With post-scheduling, users creating a new post or reel in Instagram will come with the ability to schedule posts through Advanced Settings. Here there will be an option “Schedule this post” where users can set a date and time for when the post will go live. This schedule can be edited later if necessary. Alongside the scheduling feature, Instagram is launching Achievements. These seem to be a way to get users to engage with Reels more....

Carousel Ads are texturized stories that feature multiple photos. Users on LinkedIn can scroll the horizontally with a swipe to see more images on their feed. LinkedIn says more than 300 companies signed up through beta testing. Among them were heavyweights like HP, Volvo Canada, and RBC Wealth Management. 75 percent of organizations that beta tested Carousel Ads said they will use the system again to increase click-through rates. On the website for the service, RBC Wealth Management described Carousel Ads as a step forward: “From an engagement standpoint the LinkedIn carousel ads are a great step forward for the platform....

So-called “Fake News” and other forms of misinformation have become an issue, especially on platforms such as Facebook and Google. Microsoft has largely managed to avoid the kinds of controversies that have followed those companies in both privacy and misinformation. That’s despite Microsoft also running a search engine (Bing) and advertising platform. In fact, Microsoft is taking a proactive approach to tackling misinformation. Under the C2PA coalition, the company and partners will develop open standards that allow sources to be verified....

Now, the company has confirmed that the Creators Update for Windows 10 Mobile and for other versions will come after the desktop release. In a short statement to Softpedia, Microsoft has confirmed that “the initial update will be for desktop, but other versions will be available thereafter.” However, the wait for the Windows 10 Mobile Creators Update might not be very significant. The last time Microsoft released a major update, it rolled it out to PCs first, then to Windows 10 Mobile....

At E3 last year, Microsoft stole the show by introducing Project Scorpio. As well as talking up the native 4K capabilities and beefy specs of the device, the fact it supported VR was also discussed. Indeed, the company has since confirmed virtual reality support will also come to the Xbox One and Xbox One S. However, while VR on console is definitely of interest of Microsoft, it is not the focus....

To do so, antivirus programs must update their software and add a special key to the registry. Once compatible, Windows will download the Meltdown and Spectre patches and any others available. “Microsoft added this requirement to ensure customers can successfully install the January 2018 security updates,” explains a support page. “Microsoft will continue to enforce this requirement until there is high confidence that the majority of customers will not encounter device crashes after installing the security updates....

However, with Microsoft heavily promoting the Office 365 cloud productivity service, this business-model is coming to an end. Now, the company has changed the way owners of an Office productivity suite can access Microsoft’s cloud services, limiting their access to five years. The Redmond giant is changing things up in how Office perpetual can connect to Microsoft’s cloud services. Office perpetual describes the licensed purchase of the productivity suite. It is the usual one-time cost that applies to a specific version of Office, which right now is Office 2016....

The issue stems from the broken Secure Boot DBX (KB5012170), which users were unable to install because of a recent bug. In a post on the Windows Health Dashboard, Microsoft says the Secure Boot DBX security update is causing PCs to boot into BitLocker and asking users to input recovery keys. The update was part of the August 2022 Patch Tuesday release. Workaround In the meantime when Microsoft is working on a fix, the company has provided the following workarounds for the problem:...

Today, the company has confirmed massive cuts. Through the Microsoft 2017 layoffs, there will be 3,000 people will be removed from their positions. As we mentioned in the previous report, many of the jobs will come from the company’s global salesforce team. Microsoft is continuing a wholesale transition to the cloud and many employees are surplus to requirements. Speaking with CNBC, Microsoft says that the sales division will be affected....

Over the years, Microsoft has pursued using TV White Space technology to bring low cost connection. The White Space signal sits on the 470MHz to 790MHz frequencies, a lower frequency than cellphone that sits unused in the television spectrum as it is a buffer for Wi-Fi connectivity. TV White Space has been successfully used in several regions, not least recently in Puerto Rico to help the island recover from a hurricane....

The tactical edge solutions are for remote locations where network connectivity will be poor. Two new solutions have been announced, both of which will support humanitarian organizations or military campaigns in remote areas. Dell EMC Tactical Microsoft Azure Stack and Azure Data Box are both designed to be U.S. government compliant and for U.S. military use. Starting with the Tactical Microsoft Azure Stack, the companies have created a new product based on the existing Azure Stack platform....

