Tag: Windows 10

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Microsoft Fixed a Windows 10 Zero-Day Vulnerability With The November Patch Tuesday Release

In its latest list of security updates, Microsoft announced, among other things, that it had fixed a Windows 10 zero-day vulnerability discovered by cybersecurity researchers. This vulnerability would have benefited many hackers.

November 13th, 2018, it was the second Tuesday of the month. And the second Tuesday of the month is known as Patch Tuesday, the day when Microsoft unveils its latest security patches for its software. In this newest edition, the firm has fixed a zero-day vulnerability, revealed by the IT security researchers at Kaspersky Lab, a company specializing in computer security.

The Windows 10 zero-day vulnerability would have been actively exploited

The flaw identified concerned the win32k.sys file and could allow malicious users to use it to increase their privileges on 32-bit Windows 7 systems. But for that, according to Microsoft, it was still necessary to be able to install malware on the targeted computers. A difficulty that did not frighten the hackers, since, according to Kaspersky Lab teams, this Windows 10 zero-day vulnerability was already widely exploited by many cybercriminals. It was called Advanced Persistent Threat (APT).

This announcement comes after the fix of another zero-day vulnerability, made in the October Patch Tuesday. The latter was related to win32.sys and had been spotted by Kaspersky Lab, also.

Microsoft has not yet fixed another zero-day vulnerability, though

On the other hand, it seems that Microsoft did not have time to implement another zero-day vulnerability in Windows 10, affecting Windows Data Sharing Service (dssvc.dll). Revealed a few weeks ago, this security flaw can allow a third party to recover data from an SSD disk, bypassing BitLocker’s data encryption, without any passwords required.

Microsoft did provide some tips to its users, however, on how to configure BitLocker to stay protected. In the meantime, Microsoft fixed a severe zero-day vulnerability with its November Patch Tuesday while we already look forward to the future security patch, which should appear on the second Tuesday of December.

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Microsoft Re-launched Windows 10 October 2018 Update With Bug Fixes And Improvements

Microsoft has re-launched Windows 10 October 2018 Update after fixing the bugs that caused the update’s withdrawal twice and the delay in its deployment. At the time of launch, Microsoft’s vice president for Windows OS has promised to improve software quality and delivery of these seasonal updates.

The new Windows 10 October 2018 Update will roll out gradually and, for the time being, only for users who manually update their operating system or those who downloaded the media creation tool and/or ISO.

If all goes well and severe bugs would not be reported again, Microsoft will gradually offer the upgrade to a broader market of Windows 10 users in the upcoming weeks, until a global deployment would be implemented via Windows Update.

Microsoft Re-launched Windows 10 October 2018 Update With Bug Fixes And Improvements

Besides the known bug fixes and security updates that cover the last two months, there are no relevant new features beyond those of the original Windows 10 October 2018 Update. Also, some stability improvements have been implemented.

Many users complained about the lack of quality control within the Insider testing program of the initial Windows 10 October 2018 Update. In accordance, Microsoft has promised to update the Feedback Hub tool so that the testers can report the level of bugs’ severity.

Some testers reported, before the Windows 10 October 2018 Update release, some of the most severe bugs in this version, but none of the reports received too many affirmative votes. Most users complained about poor interface performance or customization.

Along with the re-launch of the Windows 10 October 2018 Update, Microsoft’s vice president Michael Fortin has posted an official blog entry titled “Windows 10 Quality Approach to a Complex Ecosystem. Basically, it promises to improve the quality of software and the delivery of these updates.

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Windows 10 19H1 Hints To an App That Permits Making and Receiving Phone Calls on Windows 10 PCs

A few days ago, the Dell Mobile Connect application rolled out with which users could connect their smartphones with their Windows 10 PC. Among other functions, the app allows users to make calls directly from the PC, using the mobile phone as an intermediary since, basically, what it did was to reflect the phone call on the PC. Similar to this Dell Mobile Connect application, it seems that Microsoft might also launch its own app, according to the references that have been found in Windows 10 19H1.

Windows 10 19H1 hints to a possible app to sync PCs with smartphones for making and receiving calls on computers

Italian tech news portal Aggiornamentilumia has found a non-active application in Windows 10 19H1 with the name Windows.CallingShellApp.

