22 June, 2017

ESET reserachers discover Industroyer, the biggest threat to industrial control systems since Stuxnet


Industroyer is sophisticated and extremely dangerous malware designed to disrupt critical industrial processes
Dubai, UAE, 21 June 2017: ESET  researchers analyzed samples of the malware, detected by ESET as Win32/Industroyer, capable of performing an attack on power supply infrastructure. The malware was most probably involved in the December 2016 attack on Ukraine’s power grid that deprived part of its capital, Kiev, of power for an hour.
“The recent attack on the Ukrainian power grid should serve as a wake-up call for all those responsible for the security of critical systems around the world,” warns Anton Cherepanov, ESET Senior Malware Researcher.
ESET researchers discovered Industroyer is capable of directly controlling electricity substation switches and circuit breakers. It uses industrial communication protocols used worldwide in power supply infrastructure, transportation control systems, and other critical infrastructure. The potential impact may range from simply turning off power distribution through triggering a cascade of failures, to more serious damage to equipment.
“Industroyer’s ability to persist in the system and to directly interfere with the operation of industrial hardware makes it the most dangerous malware threat to industrial control systems since the infamous Stuxnet, which successfully attacked Iran’s nuclear program and was discovered in 2010,” concludes Anton Cherepanov.

باحثو إسيت يكتشفون برمجية إندوستروير الأخطر منذ ستوكسنيت
البرمجية المتطورة والخبيثة تعمل على تعطيل العمليات الصناعية الأساسية

دبي، دولة الإمارات العربية المتحدة؛ 21 يونيو 2017: حلل باحثو ’إسيت‘، الشركة العالمية الرائدة في مجال البرمجيات الأمنية الاستباقية لأجهزة المستخدمين، عيّنات من البرمجيات الخبيثة التي كشفت عنها الشركة مؤخراً تحت اسمWin32/Industroyer، والتي تمتلك القدرة على مهاجمة البنية التحتية لإمدادات الطاقة. وترجح الافتراضات مشاركة هذه البرمجية الخبيثة في هجمات ديسمبر 2016 على شبكة الطاقة الأوكرانية والتي أدت إلى انقطاع التيار الكهربائي عن جزء من العاصمة كييف لمدة ساعة.
وبهذه المناسبة، قال أنطون تشيريبانوف، أحد كبار الباحثين لدى ’إسيت‘: "ينبغي أن يكون الهجوم الأخير على شبكة الطاقة الكهربائية الأوكرانية بمثابة تنبيه لجميع المسؤولين عن أمن الأنظمة الأساسية في شتى أنحاء العالم".
واكتشف باحثو ’إسيت‘ قدرة فيروس ’إندوستروير‘ على التحكم المباشر بمقابس المحطة الكهربائية الفرعية وقواطع الدارات فيها. وتعتمد البرمجية الخبيثة على بروتوكولات الاتصالات الصناعية المستخدمة حول العالم في البنية التحتية لإمدادات الطاقة، وأنظمة مراقبة النقل، وغيرها من البنى التحتية الحيوية. ويمكن أن يتدرج التأثير المحتمل من مجرد التوقف عن توزيع الطاقة إلى التسبب بسلسلة من الإخفاقات، وصولاً إلى إحداث أضرار جسيمة على المعدات.
وأضاف تشيريبانوف: "تجتمع قدرة ’إندوستروير‘ على الاستمرار في النظام والتدخل مباشرة في تشغيل الأجهزة الصناعية ليتحول إلى أكبر التهديدات الخطيرة التي تواجه أنظمة التحكم الصناعي منذ ’ستوكسنيت‘ سيء السمعة؛ والذي نجح في إطلاق هجمات على البرنامج النووي الإيراني وتم اكتشافه في عام 2010".
 



