Microsoft President and Vice Chair Brad Smith speaks with leaders in government, business and culture to explore the world’s most critical challenges at the intersection of technology and society.
As a 30-year veteran of an industry driven by disruption, Brad Smith hosts candid conversations with his guests that examine, reframe and explore potential solutions to the digital issues shaping our world today, including cybersecurity, privacy, digital inclusion, environmental sustainability, artificial intelligence and human rights.
Similar trends are being recorded around the world for television, social media and other channels that provide video content.
Is it estimated that in Japan, over 360,000 people are Deaf or Hard of Hearing – 70,000 of them use sign language as their primary form of communication, while the rest prefer written Japanese as the primary way of accessing content. Additionally, with nearly 30 percent of people in Japan aged 65 or older, the Japan Hearing Aid Industry Association estimates 14.2 million people have a hearing disability.
Major Japanese broadcasters have subtitles for a majority of their programs, which requires a process that includes dedicated staff and the use of specialized equipment valued at tens of millions of Japanese yens. “Over 100 local TV channels in Japan face barriers in providing subtitles for live programs due to the high cost of equipment and limitations of personnel” said Muneya Ichise from SI-com. The local stations are of high importance to the communities they serve, with the local news programs conveying significant updates concerning the area and its population.
To address this accessibility need, starting 2018, SI-com and its parent company, ISCEC Japan, have been piloting with local TV stations innovative and cost-efficient ways of introducing subtitles to live broadcasting. Their technical solution to offer subtitles for live broadcasting, AI Mimi, is an innovative pairing between human input and the power of Microsoft Azure Cognitive Service, creating a more accurate and faster solution through the hybrid format. Furthermore, ISCEC is able to compensate for the shortage of people inputting subtitles locally by leveraging their own specialized personnel. AI-Mimi has also been introduced at Okinawa University and the innovation was recognized and awarded a Microsoft AI for Accessibility grant.
Based on extensive testing and user feedback, themed around the need for bigger fonts and better display of the subtitles on the screen, SI-com is able to create a model with over 10 lines of subtitles on the right side of the TV screen, moving away from the more commonly used version with only two lines in display at the bottom. In December 2021, they demoed the technology for the first time, in a live broadcast, partnering with a local TV channel in Nagasaki.
TV screenshot of demo with local TV channel in Nagasaki
Let’s take a little trip. It is raining in Seattle today (surprise, surprise), so we have decided to head to San Diego for the weekend as the weather should be better there. The first thing we want to do is figure out how far it is from Seattle to San Diego, as well as find nearby gas stations with an easy map experience. We’ve heard the drive is beautiful, especially along the Oregon coast, so let’s calculate the driving distance using the Bing Maps Distance Calculator.
Distance Calculation
The Bing Maps Distance Calculator App will generate the distance between two places on the map. Enter “Seattle” in the “Add a Place” box in the left-hand navigation. You’ll see it added to the the list below the input box. Then, enter “San Diego.” There are multiple places in the world called San Diego, so select “San Diego, CA” from the disambiguation list box.
With each input a flag is placed on the map and, after you select San Diego, a distance calculation will kick in and calculate the distance for one or more routes. So, next to the arrow directions icon you’ll see just how many miles it is to drive, transit or walk from Seattle to San Diego (you can also switch to kilometers).
Just like you might expect, the Distance Calculation app allows users to tweak map settings. Using “Add Desitination” will allow you to add points of interest along the way and you can re-order these and the route will be recalculated. You can also click and drag the route itself to take different roads as you see fit.
Click the “Go” button and the map will calculate the fastest route distance between Seattle and San Diego. There’s also a route line drawn on the map to represent the driving directions. We can now add a stop to say, Newport, OR to visit the Aquarium on the Oregon Coast. Before adding that stop we could see it is about 1255 miles to take the more western coastal route versus 1268 miles for the inland route so that was an easy choice! We can now also decide if it is worth adding Newport, OR as it extends extends the distance to 1366 miles.
Moving the end points will not only change the destination (or origin), but it will also reverse geocode the location (estimate the address where you moved the pin). We could also add stops on our journey by simply typing over with another location in the box — like Phoenix, AZ. The Distance Calculator Map App will add the summation of all points as the result. So, now driving from Seattle to Vegas to is about 1,247 miles and driving all the way through to Phoenix is 1,541 miles.
The location list provides the calculation next to the destination from the previous stop, so now we can see the distance from Seattle to Vegas and Vegas to Phoenix, in addition to the whole trip. We should note that the top right options also offer Dark road, Aerial and Streetside modes. However, the whole idea was to drive along the coast, so let’s set off on the route from Seattle to San Diego and figure out the cost of gas using the Gas Prices Map App.
Gas Prices
The Gas Prices Map feature is pretty self-explanatory – it finds gas prices within a 5-mile radius of where you’re searching. It also doubles as a gas station finder app. So, we’ll look closer at the beginning of our route in Seattle and find the closest gas station with the best price. Because we can have two map apps running simultaneously in different browser pages, we can see our route from Seattle to San Diego still on the map. This allows us to see where these gas stations are relative to our route. So, while Union 76 is $5.90 per gallon, there’s a Shell station that’s $5.52 per gallon and that is a significant difference of 38 cents per gallon, so it does pay to shop around before you leave.
