Archive for the 'Software' Category

Security: The weakest link

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We have been asked a few times for an example to better understand that the security of a system is defined by its weakest link. Well here’s one of our example video for that…

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Software: World Clock Screen-Saver

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The World Clock by Simon Heys is an interesting screen-saver for Mac OS X, Windows PCs and the Apple iPhone. Very interesting typography and eye friendly dark background…

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DEFCON: From war-dailing to war-carting

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Three MIT students have shown the weaknesses of the Boston and other local transportation systems in the US (and of course got sued instead of learning from it). The image below is a compilation of some of the DEFCON slides from their presentation…

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IT-Terms explained: Cloud computing

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In the 10 minutes video below some of the key “figure-heads” of Web 2.0 are being asked to give a short definition of what cloud computing might be.

While some didn’t take the question too serious its quite interesting which benefits others have identified…

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Humor: Does Linux make you fat?

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To our knowledge the image below is from a presentation last week by Craig Ross, one of the Ottawa Linux Symposium organizers.

Either Linux does make you fat or maybe it has grown up (a bit).

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Drawing with OpenStreetMap in 3D

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Slovenian blogger and OpenStreetMap contributor Igor Brejc who is also the author of the Kosmos rendering application has described how to turn OpenStreetMap maps into 3D. There is a set of images plus a video (link below) providing a first impression how these maps look like in 3D…

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Today: SysAdminDay

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Friday, July 25th, 2008, is the 9th annual System Administrator Appreciation Day. On this special international day, give your System Administrator something that shows that you truly appreciate their hard work and dedication…

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Web: Naked Girls for Captcha solving

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While reports that online porn sites offering free access when the visitors enter the right response to a Captcha secured entry field have been around for a while (see for example “BoingBoing 2004″ ) with recent rises in spam originating from Google, Yahoo or Hotmail accounts the discussion on that topic is on again.

Captchas or “Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart” that are within these relay attacks defeated by visitors to the…

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CNCI - A new cybersecurity program

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It’s G.W. Bush’s single largest request for funds in the 2009 intelligence budget and its a “highly classified, multiyear, multibillion-dollar project“.

It goes by the name CNCI aka “Cyber Initiative” and the director National Intelligence, Mike McConnell, calls it a pro-active measure to protect the US Government computing infrastructure and in the future potentially also the computing environments of (US) private entities.

While the secrecy surrounding the program does not even provide specific funding figures or a breakdown, the House Intelligence committee in its report on the program “recognizes” that “…it will be imperative that the government also take into account the interest and concerns of private citizens, the US information technology industry, and other elements of the private sector…“.

They call it a public-private partnership and outlined how the oversight should happen by a panel of lawmakers, executive branch officials and some private sector representatives. And the House has already approved 90% of the requested budget.

So far so good, sounds all nice and positive - a fresh start, “unlike any model currently existing“, well, well, well if your memory in that branch of IT goes back long enough (10 years+) then you will say together with us: Nice words but we have heard them before and when we acted within the scheme we got heavily burned and a bunch of gov. crooks around the world filled their pockets with Billions of Dollars.

So if its a “fresh start” back up your words with actions!

Demonstrate that you have learned from the past mistakes and…

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News: Disgruntled IT Admin blocks access to SF city network

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From time to time there are stories passed around how a single tech employee is holding a company or agency hostage over a personal dispute or after being fired. This time its a story about an senior admin from San Francisco.

As the SF Chronicle reported yesterday he was arrested by Police this weekend and is being hold in jail on a USD 5 Million bail. He’s accused of having tampered with San Francisco’s new fiber network that provides access for officials to government documents, their emails and the administrative systems…

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