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Azure Stack Edge expands with NVIDIA GPU preview

We’re expanding the Microsoft Azure Stack Edge with NVIDIA T4 Tensor Core GPU preview during the GPU Technology Conference (GTC Digital). Azure Stack Edge is a cloud-managed appliance that brings Azure’s compute, storage, and machine learning capabilities to the edge for fast local analysis and insights. With the included NVIDIA GPU, you can bring hardware acceleration to a diverse set of machine learning (ML) workloads.

What’s new with Azure Stack Edge

At Mobile World Congress in November 2019, we announced a preview of the NVIDIA GPU version of Azure Stack Edge and we’ve seen incredible interest in the months that followed. Customers in industries including retail, manufacturing, and public safety are using Azure Stack Edge to bring Azure capabilities into the physical world and unlock scenarios such as the real-time processing of video powered by Azure Machine Learning.

These past few months, we’ve taken our customers’ feedback to make key improvements and are excited to make our preview available to even more customers today.

If you’re not already familiar with Azure Stack Edge, here are a few of the benefits:Azure Stack Edge Hi-Res

  • Azure Machine Learning: Build and train your model in the cloud, then deploy it to the edge for FPGA or GPU-accelerated inferencing.
  • Edge Compute: Run IoT, AI, and business applications in containers at your location. Use these to interact with your local systems, or to pre-process your data before it transfers to Azure.
  • Cloud Storage Gateway: Automatically transfer data between the local appliance and your Azure Storage account.  Azure Stack Edge caches the hottest data locally and speaks file and object protocols to your on-prem applications.
  • Azure-managed appliance: Easily order and manage Azure Stack Edge from the Azure Portal.  No initial capex fees; pay as you go, just like any other Azure service.

Enabling our partners to bring you world-class business applications

Equally important to bringing you a great device is enabling our partners to bring you innovative applications to meet your business needs.  We’d love to share some of the continued investment we’re making with partners to bring their exciting developments to you.malong_logo_e_l_h

As self-checkouts grow in prevalence, Malong Technologies is innovating in AI applications for loss prevention.

“For our customers in the retail industry, artificial intelligence innovation is happening at the edge,” said Matt Scott, co-founder and chief executive officer, Malong Technologies. “Along with our state-of-the-art solutions, our customers need hardware that is powerful, reliable, and custom-tailored for the cloud. Microsoft’s Azure Stack Edge fits the bill perfectly. We’re proud to be a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner, working with Microsoft to help our retail customers succeed.”

Increasing your manufacturing organization’s quality inspection accuracy is key to Mariner’s Spyglass Visual Inspection application.

Mariner“Mariner has standardized on Microsoft’s Azure Stack Edge for our Spyglass Visual Inspection and Spyglass Connected Factory products. These solutions are mission critical to our manufacturing customers. Azure Stack Edge provides the performance, stability and availability they require.” – Phil Morris, CEO, Mariner

Building computer vision solutions to improve performance and safety in manufacturing and other industries is a key area of innovation for XXII.

“XXII is thrilled to be a Microsoft partner and we are working together to provide our clients with real time video analysis software on edge with the Azure Stack Edge box. With this solution, LOGO XXII _ NOIR _ SMALLAzure allow us to harvest the full potential of NVIDIA GPUs directly on edge and be able to provide our clients in retail, industry and smart city with smart video analysis that are easily deployable, scalable and easily manageable with Azure stack Edge.” – Souheil Hanoune, Chief Scientific Officer, XXII

More to come with Azure Stack Edge

NVIDIA4There are even more exciting developments with Azure Stack Edge coming. We’re putting the final touches on much-awaited new compute and AI capabilities including virtual machines, Kubernetes clusters, and multi-node support. Along with these new features announced at Ignite 2019, Data Box Edge was renamed Azure Stack Edge to align with the Azure Stack portfolio.

Our Rugged series for sites with harsh or remote environments is also coming this year, including the battery-powered form-factor that can be carried in a backpack. The versatility of these Azure Stack Edge form-factors and cloud-managed capabilities brings cloud intelligence and compute to retail stores, factory floors, hospitals, field operations, disaster zones, and rescue operations.

Get started with the Azure Stack Edge with NVIDIA GPU preview

Thank you for continuing to partner with us as we bring new capabilities to Azure Stack Edge. We’re looking forward to hearing from you.

  • To get started with the preview, please email us and we’ll follow up to learn more about your scenarios.
  • Learn more about Azure Stack Edge.

Learn more about Azure’s Hybrid Strategy

Read about more updates from Azure during NVIDIA’s GTC.

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Xbox chief Phil Spencer’s message to the gaming community on what we’re doing to help today

We are living in
unprecedented times. The COVID-19 pandemic has impacted the lives of people
around the world and changed the way we go about our daily lives. Here at
Microsoft, we’re constantly asking ourselves what we can do to support people
during this challenging time. To me, the most important thing to remember is
that we’re all living and learning through this together. 