Starting the Gas Prices Map App loads all gas stations as soon as you ask; it’s as quick as the Distance Calculator App because they are all supported by Bing Places and Bing Maps. You’ll notice the branded icons on the left navigation panel with name, address, and price information per station along with pins on the map. Clicking on any of the pins will pop up a callout that gives you the same information, plus the last date and time the information was updated. There’s also a link to get directions from within Bing Maps. Clicking on any of the gas stations found on the left-hand navigation of the app will recenter the map to the respective gas station.
Alright! So, we’ve decided to drive, we’re fueled up and on our way. After enjoying the beautiful Pacific Coast, we get to San Diego and head down to the waterfront. Now, we need a parking spot to let the car cool off and enjoy that cool ocean breeze. Enter the Parking Finder Map App.
Parking Finder
The Distance Calculator App will get us to our destination, and now we’ll need to find a place to park safely. The Parking Finder Map App helps users find a place to park their car. There’s just so much more, though! The Parking Finder Map App uses contextual business information just like the Gas Prices Map App.
Even before you select a parking lot by clicking on the respective pin on the map, you’ll get a list with contextual information such as address, hours, and a phone number at the left of the map. Hovering over each “P” pin may also get information about the type of lot such as outdoor and self-parking plus the payment types they accept if that information is available. Getting there is just as easy as finding gas stations in a map app.
The app uses the Bing Maps One-Click Directions feature for calculating directions to the respective lot. Just click the link, select your current location as the starting point and the route will be calculated for you with step-by-step directions within Bing Maps.
How to get there — Isochrone API
Distance by time features are powered by the versatile Isochrone API — here’s how it works. Rather than using a distance circle to reduce the area to be searched, Isochrone polygones represent answers to “Where can I get to within 30 minutes by car, foot or transit?”. Think of any major city that has a river running through it. Places on the far side of the river are physically close but are actually harder to get to as you need to find a bridge to cross and isochrones take this into account. For this reason, isochrones completely change the way we think about calculating distances and travel times from point A to B. In fact, the Bing Maps Isochrone API also supports multiple stops if you’re planning a longer journey or expect to use multiple transit routes. This is achieved with the use of isoline polygons that can quickly visualize the distance you can travel in a given time, or vice versa.
This is particularly useful for automotive travelers who are using a map app to find nearby gas stations within a limited travel distance because they are low on fuel. Alternatively, this feature can come in handy for electric vehicle users who are planning trips around charging stations with range constraints in mind. Support for multiple modes of transportation, including walking, car, and public transportation, means that you’ll always have a tool you can use to navigate, even in an emergency.
For more on the Isochrone API, check out our LinkedIn customer story! The LinkedIn team used location intelligence, the Isochrone API, and other intuitive mapping features to provide users with the ability to visualize potential commutes when looking for jobs. Developers can use this API to turn simple gas station finder apps into location-aware solutions with distance calculation and other features. See a live demonstratation of the Isochrone API with sample code at samples.bingmapsportal.com.
Finding Gas and Parking With Location Intelligence
The difference between a good mapping app and a great one is location intelligence. The ability to add local insights to your maps can completely revamp the user experience — and that’s exactly what gas and parking finder apps do. Bing Maps API’s location intelligence uses geolocation to provide users with contextually relevant information for any given location. Whether it’s gas stations, restaurants, or hotels, location intelligence makes every step of the trip easier.
Similarly, you can plan ahead by getting a streetside view of potential gas stations found on the map. This is accomplished with Bing Maps API’s collection of high-resolution location data. Aerial imagery allows users to get a bird’s eye view of various attractions and points of interest, while travelers that are even more curious can switch over to a streetside view for a close-up.
Distance calculation, gas prices and parking finder apps are just a glimpse of what you can do with the full range of Bing Maps API features. Users can add multiple stops to their route, add locations to favorites for future visits, and view real-time traffic data – all in the same app.
So, there you have it — a little weekend getaway from Seattle along the beautiful Pacific Coast to spend some time in San Diego, all powered by Bing Maps. Although, we’re probably going to hit Bing Travel to fly home and have the car shipped back since 20+ hours of driving is good enough for us.
Calculating distances is just the start with Bing Maps API. Use it to manage and automate multiple itineraries or geocode hundreds of locations simultaneously. Create a key today to get started.
Team Xbox honors Disability Pride month for the first time, uplifting our extraordinary Gaming and Disability community. As a member of the disability community and an Xbox Accessibility Program Manager, I’d like to highlight the importance of celebrating people with disabilities. Disability Pride is about acknowledging our own unique experiences with disability as a natural and beautiful aspect of human diversity. This includes all disabilities – both seen and unseen. This is our chance to highlight the vast spectrum of people represented by this moment, including advocates past and present working to create more inclusive and accessible experiences across all facets of life. This is an opportunity for Xbox to celebrate the more than 400 million video game players with disabilities around the world (source), as we aim to create a space where people with disabilities don’t feel the need to mask or cover their disabilities, but find connection among an inclusive gaming community that celebrates us as we are.
As someone with multiple invisible disabilities, the tendency to mask and cover resonates with me. We must work to remove this barrier for so many who feel that they must hide their disabilities to fit in or make others feel more comfortable. It took many years, but with the support of friends and family I’ve learned to embrace the importance of my mental health, chronic pain, and attention-deficit-related disabilities as key aspects of my identity. Like so many others in the disability community, it drives the work I find meaningful and has led to amazing opportunities to work on projects near and dear to my heart. This includes our new Mental Health Guidelines section of our Xbox Accessibility Guidelines that launched in May.
