Does Wi-Fi Security Really Matter?
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro
Seems the Wi-Fi Alliance is having yet another crack at coming up with
a really secure protocol, this time to be called WPA3
<http://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/01/09/wi_fi_wpa3/>.
Does anybody care? Remember that on the Internet, security is
implemented between the endpoints, the protocols are designed not to
care that everything in-between might be pawed through by
eavesdroppers, or even active attackers trying to inject fake data.
1 year, 1 month
Massive New 'Salesforce Tower' Light Sculpture: AI, Ubuntu, Fog, and a MacBook
by Peter Reutemann
'The new tallest building on the San Francisco skyline -- and the
tallest building in America west of the Mississippi -- includes a
nine-story electronic sculpture that's been called the tallest piece
of public art on Earth. It uses 11,000 LED bulbs reflected off the
tower-topping aluminum panels -- each pixel created by a set of red,
green, blue and white lights controlled by 8-bit PIC microcontrollers.
"On a clear night, the show is visible for 30 miles," reports IEEE
Spectrum.
Slashdot reader Tekla Perry shares their article about "the technology
involved in the light show at the top of Salesforce Tower. Electrical
engineer and artist Jim Campbell explains it all -- and how the
window-washer problem stumped him for nearly a year."
"[O]n the 62nd floor, a central PC-based computer runs Ubuntu Linux,
sending instructions to a communications control system that splits
the data and sends it at 11 Mbit to the 32 enclosures using a custom
communications protocol... We will capture images throughout the day,
sending them to Amazon's cloud, and run some algorithms designed to
identify visual interesting-ness. For example, at its simplest, when
we look at the sky, if it's all blue, it's boring, if it's all white,
it's boring, if it has white and blue it is likely to be interesting.
We'll chose the best half hour of the day at each camera, based on
movement and color, to display...."
And finally, when the main display shuts down late at night, another
system designed by Campbell will kick in. In this static display, a
set of 36 white LEDs will create a three-dimensional constellation of
lights that will look like stars. "It's quieter, it has a random
aspect to it," he says.
"Since construction started, the tower has emerged as an icon of the
new San Francisco -- techie, ambitious, perhaps a little grandiose,"
writes the New Yorker, capturing the moment when Campbell finally
unveiled his four-year project -- while fighting stomach flu and a
chest cold, on a night which turned out to be prohibitively foggy. The
executive vice-president of Boston Properties told him cheerily, "Jim!
Look on the brighter side. We've got every night for the rest of our
lives."
"There was a long silence from the people on the terrace. The fog was
thick. At last, someone exclaimed, 'Woo-hoo!,' and a volley of cheers
followed." Although the colors they were seeing came from the
celebratory fireworks and not from Jim's light sculpture.
Are there any San Francisco-area Slashdotters who want to weigh in on
the Salesforce Tower?'
-- source: https://tech.slashdot.org/story/18/06/30/2031224
Cheers, Peter
--
Peter Reutemann
Dept. of Computer Science
University of Waikato, NZ
+64 (7) 858-5174
http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/
http://www.data-mining.co.nz/
1 year, 11 months
It’s Not A Bug, It’s A Feature!
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro
The IndexByDate.txt files available on the various Bitsavers directories
(e.g. <http://bitsavers.trailing-edge.com/pdf/>) list the various items
available in order of date. But if you want them ordered by name, so
items in the same directory come together, the logical thing to do is
use the sort(1) <https://linux.die.net/man/1/sort> command on this file.
You specify the sort key by a “field definition”. The man page says
that, by default, each field starts at a non-whitespace character after
whitespace. The file has a very regular format: splitting by
whitespace, you get the date, the time, and then the pathname. So a
command like
sort -k3 IndexByDate.txt
should work. Except I was seeing a sequence like this:
2006-08-17 22:17:12 ge/MarkI_Timesharing/IPC-202646_FORTRAN_Aug66.pdf
2012-08-29 02:26:21 generalAutomation/18_30/88A00026A-A_GA1830_Industrial_Supervisory_System_Reference_Manual_May69.pdf
...
2018-05-16 00:33:35 georgiaTech/GTL_Programmers_Reference_Manual_for_the_Burroughs_B_5500_Aug1974.pdf
2006-08-27 11:36:57 ge/PAC-4000/GET-3201B_PAC-4000_SysMan_Mar66.pdf
As you can see, the “ge” section is interrupted by “generalAutomation”
and others, and then resumes after them. What was going on?