I have previously stated that I believe gaming has a unique power to bring people together, to entertain, to inspire and connect us, and I believe that’s even more true under these unique circumstances. Many are looking to gaming to remain connected with their friends while practicing social distancing, and we are seeing an unprecedented demand for gaming from our customers right now.

With hundreds of millions of kids at home due to coronavirus-related school closures more kids are going online to spend time with their friends, explore online worlds and learn through play. Families are trying to navigate the need to help their children with distance learning and balance that with taking time to have fun.  That’s why we announced today that we are adding a new Education category to the Minecraft Marketplace with free educational content players and parents can download.

The educational content we’ve curated lets players explore the
International Space Station though a partnership with NASA, learn
to code with a robot, visit famous Washington D.C. landmarks, find
and build 3D fractals, learn what it’s like to be a marine biologist, and so
much more. This is launching for free
download today and will be available through June 30, 2020.

With so many turning to gaming, helping everyone stay safer online is also a top priority for us. This is why we provide family settings that help parents choose the screen time limits, content filters, purchase limits, communication and sharing settings that are right for their families. While kids may be home from school, family settings can help balance gaming with offline schoolwork and other responsibilities.

There are also some ways
that we can bring brand-new players into the fold. For example, our Copilot
feature can be especially helpful for children, new gamers or those who need
unique configurations to play, allowing two controllers to play as if they were
one.

We understand the important
role gaming is playing right now to connect people and provide joy in these
isolating and stressful times, and our teams are working diligently to ensure
we can be there for our players. To that end, we are actively monitoring
performance and usage trends to ensure we’re optimizing the service for our
customers worldwide and accommodating for new growth and demand.

While these are unprecedented times we are living in, I
have no doubt that we’ll come through this experience stronger than ever.

Stay safe and be good to one another.

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Microsoft’s venture fund M12 adds fraud and abuse prevention platform Arkose Labs to portfolio

By James Wu

I’m excited to welcome Arkose Labs—a fraud and abuse prevention platform, to protect web and mobile apps—to the M12 portfolio.

In an increasingly digital world where success is measured by Monthly Active Users (MAU) and Daily Active Users (DAU), online traffic is a critical performance indicator. Unfortunately, not all online traffic is created equal. The internet has become a hotbed of global cybercrime as financial transactions and exchanges of personally identifiable information become commonplace.

Cybercrime is on the rise because fraud is a well-funded global operation fueled by deep knowledge sharing and sophisticated tools and resources. Year over year, fraud grows in frequency, size and complexity. Fraudsters have long been playing a cat and mouse game with digital businesses, rapidly bypassing their defenses and evolving tactics to maximize the ROI of cybercrime. Because profitability is the goal for purveyors of fraud and abuse, we are investing in a technology that is focused on breaking the business model of fraudsters. 

Since its founding, Arkose Labs has been thinking about fraud and abuse defense a little differently. Arkose’s mission is to upend the fraud economy by introducing friction to fraud operations and—as a result—diminish their efficiency and financial returns. The more time and resources fraudsters and bots deplete trying to bypass Arkose challenges, the less time they spend wreaking havoc on Arkose customers.

Arkose Labs provides an end-to-end anti-fraud platform that delivers high fidelity detection and prevention with its flagship products: Arkose Detect and Arkose Enforce. Arkose Detect—the risk engine—unearths patterns across devices and networks in real-time for behavioral analytics and anomaly detection. Suspicious traffic will immediately trigger Arkose’s enforcement layer.

Arkose Enforce is a challenge-response mechanism that works in conjunction with Arkose Detect to authenticate unrecognized requests. Unlike legacy technology, Arkose Enforce is adaptive and purpose-built for fraud prevention; it learns from past attacks and adapts as Arkose encounters innovative attack schemes.

Above and beyond the business opportunity, the user experience of Arkose piqued our interest. Arkose introduces both game design (Arkose Labs founder, Matthew Ford, was a game designer) and security principles—two seemingly unrelated disciplines—into its product. By design, good users are intended to intuitively solve the challenges (such as rotating an animal onto its feet) with ease while stumping bots and fraud rings.

No alt text provided for this image

Arkose Labs’s Enforcement Challenge as it appears on Microsoft.com. One of the features of Arkose Labs is that the look and feel mimic the website it protects.

Arkose’s solution is a light deployment that seamlessly integrates with customers’ existing infrastructure and protects against a wide variety of industry-specific and business-critical use cases, including: account takeover, new account fraud, fake reviews, gift card fraud, scalping and spam.

As companies experience fraud at unprecedented scale, Arkose customers—including product teams at Microsoft, GitHub, and Electronic Arts—are adopting Arkose to protect assets and reduce fraudulent activity. Arkose protects EA gamers from bot-led abuse of its in-game economy. Microsoft Outlook issues an Arkose challenge when a user attempts to send spam. GitHub uses Arkose at the point of registration to verify authenticity of sign ups. Fraud prevention is not for the faint-hearted, but Arkose provides 100% service-level-agreements (SLAs) to prevent inauthentic requests at scale to demonstrate a strong commitment to its customers.