Both companies made the declaration in 10-K forms discovered by Wired. 10-K forms are standardized papers that organizations must file each year. Created for investors, the documents give an overview of business and finance performance. Microsoft and Google both place AI under the “risk factors” section of their 10-K forms. After years of increasing AI capabilities, this is the first time the companies have recognized the business danger of AI: From Alphabet’s (Google parent) 10-K, filed last week: “[N]ew products and services, including those that incorporate or utilize artificial intelligence and machine learning, can raise new or exacerbate existing ethical, technological, legal, and other challenges, which may negatively affect our brands and demand for our products and services and adversely affect our revenues and operating results....

“We are delighted to partner alongside Microsoft as we continue to strengthen Quorum and expand capabilities and services on the platform,” said Umar Farooq, global head of blockchain, JPMorgan. “Azure will bring unique strengths to enterprise clients using Quorum.” Quorum was created by JP Morgan back in 2015, based on the Ethereum network. It holds the company’s JPM Coin currency and focuses on enterprise application. The ledger can be utilized across a variety of industries to track goods and transactions in a secure, private way, with businesses like Louis Vuitton, Shell, and Starbucks using the platform....

PromoteIQ is a firm that specializes in marketing technology for online retailers and brands. Microsoft says PromoteIQ will remain operational under its own brand and will maintain its current clients. Microsoft will add support, including providing access to aritifical intelligence and machine learning technology. In a blog post on its website, PromoteIQ’s co-founders, Peter Schwartz and Alex Sherman, said they want Microsoft to help grow the brand. “Our combined entities have a tremendous opportunity to redefine and deliver the next generation of vendor marketing to retailers and brands....

“Unfortunately, due to high demand for virtual machines in this region, we are not able to approve your quota request at this time. We are continuing to expedite additional capacity for the US East 2 (EUS2).” This has reportedly been an issue for over a week, with some users instructed to deploy to US West servers or request a smaller number of cores. Meanwhile, Reddit user BloinkXP said his company had been whitelisted, but Microsoft’s response was “we aren’t sure how we got here”....

These npm packages are designed to take valuable personally identifiable information (PII). Researchers with JFrog, Shachar Menashe and Andrey Polkovnychenko say they found the repositories on March 21 with 50 packages and that number soon grew to 200. The company explains how the attack is targeting Microsoft Azure: “After manually inspecting some of these packages, it became apparent that this was a targeted attack against the entire @azure npm scope, by an attacker that employed an automatic script to create accounts and upload malicious packages that cover the entirety of that scope....

Crypto mining is essentially a process where new bitcoins are created by solving complex math problems that verify transactions. Creating new cryptocurrency is as simple as mining gets as the process is complicated and requires computers and software to do the heavy lifting. Microsoft Universal License Terms for Online Services now state that Azure and any other online service cannot be used for mining. This change was made quietly as it has been in effect since December 1....

I’ll touch on the GA of Virtual Assistant Solution Accelerator before getting to the more interesting changes made to Microsoft Bot Framework. If you’re unfamiliar with this tool it provides a solution for creating and customizing virtual assistants. Microsoft is expanding the functionality of the Virtual Assistant Solution Accelerator. The tool now includes integrations for a calendar, to-do, and “who” queries. If you’re interested in the Accelerator, you can check it out on GitHub as an open source project....

Security defaults are not new on Azure Active Directory, which began rolling out in October 2019. At the time, they were only available for Azure AD customers creating a new tenant. They are now used by 30 million organizations around the world. In the coming months, Microsoft will roll out more security defaults on Azure Active Directory. This latest rollout will allow the defaults to reach more organizations and cover 60 million additional Azure AD accounts....

In June, Microsoft announced it is developing an improved built-in text finder for Chromium. This is a feature that makes it easier to search for defined text on a page. Microsoft believes it can improve the experience and has now released its version of the tool. Microsoft’s proposal showed the company wanted to bring more accuracy when selecting text when launching the finder. For example, if a user selects text on a page and launches the finder, the text will be automatically placed into the finder box....