Ctrl+Alt+Azure

This week, we review the Microsoft Digital Defense report 2025. We did the same for 2024 and 2023, so this time we'll look at what's interesting in the report and what to focus on from a security perspective. (00:00) - Intro and catching up. (03:40) - Show content starts. Show links - Microsoft Digital Defense Report 2025 - Ctrl+Alt+Azure: Episode 275: Microsoft Digital Defense Report 2024 - Ctrl+Alt+Azure: Episode 210: Microsoft Digital Defense Report 2023 - HackTheBox - Give us feedback!

In this week's episode, we look at recent Microsoft Tech updates. By popular request, we're expanding the scope beyond just Azure to include Microsoft 365, Power Platform, and similar Microsoft platforms and capabilities. What's new? What's interesting? What's retiring? (00:00) - Intro and catching up. (04:40) - Show content starts. Show links - Public preview: VM Customization in Azure: Disable Multithreading & Constrained Cores - Containerization Assist (GitHub) - Microsoft Azure Migration Hub - Private Link service Direct Connect Feedback - Give us feedback!

Today, we talk about identity mistakes, with our guest, Stephan van Rooij. We learn about OWASP top 10, his project IdentityProxy and things to avoid when building custom solutions that revolve around identities. (00:00) - Intro and catching up. (02:50) - Show content starts. Show links - Blog: https://svrooij.io - LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/stephanvanrooij - IdentityProxy: https://github.com/svrooij/identityproxy - OWASP Top 10 - GitHub servers being migrated to Azure Feedback - Give us feedback!

Today, we go through the three recommended and must-have alerts you should configure in all of your Azure tenants. We touch upon FinOps, security, a bit of WAF and CAF, and find out if we're using these recommendations ourselves. (00:00) - Intro and catching up. (03:20) - Show content starts. Show links - Azure Quota Alerts (Preview): Still overlooked, but incredibly useful | Microsoft Community Hub Feedback - Give us feedback!

In this week's episode, we take a tour of Microsoft PowerToys in 2025. What's in there? What's new? Do we actually use these tools, or are they just gimmicks? (00:00) - Intro and catching up. (06:44) - Show content starts. Show links - Microsoft PowerToys Feedback - Give us feedback!

In this week's episode, we talk about our experiences with SharePoint and Project. Now that Project Online is going away, as well as SharePoint 2013-style Workflows, we discuss the options for moving to more modern capabilities, and why these are still very valid tools. (00:00) - Intro and catching up. (03:58) - Show content starts. Show links - Project Online is retiring - SharePoint 2013 Workflow retirement - SharePoint 2013 Workflow Assessment Tool - SharePoint Workflow Manager Feedback - Give us feedback!

In this week's episode, we share ideas, experiences and lessons learned running AI workloads at home. On a laptop, in a custom-built AI rig, and everything in between! (00:00) - Intro and catching up. (03:37) - Show content starts. Show links - HuggingFace - Ollama & Open WebUI - LMStudio - Azure AI Foundry Local Feedback - Give us feedback!

This week, we dive deep into security-focused updates from Microsoft. As we've done with more generic tech updates, this time we'll focus on the interesting security updates from Microsoft. (00:00) - Intro and catching up. (04:29) - Show content starts. Show links - RETIREMENT: Migration from Azure China CDN to Azure Front Door - PREVIEW: Custom block response codes and body for Application Gateway WAF - PREVIEW: Azure Bastion now supports connectivity to private AKS clusters via tunneling - PREVIEW: Workspace-level Private Link for Microsoft Fabric workspaces - GA: AKS Security Dashboard - WAF: CAPTCHA, and JS challenge Feedback - Give us feedback!

Today, we take a look at Azure Storage Discovery. It's a new preview feature that gives you insights and actionable items across all your Storage Accounts. We discuss our experience using it and how to properly test its capabilities. (00:00) - Intro and catching up. (03:25) - Show content starts. Show links - Azure Storage Discovery - Pricing Feedback - Give us feedback!

Today, we'll take a look at something that is of the essence for anyone working with identities and the shift to the cloud. What is Group SOA, and why should you care? We reflect on the dependencies of Active Directory, the five stages of transformation, and what this capability will help you achieve. (00:00) - Intro and catching up. (05:20) - Show content starts. Show links - Group SOA Provide feedback - Give us feedback!

