📈 JEDI Training, WFH, and Cyber-Terrorism.
Happy Friday! Sorry for the delay, but here is this weeks news all the way from the great state of Colorado.
General note: Going forward I’ll be releasing the letter every other week in a slightly longer format.
May The Force Be With You
The Defense Department said on Tuesday that it would not go forward with a lucrative cloud-computing contract that had become the subject of a legal battle amid claims of interference by the Trump administration.
In January, The Pentagon had warned Congress that it might walk away from the contract if a federal court agreed to consider whether former President Donald J. Trump interfered in a process that awarded the $10 billion JEDI contract to Microsoft over its rival Amazon. Sort of makes you think… who would be quicker friends with the former President: Gates or Bezos?
The JEDI (Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure) project was a major cloud computing contract that would have allowed the country's military to improve communications with soldiers on the battlefield, with artificial intelligence being utilized to enhance fighting capabilities and war planning.
Hilariously, through this deal we get to see the disadvantages of a rapidly changing tech industry. The New York Times wrote,
A senior administration official said that soon after the Biden administration took office, it began a review that quickly concluded that the costly arguments over JEDI had been so lengthy that the system would be outdated as soon as it was deployed.
After JEDI was cancelled, the Pentagon proposed a new cloud architecture called the Joint Warfighter Cloud Capability. And the Pentagon made clear that only Microsoft and Amazon Web Services had the capacity to build it. The Pentagon’s announcement suggested that it would buy technology from both companies, rather than awarding one large contract to a single provider, as it had for JEDI.
JEDI was the Super Bowl of cloud deals and many considered to be the marquee contract for providing cloud-computing services to the federal government. As someone in sales, I feel for you anonymous Microsoft rep. You’ll hit quota somehow.
I think Bill Gates (shown below) will be just fine without the contract, even with this picture on the internet.
Read More Here
I Don’t Want To Go To School
It sounds a little childish but for all of us working remotely, it resonates in some capacity. Remote work has given people both hardship and opportunity but if one thing is for certain, there is a majority opinion in the debate on going back to the office.
After spending more than a year at home, some don’t want to go back to commuting, preferring the flexibility of remote work at least a few days a week. Others are simply burned out from logging long hours while also balancing child care and remote school, sometimes all at once.
In what’s been dubbed the “Great Resignation,” a whopping 95% of workers are now considering changing jobs, and 92% are even willing to switch industries to find the right position, according to a recent report by jobs site Monster.com. Most say burnout and lack of growth opportunities are what is driving the shift, Monster found.
Already, a record 4 million people quit their jobs in April alone, according to the Labor Department. At the same time, there are more opportunities for job seekers — with the Labor Department reporting a record 9.3 million job openings as of the latest tally.
In a survey of more than 350 CEOs and human resources and finance leaders, 70% said they plan to have employees back in the office by the fall of this year — if not sooner — according to a report by staffing firm LaSalle Network.
Come the fall, companies will be faced with a decision of what to do with their employees. 9 out of 10 organizations will be combining remote and on-site working, according to a McKinsey survey.
I’m curious to see how different people’s reactions are walking in on “the first day of a new school year”.
Read More Here
Ransom Note
Between 800 and 1,500 businesses around the world were compromised or affected by a cyberattack on Friday that security experts said could be the largest attack in history using ransomware, in which hackers shut down systems until a ransom is paid.
Hackers compromised Kaseya, a Miami-based software company that provides technology services to tens of thousands of organizations around the world. Many of its customers are so-called managed service providers, which in turn provide security and tech support to other companies and collectively reach millions of businesses.
“It totally sucks,” Fred Voccola, Kaseya’s chief executive, said in a video posted on YouTube early Tuesday, addressing the company’s customers. “If I was you, I’d be very, very frustrated, and you should be.”
A Russian-based cybercriminal organization known as REvil claimed responsibility on Sunday for the attack, writing about it on their dark web blog. I know… sounds like a certain Matthew Broderick film from 1983. Some victims were being asked for $5 million in ransom, Huntress Labs said. REvil also said it would publish a tool that would allow all infected companies to recover their data if it were paid $70 million in Bitcoin.
Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary, said American national security officials had been in touch with Russian government officials over the attack.
This attack comes just months after the large-scale SolarWinds hack and analysts are saying they have similarities. A lot is still unknown about this weeks breach, but cybersecurity lapses are seemingly trending in the wrong direction.
Side note: “It totally sucks” is probably the most hilarious response to an international crime I’ve ever heard.
Read More Here
ICYMI
Feds Seize Robinhood CEO’s Phone in GameStop Trading Halt Investigation
AI Bot Tracks How Much Time Politicians Spend On Their Phones
Tech Products Of The Week
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