UnifyID

OS1 rendition of artificial intelligence from Her Artificial Intelligence and has made some considerable progress over the last couple of years. Most of this current progress that is usable has been developed for industry and business purposes, as you’ll see in coming posts. Research institutes and dedicated, specialised companies are working toward the ultimate goal of AI (cracking artificial general intelligence), developing open platforms and the looking into the ethics that follow suit. There are also a good handful of companies working on AI products for consumers, which is what we’ll be kicking this series of posts off with. the fourth industrial revolution Artificial intelligence is like climbing a tree to try and reach the moon; one can report steady progress, all the way to the top of the tree. This is in a series of posts that looks at the landscape of the artificial intelligence industry and the companies and institutes developing products that are moving the needle of knowledge of machine intelligence and consciousness forward for humanity. Part 1 of 3 A break down of the series I’ve trawled through literally thousands of websites (6,000+ links) over a few of weeks to bring you a comprehensive list of the best AI products and most promising companies in the field. PS. my Macbook track pad is now dying from too many clicks. a list of AI companies and products (B2C) a list of AI companies (B2B) a list of AI companies (because there are so damn many!) and a few added extra Part 1 — for personal use Part 2 — for business and industr y Part 3 — for business and industry extended As a note: a few of the products haven’t launched yet, and may be still in Beta, though are exciting ideas, well backed or look promising. Most you can use now. Let me know your feedback (including any edits, adds and removals) Let me know if you think I’ve put a company under the wrong category or if I’ve totally got the description wrong about a company / it just needs a little alteration then . Also feel free tell me about any companies you think I’ve missed that need to added to the list — comment below and I’ll put them on. holla at me (on Twitter) I’ve highlighted some of my favourites, enjoy —! Artificial Intelligence for personal use:🏠 Personal / In-Home — kitchen assistant for turn-by-turn directions in the kitchen — verify your identity by the way you walk, type and sit Bridge Kitchen UnifyID 👔 Work — helps you manage phone calls — helps you write better resumes — helps you find a dream job — helps with email overload, organisation and communication — a better and smarter calendar — scans for jobs and helps manage your application process — helps you make smarter decision for your career Carly Mosaic Newton Notion Robby Stella Woo 👯 Social — helps you find meaningful professional connections — dating app with Face Search — let Eezy take care of your evening so you can take care of having fun — ironic hashtag and comment generator for your photos — can tell you how hot you are — introduces you to people you should really meet (work and play) Brightcrowd Dating.ai Eezy Hashley Hotness.ai Rey 🎓 Education — helps children to learn maths Thirdleap 🏥 Health / Medical — your virtual health assistant — can help if you’re feeling unwell — personal health coach — helps you care for loved ones with Alzheimer’s — food recognition from meal photos to help count calories — makes lab results easy to understand — mental healthcare in your pocket — diagnose snoring and tooth grinding Abi Ada Airi Alz.ai Bitesnap doc.ai Tess by x2 Sleep.ai 🕵️ Agents — Personal — everyday personal assistant for in-home — everyday personal assistant on iPhone and Mac — everyday personal assistant on PC and Windows devices — competitors to Siri, Now and Cortana — a holographic anime assistant in an espresso machine — everyday personal assistant — similar to Amazon Echo — is the world’s first open source voice assistant — like Siri with an interface — virtual assistant with an interface — like Siri but 10x better Amazon Echo / Alexa Apple Siri Cortana Facebook M Gatebox Google Assistant Ling Mycroft Remi Spoken Viv 📅 Agents — Professional — meeting scheduling assistant — meeting scheduling assistant (aimed at C-Suite) — meeting scheduling assistant — meeting scheduling assistant — handles meeting scheduling and manages calendar — automatically discover and organise your work — meeting scheduling assistant — personal assistant to help you at work Clara Julie Desk Kono Mimetic My Ally SkipFlag x.ai Zoom.ai 🙍 Agent — Fun — your AI girlfriend — your AI friend that you raise through text conversations Fembot Replika 📝 Agents — Chatbot — helps you make smarter business decisions — create a Facebook chatbot in 7 minutes — chatbot to help you throughout your daily life — monitor analyse your carbon emissions Brin Chatfuel myWave Lyra 🗞️ Entertainment / News — content and news app that learns what you like and don’t like — learns what you enjoy and finds stories you’ll like Jottr News360 ✈️ Travel — automatically calculates and adds meeting travel time — helps you manage travel itineraries and meetings —helps with booking flights, hotels, restaurant reservations and more — traffic forecaster and travel time prediction Emma **ETA** Mezi Ready 🚗 Vehicle — turns any car into a smart car Vinli 🏃‍ Fitness — smarter running app Mara 🎵 Music — composes emotional soundtrack music — finds music you might like Aiva Pandora 🏛️ Insurance / Legal — can advise you on legal issues — tracks and rewards safe drivers Docubot Driveway 🛒 Shopping — helps identify if clothing and accessory items are authentic Entrupy 💰 Finance — fast answers about your finances — a personal Tax Accountant — helps you achieve your financial goals — helps you do your banking — rounds up purchases and invests the spare change — helps you manage your finances — institutional-grade active portfolio management — helps you pay bills easily — AI for your daily finance decisions Abe Andy Bond Finn.ai Mylo Olivia Responsive Roger Wallet 📱 Social media / Website management — websites designed automatically, just add content and publish — ironic hashtag and comment generator for your photos — build elegant landing pages using your social media content Firedrop Hashley Signature 💡 IoT / IIoT — home activity, movement and identity sensor — smart-home platform focused on speech and sound — one place to connect your smart home devices — grow room controller and monitoring system — helps you monitor and improve your sleep — whole house voice control — is the world’s first open source voice assistant — the baby monitor reinvented — a range of in-home devices such as Thermostat, security and alarms Aerial Bridge.ai Cubic Grojo Hello Josh Mycroft Nanit Nest ⌚ Wearables — helps you learn a new language from conversations through your day — wearable for martial arts to help analyse kicks and fights Eli **Kick.ai** 🌐 Language / Translation — transcribe conversations in English and Hindi — language translator powered by neural networks Liv Microsoft Translator 🤖 Robots — a humanoid robot aimed to be as capable as a human — a robot (I couldn’t work out its purpose, but it sounded cool!) Roboy Spoon 💌 Useful + Fun + Random — helps you find and buy cannabis (with recommendations) — universal field guide that suggests possible matches — is a collaborative storytelling experiment using AI, machine learning, robotics, bio-engineering and IoT — laughs visualised in a digital format, that may be sent to space — beer brewed by artificial intelligence Elevator Fieldguide Frankenstain.ai #Laugh IntelligentX Brewing Co. 