In this week's episode, we look at recent Microsoft Tech updates. By popular request, we're expanding the scope beyond just Azure to include Microsoft 365, Power Platform, and similar Microsoft platforms and capabilities. What's new? What's interesting? What's retiring? (00:00) - Intro and catching up. (04:15) - Show content starts. Show links - Create Tenant Level Service Health Alerts (preview) - Azure Monitor | Microsoft Learn - AKS Updates - What is Azure App Testing? - Azure 128 & 192 vCPU sizes - Azure Cloud HSM - GA: Network Security Perimeter - Two-way forest trusts for Entra DS Feedback - Give us feedback!

Back in 2020 we did our first episode on Microsoft Sentinel. We feel it's time to revisit Sentinel after five years, and take a look at where it stands today. What's relevant, what's new, and what's happening with Sentinel? (00:00) - Intro and catching up. (04:29) - Show content starts. Show links - Microsoft Sentinel Quickstart - Sentinel Data Lake - Give us feedback!

In this week's episode, we break down Model Context Protocol, or MCP. What is it, why should you care, and how does it change your solutions? We discuss the concept, the architecture, and share our experiences working with MCP solutions. (00:00) - Intro and catching up. (03:02) - Show content starts. Show links - MCP home: modelcontextprotocol.io - Use MCP: Connect to Remote MCP Servers - Build a server: Build an MCP Server - Build a client: Build an MCP Client - modelcontextprotocol/csharp-sdk: The official C# SDK for Model Context Protocol servers and clients. - MCP Dev Days session - Give us feedback!

In this week's episode, we'll take a look at n8n—the agentic workflow engine/tool/product/service. How does it compare to Power Platform, Azure Functions, Azure AI Foundry, Copilot Studio, and other similar offerings from Microsoft? Self-hosting vs. cloud-hosted? We also share lessons learned and other insights. (00:00) - Intro and catching up. (03:44) - Show content starts. Show links - n8n.io - n8n GitHub Repo - n8n workflows Feedback - Give us feedback!

This is episode 300! Massive thank you and gratitude to everyone for tuning in over the years. We reflect a bit on the past 6 years of the show, and then we dive deep into security-focused updates from Microsoft. (00:00) - Intro and catching up. (03:02) - Show content starts. Show links - What's new in Microsoft Defender for Cloud features | Microsoft Learn - Containers support matrix in Defender for Cloud | Microsoft Learn - Alerts for AI services - Microsoft Defender for Cloud | Microsoft Learn - Manage workspaces in Microsoft Security Copilot | Microsoft Learn - Manage security compute unit usage in Security Copilot | Microsoft Learn - Azure DNS security policy | Microsoft Learn Feedback - Give us feedback!

In this week's episode, it's time to share insights and lessons learned from self-hosting stuff at home! We'll talk about the why and the what, and also some stuff that didn't work at all. You'll also hear about how to best service workloads from home, and what sort of equipment is needed. (00:00) - Intro and catching up. (04:04) - Show content starts. Show links - Cloudflare Tunnel - Jussi's ipecho service - Give us feedback!

Today, we'll talk about AVNM, or Azure Virtual Network Manager, with insights from Microsoft's Jack Tracey. What is it, and why do you need it? We talk about mesh networks, routing, IP address management, AVNM with Azure Landing Zones, and more! (00:00) - Intro and catching up. (05:08) - Show content starts. Show links - What is AVNM? - Frequently asked questions about Azure Virtual Network Manager | Microsoft Learn - Azure Virtual Network Manager in Azure landing zones - Cloud Adoption Framework | Microsoft Learn - Give us feedback!

In this week's episode, we'll talk about vibe coding - the practice of writing code that prioritizes aesthetics, creativity, and personal expression. What's our experience on this? What tooling are we using? What does this mean for productivity? (00:00) - Intro and catching up. (04:14) - Show content starts. Show links - Mistral Small 3.2 Feedback - Give us feedback!

Today, we'll talk about Azure Landing Zones, with insights from Microsoft's Jack Tracey. What are landing zones, to be more exact? We touch topics on application and platform landing zones, networking, architectures, infrastructure as code, and many others. (00:00) - Intro and catching up. (02:30) - Show content starts. Show links - Azure Landing Zones | Cloud Adoption Framework - Azure Landing Zone Accelerator - Azure Landing Zone Brownfield - Development environments - Give us feedback!

In this week's episode, we look at MCRA - the Microsoft Cybersecurity Reference Architecture. Updates were released in April 2025; we'll go through the updates and explain why MCRA matters. (00:00) - Intro and catching up. (05:29) - Show content starts. Show links - Updated MCRA Feedback - Give us feedback!