The product speaks for itself, but what really sets this company apart is the incredible team at Arkose Labs. Arkose founders, Kevin Gosschalk (CEO) and Matthew Ford (VP of Product), and their leadership team boast phenomenal experiences combating fraud. When M12 met the team, it was clear that customer-centricity and enthusiasm for Arkose’s mission permeated throughout the organization. CISOs and fraud teams dream of the day when bots and abuse in the online world dwindle to zero. Until then, we’re excited to be working with a preeminent organization making strides against the fraud economy.

To learn more about M12, visit www.m12.vc.

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Free educational content now available in Minecraft Marketplace

The world is upside down right now. We’re learning lots of new phrases like social distancing, contact tracing, and stop snacking just because you’re bored. Everyone around the world is coming together to do their part, whether that’s working on finding a vaccine, delivering food and supplies, or staying indoors. Whatever the case, all of our daily routines have been thrown completely out of whack. It’s easy to get scared at a time like this, which is why focusing on something can help you stay calm. 

Educators around the world are doing everything they can to provide digital lessons for the half a billion students who are out of school due to the COVID-19 pandemic. This is not an easy task and we want to do our part to help keep young minds sharp and stimulated. 

If you head over to the Minecraft Marketplace, you will find some of our favorite lessons from Minecraft: Education Edition in a brand new Education category. These educational worlds can be played on your own, with your kids, parents or friends. From the comfort of your home, you can tour the International Space Station or even explore the inside of a human eye. We’ve also included ten worlds from our Marketplace creator community! Thanks to creators Everbloom, Jigarbov, Lifeboat, Razzleberries, The World Foundry, Blockworks, and Imagiverse you can explore renewable energy, marine biology, Greek history, and more! The worlds include lesson plans like creative writing activities, build challenges, and tricky puzzles. 

All of these worlds are launching today and are free to download through June 30, 2020.

Anyone with Minecraft for Bedrock platforms can find these worlds by launching Minecraft and visiting the in-game store. Minecraft is available on Android & iOS, Kindle Fire, Windows 10 PC, Gear VR, Oculus Rift, Fire TV, Xbox One, Windows MR, Nintendo Switch, and PlayStation 4. 

You can find the complete content list here: https://www.minecraft.net/en-us/marketplace/education

To learn more about distance learning with Minecraft: Education Edition, visit: https://aka.ms/remote-learning-blog

Stay safe, wherever you are. We’ll get through this.

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Bleeding Edge now available with Xbox Game Pass and on Xbox One, Windows 10 and Steam

Summary

  • Bleeding Edge is available now with Xbox Game Pass and on Xbox One, Windows 10 and Steam
  • Play from now until March 31 to unlock exclusive Punk Pack items
  • Mekko, everyone’s favorite trash-talking dolphin will be coming to the fight soon after launch

The day is finally here – Bleeding Edge is now available worldwide with Xbox Game Pass and on Xbox One, Windows 10, and Steam!

From humble beginnings as a passion project developed by a tiny team at Ninja Theory, it has been absolutely incredible to see Bleeding Edge smash its way into the hands of our fans, and we couldn’t be more excited to see you all out there in the arena.

For the uninitiated, Bleeding Edge is a unique 4v4 online brawler that showcases exhilarating combo-based action combat and strategic objective-based gameplay. Best experienced with friends or open communication with other players, Bleeding Edge redefines the meaning of squad goals and really puts the team in teamwork. At launch, Bleeding Edge features a diverse roster of 11 larger-than-life fighters hailing from the edges of society, 5 vibrant sprawling cyberpunk arenas, and 2 fast-paced game modes: Objective Control and Power Collection. 

As an Xbox Play Anywhere title, Bleeding Edge is fully cross play and cross save between both Xbox One and Windows 10 and also with Steam – this means that if you played during our Closed Beta, all your progress will be saved for launch.

If you’re an active Xbox Game Pass member, you can play Bleeding Edge as part of your existing Xbox Game Pass membership! Also, if you play from today until March 31, you’ll unlock our exclusive Punk Pack that includes three fighter skins, Rioter’s hoverboard, an in-game sticker pack, and three fighter emotes. For more information, please visit BleedingEdge.com

Those who pre-ordered Bleeding Edge will also receive the Punk Pack.

What’s new for launch?

We have a new map available in the rotation: Landslide!
Landslide is set in sunny Mexico and features unique defensive power ups, and a
few mini trains. Getting hit by a train packs a fair punch, so be sure to push
or freeze your opponents on the tracks at just the right moment.

What’s coming later?

Mekko, everyone’s favorite trash-talking dolphin will be coming to Bleeding Edge soon as a post-launch update. Check his fighter page here on our website to read up on his moves.

We’ll continue to support Bleeding Edge, but we also want to hear from you, the community. Please join our Discord or visit our forums to tell us what you think of Bleeding Edge. As we always say, your feedback is very valuable to us in helping shape the game and make it the best it can be. We couldn’t be more grateful for having such a passionate and dedicated community that have been with the game since technical alpha – thanks to your feedback, we’ve made some fantastic recent changes and additions to Bleeding Edge, such as improving the pacing of our Power Collection game mode and adding anti-heal mods and abilities.

