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dp
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join:2000-12-08
Greensburg, PA

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dp

MVM

Evolving Microsoft's Advance Notification Service in 2015

Our Advance Notification Service (ANS) was created more than a decade ago as part of Update Tuesday to broadly communicate in advance, about the security updates being released for Microsoft products and services each month. Over the years, technology environments and customer needs have evolved, prompting us to evaluate our existing information and distribution channels. This desire to improve is why customers may have seen us introduce myBulletins to provide bulletin reports tailored to customer preferences, discontinue the Deployment Priority matrix in favor of the Exploitability Index, modify the Exploitability Index to account for more threat scenarios, simplify security bulletin content to help customer understanding, and create a centralized glossary for bulletin definitions. The change being announced today fits within that context.

We are making changes to how we distribute ANS to customers. Moving forward, we will provide ANS information directly to Premier customers and current organizations involved in our security programs, and will no longer make this information broadly available through a blog post and web page.

ANS has always been optimized for large organizations. However, customer feedback indicates that many of our large customers no longer use ANS in the same way they did in the past due to optimized testing and deployment methodologies. While some customers still rely on ANS, the vast majority wait for Update Tuesday, or take no action, allowing updates to occur automatically. More and more customers today are seeking to cut through the clutter and obtain security information tailored to their organizations. Rather than using ANS to help plan security update deployments, customers are increasingly turning to Microsoft Update and security update management tools such as Windows Server Update Service to help organize and prioritize deployment. Customers are also moving to cloud-based systems, which provide continuous updating.

For Premier customers who would still like to receive this information, Microsoft will continue to provide ANS through their Technical Account Manager support representatives. ANS will also continue to be provided to current organizations that are part of our security programs such as the Microsoft Active Protections Program. For customers without a Premier support contract, we recommend taking advantage of myBulletins, which enables customers to tailor security bulletin information based on only those applications running in their environment.

As our customers’ needs change, so must our approach to security. We remain relentless in our commitment to protect customers and the ongoing delivery of secure computing experiences.

Thank you,

Chris Betz
Senior Director, MSRC

»blogs.technet.com/b/msrc ··· 015.aspx

siljaline
I'm lovin' that double wide
Premium Member
join:2002-10-12
Montreal, QC

siljaline

Premium Member

If you remove the legalese, what this really means is that MS is discontinuing (ANS) Advance Notification Service.

For those with user created mail folders named Microsoft or something that identifies the delivery of said mail - will become significantly less popular from this day forward.

Less is the new more.
siljaline

siljaline to dp

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to dp
So sayeth those from MS:
quote:
"The reason (for the change) is that the vast majority of customers don't use the ANS; they wait for Update Tuesday, or take no action, allowing updates to occur automatically due to optimized testing and deployment methodologies," the spokesperson said.
So, those that signed up for (ANS) Advance Notification Service really didn't want the monthly notices

»www.zdnet.com/article/mi ··· ailable/

aussiedog
join:2007-01-10
Mesilla Park, NM

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Hmmm... sounds like Absolute BS approaching critical mass.

Blackbird
Built for Speed
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join:2005-01-14
Fort Wayne, IN

2 recommendations

Blackbird to siljaline

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to siljaline
said by siljaline:

... So, those that signed up for (ANS) Advance Notification Service really didn't want the monthly notices ...

Their statement's double-speak for saying: "We're cutting costs. So regardless of who signed up for what or why, we're shutting it off... unless, that is, you're too big for us to risk alienating you. Since we've begun having our users perform the QA on our updates anyhow, there's no real reason to bother telling folks what's coming or when. It all comes from MS anyway, so it must be good - if it's not, we'll eventually get it right... just trust us."

Hank
Searching for a new Frontier
Premium Member
join:2002-05-21
Burlington, WV

Hank

Premium Member

Its probably time to move away from Microsoft. They want us to buy their products but provide less and less service.

siljaline
I'm lovin' that double wide
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join:2002-10-12
Montreal, QC

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The newly found alienation from millions of users that depend on this and other "expected" services that Microsoft should provide will drive users to other OS as many have already. There's been a huge gasp yet again in the community as to this sudden loss of yet something we've become so accustomed to.

Despite the MS double-speak, most of us will forge on as we've always done.
There will be less Pre Patch Tuesday chatter from dp See Profile & NICK ADSL UK See Profile on the run up to each Patch week.

»www.networkworld.com/art ··· ree.html


aussiedog
join:2007-01-10
Mesilla Park, NM

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Cutting costs and evidently looking for more dollars to squeeze...
»www.infoworld.com/articl ··· echwatch

StuartMW
Premium Member
join:2000-08-06

StuartMW

Premium Member

I've been pondering the long term future of Microsoft for many years. That company is, or will be, facing a number of challenges.

IMO the market for their OS'es is pretty much saturated. In other words there's not as much growth as there was in the early days of PC's. That means declining, or at best constant, revenue from that sector.

Another problem is that the desktop PC market is decreasing. Many people now use mobile devices (tablets, phones etc) exclusively. Microsoft obviously sees that and has tried to get into those markets with the Surface and Windows Phone products. From my view those attempts have had limited success at best.

