Happy Friday-Did you notice that the big Ashton Solutions logo that usually appears at the top of this publication is missing? Now that we’re fully up and running on Hubspot, we’re still trying to fine tune things and make it so that we’re in more inboxes (and fewer spam folders). I appreciate everybody who let me know last week that this hit the inbox. One of these days, I’ll be back in the good graces of the spam gods, but in the meantime, it’s been recommended to remove images from the top of marketing emails. We’ll see what happens.
On another note, congrats to Brian Arthur of America’s Flooring Source who predicted the Seahawks over the Pats by a final score of 35-14. Had the Seahawks not had a late TD nullified by a holding call, he would’ve been even closer to the final score of 29-13. Brian is now in possession of some new Ashton swag, and if he ever gets out of the flooring business, I hear there’s an opportunity for him in Vegas…
As for the real reason you’re here, scroll down to find out more about
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Common Sense
It’s a little concerning to see that government edge devices (firewalls, routers, switches, etc.) “are often decades old”… Leave it to the government to be right on top of urgent issues like cybersecurity. With as much heat as they’re putting on Department of Defense contractors (and now they’re vendors, like Ashton) in terms of CMMC compliance, I’d say this is a perfect example of “do as I say, not as I do”.
Now that Poland’s power grid has been attacked by a Russian government-linked hacker group, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) has given U.S. civilian agencies one year to upgrade end of life edge devices. No mention of how they plan to enforce that mandate or what repercussions there will be. My guess is that horse is already out of the barn.
As an aside, we met with a manufacturing firm (prospect) this morning who’d recently been hacked because their Sonicwall firewall had not been properly patched because it was so out of date…
Olive Oil
I know a guy who got a job working for George H.W. Bush when he was the VP. His resume stood out in a crowded room because he mentioned his interest in photography, and it just so happened that the person reviewing resumes was a big photographer. The rest is history. The question is, how much personal info on a resume is too much? As it relates to the person who listed “olive oil” as an interest on their resume for finance roles, I’m all for it. Gotta stand out in a crowd and be a little different from everybody else. Thoughts?
AI Attorneys
If you’re getting your legal advice from one of your AI agents, you need to consider the new legal ruling that says there is no client-attorney privilege when throwing your info into AI. So, be careful who you talk to and consider what you’re sharing.
Hot Sauce
I was onboard with the idea of drinking hot sauce before skiing as soon as I read the title of this article. Then I saw that hot sauce may also ease post-skiing inflammation of knees (and other joints). Now I need to find some little to-go bottles for our next trip (while not going too hot for fear of a mid-mountain backfire).
Telling It Like It Is
A few years back, the US government banned federal agengies from using Russian antivirus software Kaspersky. Makes sense. Kaspersky is tied to the Russian government and why would we want to give our adversaries any more info about us than they already had. Just recently, American cyber security firm Palo Alto was one of numerous companies banned from China. Makes sense… they don’t trust us any more than we trust them.
Now, however, after Palo Alto was hacked by Chinese agents, they’re afraid to admit it, instead saying that it was an “Asian-based” organization. According to the article, they fear retribution and figured that NOT being specific is the “best way to inform and protect governments…” Because we all know about the hackers from Laos, Cambodia, and Viet Nam, right?
The Super Bowl
Boring game, boring ads, and no, I didn’t watch the halftime show (or the other halftime show). I turned on the OIympics for speedskating and womens ice hockey. Much better than halftime entertainment, any day of the week.
Inbox was, as usual, full of Super Bowl-related follow ups this week, including one publication’s list of the best Super Bowl ads, ever. The Doritos ad was definitely disturbing, Terry Tate is my all-time favorite, and the mini Darth Vader was priceless… but the rest? I guess if they’re comparing to this year, maybe they were good, although I did enjoy Budweiser, Dunkin’, and Uber Eats.
I’ll leave you this week with some extreme beachcombing, Olympic Ice, (although my favorite Olympic ice story is the loonie from 2002), and ads for fake products (you’ve all seen these on social media- Nancy found this video and it’s really interesting).
Have a great weekend and enjoy the snow while it’s still here.
Abbey