You can follow us on Twitter, Instagram or Facebook to hear the latest and greatest from the devs.

So, what are you waiting for? Grab your team and ready up
for some hypercharged 4v4 action, on us!

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Delivering information and eliminating bottlenecks with CDC’s COVID-19 assessment bot

In a crisis like the COVID-19 pandemic, it’s not only important to deliver medical care but to also provide information to help people make decisions and prevent health systems from being overwhelmed.

Microsoft is helping with this challenge by offering its Healthcare Bot service powered by Microsoft Azure to organizations on the frontlines of the COVID-19 response to help screen patients for potential infection and care.

For example, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) just released a COVID-19 assessment bot that can quickly assess the symptoms and risk factors for people worried about infection, provide information and suggest a next course of action such as contacting a medical provider or, for those who do not need in-person medical care, managing the illness safely at home.

The bot, which utilizes Microsoft’s Healthcare Bot service, will initially be available on the CDC website.

Public health organizations, hospitals and others on the frontlines of the COVID-19 response need to be able to respond to inquiries, provide the public with up-to-date outbreak information, track exposure, quickly triage new cases and guide next steps.  Many have expressed great concern about the overwhelming demand COVID-19 is creating on resources such as urgent, emergency and nursing care.

In particular, the need to screen patients with any number of cold or flu-like symptoms — to determine who has high enough risk factors to need access to limited medical resources and which people may more safely care for themselves at home — is a bottleneck that threatens to overwhelm health systems coping with the crisis.

Microsoft’s Healthcare Bot service is one solution that uses artificial intelligence (AI) to help the CDC and other frontline organizations respond to these inquiries, freeing up doctors, nurses, administrators and other healthcare professionals to provide critical care to those who need it.

The Healthcare Bot service is a scalable Azure-based public cloud service that allows organizations to quickly build and deploy an AI-powered bot for websites or applications that can offer patients or the general public personalized access to health-related information through a natural conversation experience. It can be easily customized to suit an organization’s own scenarios and protocols.

To assist customers in the rapid deployment of their COVID-19 bots, Microsoft is making available a set of COVID-19 response templates that customers can use and modify:

  • COVID-19 risk assessment based on CDC guidelines
  • COVID-19 clinical triage based on CDC protocols
  • COVID-19 up-to-date answers to frequently asked questions
  • COVID-19 worldwide metrics
COVID-19 assessment bot screenshots
Screenshots from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention COVID-19 assessment bot.

Providence, one of the largest health systems in the U.S. headquartered near Seattle and serving seven Western states, had previously used Microsoft’s Healthcare Bot service running on Azure to create a healthcare chatbot named Grace that could help answer patient’s questions online. Using CDC guidelines and its own clinical protocols, Providence was able to build a similar Coronavirus Assessment Tool in just three days to help people in the communities it serves know whether they should seek medical attention for their respiratory symptoms.

The tool, which launched in early March, can bring a prospective patient directly into a telehealth session with a clinician to get immediate care.  It also aims to prevent healthy people or those with mild symptoms from showing up at clinics and emergency departments, which helps to limit community infection and save hospital beds and equipment for those who need it.

Other providers who are now using Microsoft’s Healthcare Bot service to respond to COVID-19 inquiries include:

Virginia Mason Health System, based in Seattle and serving the Pacific Northwest region, has created a patient assessment Healthcare Bot to help its patients understand whether care is needed. The instance is live and has thousands of daily users.

Novant Health, a healthcare provider in four states in the Southeast with one of the largest medical groups in the country, has created a Healthcare bot for COVID-19 information that went live on its website within a few days, with thousands of daily users since its launch.

Across all users, customized instances of Microsoft’s Healthcare Bot service are now fielding more than 1 million messages per day from members of the public who are concerned about COVID-19 infections — a number we expect to escalate quickly to meet growing needs. We hope the answers it can provide will curb anxiety that the “worried well” may experience without clear guidance and save lives by speeding the path to care for those who need it most.

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Celebrate 2 years of Sea of Thieves on Xbox One and Windows 10 with free play and lots more this weekend

Sea of Thieves – Celebrate Our Second Anniversary with a Bonanza Weekend!

It’s been two years since Sea of Thieves arrived on Xbox One and Windows 10, and what years they’ve been. Since launch, we’ve seen over 10 million pirates plundering the seas, and during the last 24 months we’ve forged on with the wind in our sails to deliver an abundance of additions to the game – most notably in 2019’s Anniversary Update and with the introduction of monthly content updates from last July.

We’re incredibly proud of how far we’ve journeyed from launch, and we’re excited to continue making waves with future content updates. We’re humbled by how many player stories we’ve seen shared, and our community continually inspires us. So we can’t wait to show you all what’s on the horizon – but for now, we want to celebrate everything that’s come before!