📚 Research — breaks down articles and PDF’s into quick, readable dot points — helps you research and visualise concepts in research papers Apollo Iris 🎫 Events, Conferences and Communities — an annual event where leading AI researchers and top industry practitioners meet and collaborate — Bootstrap Labs Venture firm — the one stop shop for AI/ML/DL events and conferences — strong name game! The AI Conference **Applied Artificial Intelligence Conference** **Events.ai** oh.hai.ai — applied AI community and events — applied AI community and events — applied AI community and events — applied AI community and events — applied AI community and events — applied AI communities and events — applied AI community and events — applied AI community and events — applied AI community and events — applied AI community and events — applied AI community and events — applied AI community and events — applied AI community and events — applied AI community and events — applied AI community and events — applied AI community and events — applied AI community and events — applied AI community and events Amsterdam Bangalore Berlin Bucharest Budapest City.ai Hamburg Hongkong London Madrid Krakow Oslo Tallinn Tirana Singapore Sofia Stockholm Valletta 📰 News and blogs — a weekly collection news and resources on AI and ML — AI and Machine Learning blog — AI newsletter delivered every 2 weeks — AI commentators — dedicated to making the power of deep learning accessible to all — dedicated news and updates for ML and AI — a hand-curated newsletter ML and DL — f0rum for AI, ML and Robotics AI Weekly Approximately Correct Axiomzen Concerning.ai Fast.ai Machinelearning.ai Machine Learning Weekly PRAI That’s a wrap! I’ll be bringing out , which will be arriving shortly! Part 2 + 3 Original post at https://www.liamiscool.com/a-list-of-artificial-intelligence-tools-for-personal-use I also (good stuff) sometimes. Tweet

A list of artificial intelligence tools you can use today — for personal use (1/3)

Understanding What are Decentralized Trading Protocols and Why Does it Matter for Web3 Decentralized trading protocols to offer an alternative to traditional centralized exchanges (CEX) in the trading of cryptocurrencies. The main vision behind decentralization is to eliminate the need for intermediaries and provide a more secure and transparent platform for trading digital assets. aim With no central authority controlling the exchange, users have complete control over their assets, reducing the risk of theft or loss in the event of a hack. Decentralized trading protocols offer numerous , including increased security, reduced fees, and improved privacy. They also provide a level of transparency that is not possible with centralized exchanges, as all transactions are publicly recorded on a blockchain. This allows for greater accountability and reduces the possibility of fraud. In addition, decentralized trading protocols enable cross-border trading and enable users to trade assets that may not be available on centralized exchanges. benefits What is a Dual-Chain System in DeFi? A dual-chain system in blockchain refers to a system where two chains are utilized to achieve a specific goal. The dual-system in DeFi refers to the use of two different protocols, one for settlement and the other for communication, in a decentralized finance system. This setup allows for faster and more efficient transactions while still maintaining the security and decentralization provided by the underlying blockchain technology. The communication protocol is responsible for transmitting information and executing transactions, while the settlement protocol ensures that the actual transfer of funds takes place in a secure and transparent manner. This approach allows DeFi systems to handle high volumes of transactions while still providing the necessary security and trust for users to participate in financial activities. The use of a dual-system in DeFi provides a balance between speed, efficiency, and security, making it a key component of the growing DeFi ecosystem. Innovative Dual-Chain System Unifies User Experience and Decentralization on Dexalot Subnet Launch Decentralized cryptocurrency exchange, Dexalot, has launched its new trading platform, the Dexalot Subnet, on the Avalanche network. This marks a significant milestone in the advancement of decentralized trading protocols and offers a user experience similar to centralized exchanges (CEX) while maintaining decentralization and transparency. : Vested Interest Disclosure The author is an independent contributor publishing via our . Be it through direct compensation, media partnerships, or networking, the author has a vested interest in the company/ies mentioned in this story. HackerNoon has reviewed the report for quality, but the claims herein belong to the author. #DYOR. brand-as-author program In the case of Dexalot, the dual-chain system consists of the main chain (Avalanche C-Chain) and the exchange chain (Dexalot Subnet). The main chain is responsible for the deposit and withdrawal of assets, while the exchange chain facilitates the actual trading of assets. By utilizing both chains, Dexalot is able to offer a user experience that is similar to centralized exchanges (CEX) without sacrificing decentralization and transparency. The exchange chain, or Subnet, is built on an Avalanche Subnet and has been optimized for speed, safety, and user experience through the use of an on-chain central limit order book (CLOB) and low transaction fees. The communication between the main chain and the exchange chain is facilitated through cross-chain communication protocols, which enables DeFi users to trade with confidence without having to surrender control over their assets. The innovative dual-chain design sets the stage for further mass adoption of DeFi by establishing a foundation for multiple ecosystem interoperabilities to be created on top of and around it. According to Cengiz Dincoglu, Co-Founder and CTO of Dexalot, the Subnet is optimized for speed, safety, and user experience. The team behind Dexalot is looking forward to introducing DeFi traders to the platform and setting itself apart from other centralized and decentralized exchanges in the market. The innovative design of the Subnet lays a foundation for expanding to other host chains, furthering the mass adoption of DeFi. The implementation is said to create opportunities for multiple ecosystem interoperabilities to be built on top of and around Dexalot. Don’t forget to like and share the story! Image credits: . Aditya Vyas