My connection to this community began with the nonprofit work my father does with wounded veterans through Warfighter Engaged. It grew as I pursued a career in occupational therapy before joining Team Xbox. I have witnessed so many navigating their own journeys with temporary and permanent disabilities. For myself and many others, gaming commonly played a powerful role in unlocking opportunities to connect socially with others and build a community of support through fun and engaging mediums. Gaming is a staple of modern culture today, and it should be inclusive of everyone who wants to play. This inspires my work and the work of my team, as we remain vigilant in our dedication to helping the disability community feel heard, included, and supported in accessing gaming in a way that brings them joy and community.
As we honor Disability Pride, here are a few ways that Xbox is celebrating and uplifting our Gaming and Disability community in July and beyond:
Ways to connect and join our community!
Team Xbox is excited to offer features and resources that support and enable the Gaming and Disability community to come together, play, and be who they are. We remain committed to providing gaming experiences that invite all players to share in the joy and connection of gaming. Learn more.
American Sign Language (ASL) Xbox Twitch Channel – Two months ago, Xbox launched an American Sign Language (ASL) Xbox channel on Twitch at /XboxASL in partnership with Sorenson, a communications company with the largest interpreter base in the world. Every day, the Xbox Plays team goes live on the Xbox Twitch channel, playing the latest and greatest titles from the world of Xbox. The channel features interpretation for approximately 25 hours of livestreams each week. Visit the new channel here and learn more about Xbox’s partnership with Sorenson here.
Filter capabilities on tags making it easier to discover the next game you will love – Last fall, Xbox announced the addition of Accessibility Feature Tags for games in the Xbox Store, making it easier for players to find games that have one or more of the 20 accessibility tags that were defined in partnership with the disability community and user research. Now with over 400 titles tagged and over 100 with 5 or more tags, we are excited to share players can now search and then filter by one or more tags to find their next game! This feature was based on community feedback, and we look forward to continuing to incorporate suggestions in the future.
Addition of required inputs for games on Family Gaming Database: Xbox is proud to support the Family Gaming Database as it makes it easier for players with disabilities to find games with control schemes that are well-suited for them. Their accessibility pages now lists the default required inputs to popular games to enable caregivers, occupational therapists, and physical therapists to more easily create adaptive gaming configurations for those in the Gaming & Disability Community they support. Check out more on the Family Gaming Database Accessibility pages.
Gaming and Impact with Microsoft Rewards
Microsoft Rewards members in the United States and the United Kingdom can earn and donate points to organizations supporting gaming and disability communities with Xbox. The organizations below will be featured on console throughout July:
SpecialEffect: We put fun and inclusion back into the lives of physically disabled people by helping them to play video games. We are transforming the lives of physically disabled people across the world through the innovative use of technology. At the heart of our work is our mission to maximize fun and quality of life by helping people control video games to the best of their abilities. (US and UK)
The AbleGamers Foundation: Creating opportunities that enable play in order to combat social isolation, foster inclusive communities, and improve the quality of life for people with disabilities. (US)
Warfighter Engaged: Warfighter Engaged Is a 501c3 non-profit. Their mission is to improve the lives of severely injured and disabled warfighters with custom adapted video game controllers, recreational items, and other solutions to provide greater independence. (US)
DAGERSystem: DAGERSystem is a nonprofit focused on gaming journalism through the lens of accessibility. Our goal is to educate disabled gamers and their support systems, while providing meaningful employment for disabled professionals. (US, featured mid-July)
Xbox gamers can earn Microsoft Rewards points in various ways, such as playing or purchasing games after downloading the Microsoft Rewards app on Xbox. Earn points and redeem them for real rewards. Join us today and donate through Xbox.
Xbox Ambassadors Feature Stories about Gaming and Disability
Throughout Disability Pride Month, we will be spotlighting stories about accessibility in gaming from Xbox Ambassadors within the community with disabilities. These are their stories.
Discover Games Curated by Disability and Neurodiversity Communities at Microsoft
People with disabilities and who are neurodiverse are among the talented people that work on and play games, and have been for as long as games have existed. During July and beyond, Microsoft Store on Xbox or Windows visitors and Xbox Game Pass members can easily access games created by and reflecting the experiences of neurodiversity and people with disabilities related to chronic or complex illness, mobility, hearing, vision, speech, learning, and mental health.
Check out a few highlights from the Xbox and Windows games collection that include creators, leads, experiences, and character creation options that include features like prosthetic limbs.
Citizen Sleeper (Available with Xbox Game Pass) – Roleplaying in the ruins of interplanetary capitalism, this game explores the complexity of a body that functions differently than the mind. In order to keep your artificial body alive, you must acquire technology that is high in demand and hard to come by, creating a playable experience that is parallel to the obstacles of having a disability in today’s modern world.
Forza Horizon 5 (Available with Xbox Game Pass) –Forza Horizon 5 improved character creation options to include prosthetic limbs and pronoun options. Accessibility features also include American Sign Language (ASL) and British Sign Language (BSL) support for in-game cinematics, a game speed modification setting, customizable subtitle options, High Contrast mode, Color Blindness mode, and more.
The Vale: Shadow of the Crown – Play as Alex, a princess who was born blind, in this audio-based adventure created in partnership with people who are blind. This action-adventure game also won Best Blind/Low Vision Accessibility, and Indie Excellence Awards from Can I Play That? in 2021.