As a thank you to our players and a celebration of all things Sea of Thieves, we’ve planned a programme of challenges and goodies kicking off this weekend and running throughout March’s content update. There’s a lot of in-game swag to be bagged for making all the right moves, so let’s take a look at the line-up!

Play Sea of Thieves free this weekend

To start with, an incentive if you’re not one of the millions of pirates who’ve joined us on the seas already: Sea of Thieves is part of the Xbox Free Play Days this weekend, and will be free for all Xbox Live subscribers to play until March 23rd! Don’t worry about being a late starter as all new pirates are eased into the game via the Maiden Voyage, a narrative-driven tutorial experience that provides guidance and information to fledgling sailors.

Enter the Heart of Fire

Let’s not forget this month’s free content update, Heart of Fire. Live since March 12th, this update brings the next fiery Tall Tale to Sea of Thieves, Athena’s Run Voyages for Pirate Legends and some brand new missiles in the form of chainshot for your cannons and throwable Blunderbombs.

Heart of Fire: Official Sea of Thieves Content Update

Duration 4:52

Bag the Anniversary Eye of Reach

What would a birthday be without a present? If you play Sea of Thieves between Thursday, March 19th and Friday, March 27th, you’ll get the very special, very golden ‘X Marks the Spot’ Eye of Reach! For those of you who will want to equip it straight away, don’t worry – the weapon will appear in your armoury immediately upon entering the game.

Snap up the skeletal Spinal Figurehead

As made famous in Rare’s ’90s fighting game Killer Instinct (and resurrected for the modern version in 2013), Spinal can be claimed for the front of your ship just by watching Sea of Thieves’ anniversary stream at mixer.com/seaofthieves on Friday, March 20th. Make sure your Microsoft and Sea of Thieves accounts are linked so that you qualify for this MixPot item, sign in and join us there from 5pm-7pm GMT!

Set sail with Ori and the Will of the Wisps

If you’re joining Sea of Thieves via Game Pass Ultimate, don’t forget you can also claim the wonderful Ori-inspired ship set to carry you into adventure. This gorgeous new livery is available exclusively to Game Pass Ultimate subscribers from March 18th, and you can see it in all its glowing glory right here:

Ancestral Ship Set Reveal Trailer – Official Sea of Thieves

Duration 0:41

Relive some of Sea of Thieves’ greatest moments

From Friday, March 20th, pirates will also be able relive some of the greatest Sea of Thieves moments from the last two years. Take a truncated tour through The Hungering Deep, Cursed Sails and Forsaken Shores to bag cosmetics previously limited to the first time these updates launched. For example, if you hadn’t taken to the seas or missed your chance to bag Merrick’s drum the first time around, you’ll have the opportunity to earn it now – allowing everyone to get a taste of some of the events they might have missed from year one!

Turn the seas red with Bleeding Edge

The fun doesn’t stop there. From March 30th, you’ll also be able to unlock some awesome Bleeding Edge ship cosmetics. Pirates will be challenged throughout the week with three objectives, and motivated to complete them with stunning Bleeding Edge-inspired sail, flag and hull designs. As with the Hunter’s Haul event last month, you’ll also be able to track your progress through these objectives here on the Sea of Thieves website – so stay tuned for more info on this event which is set to see the seas turn red…

Want to find out more about Sea of Thieves? Follow us at any of our social channels below, then take the plunge and embark on an epic journey with one of gaming’s most welcoming communities!

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It’s been two years since Sea of Thieves arrived on Xbox One and Windows 10, and what years they’ve been. Since launch, we’ve seen over 10 million pirates plundering the seas, and during the last 24 months we’ve forged on with the wind in our sails to deliver an abundance of additions to the game – most notably in 2019’s Anniversary Update and with the introduction of monthly content updates from last July.

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We’re incredibly proud of how far we’ve journeyed from launch, and we’re excited to continue making waves with future content updates. We’re humbled by how many player stories we’ve seen shared, and our community continually inspires us. So we can’t wait to show you all what’s on the horizon – but for now, we want to celebrate everything that’s come before!

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As a thank you to our players and a celebration of all things Sea of Thieves, we’ve planned a programme of challenges and goodies kicking off this weekend and running throughout March’s content update. There’s a lot of in-game swag to be bagged for making all the right moves, so let’s take a look at the line-up!

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Play Sea of Thieves free this weekend

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To start with, an incentive if you’re not one of the millions of pirates who’ve joined us on the seas already: Sea of Thieves is part of the Xbox Free Play Days this weekend, and will be free for all Xbox Live subscribers to play until March 23rd! Don’t worry about being a late starter as all new pirates are eased into the game via the Maiden Voyage, a narrative-driven tutorial experience that provides guidance and information to fledgling sailors.

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Enter the Heart of Fire

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Let’s not forget this month’s free content update, Heart of Fire. Live since March 12th, this update brings the next fiery Tall Tale to Sea of Thieves, Athena’s Run Voyages for Pirate Legends and some brand new missiles in the form of chainshot for your cannons and throwable Blunderbombs.