Among the text strings, there are some that refer to several connection-related functions for calls such as “preparing..”, “transfer to PC,” “transfer,” “could not transfer, “incoming call options” or “the call could fail.” Also, “you are out of Wi-Fi range” appeared there, indicating that everything would be done via wireless connections.

The new functions might eventually come as a standalone app or in “Your Phone”

Not being an active app, we cannot know exactly all its function or how it works, however, and taking into account the development of “Your Phone,” it would not be surprising that the next step of Microsoft is to allow users to use Windows 10 PCs to make and receive phone calls.

You should take all that with a grain of salt, even though you might be one of those people who are waiting for a Microsoft standalone app to sync your smartphone to your Windows 10 PC for making and taking phone calls. Luckily, the functions found within the Windows 10 19H1 might either be implemented in a standalone app or might arrive in the “Your Phone.”

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Windows 10 Has A Bug Within Its Built-in ZIP Tool – Microsoft To Launch A Patch in November

Windows 10 has some bugs after the recent updates, according to users’ reports. After a very troublesome issue that deleted the files of several users, here is another recently revealed bug that affects the ZIP archives. Microsoft has promised a patch.

Windows 10 has a bug regarding the built-in ZIP tool

If you use the native Windows 10 tool to access and extract the content of a ZIP archive, a conflict may exist, only that the Windows 10 users are not warned about it. If you copy or move files from a ZIP archive, without first extracting the content to a new folder containing files with the same name, Windows 10 does not display the pop-up message “Do you want to replace these files?”

Windows makes it look like the files have been replaced automatically when, in reality, the copy action for these files is not executed. This scenario does not occur when you use a third-party tool to extract archives, such as 7Zip or WinRAR, just to mention a few.

Microsoft to fix the ZIP tool bug with a patch to be launched in November

The problem mentioned above popped up after the recent Windows 10 October 2018 Update Microsoft rolled out earlier this month, just a few weeks ago. As regarding this ZIP tool bug, Microsoft announced that a patch would soon be available for download.

However, the giant tech company announced that the patch would arrive in early November, but offered no additional details on this patch.

If you regularly handle ZIP archives with the Windows 10 built-in tool, it may be advisable to turn to 7Zip or WinRAR in order to avoid the problems mentioned above. Also, with 7Zip, WinRAR, or any other such tool, users will be able to work with virtually any type of archive in the world.

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The Best Minimalist Text Editors for Windows 10

Choosing the right minimalist text editor in Windows 10 might be challenging since there are all kinds of programs in this category. For that reason, we come into helping you with a list of the best minimalist text editors for Windows 10, so that you can write without distractions, focusing on your task only.

Minimalist text editors are good options for novelists, journalists, or anyone else who wants to focus on their writing tasks, without getting distracted. This type of editors will also offer you anything you need to write and format your work as you want.

The Best Minimalist Text Editors for Windows 10

Typora

Typora is a minimalist text editor for Windows, Linux, and MacOS. Its design is straightforward, very clean, and with not many elements that would distract us when writing. Also, this one stands out for having many functions besides writing, as we can insert tables and code language, as well as we can create equations and all kinds of mathematical operations with it.

Typora is also compatible with Microsoft Word formats, PDF, and many others.

Raven

Raven is one of the best minimalist text editors, even though it’s still in Beta version. However, it’s an excellent choice for all kinds of writers. That is a text editor that we can use on Windows, MacOS, and Linux.

Raven is a simplistic, minimalist text editor that boasts a fullscreen, gray text box so that it won’t distract us from our writing tasks. Also, it shows a side panel from where we can access the functions it offers us to edit all the texts as we want. Besides, Raven allows users to save their work directly on Google Drive or Dropbox.

Ghostwriter

The last one in our list of the best minimalist text editors for Windows 10 is Ghostwriter which is also available for Linux. Ghostwriter’s design stands out for being simple with no distractions within the text box. At the top, we have a series of buttons that offer access to the editor’s functions.

Ghostwriter minimalist text editor allows users to save their work in various formats, including Microsoft Word formats. It also comes with support for HTML code and Markdown, as well. Besides, Ghostwriter also supports PDF and ODT files.

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