Fractured Minds – Created by Emily Mitchell with the hope of aiding in understanding and awareness of mental illness, this game explores anxiety and mental health through a journey into the human psyche.
Psychonauts 2 (Available with Xbox Game Pass) – This fun action-platformer explores the psyche of its characters and is praised for its approach to mental health. Dr. Raffael Boccamazzo is an autism self-advocate and was consulted as a mental health expert.
View the collections in Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Chile, China, Colombia, Czechia, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hong Kong, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Slovakia, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, Thailand, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, the United States, and Vietnam. Visitors to both the Xbox and Microsoft Store on Windows can find disability and neurodiversity community picks by searching for “Disability”, “Neurodiversity”, and related terms. Content is subject to availability by country.
Celebrate with New Disability Pride Gamerpic, Profile Themes and Avatar Items!
In partnership with gaming and disability communities at Xbox, we’re introducing a new gamerpic, profile themes, and avatar items! The gamerpic and profile theme will be available on console and the Xbox PC app. Get your avatar items here. Content is subject to availability by country.
Today, Microsoft released a new report outlining details of the latest Russian cyber operations in its war on Ukraine. The report offers five conclusions that come from the war’s first four months. https://lnkd.in/guVHmZ-x
How do you fund new units of affordable housing in the Puget Sound region? Most projects spend years sorting out financing while families face increasingly expensive options.
One approach to address the challenge is the Evergreen Impact Housing Fund, a partnership with the Seattle Foundation that brings catalytic capital to #AffordableHousing development.
Together with Microsoft and other partners, they’re pioneering new solutions to the #PugetSound region’s affordability crisis and helping hundreds find new homes. https://lnkd.in/gnX-V8as
Research shows an estimated 85% of autistic people in the U.S. are unemployed, compared with around 4% of the general population. Our latest newsletter discusses the topic of neurodiversity #hiring and explores what it means to be #neurodivergent: https://lnkd.in/ghz7PY5j
What’s next in the fight against climate change? 🤔 We caught up with four experts at Microsoft on their #sustainability predictions for 2022: https://t.co/OsfxkvgkyY
🦈 Born out of a joint effort between Microsoft, The Singapore National Parks Board and Conservation International, Fin Finder🔍, Asia’s first-AI powered mobile app that uses #AI to visually identify illegally traded shark and ray species, empowers enforcement officers to quickly flag suspicious fin shipments. By placing this powerful solution in the hands of experts, we hope to accelerate the efforts against critical global environmental challenges. Read more here: https://lnkd.in/dgJR9kTh
🤔 How do we design, develop and deploy our AI systems responsibly? We recently shared our updated Responsible AI Standard, a framework to guide how we build AI systems. Here’s what you need to know: 🗓️ A few years. Multiple departments. Countless tests. Our Responsible AI Standard reflects hundreds of inputs across Microsoft technologies, professions and geographies that have improved clarity and practicality of the requirements. ❌ Laws have not kept up with AI’s unique risks or society’s needs, even as it becomes more a part of our lives. The Microsoft #ResponsibleAI Standard details concrete goals that teams developing AI system must accomplish to uphold our six AI principles. (pictured below) 🛠️Leveraging learnings from products like our speech-to-text technology and Azure AI’s Custom Neural Voice, we’re making a few changes to our #AI products: We’re adding new controls for high-risk AI biometric services and retiring certain capabilities in our Face API. 💡We recognize the Responsible AI Standard is just one of many steps in our Responsible AI journey, and we’re committed to open, honest and transparent in our efforts to make meaningful progress. Learn more here: https://lnkd.in/g3eyBg_T
Today, we’re excited to celebrate the launch of the Xbox App on Samsung 2022 Smart TVs, enabling you to play hundreds of cloud-enabled Xbox Game Pass games like Halo Infinite, Forza Horizon 5, and Microsoft Flight Simulator without a console.
Starting today in 27 countries, you can turn on your Samsung 2022 Smart TV, navigate to the Xbox App in the new Samsung Gaming Hub or Media Hub, connect your Bluetooth controller, and play. It’s as simple as using any other streaming app on your TV.
Here’s what you need to know to get started:
Getting Ready
Playing Xbox games on 2022 Samsung Smart TVs is a seamless experience. To make sure you’re ready to game, here’s what you’ll need:
To access the Xbox app, you’ll need one of Samsung’s 2022 Smart TVs.
If you don’t have a membership and want to try the experience for yourself before you sign up, you can play Fortnite for free without an Xbox Game Pass Ultimate membership.
Almost any Bluetooth-enabled controller will work with the Xbox app, like the Xbox Wireless Controller, Xbox Adaptive Controller, Elite Series 2 Controller, or the DualSense controller.
How to Access the Xbox App
There are two ways you can access the Xbox app on a 2022 Samsung Smart TV depending on where you’re located.
In some countries you can access the Xbox app through Samsung’s new Gaming Hub. Simply navigate to the Gaming Hub via the user interface, launch the Xbox app, and you’re ready to go!
Otherwise you can navigate to the Samsung App store from the Samsung Media Hub, search for “Xbox” to download the app onto your TV, and launch it to begin playing.
As we shared earlier this month, we’re excited to take this first step with Samsung and look forward to keeping you up to date during this next evolution in our vision. With Xbox Game Pass Ultimate and a controller, you can easily jump into the world of gaming and connect with your friends and communities on Xbox.