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Bag the Anniversary Eye of Reach

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What would a birthday be without a present? If you play Sea of Thieves between Thursday, March 19th and Friday, March 27th, you’ll get the very special, very golden ‘X Marks the Spot’ Eye of Reach! For those of you who will want to equip it straight away, don’t worry – the weapon will appear in your armoury immediately upon entering the game.

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Snap up the skeletal Spinal Figurehead

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As made famous in Rare’s ’90s fighting game Killer Instinct (and resurrected for the modern version in 2013), Spinal can be claimed for the front of your ship just by watching Sea of Thieves’ anniversary stream at mixer.com/seaofthieves on Friday, March 20th. Make sure your Microsoft and Sea of Thieves accounts are linked so that you qualify for this MixPot item, sign in and join us there from 5pm-7pm GMT!

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Set sail with Ori and the Will of the Wisps

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If you’re joining Sea of Thieves via Game Pass Ultimate, don’t forget you can also claim the wonderful Ori-inspired ship set to carry you into adventure. This gorgeous new livery is available exclusively to Game Pass Ultimate subscribers from March 18th, and you can see it in all its glowing glory right here:

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Relive some of Sea of Thieves’ greatest moments

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From Friday, March 20th, pirates will also be able relive some of the greatest Sea of Thieves moments from the last two years. Take a truncated tour through The Hungering Deep, Cursed Sails and Forsaken Shores to bag cosmetics previously limited to the first time these updates launched. For example, if you hadn’t taken to the seas or missed your chance to bag Merrick’s drum the first time around, you’ll have the opportunity to earn it now – allowing everyone to get a taste of some of the events they might have missed from year one!

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Turn the seas red with Bleeding Edge

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The fun doesn’t stop there. From March 30th, you’ll also be able to unlock some awesome Bleeding Edge ship cosmetics. Pirates will be challenged throughout the week with three objectives, and motivated to complete them with stunning Bleeding Edge-inspired sail, flag and hull designs. As with the Hunter’s Haul event last month, you’ll also be able to track your progress through these objectives here on the Sea of Thieves website – so stay tuned for more info on this event which is set to see the seas turn red…

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Want to find out more about Sea of Thieves? Follow us at any of our social channels below, then take the plunge and embark on an epic journey with one of gaming’s most welcoming communities!

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Take part in The Hungering Deep Anniversary event now!

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Our Hungering Deep Anniversaryevent has ended – check out your final stats!

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Ready your cannons as Cursed Sails arrives, the second free update for Sea of Thieves, debuting terrifying skeleton ships and more new content alongside a time-limited campaign.

\n\n

Pirate dominion over the waters is being challenged by crews of skeletons, united by their warped desire for vengeance on the living. Each region will be called out, so prepare to fight to protect your favourite Outposts! Form Alliances to share the rewards of co-operation, or perhaps the new three-person Brigantine ship will help to even the odds?

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Take part in The Hungering Deep Anniversary event now!

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The power of mentorships in bringing more women into cybersecurity

From the way our industry tackles cyber threats, to the language we have developed to describe these attacks, I’ve long been a proponent to challenging traditional schools of thought—traditional cyber-norms—and encouraging our industry to get outside its comfort zones. It’s important to expand our thinking in how we address the evolving threat landscape. That’s why I’m not a big fan of stereotypes; looking at someone and saying they “fit the mold.” Looking at my CV, one would think I wanted to study law, or politics, not become a cybersecurity professional. These biases and unconscious biases shackle our progression. The scale of our industry challenges is too great, and if we don’t push boundaries, we miss out on the insights that differences in race, gender, ethnicity, sexuality, neurology, ability, and degrees can bring.

As we seek to diversify the talent pool, a key focus needs to be on nurturing female talent. Microsoft has hired many women in security, and we will always focus on keeping a diverse workforce. That’s why as we celebrate Women in Cybersecurity Month and International Women’s Day, the security blog will feature a few women cybersecurity leaders who have been implementing some of their great ideas for how to increase the number of women in this critical field. I’ll kick off the series with some thoughts on how we can build strong mentoring relationships and networks that encourage women to pursue careers in cybersecurity.

There are many women at Microsoft who lead our security efforts. I’m incredibly proud to be among these women, like Joy Chik, Corporate Vice President of Identity, who is pushing the boundaries on how the tech industry is thinking about going passwordless, and Valecia Maclin, General Manager of Security Engineering, who is challenging us to think outside the box when it comes to our security solutions. On my own team, I think of the many accomplishments of  Ping Look, who co-founded Black Hat and now leads our Detection and Response Team (DART), Sian John, MBE, who was recently recognized as one of the top 50 influencers in cybersecurity in the U.K., and Diana Kelley, Microsoft CTO, who tirelessly travels to the globe to share how we are empowering our customers through cybersecurity—just to name a few. It’s important we continue to highlight women like these, including our female cybersecurity professionals at Microsoft who made the Top 100 Cybersecurity list in 2019. The inspiration from their accomplishments goes far beyond our Microsoft campus. These women represent the many Microsoft women in our talented security team. This month, you’ll also hear from some of them in subsequent blog posts on how to keep the diverse talent you already have employed. And to conclude the month, Theresa Payton, CEO at Fortalice Solutions, LLC., and the host of our CISO Spotlight series will share tips from her successful experience recruiting talented women into IT and cybersecurity.