Unifying User Experience and Decentralization: The Innovative Dual-Chain System on Dexalot Subnet

Although there are a few altcoins that have caught some attention in the media and have seen peaks of significant investment, there is no denying that Bitcoin dominates the industry by a landslide. According to , 36% of all US crypto owners have Bitcoin in their wallets. Influencer Marketing Hub Furthermore, the overall value of the currency has climbed from just $500 in 2016 to a whopping $17,000 per coin in 2022, which speaks to its incredible capacity for exponential growth. For software developer, Nikita Chashchinskii, Bitcoin, as the leading digital currency, has the potential to become a stable foundation for a market that has seen far too much volatility within the last few years. While many people are still naive and overwhelmed by this new sector of the financial market, Nikita is a part of a forward-thinking team spearheading the technology. The project is being developed with Drivechain and is positioned to make the world of cryptocurrency more transparent, and more secure at the same time. The Makings of a Blockchain Software Development Expert From a very young age, Chashchinskii was enthralled by science fiction and imagined himself as a protagonist in the novels that he would read, using technology to solve problems and make the world a better place. Video games allowed him to indulge in those fantasies and also presented a potential career path for his future. He was eager to learn, as his interest in software development grew, and he spent many hours of his childhood reading books about basic programming language and mathematical systems used in game design. By the time he was in secondary school, Nikita was experimenting with simple game design to begin putting the acquired knowledge into practice. At the same time, he continued to expand his studies and moved beyond basic C++ to learn more complex and professional programming languages like Rust, Haskell, and Python. Highly motivated and eager to jump into the industry, he even contributed to an open-source game engine through his last year of high school and the first year of college. Chashchinskii continued to do some freelance work during his college years. Then, while in his final year of his bachelor’s program, he came across an exciting opportunity to participate in an international competition where contestants were required to build Zcash sidechain software, to help enable privacy with Bitcoin, for the Drivechain project. He was familiar with the project and was enticed by its potential to create a distributed prediction market for cryptocurrency. Although he was very busy juggling school and a day job as a full-stack engineer, he used any free time he could find to work on the task and, in the end, was the only competitor who developed a functional solution. Hitting the Nail on the Head With Drivechain Nikita clearly had an affinity for Drivechain development and, as a result, he was brought onto the team to continue working on the project. After completing his bachelor’s program, he was accepted into a master’s program in software engineering. He pursued his studies, worked his day job, and continued to build more prototypes of the Zcash sidechain in his spare time. By the end of 2021, he let go of his job to focus on his studies and Drivechain-related work – which was particularly important, as he had received an offer for full-time employment on the project for after graduation. Unfortunately, Chashchinskii did not have the chance to complete his master’s degree due to the volatile circumstances in Russia. After leaving the country and relocating to Istanbul, he had much more time on his hands which he spent mostly on the development of  Drivechain, and during that time, Nikita really found his stride. Most significantly, he built a software library that makes it much easier to build sidechains of altcoins – enabling their unique features – within the Bitcoin framework. Nikita explains that “Right now, adopting new technology in the cryptocurrency world is usually accompanied by creating a new 'token' or 'monetary unit', fragmenting the network, making the cryptocurrency industry something lesser than the sum of its parts, creating internal conflict, and legitimizing ponzi schemes and other con-artist [techniques].” In contrast, the two-way-pegged Bitcoin sidechains that he is developing have the potential to unite the entire cryptocurrency industry. By enabling the adoption of a variety of new technologies, without creating any new monetary units, BTC could easily be moved from one technological platform to another. Furthermore, it could do so at a 1-to-1 exchange rate. This would allow individual users to independently make decisions about the risks and features that they want to explore, without affecting the foundation of the currency at all. As this project gains momentum, it is likely going to lead to Bitcoin absorbing the market share of all useful altcoins by converting them into sidechains. Chashchinskii has already built solid sidechain versions of both Zcash and Ethereum, and his innovative work has been featured in Bitcoin Magazine. He is very excited about this unification, as it will lead to a more trustworthy and predictable market. Currently, the hope of hitting it big with a new monetary unit is exactly the type of promise that schemers use to target investors, especially those who are inexperienced and easy to take advantage of. Of course, the project not only benefits the users within their massive network, but it is also a huge level-up for Bitcoin. Until now, Bitcoin has not been able to explore new technologies