We can’t wait to hear what you think of this experience, so please continue sharing your feedback with us.
The ways we work have changed dramatically over the past several years, and those changes go so much further than whether work happens at home, in an office, or somewhere in between. In this collaboration-first world, every organization needs a digital fabric that binds people together—from the C-suite to the frontline, and across every role and function.
At the center of this digital fabric is Microsoft Teams, and it’s enhanced by the productivity tools of Microsoft 365, the digital employee experience in Microsoft Viva, and the power and security of Windows.
We have lots of new updates this month across Microsoft 365, including a first-of-its-kind solution with Microsoft Viva Sales, and new capabilities for Teams, Outlook, Word, and more. And we’ve upgraded endpoint security to keep businesses safe and give IT departments better tools.
Let’s dive in.
Facilitating deeper customer connections
Microsoft Viva is the digital-first employee experience for every employee. It connects employees to the organization’s mission and culture and supports engagement and retention. Now, it goes further to help employees excel at their job.
Microsoft Viva Sales reimagines the selling experience, giving salespeople AI-driven insights and data automation right in the flow of work. Sellers will be able to automatically capture, access, and register data into any customer relationship management (CRM) system. Enriched with data from Microsoft 365, Viva Sales helps salespeople create deeper connections and relationships with customers to make better, faster sales.
Viva Sales is the first of its kind solution, and we’re excited to roll out additional business-specific tools soon. Learn more about Viva Sales announcement.
Increasing communication, time management, and search in the flow of work
Overflowing inboxes are nothing new but continue to be a pain point for many. We’re introducing new features in Outlook to help you better manage your time: Bookings with me puts you in control of when people can book an appointment with you, updates to Microsoft Forms help streamline communication, and enhancements within Search make it easier to find and share information with your co-workers.
With Bookings with me in Outlook, you can create, customize, and share a personal Bookings page where people can book time with you based on your personal preferences. Start customizing your Bookings page in the web calendar by clicking on Create bookings page.
Microsoft Forms has a new distribution and notification experience, available now. You can share with people directly, create a QR code, embed a link, or even generate an email invitation with a dedicated template. You can easily keep track of responses and send reminders with one click.
Microsoft Search is a modern, AI-powered search solution for your workplace. Whether your users are looking for a ServiceNow knowledge article, a Confluence wiki, or a document on a Windows file share, you can use Graph connectors to index all your content to save them time and increase productivity by bringing that information into the flow of their work.
Improving the Office.com experience
We’re enhancing the productivity tools millions of people rely on every day to get work done, with an improved Office.com experience. These new updates will allow users to create, share, and collaborate all in one place with their favorite apps.
The newly designed Office.com sign-in and sign-up page greets you with a modern entry point to get your day started on the web. We are introducing a new onboarding experience that helps you understand how to better use and engage with Office. Additionally, with the new Create experience, you can access new creation templates in a single location.
Enabling visual storytelling
When it’s time to “show” rather than “tell” your story, Word Designer can help deliver inspiration thanks to updates that contextualize image suggestions, offering customized recommendations to meet your unique needs.
Updating endpoint security for IT departments
When work can happen from anywhere, the management and security of endpoint devices have become more critical and more complicated. So, our efforts to be a reliable, consistent, and trustworthy digital endpoint manager have only increased.
Microsoft Endpoint Manager now offers IT administrators a way to create organization-level policies to mute after-hours notifications and can get visibility into which devices models are most performant for people in their organization. This further enables organizations to improve the employee technology experience with the endpoints they use every day.
IT departments subscribed to Windows E3/5 can now rely on Windows Autopatch to handle endpoint updates for M365 software, Windows 10, and Windows 11. Automatic updates help reduce gaps in security and build organization-wide trust that endpoints are secure. This new service will be available July 7, 2022, at no additional cost and requires Intune and Microsoft Azure Active Directory (Azure AD).
Looking forward
This month, we rolled out a series of updates and improvements to Microsoft 365, all designed to give employees the insights, context, and support they need to get their jobs done effectively. There’s more coming next month as we announce several product innovations at Inspire, our largest partner event of the year. Stay tuned.
Addressing and mitigating the effects of climate change requires a collective effort, bringing our strengths to bear across industry, government, academia, and civil society. As we continue to explore the role of technology to advance the art of the possible, we are launching the Microsoft Climate Research Initiative (MCRI). This community of multi-disciplinary researchers is working together to accelerate cutting-edge research and transformative innovation in climate science and technology.
MCRI enables us to bring Microsoft’s research skills and compute capacities to deep and continuous collaboration with domain experts. For the kickoff of this initiative, we are focusing on three critical areas in climate research where computational advances can drive key scientific transformations: Overcoming constraints to decarbonization, reducing uncertainties in carbon accounting, and assessing climate risks in more detail.
Through these collaborative research projects, we hope to develop and sustain a highly engaged research ecosystem comprising a diversity of perspectives. Researchers will offer transdisciplinary and diverse expertise, particularly in areas beyond traditional computer science, such as environmental science, chemistry, and a variety of engineering disciplines. All results of this initiative are expected to be made public and freely available to spark even broader research and progress on these important climate issues.
“As researchers, we’re excited to work together on projects specifically selected for their potential impact on global climate challenges. With Microsoft’s computational capabilities and the domain expertise from our collaborators, our complementary strengths can accelerate progress in incredible ways.”