Market forces will drive climate change efforts as US exits Paris agreement


·         US exit from COP21 won’t impact climate protection efforts
·         UAE opportunity to lead Middle East in growing renewable energy infrastructure
·         Berlin Green Investment Summit gathers financial, scientific and political leaders
Dubai, United Arab Emirates, 20 June 2017: Following the announcement by President Donald Trump that the United States will withdraw from the COP21 agreement, leading impact investor Jochen Wermuth, Founder and CIO of Wermuth Asset Management, has said that the move will not be detrimental to climate protection efforts. Speaking at the Berlin Green Investment Summit at the offices of the Tagesspiegel on 20 June, Wermuth said that market forces will dictate the path of climate change, following the strong growth and resulting competitiveness of renewable energy and electric vehicles.
The conditions for investment in renewable energy in the Middle East are healthy. The cost of solar energy in Dubai is now approximately USD 3 cents per kilowatt. Commitments have been made by leading Middle East countries, such as the UAE, to develop solar energy production. The Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Solar Park, for example, is a USD 13 billion project that will produce 5 gigawatts of power once completed. As a project developed in the oil-rich UAE, this is a clear example that environmental sustainability is now increasingly high on the regional economic agenda.
The global cost of energy generation from wind and solar power has continued to fall and is now offered at less than $3cent/kWh, with which oil can only compete at a price below $5/barrel. Electric vehicles are competitive, with 250 million Chinese drivers now using 100% electric cars, scooters and bikes. Meanwhile, the cost of storage is also falling rapidly. In many developed markets, renewable energy is more competitively priced than fossil fuel alternatives without the support of government subsidies, and therefore an obvious choice for forward-thinking investors.
Fossil fuel subsidies, however, remain an issue. The health costs of burning a ton of CO2 (eg. through asthma, allergies and cancer) are estimated by the IMF to be around 60/ton of CO2, with global climate change costs of around 70/ton. The total cost amounts to around 130/ton, which is what Sweden, the fastest growing OECD economy for the past 20 years, charges for CO2 emissions. According to the EU Emission Trading System (ETS), the price of CO2 emissions is as low as 5/ton, with some estimates for the price of CO2 globally as low as negative 150/ton (subsidised). In May 2017, the High Level Commission on Carbon Prices, led by Nobel Laureate Joseph Stiglitz and Lord Nicholas Stern concluded that an immediate move to CO2 prices of at least €40-€70/ton is required to limit further misallocation of capital and to have a chance of reaching the Paris agreement’s target of no more than 1.5 degrees Celsius global warming.
Jochen Wermuth commented:
“Trump’s withdrawal from the Paris agreement is not the catastrophe it seems. Mega-trends in ever cheaper renewable energy, electric mobility and storage are well established and backed by their competitiveness. As recently as a year ago, such a decision could have been detrimental, now it simply means parts of the US will be left behind. The EU and China are leading the green industrial revolution and will assume global economic leadership. The economic case for moving into renewables before the carbon bubble bursts is well understood. Market forces are now climate change’s best friends. The world of fossil fuels is slowly coming to an end, and is set to become as outdated as an unreconstructed US president attempting to extend the life of America’s coal and oil industries.”
In investment terms, major global corporates, insurers, and other institutions have shown a growing appetite, and are delivering on commitments, to divest from fossil fuels. They realize that the financial risk associated with investment in exploration for oil, coal and gas is growing. The international Divest Invest programme, which establishes commitments to investing away from fossil fuels and into environmentally-friendly alternatives, calculates that over USD 5 trillion has been withdrawn from oil, gas and coal companies by institutional and private investors globally.
Wermuth continued:

"Resource-efficient and green power companies not only contribute to the reduction of CO2 emissions, but are economically attractive and therefore offer profitable investment opportunities now and in the future. Investments in companies with established business models in the areas of resource efficiency, renewable energy and electro-mobility - whether through the purchase of shares or bonds, or private equity investments - will continue to grow in importance. In this context, growth stage private equity investment is key, as many companies in the emerging technologies space will be absent from stock markets for some time. The historical comparison is striking: the champions of the last industrial revolution - the Siemens, Rockefellers and JP Morgans - were not listed from inception, but all eventually took their place as champions, eventually replacing all but one of the constituents of the first Dow Jones Index, which had been made up mainly of steam engine railway companies. The upside potential of the green industrial revolution can therefore mainly be realised by investing in growth stage private equity, which will be of critical importance for asset allocation by institutional investors, not just for the returns it offers, but also for the strategic information new technologies and business models provide for other assets, such as bonds of oil-producing nations.”

ONE launches one-stop data tracking tool to reveal needs of world’s refugees



The MOVEMENT platform brings together the latest data on displaced people to highlight countries with the greatest need and the largest funding gaps

To help donors and governments make informed decisions about how to effectively support the world’s 65 million displaced people and their host countries, anti-poverty group The ONE Campaign today launches a unique data tool - MOVEMENT.

The initiative, launched on World Refugee Day, shines a light on one of the biggest barriers to addressing humanitarian needs - a crisis of data.   

MOVEMENT weaves together the most reliable, up-to-date official data-sets from humanitarian organisations and records them into a standardised interface to best show where displaced people are today, what the greatest humanitarian needs are globally, and where humanitarian funding flows align—or do not—with those places of greatest need.