without bringing risk to its entire community, as well as to its own foundational software. With sidechains, they create an avenue for freedom and flexibility while protecting their core technology. The Drivechain project, created by , aims to improve Bitcoin to the point where all the other digital currencies become obsolete. LayerTwo Labs To achieve this, the cryptocurrency must combine privacy, scale, and versatility. It also has to function in every use case and include a more intuitive UX. LayerTwo Labs was founded by veterans of the cryptocurrency industry, and Nikita’s unique skills and aligned goals made him a perfect addition to the team. In conclusion, Nikita says “With Drivechain it is possible to copy any altcoin’s technology 1-to-1, creating a sidechain that is strictly superior to the copied altcoin, because it has the exact same features, as well as Bitcoin’s greater network effect… Drivechain [also] enables distributed censorship resistant prediction markets on Bitcoin, [which] would let us direct the predictive power of financial speculation towards forecasting the future – as well as potentially enabling other applications like financial derivatives, insurance, funding public goods, and governance.]”

Nikita Chashchinskii Is Unifying the Cryptocurrency Industry
With Drivechain

Unifying Random Generation and Shrinking (Property-based Testing Part 4)

Today, consumers use a wide variety of devices, browsers, and channels during their buying journey. Although the advent of online shopping has opened big opportunities for brands, at the same time, the disparity in customer data has drastically increased. Companies capture, track, and store customer data at various sources. This gives birth to serious data quality issues, including format variations, incorrect patterns, missing information, and record duplication. In this blog, we will look at why unifying mailing lists and linking rows is detrimental to enabling customer personalization, and how you can ensure clean, standardized, and matched data. Why is Unifying Mailing Lists Important? A consumer uses about 20 marketing channels when making a buying decision. Most businesses do not have any unifying technology implemented for customer data. This causes problems when they want to understand their customers better – in terms of behavior and preferences. Some common channels used by customers include emails, websites, social media platforms, digital magazines, chatbots, etc. When customer data is generated at multiple ends, there must be some way to consolidate and unify it to get a single, comprehensive view. Businesses that use clean, matched mailing lists avoid serious complications, such as: Hard bounce rate or failed email deliveries, indicating that most email addresses in your mailing list are invalid or do not exist. Decreased customer engagement since the brand fails to understand their customer’s preferences and buying intentions. Failed mail deliveries since customer addresses stored in the database are not standardized or verified, and do not point to a valid mailable location. Duplicate marketing efforts incurred due to the presence of multiple records for the same individual can cause you to waste a lot of time and resources. Inaccurate business intelligence which causes business leaders to base critical decisions on inaccurate customer information. How to Unify Customer Lists? Unifying customer lists is a systematic process that consists of the following steps: Import lists The first step is to get all lists that need to be unified at one place. This can include connecting to different databases, local files, third-party applications, etc. You may have to review and consider the structural differences between databases, as well as the variation in column titles. To fix such issues, you need to import selected columns, rename columns, as well as map columns from one list to another to define which ones contain the same information. Profile lists When the lists are imported, you need to run data profiling algorithms that will statistically analyze each list and highlight possible data cleansing opportunities. This includes finding out: Blank or empty values, Incomplete records, Incorrect formats and data types, Invalid pattern, Irrelevant or garbage values, etc. Standardize data values Now it's time to fix issues that were identified during the data profiling stage, including specifying missing information, transforming patterns, formats, and data types, and more. This step also includes column parsing or merging – you need to divide one column into multiples or merge multiple columns into one. This is done to get more accurate results when you are matching lists to identify records belonging to the same customer. For example, parsing Full Name column into First Name, Middle Name, and Last Name columns. Similarly, you can merge City and Country columns into one. Match rows in lists In this step, you will match and link records that belong to the same customer. This can be done in two ways depending on whether your lists have uniquely-identifying attributes. With unique attributes: Presence of unique attributes such as Social Security Number or an IP Address can help you to perform exact matches on lists and find out which belong to the same customer. Without unique attributes: In absence of unique identifiers, you need to perform advanced . This process includes selecting a combination of attributes, comparing them across records, and computing the likelihood of them belonging to the same customer. matching techniques such as fuzzy matching Deduplicate and merge matching results Once you have identified records that possibly belong to the same individual, now it’s time to deduplicate and merge them to get the golden record. To avoid data loss, you need to merge or overwrite information from duplicate records onto the main one. Once done, you can delete the duplicates and mark the main one for export. Last Word This is how you can attain a clean, unified mailing list that shows a comprehensive view of your consumers. Ideally, you would want to get the most accurate matching results to prevent data loss. For this reason, employing advanced tools such as can help implement the entire process with speed and efficiency. record linkage software Interactions and experiences designed using unified datasets can help you to build more valuable relationships with your customers – something that is impossible without understanding their behavior and preferences. This is why it is imperative to use advanced tools that allow you to get the most out of your data.