– Karin Strauss, Microsoft
Microsoft researchers will be working with collaborators globally to co-investigate priority climate-related topics and bring innovative, world-class research to influential journals and venues.
Phase one collaborations
Carbon accounting
Real-time Monitoring of Carbon Control Progress from CO2 and Air Pollutant Observations with a Physically informed Transformer-based Neural Network
Understanding the change in CO2 emissions from the measurement of CO2 concentrations such as that done by satellites is very useful in tracking the real-time progress of carbon reduction actions. Current CO2 observations are relatively limited: numerical model-based methods have very low calculation efficiency. The proposed study aims to develop a novel method that combines atmospheric numerical modeling and machine learning to infer the CO2 emissions from satellite observations and ground monitor sensor data.
AI based Near-real-time Global Carbon Budget (ANGCB)
Zhu Liu, Tsinghua University; Biqing Zhu and Philippe Ciais, LSCE; Steven J. Davis, UC Irvine; Wei Cao, and Jiang Bian , Microsoft
Mitigation of climate change will depend upon a carbon emission trajectory that successfully achieves carbon neutrality by 2050. To that end, a global carbon budget assessment is essential. The AI-based, near-real-time Global Carbon Budget (ANGCB) project aims to provide the world’s first global carbon budget assessment based on Artificial Intelligence (AI) and other data science technologies.
Carbon reduction and removal
Computational Discovery of Novel Metal–Organic Frameworks for Carbon Capture
Removing CO2 from the environment is expected to be an integral component of keeping temperature rise below 1.5°C. However, today this is an inefficient and expensive undertaking. This project will apply generative machine learning to the design of new metal–organic frameworks (MOFs) to optimize for low-cost removal of CO2 from air and other dilute gas streams.
An Assessment of Liquid Metal Catalyzed CO2 Reduction
The CO2 reduction process can be used to convert captured carbon into a storable form as well as to manufacture sustainable fuels and materials with lower environmental impacts. This project will evaluate liquid metal-based reduction processes, identifying advantages, pinch-points, and opportunities for improvement needed to reach industrial-relevant scales. It will lay the foundation for improving catalysts and address scaling bottlenecks.
Computational Design and Characterization of Organic Electrolytes for Flow Battery and Carbon Capture Applications
Energy storage is essential to enable 100% zero-carbon electricity generation. This work will use generative machine learning models and quantum mechanical modeling to drive the discovery and optimization of a new class of organic molecules for energy-efficient electrochemical energy storage and carbon capture.
Despite encouraging progress in recycling, many plastic polymers often end up being one-time-use materials. The plastics that compose printed circuit boards (PCBs), ubiquitous in every modern device, are amongst those most difficult to recycle. Vitrimers, a new class of polymers that can be recycled multiple times without significant changes in material properties, present a promising alternative. This project will leverage advances in machine learning to select vitrimer formulations that withstand the requirements imposed by their use in PCBs.
The concrete industry is a major contributor to greenhouse gas emissions, the majority of which can be attributed to cement. The discovery of alternative cements is a promising avenue for decreasing the environmental impacts of the industry. This project will employ machine learning methods to accelerate mechanical property optimization of “green” cements that meet application quality constraints while minimizing carbon footprint.
Environmental resilience
Causal Inference to Understand the Impact of Humanitarian Interventions on Food Security in Africa
The Causal4Africa project will investigate the problem of food security in Africa from a novel causal inference standpoint. The project will illustrate the usefulness of causal discovery and estimation of effects from observational data by intervention analysis. Ambitiously, it will improve the usefulness of causal ML approaches for climate risk assessment by enabling the interpretation and evaluation of the likelihood and potential consequences of specific interventions.
Improving Subseasonal Forecasting with Machine Learning
Water and fire managers rely on subseasonal forecasts two to six weeks in advance to allocate water, manage wildfires, and prepare for droughts and other weather extremes. However, skillful forecasts for the subseasonal regime are lacking due to a complex dependence on local weather, global climate variables, and the chaotic nature of weather. To address this need, this project will use machine learning to adaptively correct the biases in traditional physics-based forecasts and adaptively combine the forecasts of disparate models.
Investing in teachers’ growth to help them be more effective is key to improving student learning. The reason: teacher quality has more impact on students than any school education program or policy does, and in fact, teacher effectiveness is the largest factor influencing student outcomes, outside of family background1.
To transform education, it’s critical that all teachers, leaders, and staff have the ability and capacity to continually evolve their methods and adopt new technologies as lifelong learners. Microsoft education has developed many resources for educators and other school staff, whether they are classroom teachers, school leaders, or in other roles.
With the shift to the new Microsoft Learn Educator Center, we have taken the opportunity to refine the professional growth offerings we have available for educators and school leaders. We strive to support them in becoming proficient in Microsoft technologies, and in learning more innovative classroom skills through fun, guided, hands-on content specific to their role and goals.
Beginning on July 1, 2022, the Microsoft Innovative Educator badge will be retired. In its place, we’ll have a new set of educator learning opportunities to help you and your colleagues grow your skills—and work towards the Microsoft Innovative Educator Expert program.
Microsoft Educator
(Starting July 1, 2022)
If an educator or school leader is new to Microsoft teaching and learning tools, this learning path we have curated will help get you started. Focused on best practice and some basics for facilitating a blended or hybrid learning environment, this is the first step in a professional growth journey. To unlock this badge, successfully complete this online through the Microsoft Learn Educator Center, or through one of our training partners in an instructor-led setting.