Our cyber teams must be as diverse as the problems we are trying to solve

You’ve heard me say this many times, and I truly believe this: As an industry, we’ve already acknowledged the power of diversity—in artificial intelligence (AI). We have clear evidence that a variety of data across multiple sources and platforms enhances and improves AI and machine learning models. Why wouldn’t we apply that same advantage to our teams? This is one of several reasons why we need to take diversity and inclusion seriously:

  • Diverse teams make better and faster decisions 87 percent of the time compared with all male teams, yet the actual number of women in our field fluctuates between 10 and 20 percent. What ideas have we missed by not including more women?
  • With an estimated shortfall of 3.5 million security professionals by 2021, the current tech talent pipeline needs to expand—urgently.
  • Cyber criminals will continue to exploit the unconscious bias inherent in the industry by understanding and circumventing the homogeneity of our methods. If we are to win the cyber wars through the element of surprise, we need to make our strategy less predictable.

Mentoring networks must start early

Mentorship can be a powerful tool for increasing the number of women in cybersecurity. People select careers that they can imagine themselves doing. This process starts young. Recently a colleague’s pre-teen daughter signed up for an after-school robotics class. When she showed up at the class, only two other girls were in the room. Girls are opting out of STEM before they can (legally) opt into a PG-13 movie. But we can change this. By exposing girls to technology earlier, we can reduce the intimidation factor and get them excited. One group that is doing this is the Security Advisor Alliance. Get involved in organizations like this to reach girls and other underrepresented groups before they decide cybersecurity is not for them.

Building a strong network

Mentoring young people is important, but to solve the diversity challenges, we also need to bring in people who started on a different career path or who don’t have STEM degrees. You simply won’t find the talent you need through the anemic pipeline of college-polished STEM graduates. I recently spoke with Mari Galloway, a senior security architect in the gaming industry and CEO of the Women’s Society of Cyberjutsu (WSC) about this very topic in my podcast. She agreed on the importance of finding a mentor, and being a mentee.

Those seeking to get into cybersecurity need a network that provides the encouragement and constructive feedback that will help them grow. I have mentored several non-technical women who have gone on to have successful roles in cybersecurity. These relationships have been very rewarding for me and my mentees, which is why I advocate that everybody should become a mentor and a mentee.

If you haven’t broken into cybersecurity yet, or if you are in the field and want to grow your career, here are a few tips:

  • Close the skills gap through training and certificate programs offered by organizations like Sans Institute and ISC2. I am especially excited about Girls Go Cyberstart, a program for young people that Microsoft is working on with Sans Institute.
  • Build up your advocate bench with the following types of mentors:
    • Career advocate: Someone who helps you with your career inside your company or the one you want to enter.
    • Coach: Someone outside your organization who brings a different perspective to troubleshooting day-to-day problems.
    • Senior advisor: Someone inside or outside your organization who looks out for the next step in your career.
  • Use social media to engage in online forums, find local events, and reach experts. Several of my mentees use LinkedIn to start the conversation.
  • When you introduce yourself to someone online be clear that you are interested in their cumulative experience not just their job status.

For those already in cybersecurity, be open to those from the outside seeking guidance, especially if they don’t align with traditional expectations of who a cybersecurity professional is.

Mentorship relationships that yield results

A mentorship is only going to be effective if the mentee gets valuable feedback and direction from the relationship. This requires courageous conversations. It’s easy to celebrate a mentee’s visible wins. However, those moments are the result of unseen trench work that consists of course correcting and holding each other accountable to agreed upon actions. Be prepared to give and receive constructive, actionable feedback.

Creating inclusive cultures

More women and diverse talent should be hired in security not only because it is the right thing to do, but because gaining the advantage in fighting cybercrime depends on it. ​Mentorship is one strategy to include girls before they opt out of tech, and to recruit people from non-STEM backgrounds.

What’s next

Watch for Diana Kelley’s blog about how to create a culture that keeps women in the field.

Learn more about Girls Go Cyberstart.

Bookmark the Security blog to keep up with our expert coverage on security matters. Also, follow us at @MSFTSecurity for the latest news and updates on cybersecurity. Or reach out to me on LinkedIn or Twitter.

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Microsoft Teams at 3: New features and the importance of enabling remote work


Microsoft Teams at 3: Everything you need to connect with your teammates and be more productive

This week marks the third anniversary of Microsoft Teams. It’s been an incredible three years, and we’re inspired to see the way organizations across the globe are using Teams to transform the way they work. Today, we’re sharing some new Teams capabilities across a few different aspects of the Teams experience, many with a tie to meetings.