Unifying Mailing Lists to Enable Customer Personalization

We’re living in a pandemic of data breaches. More than 17 billion personal records were exposed last year, and 2024 has begun with a string of several high-profile back-to-back breaches in the first quarter, including data exposure of millions of AT&T account holders. Big Tech companies are in the crosshairs, too, facing mounting criticism from government officials calling for urgent reform. Even the open-source software supply chain is under threat from social engineering campaigns looking to compromise maintainer projects. ‘Social engineering’ is the key term here because it’s not software vulnerabilities that enterprises should be worried about. Those only make up 5% of breaches, while 68% involve the human element. How can this be? And what should companies do about it? The doors we open for hackers – and how to close them Exotic and sophisticated zero-day attacks and vulnerability exploits may garner the bulk of attention from the press, CISOs, and security teams, but the reality is that today’s cybersecurity tools are becoming exceedingly efficient at preventing and remediating these attacks. Hackers know this. They’re not going after software vulnerabilities. They’re attacking identity because it’s far cheaper and easier to exploit or force human error. So, they target credentials such as passwords, browser cookies, and private API keys. The data says it all, really: a Verizon report proves these credentials show up in 86% of security breaches related to web-based applications and platforms. Obtaining these credentials is how attackers do the most damage with minimal ease. Sometimes, these credentials are shared a little too freely. Other times, a shocking amount goes unused. The point is that organizations have lost control of their credentials, and the result is a growing fragmentation of identities across increasingly complex technology stacks. Those stacks are filled with layers that manage security in different ways, from Kubernetes clusters to Linux servers, copious amounts of specialized databases, IoT, cloud APIs, etc. It gets even more convoluted on a granular level once you’re inside a cloud account. If you have three Windows servers and seven Linux servers, each of those also governs its own login credentials. If you’ve got a multi-cloud setup with both AWS and Azure, those companies also track identity in different ways. In the quest for greater efficiency, DevOps engineers are even splitting cloud-native applications into smaller micro-services, each needing its own identity. Each of these layers opens yet another door for attackers to enter. If you’re an enterprise operating with more DevOps and cloud infrastructure, you’re inevitably going to add even more layers to the stack. More layers mean more doors. In other words, the mere presence of secrets, such as private keys, API keys, passwords, or even browser cookies, should be seen as a vulnerability waiting to be exploited in an identity attack. Stop using secrets for access purposes The problem isn’t the technology itself, though, but human behavior. Any time you create more doors, you’re increasing the probability of human error. So, how do you fix these data breaches? The first step is to consolidate all identities. All identities - including people and machines like servers, laptops, bots, databases, microservices, etc. – must be united into an inventory that provides a single source of truth. The second step is to make these identities impossible to impersonate or “steal”, effectively making the infrastructure security immune to human mistakes. To do this, minimize or eliminate the reliance on secrets for authentication purposes. As a rule, your identity should also never ever be presented as information. The only way to prevent data theft on a catastrophic scale is to remove all static credentials and standing privileges and instead deploy strong authentication with cryptographic identity. In practice, this means basing identity on three-point criteria that include 1) a user’s specific device, 2) a biometric marker, and 3) a personal identification number (PIN). In theory, this is exactly how the iPhone works: the biometric marker is facial recognition, the personal identification number is your PIN code, and the Trusted Platform Module (TPM) chip inside the phone is what governs the ‘machine identity.’ But credentials – or doors, if you will – are just half the story. Observability isn’t enough The thing about human error is that it’s blind to the quality of your cybersecurity and observability tools. It only takes one human to make a mistake by granting access to the wrong people. This already happens. As we learned earlier this year, Google Kubernetes Engine admins are not immune to misunderstanding the significance and scope of default user groups and assigning dangerous permissions to them. The cybersecurity industry has spent a disproportionate amount of time and money on observability. Companies are acquiring and maintaining tools to respond to threats rather than fix enforcement to proactively protect infrastructure. One reason companies tend to be put off by fixing enforcement is the aforementioned complexity of modern technology stacks. The natural assumption is you need competent teams who can configure every single layer with its own authentication, its own authorization, its own encryption, and its own audit. The smarter solution here would be for the cybersecurity industry to embrace a new paradigm for modernizing secure access to infrastructure. This paradigm has to be built on embracing mechanisms that unify all access within a single control point for authentication and authorization. Most enterprises sorely need (and yet lack) this mechanism as a front-end to all of their disparate infrastructure. Access should only ever be granted based on tasks, and only the minimum required privileges should ever be granted. These should then be de-provisioned immediately afterward. This concept of on-demand least-privileged access then needs to be applied to both human and non-human machine and service accounts. In other words, every company should be able to easily enforce the policy that developers should never have access to production data. However, without unified access controls, this will remain a sci-fi concept for many cybersecurity professionals. Unifying