Once an educator or school leader has earned the Educator badge and is ready to go deeper into Microsoft tools in teaching and learning, successful completion of two learning paths will unlock the Advanced Educator badge.
To experience all the toolsets and features that Teams has for supporting an inclusive and accessible learning environment, begin with Master Microsoft Teams for any learning environment.
Navigate through the 21st Century Learning Design learning path to see how skills such as collaboration, self-regulation, skilled communication, problem solving, knowledge construction and the use of Information and communications technology (ICT) for learning can be embedded into lessons to ensure that students are successful in their future roles. By successfully completing this learning path, you will be prepared to take the Microsoft Certified Educator Exam.
(Note: This is an annual badge and there will be new criteria each year for educators and school leaders to earn their annual Microsoft Advanced Educator badge).
Are you an educator who is striving to find new ways to engage your students and colleagues? (By “educator” we mean either a classroom teacher, a school leader, a professional learning specialist/trainer, an instructional aide, a curriculum specialist, or anyone who impacts teaching and learning in their role). If so, and you’d like to connect with a global, professional learning community of other educators just like yourself who are constantly pushing the boundaries of how learning functions in the classroom, we would love to have you as a part of our Microsoft Innovative Expert (MIE) community!
MIE Experts will be selected by the regional Microsoft representative based on the quality of the responses to the self-nomination form, the level of innovation and use of Microsoft tools described in the learning activity, and the level of detail describing how becoming a part of the program will impact both teaching and student learning.
Like most of you, I was glad to see the 2022 RSA Conference return to its in-person roots after a two-year digital hiatus. This year’s event was a great success, drawing 26,000 attendees to three days of cutting-edge security sessions, tutorials, seminars, and special events at Moscone Center in San Francisco. The conference included more than 600 speakers and 400-plus exhibitors, along with hundreds of media representatives. Microsoft Security was on the ground, interacting with customers and security professionals at Microsoft’s 20-plus earned sessions, as well as showcasing new solutions like Microsoft Entra that help realize our goal of comprehensive security.
I was honored to give a keynote address (video courtesy of RSA Conference) on the future of cybersecurity, including a look at where technology and human expertise are headed, as well as why creating a more inclusive and diverse security workforce will be critical in our defense against evolving threats. Also addressing a subject that’s become more urgent with the growth of the decentralized enterprise, my colleague Bret Arsenault, Microsoft Corporate Vice President (CVP) and Chief Information Security Officer (CISO), gave a special presentation on managing Shadow IT. All in all, it was a fun, collegial, and productive five days. Let’s look at some of the highlights.
Figure 1. Vasu Jakkal gives the keynote address—Innovation, Ingenuity, and Inclusivity: The Future of Security is Now.
Microsoft Security Hub—you made it shine
Thanks to our guests and some hard work by our onsite team, the Microsoft pre-day event was a huge hit. We registered 430 attendees for this all-day event held on June 5, 2022, at Bespoke Event Center. Attendees were able to partake in Q&As with security experts about Zero Trust, threat intelligence, multicloud protection, risk management, and how Microsoft is re-envisioning the future of identity and access with Microsoft Entra.
I hosted Bret Arsenault in a fireside chat about navigating today’s security challenges and my colleague Joy Chik, CVP of Identity and Access, made a special presentation on Microsoft Entra and the trust fabric of identity.
Figure 2. CVP of Identity and Access Joy Chik speaks at the 2022 RSA Conference.
Attendees also enjoyed our immersive walkthrough art experience (and of course, the custom swag bar). Many guests took advantage of the reception to network with other security professionals and reconnect with old friends. It was great to see some familiar faces and share new insights with defenders across our community—a big thank you to everyone who joined us!
Figure 3. Attendes network at the Microsoft Security Hub.
Microsoft had a booth at the North Expo of RSA which showcased Microsoft comprehensive security solutions across our six product families: Microsoft Entra, Microsoft Endpoint Manager, Microsoft Defender, Microsoft Sentinel, Microsoft Purview, and Microsoft Priva. More than 7,300 people visited the Microsoft booth.
Figure 4. Microsoft Security booth at RSA Conference 2022.
Standout sessions
Microsoft speakers appeared in more than 20 earned sessions at this year’s RSA, addressing everything from supply chain attacks to ransomware, botnets, and ways to protect our democracy. We also hosted 40 sessions in our booth. Some of our most popular sessions included:
Practical Learnings for Threat Hunting and Improving Your Security Posture: Hosted by Jessica Payne, Principal Security Researcher and Threat Intelligence Strategist at Microsoft, and Simon Dyson, Cyber Security Operations Centre Lead in NHS Digitals Data Security Centre, this 50-minute session addressed threat hunting and security posture improvements from a threat intelligence-informed perspective. Attendees gained insights from Jessica’s experience in demystifying and defusing real-world ransomware attacks. They also got a first-hand recounting of Simon’s work securing the complex network maintained by England’s National Health Service (NHS) during the pandemic, and how his team’s experience can benefit all of us.