To me the public appearance of "cost cutting" means they're in trouble. How much I'm not sure.

Microsoft has been a dominant force in the PC market for over 30 years. IMO they're in decline but only time will tell.
Kerodo
join:2004-05-08

1 recommendation

Kerodo

Member

I have been watching things for years also, and I think MS is in decline too. They keep making all the wrong moves and now they're beginning to suffer. IMO, they a dying dinosaur.....

siljaline
I'm lovin' that double wide
Premium Member
join:2002-10-12
Montreal, QC

siljaline

Premium Member

MS pulled ANS although they really shouldn't have, this isn't the end of what's in store from them. More in the weeks and months to come.

Those that are MVP's or connected to MS beware of your NDA's.

siljaline

siljaline to dp

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Microsoft Slammed for Taking Patch Tuesday Private
quote:
“Microsoft is basically going back to a message of ‘just blindly trust’ that we will patch everything for you. Honestly, it's shocking.”
»www.infosecurity-magazin ··· tuesday/
Mele20
Premium Member
join:2001-06-05
Hilo, HI

Mele20

Premium Member

From the infosecurity article:

“I’m glad to see that they are willing to talk about the trends they observe in the existing system, but by making this switch, Microsoft is not just cutting through the clutter, they are hiding their security report card from the general public.”

I'm not surprised. Microsoft is smarting from all the recent bad patches, etc. Anything they can do to make patching more secretive they will do. This may only be the beginning. When a company, even one as large and central to so much of what we do, begins to flail anything can and will happen. Tighten your seatbelts.
jupitermoon
join:2011-09-27

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Well, they're not really shutting it off. They're just going to charge for it.

Woody Leonhard's article at InfoWorld is an interesting read:
quote:
Microsoft to charge Windows users for advanced security notifications

By abruptly stopping free warnings for Black Tuesday patches, Microsoft continues to alienate those who are trying to keep Windows afloat

InfoWorld | Jan 9, 2015

For those of us who watch every month for advance warning of Microsoft security patches -- they appear on the Thursday preceding Black Tuesday, every month -- yesterday came as a slap in the face. Without any warning, Microsoft abruptly stopped its free Advance Notification Service on the day we were all expecting the usual advanced warnings for the January 2015 Black Tuesday patches....
quote:
Translation: If you want advanced notice of upcoming security bulletins, you have to become a Premier customer....
quote:
As you might imagine, the online tech support community has reacted with a big Bronx cheer....
Here's the link to the full article:

»www.infoworld.com/articl ··· ons.html
lorennerol
Premium Member
join:2003-10-29
Seattle, WA

lorennerol to Hank

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to Hank
said by Hank:

Its probably time to move away from Microsoft. They want us to buy their products but provide less and less service.

No, I think they want to become a rental-only company. This would nearly eliminate the need for them to share their dirty laundry, and eliminating ANS is just another way of doing the same.

This is not a company taking good care of its customers. They should have been split up during the antitrust trial- everyone, from users to employees to shareholders would be better off now, I think.

StuartMW
Premium Member
join:2000-08-06

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So this coming Tues we'll see a number of patches released by Microsoft but we, the readers of this, probably have no idea what they are. In theory KnowledgeBase (KB) articles will tell us but these are often unavailable at the same time (why patches and KB articles can't be released at the same time I don't know).

That, and MS's recent history of borked updates, means I'll probably be holding off installing patches for a week or so.

Blackbird
Built for Speed
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join:2005-01-14
Fort Wayne, IN

Blackbird

Premium Member

said by StuartMW:

... That, and MS's recent history of borked updates, means I'll probably be holding off installing patches for a week or so.

Given the increasingly... uhmm... "erratic" reliability of MS patches in recent months, my "wait before install" window for MS patching is now out to around 2-3 weeks. For some reason, certain of the recent patch glitch problems have taken longer for the full extent of their problems to be revealed. That is, of late it's been taking a while longer for the canary-in-the-cage to die.
Shady Bimmer
Premium Member
join:2001-12-03

Shady Bimmer to StuartMW

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to StuartMW
said by StuartMW:

So this coming Tues we'll see a number of patches released by Microsoft but we, the readers of this, probably have no idea what they are. In theory KnowledgeBase (KB) articles will tell us but these are often unavailable at the same time (why patches and KB articles can't be released at the same time I don't know).

Perhaps I'm missing something. The announcement seems to be for the Advance Notification Service - as in the pre-notification that occurs in the week before the updates are actually released. An example would be as referenced in the common threads here such as »Microsoft Security Bulletin Advance Notification - December 4, 2014

The actual security releases don't necessarily seem to be part of this change. In other words on each patch tuesday we may still receive the same details we have always received as those covered in other common threads here such as »Microsoft Security Bulletin Releases and »Microsoft Security Bulletin(s) for December 9, 2014, 2014

If this is indeed just the Advance notification then I don't see that Microsoft is removing any detail - just that we won't receive it until the fixes are actually released. Even if the actual security bulletin is not posted on patch tuesday to a blog it appears the detail will be available via the MyBulletins service referenced in the announcement, for those customers that do not have a premier support agreement.