Read more

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What we can learn from the current school closures about how to support remote learning

From time to time, we feature guest blogs from educators who are making a difference in the lives of young people and who are eager to share their success with the Microsoft Education community. These  Changemakers, as we call them, offer insights into the effective use of classroom resources, how to prepare today’s youth for the jobs of tomorrow, and ways that technology can personalize instruction and empower students to lead in their learning. Today’s Changemaker blog was written by Meredith Roe, virtual school program manager for Catholic Education Western Australia. 

The global COVID-19 outbreak is challenging the continuity of learning for schools and other education institutions. Whether you’re at a school that has experience with remote learning, or one that’s learning how to implement it in the moment, there are resources available to help. I’ve found Microsoft Office 365 tools can be especially useful for remote learning. 

The learning opportunity 

Events that close schools can leave us with a sense of loss, sadness and worry, and going remote can come with negative connotations or be considered a second-rate option. However, if we try to see the current crisis, hard as it might be, as a chance for reflection and staff and student skill development, then remote learning seems like less of a burden. Let’s be clear, though, there are important conditions that must be met for remote learning to succeed. I’ve listed the ones that I believe are critical here. 

Staff professional development  

Developing teacher skills ought to be a top priority for any school or system. We can ensure quality learning continues if we prepare teachers through strategic planning and meaningful professional learning opportunities. 

There lots of options for delivering high-quality professional learning. Here are some examples, all of which should be possible to try even during a closure. 

  • Online courses through the Microsoft Educator Community
  • School- or system-led webinars delivered via Teams
  • Access to existing resources in a OneNote or a SharePoint site or many of the other resources that Microsoft have created specifically for remote learning. 

Remember, Teams and OneNote, along with other Office 365 tools, can provide a platform for easy collaboration and communication and access to resources.  

Spending time to skill up for distance learning during ordinary times is worthwhile. If a school ends up not needing to close in the event of an emergency, it will simply have had an opportunity to engage staff in learning that helps integrate technology into the curriculum. It’s hard to argue against that! 

One great resource is the Network of Microsoft Authorized Global Training Partners, which is available to help schools develop a comprehensive professional development plan and staff training. 

Student skill development  

Experience with remote learning can help students gain the skills needed to transition to post-secondary settings, such as college and the workforce. Among other things, it can build resilience and the ability to collaborate and problem solve.

Students need to be given some independence and taught technical skills to be ready for distance learning. Here are some ideas: 

  • Use the Praise app in Microsoft Teams as a badging system and feedback tool when working on skills development.
  • Involve students in your remote learning planning by using Polly, a way to conduct polls in Teams, to determine structure of the class team. 
  • Through Flipgrid you can gather student voice, such as what they perceive as challenges and opportunities during remote learning days. 
  • Microsoft Forms is terrific for feedback, including after a school-closure event is over. 

During the school year, it’s a good idea to promote remote learning as it will provide parents with a springboard for conversations with their children about the importance of keeping learning going.  

Clear expectations  

Clear expectations are essential to make remote learning work. These should include expectations around: 

  • Educator and staff availability
  • Communication tools and strategies 
  • The completion of student work
  • Staff response time to student questions

Ensuring everyone understands these expectations prior to starting remote learning will avoid rash decisions during an emergency. While these plans can be documented in a text-based tool, consider also recording a message in Flipgrid or Stream so staff can access those during the remote learning period if clarification is needed. Also add them to a OneNote document, as a tab in a staff team, for easy access.  

Communication strategy 

During an event that requires schools to move to distance learning, school and system leaders have to communicate regularly with key stakeholders including parents, students, staff, and the relevant authorities. Teams can be a huge help. 

Creating a staff Team will help school leaders and teaching staff remain connected, enable easy sharing of resources, and contribute to a supportive community.  Asking staff to ‘like’ your posts in Teams is an easy way for administrators to make sure all parties are seeing what you’re communicating. And adding the Insights app as a tab in your team will also give you detailed data on staff activity in Posts.  

Staff support 

Remote learning can feel isolating, but with Teams, educators can remain connected to their department leaders, school leaders, and each other. School leaders also need to be visible during remote learning, which can mean: 

  • Being an active member of the team – liking staff posts (emoji’s)
  • Posting a daily staff message of encouragement (announcements)
  • Sharing best practices (through a collaboration space in a Class Notebook, embedded in the Team)
  • Showcasing examples of great work by staff (using the praise tool in Teams)
  • And encouraging the usual banter that would occur in the school corridors and staffroom (gifs, memes).  

Don’t miss the opportunity to also connect and share via Teams calls, which you can record for staff unable to attend the live call, or a Flipgrid video. 

Backup plan 

As educators we know, there will always be a need for a backup plan. It’s true when physically in the classroom, and its true with remote learning. A staff member or student might be without internet, for example. Keep in mind that if students sync their OneNote/Class Notebook before leaving school at the point of closure, they can continue to work offline.   

The more opportunities students and staff are given to use the tools needed to make distance learning a success, the smoother the transition to this type of learning will be. In an ideal world, such a transition would be seamless and the disruption to learning limited. I think that’s achievable with Teams, OneNote, and other Office 365 tools but, going forward, planning and preparation are the key to making this possible!