Conti Playbook: Infiltrate the Most Profitable Ransomware Gang: Participants learned how a disgruntled affiliate exposed one of the most infamous ransomware gangs, divulging its ransomware-as-a-service (RaaS) secrets to help take them down. This immersive, hands-on workshop guided attendees through a typical Conti attack sequence and provided tips to defend against advanced persistent threats. Thanks to Tom D’Aquino, Fabien Guillot, and Arpan Sarkar of Microsoft partner Vectra AI for this presentation.
Microsoft Defender Experts for Hunting Has Got Your Back: Abhishek Agarwal, Chief Security and Technology Officer at Helix Biotech, examined threat hunting’s virtuous cycle: track, hunt, and analyze. Specifically, attendees learned how Microsoft Defender Experts for Hunting uses AI to accomplish all three components of the cycle faster, providing automated detection, hunting, and analysis to help the team track and stop threats across the company’s multi-national enterprise.
Microsoft Security Research—How We Responsibly Disclose Vulnerabilities to Apple, Google, and the Linux Community: Jonathan Bar Or, Principal Security Researcher at Microsoft, discussed how disclosing bugs makes the world safer and benefits users, as well as giving Microsoft Security a better understanding of the technologies we work to protect. The goal is to challenge our own detections and prove product truth—making Microsoft Defender stronger by challenging our own blue teams.
Solve Secure Access Needs for Workload Identities with Microsoft Entra: Microsoft Product Managers Nick Wryter and Sandy Jiang led this informative session on the phenomenon of exploding workload identities. Currently, workload identities outnumber user identities five to one; the challenge being that many traditional identity and access management solutions don’t manage these prevalent and frequently over-permitted identities. Nick and Sandy explained how the new Microsoft Entra addresses this problem by providing a comprehensive view of every action performed by any identity on any resource, detecting anomalous permission usage at cloud scale.
Tracking Highly Evasive APTs with Vectra Detect & Microsoft Sentinel: Tom D’ Aquino, Senior Security Engineer at Vectra AI, led this demonstration of real-life threat-hunting using Vectra Detect and Microsoft Sentinel. Tom demonstrated real-world workflows for threat tracking, including individual threat severity, lateral movement, threat targets, and more.
The Shift of “Why” and “How” of Ransomware Attacks; How Microsoft Helps Customers Survive Ransomware: Led by MacKenzie Brown of Microsoft’s Detection and Response Team (DART), this session examined the how and why behind the recent increase in ransomware attacks. Attendees learned how attackers have evolved their methods to exert minimum effort for maximum return on investment (ROI), and why DART’s methodology can help you defeat them.
Shining a light on Shadow IT
Shadow IT can be broadly defined as a “set of applications, services, and infrastructure that are developed and managed outside of defined company standards.” These kinds of ad-hoc systems can pose a compliance risk, especially for security, privacy, data governance, and accessibility. Like any organization, Microsoft has not been immune to the proliferation of Shadow IT.
Figure 5. Vasu Jakkal and Bret Arsenault speak at the Microsoft pre-day event.
In keeping with our commitment to security for all, MicrosoftCVP and CISO Bret Arsenault gave a special presentation on June 8, 2022, addressing Microsoft’s approach to managing Shadow IT. Bret discussed how Microsoft’s security team is enabling engineers and developers to build and operate security capabilities in the cloud, as well as Microsoft’s three primary principles for managing and addressing Shadow IT. For attendees wanting to learn more, we followed up the event with a free white paper on managing Shadow IT. We’ve also made Bret’s presentation slides available to everyone.
2022 Excellence Awards
The Microsoft Security Excellence Awards (formerly Microsoft Security 20/20 Awards) recognize Microsoft Intelligent Security Association (MISA) members’ success during the past 12 months. This year’s 10 award categories were carefully selected to recognize the unique ways MISA members support their customers and help improve Microsoft security products. Our cross-functional panel carefully examined hundreds of nominations, narrowing the field to just three finalists for each category.
In the spirit of collaboration, Microsoft and MISA members alike voted on the winners. After dinner and cocktails, the awards were handed out at the San Francisco Design Center by Microsoft executives Phil Montgomery, Andrew Conway, Alym Rayani, Irina Nechaeva, Desmond Forbes, Sue Bohn, Mandana Javaheri, Madhu Prasha, Scott Woodgate, and myself. MISA members are a critical part of our approach to comprehensive security. We’re grateful for their vision and dedication to our shared mission of helping customers do more, safely. To all of this year’s finalists and winners—congratulations!
Comprehensive security year-round
Microsoft now protects 785,000 customers around the world, including our own digital estate. Our goal is to provide comprehensive security for our customers while enabling greater security for our shared online world. Microsoft’s best-in-breed protection, built-in intelligence, and simplified management integrates more than 50 product categories in six product families, allowing you to be fearless in the pursuit of your vision. Our newest product family, Microsoft Entra, helps fulfill that mission by creating a secure entry point for end-to-end security. Entra provides a unified admin center for Azure Active Directory (Azure AD), Entra Permissions Management, and Entra Verified ID where your organization can quickly verify and secure every identity or access request—all in one place.
Our commitment to comprehensive security also means providing the latest research and first-hand knowledge to help keep your organization secure. You can learn more at Cyber Signals, a cyberthreat intelligence brief drawn from the latest Microsoft data and research. If you attended RSA and engaged with Microsoft, please take a few minutes to respond to our RSAC 2022 survey so we can continue to improve your experience. My thanks to everyone who attended, and we’ll see you next year!
To learn more about Microsoft Security solutions, visit our website. 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.