I guess we should know on Tuesday either way.

StuartMW
Premium Member
join:2000-08-06

1 edit

StuartMW

Premium Member


How many times have you clicked in a KB link on patch Tues? As I (and others) have noticed over many years those links sometimes don't work for hours (or longer) after patches are available on WU (see the above screen capture). To put it another way details are not always available when updates are.

This has nothing to do with ANS.
StuartMW

StuartMW

Premium Member

Click for full size
This is what you often get when you click on an update "More Information" link on patch Tues.

So, no advance notification and often no details when updates come out. Nice!
Shady Bimmer
Premium Member
join:2001-12-03

Shady Bimmer to StuartMW

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to StuartMW
said by StuartMW:

How many times have you clicked in a KB link on patch Tues? As I (and others) have noticed over many years those links sometimes don't work for hours (or longer) after patches are available on WU (see the above screen capture). To put it another way details are not always available when updates are.

This has always been the case and is even acknowledged by Microsoft in every bulletin that it may take time for the details to disseminate.

This has nothing to do with ANS.

I thought this thread was about changes to the Advance Notification Service? That is what I seem to be missing I guess. . . I didn't see anything to indicate whether or not the actual bulletins would be impacted or any references to those bulletins at all in fact.

As I noted already - I guess we'll know on tuesday so there shouldn't be a need to argue about that point.

siljaline
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Montreal, QC

siljaline to StuartMW

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Seconded on the missing KB oopsies.
Mele20
Premium Member
join:2001-06-05
Hilo, HI

Mele20 to StuartMW

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said by StuartMW:

So this coming Tues we'll see a number of patches released by Microsoft but we, the readers of this, probably have no idea what they are.

Err...wait a minute! I thought Microsoft announced ditching the ADVANCED NOTIFICATION SERVICE (unless you are enterprise and are willing to pay for it). Advanced notification on the Thursday before Microsoft Patch Tuesday is SEPARATE from Microsoft Security Bulletin Summary for xxx (month) 1915 which is delivered to subscribers mailboxes on the second Tuesday of the month and is published here in this forum (and other internet security forums) by Microsoft MVP's.

I have heard nothing about Microsoft ditching the Security Bulletin Summary. I haven't received the Advance Notification in many months but generally the Security Bulletin Summary has always managed to make it into my dslreports Inbox every month for close to 15 years now (except when TWC blocked the Security Bulletin Summary as being spam and it actually took me arbitrating between the two idiots to get it fixed). In retrospect, perhaps all the problems I (and several others here) had last year with mostly missing Advanced Notification emails was actually an early experiment on Microsoft's part in how folks would react if they stopped receiving the Advanced Notifications.

Cartel
Intel inside Your sensitive data outside
Premium Member
join:2006-09-13
Chilliwack, BC

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Cartel to dp

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Microsoft: Making your life suck, one step at a time.

siljaline
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Did MS change their mind as I just got my MS Jan via email.

»technet.microsoft.com/li ··· ms15-jan
Shady Bimmer
Premium Member
join:2001-12-03

1 recommendation

Shady Bimmer

Premium Member

That would be the actual security bulletin rather than the advance notification that you would have received last week.

MS had two sets of notification - advance, typically published on the thursday before "patch tuesday", and the actual bulletin published with the fixes on "patch tuesday". The change in policy only indicated the former - it was not clear if the latter would be impacted but now we have confirmation that it was not.
Mele20
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join:2001-06-05
Hilo, HI

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to siljaline
It's the ADVANCED notification bulletin Microsoft has ditched (unless you are Enterprise and willing to pay for it). Advanced notification bulletin comes on the Thursday prior to Patch Tuesday. I, and several others here, were not getting the Advanced Notification regularly last year. I always got the actual Security Bulletin every month (just as it was waiting for me today when I got up) but frequently last year I did not get the advanced notification bulletin although I was subscribed to both bulletins for many years with no change in email address (that might explain why some advanced ones were missing last year).

StuartMW
Premium Member
join:2000-08-06

StuartMW

Premium Member

said by Mele20:

I always got the actual Security Bulletin every month (just as it was waiting for me today when I got up)...

Microsoft releases updates at 10am PST. You're 3 hours behind that. NICK ADSL UK See Profile posted the bulletin here at 10:54am PST (the post was a place holder until that time). That is 7:54am in Hawaii. Not sure what time you got up but by that time most stuff was there ready to go.

That problem is that most here live in the continental US or Canada. It is late morning/early afternoon when the patches come out and sometime after that before the bulletin appears. That makes for a long day.

PS: I'm still installing updates in my many VM's. I'll be doing that for the next few days.
lorennerol
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join:2003-10-29
Seattle, WA

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I got the notice at 4:05 PM PST. And 22 minutes later I got the first correction for this month.

siljaline
I'm lovin' that double wide
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join:2002-10-12
Montreal, QC

siljaline to Mele20

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to Mele20
Got it that Advanced is discontinued and what you're subscribed to won't change or I hope so. Should probably go to Law School in order to comprehend the legalese Chris Betz and his team have been using of late. Oh wait - he came over from CBS.