Microsoft Targets Security, AI, Data, IoT and Edge Computing at Ignite

MICROSOFT IGNITE — Attendees at this week’s Microsoft Ignite in Orlando, Florida, are hearing about the myriad of new products and enhancements that fall into three buckets – security; AI and data; and IoT and edge computing – all of which are core to the future of IT and Microsoft’s role in its customers’ digital transformation.

As Microsoft partners and customers absorb all the new functionality the company is adding to these technologies, achieving more in the modern workplace is the core of the company’s mission. Microsoft’s wants the workplace to be secure, responsive, collaborative and, increasingly, seamless.

Here are many, but not all, of the new products, services and functionality enhancements announced Monday at Ignite.

Security

Microsoft’s cybersecurity posture is comprised of three fundamental components: operations, enterprise technology and partnerships.

While the company boasts security operations with more than 3,500 full-time security professionals, AI tools, a Microsoft Threat Intelligence Center (MSTIC) that hacks its own defenses while hunting down attackers and blocks more than 5 billion distinct malware threats each month, the big news falls in the enterprise-technology column.

• Microsoft on Monday declared an end to the era of passwords. The vendor will support password-less login via the Microsoft Authenticator app for hundreds of thousands of Azure Active Directory (AD) connected apps that businesses use day in and day out.
• Microsoft also announced that Microsoft Secure Score, an enterprise-grade dynamic report card for cybersecurity that measures an organization’s security posture and provides assessments and recommendations, now includes EMS and Azure Security Center. Other enhancements include a broader set of controls from products such as Microsoft Cloud App Security and Azure Active Directory.
• The vendor contends that Microsoft Secure Score is able to reduce the chance of a security breach by 30-fold by securing both administrator and end-user accounts with multifactor authentication, and, on the user side, also turning off client-side email forwarding rules.
• Microsoft Threat Protection brings together threat-protection solutions, such as advanced threat protection and auto-remediation, across email, PCs, documents, identities and infrastructure into a single integrated experience in Microsoft 365. Microsoft notes that the service uses AI and human research to speed up investigations and eliminate threats.
• Azure Confidential Computing, a cloud service to provide a secure platform for protecting the confidentiality and integrity of data in use, is now available in public preview. 

When it comes to security and partnerships, Microsoft is driving a broad set of technology, industry and policy partnerships for a heterogeneous world, and is tackling new ecosystem challenges such as security for MCU-powered devices and IoT, with innovations such as Azure Sphere, which is available for preview.

The company also noted that it works with groups such as the FIDO Alliance, an global organization that promotes open and scalable standards that enable simpler and more secure …