Change is the only constant in life, even when it happens at a slow pace. And the same is true for Microsoft. With two decades of customers purchasing perpetual licenses through the same portal, this licensing program was due for a change.

Earlier this year, Microsoft announced it will sunset its Open Licensing program. This is a big change for a lot of our customers, but it will make things much easier for them by streamlining the available licensing programs from CDW and Microsoft.

In 2020, Cisco introduced enhancements to the Webex cloud and Webex device series, providing a way to connect to Microsoft Teams meetings directly from Cisco video devices.

There are two technologies at play here: Cloud Video Interop (CVI) and Web Real-Time Communications (WebRTC).

Zerologon is the name given to a security vulnerability found in Microsoft Windows domain controllers by Secura. It is an unauthenticated privilege escalation vulnerability in the Netlogon Remote Protocol (MS-NRPC). An attacker can leverage this flaw to gain administrative access to a Windows domain.

This vulnerability was assigned CVE number CVE-2020-1472 and rated critical. A Zerologon vulnerability that was patched by Microsoft in August has been making the news lately as proof of concept exploits have started to appear in the wild. In this post, I will discuss in more detail what this vulnerability is and how you can defend against it.

It’s hard to talk about Microsoft 365 and not mention the elephant in the room: Microsoft Teams. As remote work and the “new normal” continue to drive business decisions and the way we work, Microsoft Teams continues to be at the center of these collaboration conversations.

With all the attention on Teams, it’s easy to forget about the rest of Microsoft’s massive suite of tools that also contribute to making work life — and in some cases personal life — a little bit easier. To help you start, I’ve put together a list of four of the most effective Microsoft 365 tools I use on a daily or weekly basis that help me keep a handle on my day. There are many tools in the product suite that can help here, and even some new ones (Microsoft Lists).

With Azure, organizations have many choices to make, from which services to use to how to purchase, manage and govern its use. In October 2019, Microsoft announced changes to the volume licensing programs in ways that affected a customer’s ability to acquire Azure. Specifically, Microsoft:

1. Will no longer write new Azure-only Server and Cloud Enrollment (SCE) agreements
2. Will no longer renew Azure-only SCE agreements and subject any extended contracts to a 3 percent administrative fee
3. Will no longer allow Azure to be added to existing Enterprise Agreement (EA) contracts

Becoming an Azure Expert MSP required a companywide effort spanning multiple teams, bringing together expertise from across our global organization. We worked extremely hard to demonstrate to an independent third party that our experience in these solutions is best in class.

So what does this status mean for customers? That through our CDW Amplified™ Azure Managed Services, we provide consistent processes, tools, skills and technology to ensure successful delivery of repeatable, complex solutions based on Microsoft Azure. Learn more about our three-step approach.