Azure updates

New version of Durable Functions available now

Announcing the general availability of the version 2.0 of Durable Functions, the extension of the Azure Functions runtime that enables stateful functions and workflow orchestrations in a serverless environment.

• Azure functions

Azure Functions integration with Azure Monitor Logs is now in public preview

Azure Functions now offers an integration with Azure Monitor Logs, enabling a more consistent observability of Azure resources and integration with external monitoring tools.

• Azure functions
• Azure Monitor

Azure Site Recovery now cleans up deallocated (failed back) VMs and NICs

With this update, Site Recovery now cleans up the deallocated (failed back) VMs and NICs. In addition, if you disable replication after failback, Site Recovery cleans up the disks in the secondary region, in addition to the VMs and NICs.

• Azure Site Recovery

Azure Private Link is now available in all regions

Azure Private Link, which provides private connectivity to Azure services, is now available in all regions.

• Azure Private Link
• Virtual Network
• Azure SQL Database
• Azure Synapse Analytics
• Storage Accounts
• Azure Data Lake Storage
• Azure Cosmos DB

Azure Firewall Manager is now in preview

Azure Firewall Manager Preview is a security management service that provides central security policy and route management for cloud-based security perimeters. It works with Azure Virtual WAN Hub, a Microsoft-managed resource that lets you easily create hub and spoke architectures. When security and routing policies are associated with such a hub, it is referred to as a Secured Virtual Hub.

• Azure Firewall

New memory and compute-optimised hardware options in Azure SQL Database

Now in preview, M-series and Fsv2-series are new hardware options in Azure SQL Database specialised for workloads requiring very high compute or memory scale, or very fast CPU speed.

• Azure SQL Database

Azure Site Recovery update rollup 41 – October 2019

Issues have been fixed in the latest versions of Azure Site Recovery.

• Azure Site Recovery

Updates to Azure Cost Management – October 2019

New updates to Azure Cost Management help you better understand what you’re spending, where you’re spending it and how to optimise and plan for the future.

• Cost Management + Billing

Leverage Azure premium file shares for high availability of data

We are announcing a new option for SQL Server high availability with SQL Server failover cluster with Azure premium file shares. Premium file shares are solid-state drive backed consistent low-latency file shares that are fully supported for use with SQL Server failover cluster instance for SQL Server 2012 and above on Windows Server 2012 and above.

• SQL Server on virtual machines

Onboard on-prem servers to Security Center from Windows Admin Center

Windows Admin Center is a management portal for Windows Servers that are not deployed in Azure, offering them several Azure management capabilities such as backup and system updates. We have recently added an ability to onboard these non-Azure servers to be protected by ASC directly from the Windows Admin Center experience.

• Security Center
• Security

Workflow automation with Logic Apps

Today we are introducing a new capability in Security Center that allows customers to create automation configurations leveraging Azure Logic Apps and to create policies that will automatically trigger them based on specific ASC findings such as Recommendations or Alerts.

• Security Center
• Security

Azure Security Center Quick Fix for bulk resources generally available

With the many tasks that a user is given as part of Secure Score, the ability to effectively remediate issues across a large fleet can become challenging. In order to simplify remediation of security misconfigurations and to be able to quickly remediate recommendations on a bulk of resources and improve your secure score, you can use Quick Fix.

• Security Center
• Security

Additional regulatory compliance standards in Azure Security Center

The Regulatory Compliance dashboard provides insights into your compliance posture based on Security Center assessments. The dashboard shows how your environment complies with controls and requirements designated by specific regulatory standards and industry benchmarks, and provides prescriptive recommendations for how to address these requirements.

• Security Center
• Security

Scan container images for vulnerabilities in Azure Security Center

Azure Security Center can now scan container images in Azure Container Registry for vulnerabilities. The image scanning works by parsing the container image file, then checking to see whether there are any known vulnerabilities (powered by Qualys).

• Security Center
• Security

Threat Protection for Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) Support in Security Center

Security Center is expanding its support in the container space to one of the fastest growing services in Azure – Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS).

• Security Center
• Security

Vulnerability assessment in Azure Security Center

Applications that are installed in virtual machines could often have vulnerabilities that could lead to a breach of the virtual machine. We are announcing that the Security Center Standard tier includes built-in vulnerability assessment for virtual machines for no additional fee.

• Security Center
• Security

Extending Azure Security Center coverage with platform for community and partners

To support Security Center’s fast growth in the marketplace and meet our customers’ demands around threat protection, cloud security posture and enterprise-scale deployment and automation, our team has delivered many new capabilities, as well as working with some new partners that are part of the Microsoft Intelligent Security Association.

• Security Center
• Security

Advanced data security for SQL servers on Azure Virtual Machines

Azure Security Center’s support for threat protection and vulnerability assessment for SQL DBs running on IaaS virtual machines (VMs) is now in preview

Azure Security Center – Support for custom policies

Azure Security Center now supports custom policies (in preview). Our customers have been wanting to extend their current security assessments coverage in Security Center with their own security assessments based on policies that they create in Azure Policy. With support for custom policies, this is now possible.

• Security Center
• Security