunity to look up what the most damaging virus ever was. That title belongs to a computer worm by the name of Mydoom. Mydoom is a virus that was first found on January 26, 2004 and became the fastest spreading e-mail worm ever and has yet to be surpassed. It appeared as an e-mail that appeared like spam and was very cheaply made, but it went on to infect over 500,000 computers. It utilized a backdoor on port 3127/TCP to allow remote control of the PC by adding its own .DLL file in the system 32 directory. It also was used to hit Microsoft with DDoS attacks and succeeded in bringing down the website and other popular antivirus websites. Overall it caused about $38 billion in damages to both organizations and personal computers. I found this exercise to be enjoyable because I was able to do my own research on the side regarding the topics of discussion each week. It helped me to g...

With talking about Network security I figured I would do some research on one of the most popular kinds of hacking attacks out there, Ransomware. This is a term a lot of us have heard in recent years with the number of attacks occurring. The most recent attack that I can recall happened in February 2022 at Nvidia where the company suffered a ransomware attack by the group Lapsus$ which gained access to 1 TB of company data. They then demanded $1 million and a fee from Nvidia.  Ransomware is a type of malware that prevents users from accessing their systems or personal files and demands a ransom payment in order to gain access. Today ransomware authors order payment via cryptocurrency to cover their tracks. Some authors even sell their service to other cybercriminals which is known as Ransomware-as-a-Service. They gain access through email spam, advertising, social engineering, and spear phishing. They gain access to the network and will encrypt data files, not allowing access until...

This week we discussed printers, connecting them to networks, and troubleshooting. I figured I would take the opportunity and dedicate this blog post to different printing technologies that are on the market and some that are on the way. The first is Digital Inkjet printing which is replacing offset printing due to its high-speed printing capabilities. These printers will be the most common printers seen in organizations and companies in the coming years. They can print around 4500 words per minute which is exceptionally fast in comparison to the older printers. Next is 3D printing which is becoming more and more popular every year. It has gotten to the point where there are low-cost 3D printers on the market so that people can now print things at home. It comes in three types of technology: Stereolithography, Selective Laser Sintering, and Fused Filament Fabrication, with the latter being the most common of all three. It takes models that are made in Computer-Aided Design software and...

This week in class we went over mobile devices and especially the two most common operating systems for them Apple and Android. Mobile devices have become so rooted in the modern world that nowadays it's hard to remember a world without them. Nowadays the progress of new inventions or developments with mobile devices has slowed significantly from a couple years ago. Some of the newer inventions have just been brighter screens or foldable screens which aren't really groundbreaking developments. The only big updates just come in the form of hardware updates like upgraded processors or developments in the operating system. There are rumors of a smartphone developed by Tesla that will allow for solar power charging which could be a game-changer for people that live where it's sunny most of the time. As far as devices themselves, something that has always been talked about is the development of glasses that could almost function the same as a smartphone with the use of eye movem...

This week we talked a bit about Cloud Computing and Networks. So I wanted to do some more research into how Cloud Computing is developing and what its future should look like. For now, it looks like the next big step is the wide-scale adoption of Edge Computing which is computing that allows systems to become increasingly distributed and bring data and processing to people living farther away from cities, covering more of the globe. It reduces latency, cuts bandwidth costs, and improves connection performance. Secure Access Service Edge or SASE is a cloud-based security approach that addresses the move to Work From Home and remote work. Companies are able to use the cloud network security services such as gateways, firewalls, and zero-trust network access to secure devices connecting to the organizations' network from a remote location.  By 2023 spending on Cloud Computing is expected to break $500 billion and will be in almost every digital service on the market. Serverless cloud ...

At this point in time, 5G is still being implemented around the United States, but technology is already rapidly moving towards the next generation in cellular technology with 6G networks. These networks will have the capability to use higher frequencies, provide higher capacity, and offer much lower latency than 5G. The biggest claim is that it will support one microsecond latency communications. It will have the ability to work with Artificial Intelligence to facilitate data storage, processing, and sharing. Also, it will utilize signals in higher frequency ranges that can theoretically reach peak data rates of 1 terabyte per second. The access points will be able to serve multiple users simultaneously via Orthogonal Frequency-Division Multiple Access which is where there are multiple independently modulating subcarriers within frequencies that allow simultaneous transmission to and from multiple clients. It will be very interesting to see the future of mobile networks and just what ...