ONE’s Policy Director for Development Finance, Sara Harcourt, said: “MOVEMENT is the first tool that joins best available data on humanitarian needs, humanitarian funding and displaced people in one place, searchable by country.  It also exposes the massive data gaps that need to be filled in order accurately follow resources to results.”

The current humanitarian data system is struggling to offer an accurate picture of the impact of displacement on those forced from their homes and the countries that host them, ONE’s research revealed. In its new report ‘Movement: Minding the data gaps around displacement, funding, and humanitarian needs’, ONE shows that information is siloed and incomplete, and is dispersed across dozens of organisations in different platforms and in different formats.

Critically, it is not able to show the real price being paid when humanitarian appeals are not being met.

MOVEMENT uses latest data and can incorporate new datasets rapidly,  from official humanitarian organisations’ statistics such as UNHCRIOM and UNOCHA. It presents the statistics in an open-source format that can be used by anyone in the humanitarian sector.

While the challenges will not be overcome immediately, the collective data hub will allow campaigners, donor countries and others to better see where funding flows are misaligned with populations in need, or where they are hugely underfunded.

Added Harcourt: “European countries mainly focus on how to support the refugees coming into their borders. ButMOVEMENT shows how it is the world’s most fragile countries who are hosting the majority of the world’s displaced people.

“For example, out data shows the EU accounts for around 24% of global GDP -  but hosts only 5% of forcibly displaced people globally. World leaders should be stepping up to support those countries most in need - yet global UN appeals are less than one-third funded, making it impossible to adequately provide support. 

ONE’s Africa interim Executive Director Nachilala Nkombo, said: “Developing countries host most of the world’s refugees and the challenges they face impact development and policymaking. This interactive tool will assist those working with and for refugees to have updated information from a click of a button and change the way we have read data before.”

As the world is encouraged to focus on the plight of the displaced millions during World Refugee Week, ONE is calling on governments and donor organisations to increase transparency of their funding, and support data initiatives to help ensure that refugees and their host countries receive the support they need.

Viewers can explore and assess the current refugee crisis through an interactive map which displays current needs, where displaced people are, and how much aid is flowing to those countries. Anyone can view the data, and use the tool by clicking here: https://www.one.org/movement.

Among the highlights, MOVEMENT shows that:
·         Globally there at least 152 million people in need of humanitarian aid across 64+ countries - that’s larger than the population of Russia. Due to available data, there is no way to distinguish the needs of refugees and other displaced populations from the millions of other people in humanitarian need - these figures are all grouped together at the country level.
·         115 million people lack basic health services, 93 million lack water and sanitation services, and 34 million lack access to education - addressing these needs will require at least $23.1 billion, but currently, humanitarian appeals are only 30.9% funded.
·         The 36 most fragile countries in the world account for just 2.6% of global GDP but host 62% of all forcibly displaced people, including 71% of all IDPs. These fragile countries also are the origin point for 83% of refugees & asylum seekers who flee abroad.
·         European Union member states account for around 24% of global GDP, but host only 5% of forcibly displaced people globally, and around 15% of all refugees and asylum-seekers.
·         South Sudan, the world’s most fragile country in 2017, hosts 219 displaced people for every 1,000 inhabitants. The United Kingdom, on the other hand, hosts only three displaced people for every 1,000 of its inhabitants.

‘Movement: Minding the data gaps around displacement, funding, and humanitarian needs’ is available by clicking here:https://www.one.org/movement.

تم اطلاق ملصقات جديدة بإمكان مستخدمي تطبيق انستقرام استخدامها خلال لموسم الصيف



مع انطلاق موسم الصيف، سيشاهد مستخدمي تطبيق انستقرام مجموعة جديدة من الملصقات التي ستتوفر طوال الموسم لتضيف المزيد من المرح والإبداع في كل لحظة يلتقطونها أثناء الصيف. تضم الملصقات الجوانب الممتعة للصيف مثل عوامات السباحة والصنادل والآيس كريم والكثير غير ذلك التي


بإمكانهم استخدامها لإرسال صور مميزة للأهل والأصدقاء.

Governments can no longer ignore those left behind by globalisation


Pre-distribution strategy could help counter inequality, says LBS expert

Dubai, UAE, 21 June 2017 - Globalisation, while delivering huge benefits, has rejected segments of society because of distribution failures, according to a London Business School expert.

