Security Is Always Down To The Weakest Link
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro
Nice non-paywalled report
<https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12235615>
into how the National Party (and others) were able to obtain
supposedly-confidential details of today’s Budget announcements.
In summary, a “clone” was made of the Treasury website, containing the
Budget info, that was supposed to be swapped for the current production
site later today. It was not publicly accessible, at least directly.
However, the search function on the public site was inadvertently
sucking up the confidential info from the clone server as well, and
carefully-worded searches would reveal bits of such info as search
context, even if the actual documents being indexed were not accessible
in full.
The Police have decided that, even though such leaks are considered a
serious matter, the accesses were “not unlawful”. Which seems a
refreshing change from, say, the UK, where someone was prosecuted and
jailed some years ago just for putting “../” into a URL ...
11 months, 3 weeks
Dell Begins Pre-Installing Linux On Range of Precision Laptops
by Peter Reutemann
'"While Linux-preloaded laptops have been available for years from
smaller companies, and have represented a fraction of their own sales
with the much-admired XPS 13 developer model, Dell now offers a range
of Precision models pre-installed with Ubuntu Linux," writes Slashdot
reader Freshly Exhumed. Phoronix reports: At the start of May Dell
announced an Ubuntu Linux option for their entry-level ~$700 Precision
laptop while now they are closing out May by offering up Ubuntu 18.04
LTS on their higher-tier Precision laptop models. Ubuntu Linux has
landed for the rest of Dell's current generation Precision mobile
workstation line-up with support for the Precision 5540, 7540, and
7740. The Precision 5540 offers options of Xeon E or 9th Gen Core CPUs
with up to 64GB of RAM and options for a NVIDIA Quadro T2000. The
Precision 7540/7740 meanwhile are more powerful mobile workstations
with supporting up to 128GB of ECC RAM and latest generation
processors. The Precision 7740 model can also accomodate NVIDIA Quadro
RTX 5000 series graphics. Additional details can be found via this
blog post by Dell's Barton George.'
-- source: https://linux.slashdot.org/story/19/05/30/2154256
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
How Qualcomm Shook Down The Cell Phone Industry For Almost 20 Years
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro
A pretty sobering read
<https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2019/05/how-qualcomm-shook-down-the-c...>:
Qualcomm's first weapon against competitors: patent licensing terms
requiring customers to pay a royalty on every phone sold—not just
phones that contained Qualcomm's wireless chips.
Sound familiar?
Judge Koh draws a direct parallel to licensing behavior that got
Microsoft in legal trouble in the 1990s. Microsoft would offer PC
makers a discount if they agreed to pay Microsoft a licensing fee
for every PC sold—whether or not the PC shipped with a copy of
MS-DOS. This effectively meant that a PC maker had to pay twice if
it shipped a PC running a non-Microsoft operating system.
There’s a lot more--the article reads like a catalogue of gangster-like
tactics. All of which is perfectly all right under the US
interpretation of “Free Enterprise”, of course ...
Also, reading the details of how Qualcomm managed to sabotage Intel’s
efforts to develop 5G chips, it seems to me that Qualcomm is directly
responsible for the situation today where US companies are lagging
behind Chinese ones like Huawei in 5G capability.
1 year
Advanced Linux backdoor found in the wild escaped AV detection
by Peter Reutemann
'Researchers say they’ve discovered an advanced piece of Linux malware
that has escaped detection by antivirus products and appears to be
actively used in targeted attacks.
HiddenWasp, as the malware has been dubbed, is a fully developed suite
of malware that includes a trojan, rootkit, and initial deployment
script, researchers at security firm Intezer reported on Wednesday. At
the time Intezer’s post went live, the VirusTotal malware service
indicated Hidden Wasp wasn’t detected by any of the 59 antivirus
engines it tracks, although some have now begun to flag it. Time
stamps in one of the 10 files Intezer analyzed indicated it was
created last month. The command and control server that infected
computers report to remained operational at the time this article was
being prepared.
Some of the evidence analyzed—including code showing that the
computers it infects are already compromised by the same
attackers—indicated that HiddenWasp is likely a later stage of malware
that gets served to targets of interest who have already been infected
by an earlier stage. It’s not clear how many computers have been
infected or how any earlier related stages get installed. With the
ability to download and execute code, upload files, and perform a
variety of other commands, the purpose of the malware appears to be to
remotely control the computers it infects. That's different from most
Linux malware, which exists to perform denial of service attacks or
mine cryptocurrencies.'
-- source: https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2019/05/advanced-linux-bac...
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
libmtp error: could not delete object.
by John
Hi All,
I have just got a 16gig micro sd card with my Granddaughters data on it.
I managed to delete almost completely all the data but there are ten
files that will not delete either on the phone or my computer the phone
say the files are deleted but they remain the computer returns a "could
not delete" error.
I tried "sudo apt-get install mtp-server libmtpserver-dev"
But got a error msg unable to locate mtp and libmtpserver.
Any one can help please................
Cheers John..