It took me a while to realize that the sorting is done by locale, and
the locale setting is set to ignore the slashes. Thus, the above
sequence is effectively “gem” followed by “gen”, then “geo” and “gep”.
What I wanted was a straight ASCII sort on the full pathname, without
regard to any locale settings. But there is no hint in the man page as
to how to specify this. Then I realized: the locale is controlled by
environment variables. If you want the “non-localized” locale, then
specify the locale called “C”, thus:
LC_ALL=C sort -k3 IndexByDate.txt
and this gives the order I want.
1 year, 11 months
Linux Mint 19 'Tara' Released
by Peter Reutemann
'Linux Mint, the maker of popular Linux distro, announced on Friday
the general availability of a new version of their operating system.
Called Linux Mint 19 "Tara", the new version offers a range of new
features, improvements, and a promise that it would stick around for a
while. Writing for BetaNews, Brian Fagioli:
The most significant aspect of Linux Mint 19 is the new Ubuntu 18.04
LTS base. Tara will receive updates until 2023 -- very impressive. The
kernel is at 4.15, and all three desktop environments are being
updated too. Mate is now at version 1.2, Cinnamon gets bumped up to
3.8, and Xfce is updated to 4.12.
In Linux Mint 19, the star of the show is Timeshift, said, Clement
Lefebvre, Linux Mint Project Leader. Although it was introduced in
Linux Mint 18.3 and backported to all Linux Mint releases, it is now
at the center of Linux Mint's update strategy and communication, he
added. Thanks to Timeshift you can go back in time and restore your
computer to the last functional system snapshot. If anything breaks,
you can go back to the previous snapshot and it's as if the problem
never happened.'
-- source: https://linux.slashdot.org/story/18/06/29/2041255
Cheers, Petre
--
Peter Reutemann
Dept. of Computer Science
University of Waikato, NZ
+64 (7) 858-5174
http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/
http://www.data-mining.co.nz/
1 year, 11 months
Google Invests $22 Million In Feature Phone Operating System KaiOS
by Peter Reutemann
'Google is turning startup investor to further its goal of putting
Google services like search, maps, and its voice assistant front and
center for the next billion internet users in emerging markets. It has
invested $22 million into KaiOS, the company that has built an
eponymous operating system for feature phones that packs a range of
native apps and other smartphone-like services. As part of the
investment, KaiOS will be working on integrating Google services like
search, maps, YouTube and its voice assistant into more KaiOS devices,
after initially announcing Google apps for KaiOS-powered Nokia phones
earlier this year.
KaiOS is a U.S.-based project that started in 2017, built on the ashes
of Mozilla's failed Firefox OS experiment, as a fork of the Linux
codebase. Firefox OS was intended to be the basis of a new wave of
HTML-5, low-cost smartphones. And while those devices and the wider
ecosystem never really took off, KaiOS has fared significantly better.
KaiOS powers phones made by OEMs including Nokia (HMD), Micromax and
Alcatel, and it works with carriers including Sprint and AT&T -- it
counts offices in North America, Europe and Asia. But its most
significant deployment to date has been with India's Reliance Jio, the
challenger telco that disrupted the Indian market with affordable 4G
data packages.
"This funding will help us fast-track development and global
deployment of KaiOS-enabled smart feature phones, allowing us to
connect the vast population that still cannot access the internet,
especially in emerging markets," said KaiOS CEO Sebastien Codeville in
a statement.'
-- source: https://mobile.slashdot.org/story/18/06/29/2118251
Cheers, Peter
--
Peter Reutemann
Dept. of Computer Science
University of Waikato, NZ
+64 (7) 858-5174
http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/
http://www.data-mining.co.nz/
1 year, 11 months
Facebook, Google, and Microsoft Use Design To Trick You Into Handing Over Your Data, Report Warns
by Peter Reutemann
'A study from the Norwegian Consumer Council dug into the underhanded
tactics used by Microsoft, Facebook, and Google to collect user data.
"The findings include privacy intrusive default settings, misleading
wording, giving users an illusion of control, hiding away
privacy-friendly choices, take-it-or-leave-it choices, and choice
architectures where choosing the privacy friendly option requires more
effort for the users," states the report, which includes images and
examples of confusing design choices and strangely worded statements
involving the collection and use of personal data.
