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Quick thank you to all who have been bringing news items to our team’s attention. News covered this week includes Microsoft announces Azure PowerShell 5.0, Microsoft and Intel commit to delivering next generation confidential computing, Microsoft introduces a new Defender vulnerable devices report, Azure Cloud for Healthcare is now generally available and new training resources for Microsoft Teams admins and IT Pros on MS Learn.
Microsoft Announces Azure PowerShell 5.0
Microsoft introduced a plethora of fundamental changes to Azure PowerShell in version 5.0 including:
- Updated authentication – authentication to Azure now via the Microsoft Authentication Library (MSAL) module.
- Az.KeyVault security update – plain text property SecretValueText from the cmdlets that operate on KeyVault secrets. Your scripts will now need to use SecretValue (a SecureString) instead.
- Improved support for ACR (Azure Container Registry) and AKS (Azure Kubernetes Service)
- New default behaviors for Az.KeyVault and Az.Functions
Further details can be found here: Azure PowerShell 5.0 update
Microsoft and Intel via Azure commit to delivering next generation confidential computing
Microsoft recently announced that Azure will be an early adopter of Intel’s 3rd generation Xeon® Platform which includes full memory encryption and accelerated cryptographic performance for confidential computing with Intel Software Guard Extensions (SGX).
Microsoft Azure Attestation (MAA) further improves this security posture by enabling customers to remotely attest to the authenticity of the SGX enclave at the hardware level, ensures the latest security patches are installed, and the confirms the integrity of the code running within the enclave.
Further details surrounding this security partnership can be found here: Security Partner Azure Confidential Computing
Microsoft releases a new threat and vulnerability management report
Microsoft’s newest Defender report, now in public preview, shares details on:
Device vulnerability severity levels (e.g. all the devices with critical vulnerabilities)
Device exploit availability (e.g. all the devices with vulnerabilities that have verified exploits)
Device vulnerability age (e.g. devices with vulnerabilities that were published over 90 days ago)
Vulnerable devices by operating system
Vulnerable devices by Windows 10 version
Further details can be found here: Vulnerable devices report – threat and vulnerability management
Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare is now generally available
Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare offering is aimed at healthcare organizations to make it easier for them to focus on delivering better experiences, insights, and care. Healthcare organizations can quickly access a portfolio of new tailored capabilities offered via Microsoft Azure, Microsoft 365, Microsoft Dynamics 365, Microsoft Power Platform, and Microsoft’s ecosystem of partner healthcare solutions to create trusted, end-to-end cloud-based solutions. Healthcare organizations can engage in more proactive ways with patients and give caregivers tools to improve workflow efficiency and streamline interactions.
Read the following blog post for more information on general availability: Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare is transforming the healthcare journey
MS Learn Module of the Week
New training resources for Microsoft Teams admins and IT Pros
At Microsoft Ignite last month, Microsoft introduced several new Microsoft Teams role-based learning paths, learning modules, and interactive product experiences that are available at MS Learn. These resources were created to help you get ready to deploy and manage Microsoft Teams in your organization and deliver the experiences that meet the needs of your users, we have created new Teams training courses and interactive product how-to guides designed to quickly ramp up your Teams admin knowledge base.
If you’re looking to start your learning journey or just want to browse the new Teams learning content, check out the new MS Learn landing page for Microsoft Teams.
As you know, our team appreciates your feedback and input on the Microsoft services news we share. Let us know in the comments below if there are any news items you would like to see covered in next week show. Az Update streams live every Friday so be sure to catch the next episode and join us in the live chat.
Brought to you by Dr. Ware, Microsoft Office 365 Silver Partner, Charleston SC.
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