Infrastructure – Casserly Consulting

What is Nanotechnology, and How Can it Be Used?

Technology is seemingly being made smaller and smaller. Just think about the size of the computers from the mid ‘90s until now. Sure, you can still buy huge a gaming PC with a four-foot tower with liquid cooling, or one that is a fish tank (complete with fake fish); but, the computer you use the most fits in the palm of your hand.

Nanotechnology is the smallest “technology” yet. At its core, it’s a manipulation of the smallest elements of matter, measured in nanometers. Consider that your fingernails grow at about a rate of a nanometer per second, or that a single molecule of water is about a quarter of a nanometer across, and it will give you an idea just how small a nanometer is. It is quite literally one-billionth of a meter.

That’s really the start. Nanotechnology deals with anything in that arena that measures between 1 and 100 nanometers, and largely consists of the engineering of structures that function inside or alongside nature’s nanomachine, cells.

How Is This Technology?
It really is a true combination of science, engineering, and technology. To answer the question, engineers are currently at work attempting to create smaller, more powerful microprocessors that could be used to adjust the practical uses of every material of the physical world. You could make structures stronger, cure disease, and alter matter at the subatomic level. If that’s not technology, I don’t know what is.

When semiconductor manufacturers create the latest and greatest processors or microprocessors for use in a myriad of devices, they measure their nodes in nanometers. Today, these manufacturers are working on the five nanometer chip–a feat thought impossible by many – until IBM announced they had developed one . If DNA is only two nanometers across, we may only be a short time until machines will fit everywhere.

Why Don’t People Know About It?
Nanotechnology is in its relative infancy. In 2017, Dr. George Tulevski of IBM spoke to the challenges the field faces going forward. His perspective was that nanotechnology development and research actually has slowed since the 1980s. In the same TED Talk, he opined that the use of carbon nanotubes could potentially improve computing tenfold, but the development of this technology is just in its early stages.

Is This Technology a Good Thing?
With people today only having a limited understanding of the technology, there aren’t a lot of trustworthy opinions on the issue. Intellectia even seem hedged about the applications of nanotechnology. On one hand, theoretically it could do more than any other technology to help the human race. On the other, any technology made from wonder, and with benevolent intentions, can also be manufactured for malevolent use. Like with other contemporary technologies such as artificial intelligence, researchers will have to move slowly and not let potential profits influence their release of products involving nanotechnology.

Do you consider nanotechnology to be interesting? Would you like to see how far this rabbit hole goes, or should we as a people leave well enough alone? Leave your thoughts in our comments section below, and return to read more great technology blogs from COMPANYNAME.

ALERT: Meltdown/Spectre Hardware Vulnerability Requires Action

Just a few months after finding themselves in a firmware fiasco, Intel is making news for all the wrong reasons. This issue had the potential to affect the CPU of a device, causing a severe dip in the performance of the device.

In a blog post by a user going by the name Python Sweetness, an issue was reported, describing “an embargoed security bug impacting apparently all contemporary CPU architectures that implement virtual memory, requiring hardware changes to fully resolve.” This means that, thanks to this bug, the interactions that different programs would have with the CPU would be affected.

Under normal circumstances, a CPU will have two modes that it operates under: kernel, which permits the user to make changes to the computer itself, and user, which is considered a ‘safe’ mode. Python Sweetness discovered a bug that blurred the distinction between the two modes. The bug allowed programs run in user mode to also access kernel mode, possibly allowing malware to access the computer’s hardware.

However, the circumstances have proven to be less dire than they originally appeared. The expectation was that this bug would cause entire processes to shift back and forth between user and kernel mode, hamstringing the speed at which the device would operate. There was also the expectation that this issue would not be able to be resolved without a hardware change.

For PCs with Windows 10 installed and an antivirus that supports the patch, the fix should already be in place. However, to confirm this, go to Settings > Update & Security to see if there are any updates waiting to be installed. If not, check your update history for Security Update for Windows (KB4056892) or check with your antivirus provider to find out when it will be supported, the patch will not install until it sees that the antivirus has been updated to a version that the vendor verifies supports this patch.

Android devices had an update pushed on January 5 to provide some mitigations, with more protections coming in later updates. These patches have already been pushed to Google-branded phones, like the Nexus and Pixel lines, and may have been on other Android devices. It doesn’t hurt to check, and if you haven’t been updated, go online and put pressure on your carrier on a public forum.

Google Chrome should be updated with similar mitigations on January 23, with other browsers updating soon after. To help protect yourself until then, have your IT team activate Site Isolation to minimize the chance of a malicious site accessing data from another browser tab.

Other devices (like NAS devices, smart appliances, networking equipment, media equipment, etc.) may also be at risk, as they are using similar hardware. It’s really important for business owners to have their entire infrastructure reviewed and audited.

These kinds of issues help to demonstrate the value of an MSP’s, or managed service provider’s, services. MSPs like COMPANYNAME are sure to keep themselves informed on the latest developments in IT security and any resolutions they can pass on to businesses like yours, if they don’t implement them on your behalf.

As a result, you and the rest of your team can go about your business without having to concern yourself with solving issues like these, knowing that you can trust the team who is solving it for you. For more ways that an MSP can help keep your business security and operations optimized, reach out to COMPANYNAME at PHONENUMBER.