For $10,000, you could franchise a Chick-fil-A restaurant, buy an engagement lobster roll, or jumpstart your career in software development in less than a year through a coding boot camp. Though some question if the latter is still attainable.

For more than a decade, coding boot camps have served as a promising investment, dangling the promise of large salary, work-life balance, and in some cases, a promise of securing a job within a year of graduation to anyone willing to pay the price.

However, the boot camp industry—which once lured mid-career professionals seeking a job change, students looking to quickly break into the tech industry, and developers looking to expand their skill set to digital and in-person classrooms—has turned somber in recent years. Once popular programs such as Rithm School, a 17-week full-stack web development bootcamp, have shuttered their doors to new applicants, while others such as the Bloom Institute of Technology, a for-profit San Francisco-based boot camp, have been hit with lawsuits over their allegedly deceptive marketing practices, leading some to wonder if the accelerated programs are still a viable talent pipeline.

Read the rest here.—BM

Edge computing is transforming how the world works. Self-driving cars, real-time inventory management, remote patient monitoring…the possibilities are endless. But building all those new layers of intelligence relies on robust AI learning systems. That’s where Eaton comes in.

Eaton’s full suite of products and services is designed to help future-proof your edge deployment for AI. The AI at the Edge infographic explores the full AI adventure. It goes beyond simple backup power and digs into security, maintenance, and intelligent remote monitoring.

Get the scoop on how Eaton helps accommodate larger power requirements while keeping installation easy with products like:

• Rackmount PDU G4
• Eaton 9 series UPS
• Brightlayer Data Centers suite

Check it out.

Microsoft has begun the rollout of its new Windows App—a “unified experience” that lets users access a Windows device from other supported devices.

The new application supports connections to Azure Virtual Desktop, Windows 365, Microsoft Dev Box, Remote Desktop Services, and other remote PCs, according to Microsoft’s September 20 announcement. Supported platforms include Windows, macOS, and iOS, with a preview branch available for Android and ChromeOS devices. The app can also be accessed via web browsers.

As The Register pointed out, the Windows App is primarily a rebranding of Microsoft’s existing Remote Desktop client, which is in widespread enterprise use. Microsoft wrote in the announcement that Windows App supports a number of new or improved features, including customizability, account switching, and unified access. Windows App fully replaces the Remote Desktop Connection app for macOS and mobile operating systems, although that app hasn’t been deprecated on Windows.

Remote access tools, in general, pose a variety of security issues—when vulnerabilities allow for remote code execution, attackers can gain access to a system remotely, escalate privileges, pivot to other systems, and wreak havoc.

Keep reading here.—TM

You might want to get that checked.

Cybernews revealed September 23 that background check company MC2 Data had exposed a database with 2.2 TB of sensitive user data, potentially compromising the personal information of around 100 million Americans.

To understand how cybersecurity professionals are assessing the hack’s potential dangers, IT Brew spoke with three cybersecurity experts for their take on the hack and what consumers and IT professionals can do to protect themselves.

Taking aim. “I think one of the reasons people need to be concerned is that they can now easily prioritize high-value targets,” Gary Orenstein, chief customer officer at Bitwarden, told us.

Orenstein said that the amount of information exposed is intimidating—but that the danger is that attackers may comb through the data for big targets. The records could contain passwords and other identifying information.

“What happens now, with the adversary, is they know a current email address of a high value target, and they can just start launching phishing campaigns or trying credential stuffing attacks,” Orenstein said. “If they got one password somewhere, does that password also work on other websites, or do variations of that password also work on other websites?”

Keep reading here.—EH