Google makes opting out of personalized ads more of a chore than it
needs to be and uses multiple pages of text, unclear design language,
and, as described by the report, "hidden defaults" to push users
toward the company's desired action. "If the user tried to turn the
setting off, a popup window appeared explaining what happens if Ads
Personalization is turned off, and asked users to reaffirm their
choice," the report explained. "There was no explanation about the
possible benefits of turning off Ads Personalization, or negative
sides of leaving it turned on." Those who wish to completely avoid
personalized ads must traverse multiple menus, making that "I agree"
option seem like the lesser of two evils.
In Windows 10, if a user wants to opt out of "tailored experiences
with diagnostic data," they have to click a dimmed lightbulb, while
the symbol for opting in is a brightly shining bulb, says the report.
Another example has to do with Facebook. The social media site makes
the "Agree and continue" option much more appealing and less
intimidating than the grey "Manage Data Settings" option. The report
says the company-suggested option is the easiest to use. "This 'easy
road' consisted of four clicks to get through the process, which
entailed accepting personalized ads from third parties and the use of
face recognition. In contrast, users who wanted to limit data
collection and use had to go through 13 clicks."'
-- source: https://tech.slashdot.org/story/18/06/27/2233234
Cheers, Peter
--
Peter Reutemann
Dept. of Computer Science
University of Waikato, NZ
+64 (7) 858-5174
http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/
http://www.data-mining.co.nz/
1 year, 11 months
GitHub Gentoo Organization Hacked
by Peter Reutemann
'June 28 at approximately 20:20 UTC unknown individuals have gained
control of the Github Gentoo organization, and modified the content of
repositories as well as pages there. We are still working to determine
the exact extent and to regain control of the organization and its
repositories. All Gentoo code hosted on GitHub should for the moment
be considered compromised.
This does NOT affect any code hosted on the Gentoo infrastructure.
Since the master Gentoo ebuild repository is hosted on our own
infrastructure and since Github is only a mirror for it, you are fine
as long as you are using rsync or webrsync from gentoo.org. Details
are sparse, but we will update this story once we learn more.'
-- source: https://it.slashdot.org/story/18/06/28/2240254
Cheers, Peter
--
Peter Reutemann
Dept. of Computer Science
University of Waikato, NZ
+64 (7) 858-5174
http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/
http://www.data-mining.co.nz/
1 year, 11 months
What's Up With ProtonMail Outages?
by Peter Reutemann
Since we talked about ProtonMail in the past...
'ProtonMail, a secure email service provider used by more than two
million users and references of which has been made in shows like Mr.
Robot, has been facing outages for the last two days as it fights
numerous DDoS attacks. "The attacks went on for several hours,
although the outages were far more brief, usually several minutes at a
time with the longest outage on the order of 10 minutes," a ProtonMail
spokesperson told BleepingComputer, adding that it has tracked the
attack to a group that claims to have ties to Russia. But things are
more complicated than that, and it appears ProtonMail users, who are
already annoyed at the frequent outages over the last few days, are up
for more such downtimes in the coming days. BleepingComputer:
But in reality, the DDoS attacks have no ties to Russia, weren't even
planned to in the first place, and the group behind the attacks
denounced being Russian, to begin with. Responsible for the attacks is
a hacker group named Apophis Squad. In a private conversation with
Bleeping Computer today, one of the group's members detailed
yesterday's chain of events. The Apophis member says they targeted
ProtonMail at random while testing a beta version of a DDoS booter
service the group is developing and preparing to launch.
The group didn't cite any reason outside "testing" for the initial and
uncalled for attack on ProtonMail, which they later revealed to have
been a 200 Gbps SSDP flood, according to one of their tweets. "After
we sent the first attack, we downed it for 60 seconds," an Apophis
Squad member told us. He said the group didn't intend to harass
ProtonMail all day yesterday or today but decided to do so after
ProtonMail's CTO, Bart Butler, responded to one of their tweets
calling the group "clowns."
This was a questionable response on the part of the ProtonMail CTO, as
it set the hackers against his company even more. "So we then downed
them for a few hours," the Apophis Squad said. Subsequent attacks
included a whopping TCP-SYN flood estimated at 500 Gbps, as claimed by
the group.'
-- source: https://it.slashdot.org/story/18/06/28/159252
Cheers, Peter
--
Peter Reutemann
Dept. of Computer Science
University of Waikato, NZ
+64 (7) 858-5174
http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/
http://www.data-mining.co.nz/
1 year, 11 months