Linda Yueh, Adjunct Professor of Economics, made the comments while speaking on the 
BBC’s The Big Questions.

“Globalisation is tied up with structural change in the economy. De-industrialisation has seen people benefit from the process, but it has also seen others who have had their incomes squeezed. To reap the benefits of globalisation, we have to address those who have been left behind,” says Yueh. 

As the world’s fifth biggest economy, the UK needs to recognise its role as a global stakeholder and install institutions that share the benefits of globalisation more equitably in the future, believes Yueh.

“A billion people have been lifted out of poverty since 1990. We are at a historic point, and that has to do with the opening up of emerging markets. 

“But for every economic gain we have to think about the consequence as well.” 

Widening inequality and downward pressure on wages is helping spawn a backlash in developed economies, raising concerns over the future of globalisation.

“There are distributional consequences of globalisation, which pose a policy challenge. Do you redistribute wealth or do you undertake pre-distribution policies? Redistribution means giving someone help when they lose their job, because of automation for example. Pre-distribution is about investing in education and skills, which creates more options for workers should the economy change,” explains Yueh.

“Although redistribution is required to help those who have been left behind, we also need a strategy of pre-distribution which could lead to a fairer outcome for all.” 
تحديات العولمة ودور الحكومات في معالجتها
21 يونيو 2017، دبي الإمارات العربية المتحدة،: أشارت البروفيسور ليندا يويه أستاذ مساعد في علوم الاقتصاد في كلية لندن للأعمال، عن الجوانب السلبية المترتبة على العولمة خلال حوارٍ أجرته ضمن برنامج ذا بيج كويسشنز‘ على هيئة الإذاعة البريطانية (BBC)، وعرفت بفوائد العولمة على جميع المستويات الاجتماعية والاقتصادية. حيث سلّطت الضوء على الشرائح المهمّشة بالكامل من المجتمع، وهو الأمر الناجم عن سوء التوزيع.
وقد صرّحت يويه: "ترتبط العولمة بشكلٍ وثيق بحدوث تغييرات جذرية في الوضع الاقتصادي، فقد عادت عملية تخفيض النشاط الصناعي بالفائدة على بعض الناس على سبيل المثال، إلّا أنها أدت إلى تقليص دخل بعضهم الآخر أيضاً. لذا علينا مساعدة هؤلاء المتضررين جراء هذه الظاهرة لجني ثمار العولمة بصورةٍ حقيقية".
وتعتقد يويه أنه يجب على المملكة المتحدة، بصفتها خامس أكبر اقتصاد على مستوى العالم، إدراك دورها كلاعبٍ أساسي على الساحة الدولية لمساعدة مختلف الجهات والفئات على تقاسم فوائد العولمة بصورة أكثر إنصافاً في المستقبل.
حيث أوضحت: "شهدنا صعود مليار شخصٍ فوق مستوى الفقر منذ عام 1990، ونحن اليوم نمرّ في منعطف تاريخي هامّ يرتبط بالمزيد من الانفتاح ضمن الأسواق الناشئة، لكن علينا الانتباه إلى العواقب المترتبة على كلّ مكسب اقتصادي يتمّ تحقيقه".
وتجدر الإشارة إلى أن حالة عدم المساواة والضغوط الرامية لتخفيض الأجور تسهم في اتساع الفجوة الموجودة في الأجور، ما سيؤدي لتوليد ردود فعلٍ عكسية في الاقتصادات المتقدمة، ورفع من سقف المخاوف حول مستقبل العولمة.
كما أضافت يويه: "تصيب ظاهرة العولمة عملية التوزيع بالمزيد من التعقيدات، وهذا ما يشكّل تحدياً حقيقياً للسياسة العامة، فهل يكمن الحلّ بإعادة توزيع الثروة أم باتباع سياسات ما قبل التوزيع؟ ونقصد بإعادة التوزيع تقديم المساعدة لشخص ما قد خسر عمله بسبب عملية الأتمتة على سبيل المثال، في حين يعني التوزيع المسبق التركيز على عملية الاستثمار في تعزيز المستوى التعليمي والمهارات، لمساعدة العمال على إيجاد المزيد من البدائل في حال تعرض الاقتصاد لأية تغييرات".
وختمت يويه حديثها بالقول: "على الرغم من أهمية عملية إعادة التوزيع لمساعدة المتضررين من ظاهرة العولمة، إلّا أننا نحتاج أيضاً إلى استراتيجية خاصة بعملية التوزيع المسبق تعود بنتائج مرضية وأفضل للجميع".
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