1 year
Chinese Military To Replace Windows OS Amid Fears of US Hacking
by Peter Reutemann
'Amidst an escalating trade war and political tensions with the US,
Beijing officials have decided to develop a custom operating system
that will replace the Windows OS on computers used by the Chinese
military. From a report:
The decision, while not made official through the government's normal
press channels, was reported earlier this month by Canada-based
military magazine Kanwa Asian Defence. Per the magazine, Chinese
military officials won't be jumping ship from Windows to Linux but
will develop a custom OS. Thanks to the Snowden, Shadow Brokers, and
Vault7 leaks, Beijing officials are well aware of the US' hefty
arsenal of hacking tools, available for anything from smart TVs to
Linux servers, and from routers to common desktop operating systems,
such as Windows and Mac. Since these leaks have revealed that the US
can hack into almost anything, the Chinese government's plan is to
adopt a "security by obscurity" approach and run a custom operating
system that will make it harder for foreign threat actors -- mainly
the US -- to spy on Chinese military operations.'
-- source: https://news.slashdot.org/story/19/05/28/1613221
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
W3C and WHATWG Sign Agreement To Collaborate on a Single Version of HTML and DOM
by Peter Reutemann
'W3C and the WHATWG signed an agreement today to collaborate on the
development of a single version of the HTML and DOM specifications.
>From a blog post:
The Memorandum of Understanding jointly published as the WHATWG/W3C
Joint Working Mode gives the specifics of this collaboration. This is
the culmination of a careful exploration effective partnership
mechanisms since December 2017 after the WHATWG adopted many shared
features as their work-mode and an IPR policy. The HTML Working Group
which we will soon recharter will assist the W3C community in raising
issues and proposing solutions for the HTML and DOM specifications,
and bring WHATWG Review Drafts to Recommendation.
Motivated by the belief that having two distinct HTML and DOM
specifications claiming to be normative is generally harmful for the
community, and the mutual desire to bring the work back together, W3C
and WHATWG agree to the following terms: W3C and WHATWG work together
on HTML and DOM, in the WHATWG repositories, to produce a Living
Standard and Recommendation/Review Draft-snapshots. WHATWG maintains
the HTML and DOM Living Standards. W3C facilitates community work
directly in the WHATWG repositories (bridging communities, developing
use cases, filing issues, writing tests, mediating issue resolution).
W3C stops independent publishing of a designated list of
specifications related to HTML and DOM and instead will work to take
WHATWG Review Drafts to W3C Recommendations.'
-- source: https://tech.slashdot.org/story/19/05/28/1353243
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
Google's Chrome Becomes Web 'Gatekeeper' and Rivals Complain
by Peter Reutemann
'Few home-grown Google products have been as successful as Chrome.
Launched in 2008, it has more than 63% of the market and about 70% on
desktop computers, according to StatCounter data. Mozilla's Firefox is
far behind, while Apple's Safari is the default browser for iPhones.
Microsoft's Internet Explorer and Edge browsers are punchlines. From a
report:
Google won by offering consumers a fast, customizable browser for
free, while embracing open web standards. Now that Chrome is the clear
leader, it controls how the standards are set. That's sparking concern
Google is using the browser and its Chromium open-source underpinnings
to elbow out online competitors and tilt entire industries in its
favor. Most major browsers are now built on the Chromium software code
base that Google maintains. Opera, an indie browser that's been used
by techies for years, swapped its code base for Chromium in 2013. Even
Microsoft is making the switch this year. That creates a snowball
effect, where fewer web developers build for niche browsers, leading
those browsers to switch over to Chromium to avoid getting left
behind.
This leaves Chrome's competitors relying on Google employees who do
most of the work to keep Chromium software code up to date. Chromium
is open source, so anyone can suggest changes to it, but the majority
of programmers who approve contributions are Google employees, and any
major disagreements get settled by a small circle of senior Google
employees. Chrome is so ascendant these days that web developers often
don't bother to test their sites on competing browsers. Google
services including YouTube, Docs and Gmail sometimes don't work as
well on rival browsers, sending frustrated users to Chrome. Instead of
just another ship slicing through the sea of the web, Chrome is
becoming the ocean.'
-- source: https://developers.slashdot.org/story/19/05/28/1845238
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
Huawei's Android Replacement OS Will Launch in June, Company Exec Says
by Peter Reutemann
'Huawei's home-grown operating system -- codenamed HongMeng -- that's
set to replace Android once the Huawei ban from Google comes into full
effect, will be commercially rolled out next month, a Middle East head
for the firm revealed exclusively to TechRadar Middle East. From a
report:
On May 20, Google announced that it would partially cut off Huawei
devices from its Android operating system but was given an extension
till August 19 by the US White House. "Huawei knew this was coming and
was preparing. The OS was ready in January 2018 and this was our 'Plan
B'," said Alaa Elshimy, Managing Director and Vice President of Huawei
Enterprise Business Group Middle East. "We did not want to bring the
OS to the market as we had a strong relationship with Google and
others and did not want to ruin the relationship. Now, we are rolling
it out next month'
-- source: https://tech.slashdot.org/story/19/05/28/1524239
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
Cell phones
by John
Does anyone know where I can re-cycle some cell phones??
Cheers John..
1 year
