Patch Tuesday September 2020: all the patch news to secure and speed up your business computing.
Patch to Speed Up
Those annoying update now notifications are not just about security. Just this week I was working with a client whose computer had been getting slower and slower. The fix was to update her iPhone, her iTunes and Creative Cloud software. Once we did that, her computer was faster.
Apple Bytes
Apple released iOS 14 and shortly after 14.01 for iPhones. This is a major update for iPhones (will write blog about it soon). Also iPads and Apple Watch got updates but I would be careful about the Watch update as some users report the update makes their watches reboot. More about the everything Apple released September 15th.
Apple also released an update for OS X Catalina 10.15.7 on September 25th. This will probably be the last update for OS X before the new OS XI, Big Sur, is released later this fall.
Microsoft Updates
Microsoft released patches to fix over 130 problems in their many products this month. The patches that affect all Windows users mainly have to do with Internet Explorer and the Edge browser. More details here.
Microsoft also released an advisory that a security hole in their server software that was patched in August is being exploited by hackers now. While I recommend folks wait a few days or a week after Windows updates come out (just in case there’s a problem with the patches), don’t wait a month. Hackers reverse engineer the Microsoft patches as soon as they come out to see how they can exploit it.
Google Chrome
Google released an important security update for their Chrome Browser. You can check if your Chrome is up to date by clicking the three dots in the upper right hand corner, then click Help and then About Google Chrome.
Patch Tuesday September 2020, spend some time updating your devices. An ounce of patching is cheaper than a pound of hacking.