access controls isn’t just helpful in the proactive sense. If a data breach does eventually occur, a centralized view of all the access relationships attributed to a user or resource is essential for purposes like quickly revoking unwanted access or auditing. This is how enforcement and observability can be combined for agility. And if you’ve already assigned cryptographic identity beforehand to each individual user or resource, you’ve now associated the actual human user with each action. This means assigning the right permissions to the right people becomes a much easier task. Defend against human behavior There are, of course, positive signs of technology leaders in the industry taking data breaches very seriously. Microsoft has pledged to shore cloud vulnerabilities, prevent credentials from being stolen, and automatically enforce multi-factor authentication for employees. Any efforts to embrace stronger authentication and  cryptographic measures should be commended. If cybersecurity is going to ‘win,’ though, enterprises have to understand that stopping data breaches isn’t about defending against viruses or ultra-sophisticated hacking techniques. It’s about defending against human behavior that exposes infrastructure to data leaks. That’s the mindset that needs to change. Unified access control, paired with zero trust, must be the foundation for modernizing secure access. We’re living in a pandemic of data breaches. More than 17 billion personal records were exposed last year , and 2024 has begun with a string of several high-profile back-to-back breaches in the first quarter, including data exposure of millions of AT&T account holders. 17 billion personal records were exposed last year Big Tech companies are in the crosshairs , too, facing mounting criticism from government officials calling for urgent reform. Even the open-source software supply chain is under threat from social engineering campaigns looking to compromise maintainer projects. Big Tech companies are in the crosshairs Even the open-source software supply chain is under threat ‘Social engineering’ is the key term here because it’s not software vulnerabilities that enterprises should be worried about. Those only make up 5% of breaches , while 68% involve the human element. How can this be? And what should companies do about it? make up 5% of breaches The doors we open for hackers – and how to close them The doors we open for hackers – and how to close them Exotic and sophisticated zero-day attacks and vulnerability exploits may garner the bulk of attention from the press, CISOs, and security teams, but the reality is that today’s cybersecurity tools are becoming exceedingly efficient at preventing and remediating these attacks. Hackers know this. They’re not going after software vulnerabilities. They’re attacking identity because it’s far cheaper and easier to exploit or force human error. So, they target credentials such as passwords, browser cookies, and private API keys. The data says it all, really: a Verizon report proves these credentials show up in 86% of security breaches related to web-based applications and platforms. 86% of security breaches Obtaining these credentials is how attackers do the most damage with minimal ease. Sometimes, these credentials are shared a little too freely. Other times, a shocking amount goes unused . The point is that organizations have lost control of their credentials, and the result is a growing fragmentation of identities across increasingly complex technology stacks. Those stacks are filled with layers that manage security in different ways, from Kubernetes clusters to Linux servers, copious amounts of specialized databases, IoT, cloud APIs, etc. a shocking amount goes unused It gets even more convoluted on a granular level once you’re inside a cloud account. If you have three Windows servers and seven Linux servers, each of those also governs its own login credentials. If you’ve got a multi-cloud setup with both AWS and Azure, those companies also track identity in different ways. In the quest for greater efficiency, DevOps engineers are even splitting cloud-native applications into smaller micro-services, each needing its own identity. Each of these layers opens yet another door for attackers to enter. If you’re an enterprise operating with more DevOps and cloud infrastructure, you’re inevitably going to add even more layers to the stack. More layers mean more doors. In other words, the mere presence of secrets, such as private keys, API keys, passwords, or even browser cookies, should be seen as a vulnerability waiting to be exploited in an identity attack. Stop using secrets for access purposes Stop using secrets for access purposes The problem isn’t the technology itself, though, but human behavior. Any time you create more doors, you’re increasing the probability of human error. So, how do you fix these data breaches? The first step is to consolidate all identities. All identities - including people and machines like servers, laptops, bots, databases, microservices, etc. – must be united into an inventory that provides a single source of truth. The second step is to make these identities impossible to impersonate or “steal”, effectively making the infrastructure security immune to human mistakes. To do this, minimize or eliminate the reliance on secrets for authentication purposes. As a rule, your identity should also never ever be presented as information. The only way to prevent data theft on a catastrophic scale is to remove all static credentials and standing privileges and instead deploy strong authentication with cryptographic identity. In practice, this means basing identity on three-point criteria that include 1) a user’s specific device, 2) a biometric marker, and 3) a personal identification number (PIN). In theory, this is exactly how the iPhone works: the biometric marker is facial recognition, the personal identification number is your PIN code, and the Trusted Platform Module (TPM) chip inside the phone is what governs the ‘machine identity.’ But credentials – or doors, if you will – are just half the story. Observability isn’t enough Observability isn’t enough The thing about human error is that it’s blind to the quality of your cybersecurity and observability tools. It only takes one human to make a mistake by granting access to the wrong people. This already happens. As we learned earlier this year, Google Kubernetes Engine admins are not immune to misunderstanding the significance and scope of default user groups and assigning dangerous permissions to them . misunderstanding the significance and scope of default user groups and assigning dangerous permissions to them The cybersecurity industry has spent a disproportionate amount of time and money on observability. Companies are acquiring and maintaining tools to respond to threats rather than fix enforcement to proactively protect infrastructure. One reason companies tend to be put off by fixing enforcement is the aforementioned complexity of modern technology stacks. The natural assumption is you need competent teams who can configure every single layer with its own authentication, its own authorization, its own encryption, and its own audit. The smarter solution here would be for the cybersecurity industry to embrace a new paradigm for modernizing secure access to infrastructure. This paradigm has to be built on embracing mechanisms that unify all access within a single control point for authentication and authorization. Most enterprises sorely need (and yet lack) this mechanism as a front-end to all of their disparate infrastructure. Access should only ever be granted based on tasks, and only the minimum required privileges should ever be granted. These should then be de-provisioned immediately afterward. This concept of on-demand least-privileged access then needs to be applied to both human and non-human machine and service accounts. In other words, every company should be able to easily enforce the policy that developers should never have access to production data. However, without unified access controls, this will remain a sci-fi concept for many cybersecurity professionals. Unifying access controls isn’t just helpful in the proactive sense. If a data breach does eventually occur, a centralized view of all the access relationships attributed to a user or resource is essential for purposes like quickly revoking unwanted access or auditing. This is how enforcement and observability can be combined for agility. And if you’ve already assigned cryptographic identity beforehand to each individual user or resource, you’ve now associated the actual human user with each action. This means assigning the right permissions to the right people becomes a much easier task. Defend against human behavior Defend against human behavior There are, of course, positive signs of technology leaders in the industry taking data breaches very seriously. Microsoft has pledged to shore cloud vulnerabilities, prevent credentials from being stolen, and automatically enforce multi-factor authentication for employees. Any efforts to embrace stronger authentication and  cryptographic measures should be commended. If cybersecurity is going to ‘win,’ though, enterprises have to understand that stopping data breaches isn’t about defending against viruses or ultra-sophisticated hacking techniques. It’s about defending against human behavior that exposes infrastructure to data leaks. That’s the mindset that needs to change. Unified access control, paired with zero trust, must be the foundation for modernizing secure access.

Social Engineering is the Biggest Cyber Threat

Beijing, China – RockTree Capital, a leading crypto-native fund and merchant bank headquartered in Beijing, announces the launch of its immersive website, showcasing a futuristic film-noir concept: the Cyberpunk Crypto City. The website’s cutting-edge interactive cityscape represents RockTree's vision where Web3 has become pervasive, fusing technology, finance, and culture. The site, set in the future near the 11th halving of bitcoin, builds on the ideas of the cypherpunk movement, through advocating for the widespread use of decentralization and privacy-enhancing technologies as a route to self sovereignty and freedom for human beings everywhere.  As an early-stage investor and bespoke accelerator in Asia for its portfolio companies, RockTree Capital has been instrumental in geometrically accelerating its investee projects’ go-to-market cycle. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NUFuYDJBO4A&embedable=true Through its ultra-localized strategies and grassroots community building initiatives, RockTree has empowered emerging founders and projects to thrive in both East and West markets. Leveraging deep regional relationships with leading crypto institutions, capital collaborators, and Web3 partners, RockTree invests in and accelerates the trajectory of projects from Infrastructure, DeFi, Cross-chain, and the Bitcoin Ecosystem. Founded by visionary investor Omer Ozden and headquartered in Beijing, China, RockTree Capital operates at the nexus of the East & West with a crypto native team that bridges the human, cultural, capital and media gap across these markets. RockTree embodies a truly grassroots approach that unites Eastern and Western crypto markets and benefits its portfolio investments, which include amongst others; dYdX, The Graph, Chainlink, Fantom, Pocket, Maple, Covalent, Axelar, Eclipse, and BEVM. "RockTree focuses on the human aspects of Web3. In addition to unifying the collaboration of top people in Eastern and Western crypto markets, our core strength is identifying the human hallmarks of success for Founders and Team," says Omer Ozden, Founder and Chairman of RockTree Capital. "We utilize advanced behavioral neuroscience methods to determine Founders’ emotional intelligence, execution capabilities and integrity. We prioritize not only technological innovation, but also the individuals behind that innovation, their psychology and levels of consciousness. And we invite those projects into our trusted international ecosystem and methodology, so they can scale rapidly in foreign markets, instead of trying to figure it out organically through trial and error," said Ozden. The Cyberpunk Crypto City website represents RockTree's forward-looking vision decades in the future, where Web3 technology and digital assets penetrate all peoples’ daily lives, and decentralized finance becomes a pervasive consumer product, like soft drinks or chewing gum, allowing true democratization of finance. Visitors to the Cyberpunk Crypto City website will immerse themselves in a retro film-noir homage, with captivating visuals of a cybernetic metropolis of replicants, that is bilingual in English and Chinese, and powered by blockchain technology. Experience the future of finance at RockTree Capital's Cyberpunk Crypto City and join us in shaping the next chapter of Web3 innovation. For media inquiries, please contact: Alisa Loi lisa@rocktreecapital.com About RockTree Capital RockTree Capital is an early stage crypto-native fund and merchant bank based in Beijing, China. Our portfolio companies experience geometric scale in Asian markets through the RockTree Acceleration Program by combining our ultra-localized go-to-market strategies and grassroots long-term community building. RockTree invests into top-tier crypto projects and helps build Decacorns in the areas of Infrastructure, DeFi, Cross-chain and Bitcoin Ecosystem www.rocktreecapital.com https://twitter.com/RockTreeCapital This story was distributed as a release by Btcwire under HackerNoon’s Business Blogging Program. Learn more about the program here. Beijing, China – RockTree Capital, a leading crypto-native fund and merchant bank headquartered in Beijing, announces the launch of its immersive website, showcasing a futuristic film-noir concept: the Cyberpunk Crypto City. The website’s cutting-edge interactive cityscape represents RockTree's vision where Web3 has become pervasive, fusing technology, finance, and culture. The site, set in the future near the 11th halving of bitcoin, builds on the ideas of the cypherpunk movement, through advocating for the widespread use of decentralization and privacy-enhancing technologies as a route to self sovereignty and freedom for human beings everywhere.  As an early-stage investor and bespoke accelerator in Asia for its portfolio companies, RockTree Capital has been instrumental in geometrically accelerating its investee projects’ go-to-market cycle. RockTree Capital RockTree Capital https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NUFuYDJBO4A&embedable=true https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NUFuYDJBO4A&embedable=true Through its ultra-localized strategies and grassroots community building initiatives, RockTree has empowered emerging founders and projects to thrive in both East and West markets. Leveraging deep regional relationships with leading crypto institutions, capital collaborators, and Web3 partners, RockTree invests in and accelerates the trajectory of projects from Infrastructure, DeFi, Cross-chain, and the Bitcoin Ecosystem. Founded by visionary investor Omer Ozden and headquartered in Beijing, China, RockTree Capital operates at the nexus of the East & West with a crypto native team that bridges the human, cultural, capital and media gap across these markets. RockTree embodies a truly grassroots approach that unites Eastern and Western crypto markets and benefits its portfolio investments, which include amongst others; dYdX, The Graph, Chainlink, Fantom, Pocket, Maple, Covalent, Axelar, Eclipse, and BEVM. "RockTree focuses on the human aspects of Web3. In addition to unifying the collaboration of top people in Eastern and Western crypto markets, our core strength is identifying the human hallmarks of success for Founders and Team," says Omer Ozden, Founder and Chairman of RockTree Capital. "RockTree focuses on the human aspects of Web3. In addition to unifying the collaboration of top people in Eastern and Western crypto markets, our core strength is identifying the human hallmarks of success for Founders and Team," says Omer Ozden, Founder and Chairman of RockTree Capital. "We utilize advanced behavioral neuroscience methods to determine Founders’ emotional intelligence, execution capabilities and integrity. We prioritize not only technological innovation, but also the individuals behind that innovation, their psychology and levels of consciousness. And we invite those projects into our trusted international ecosystem and methodology, so they can scale rapidly in foreign markets, instead of trying to figure it out organically through trial and error," said Ozden. "We utilize advanced behavioral neuroscience methods to determine Founders’ emotional intelligence, execution capabilities and integrity. We prioritize not only technological innovation, but also the individuals behind that innovation, their psychology and levels of consciousness. And we invite those projects into our trusted international ecosystem and methodology, so they can scale rapidly in foreign markets, instead of trying to figure it out organically through trial and error," said Ozden. The Cyberpunk Crypto City website represents RockTree's forward-looking vision decades in the future, where Web3 technology and digital assets penetrate all peoples’ daily lives, and decentralized finance becomes a pervasive consumer product, like soft drinks or chewing gum, allowing true democratization of finance. Visitors to the Cyberpunk Crypto City website will immerse themselves in a retro film-noir homage, with captivating visuals of a cybernetic metropolis of replicants, that is bilingual in English and Chinese, and powered by blockchain technology. Experience the future of finance at RockTree Capital's Cyberpunk Crypto City and join us in shaping the next chapter of Web3 innovation. RockTree Capital's Cyberpunk Crypto City RockTree Capital's Cyberpunk Crypto City For media inquiries, please contact: Alisa Loi lisa@rocktreecapital.com lisa@rocktreecapital.com lisa@rocktreecapital.com About RockTree Capital RockTree Capital is an early stage crypto-native fund and merchant bank based in Beijing, China. Our portfolio companies experience geometric scale in Asian markets through the RockTree Acceleration Program by combining our ultra-localized go-to-market strategies and grassroots long-term community building. RockTree invests into top-tier crypto projects and helps build Decacorns in the areas of Infrastructure, DeFi, Cross-chain and Bitcoin Ecosystem www.rocktreecapital.com www.rocktreecapital.com www.rocktreecapital.com https://twitter.com/RockTreeCapital https://twitter.com/RockTreeCapital https://twitter.com/RockTreeCapital This story was distributed as a release by Btcwire under HackerNoon’s Business Blogging Program. Learn more about the program here. This story was distributed as a release by Btcwire under HackerNoon’s Business Blogging Program. Learn more about the program here . here here

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