Cameras May Open Up the Board Room to Hackers

January 23rd, 2012

One afternoon this month, a hacker took a tour of a dozen conference rooms around the globe via equipment that most every company has in those rooms; videoconferencing equipment.

With the move of a mouse, he steered a camera around each room, occasionally zooming in with such precision that he could discern grooves in the wood and paint flecks on the wall. In one room, he zoomed out through a window, across a parking lot and into shrubbery some 50 yards away where a small animal could be seen burrowing underneath a bush. With such equipment, the hacker could have easily eavesdropped on privileged attorney-client conversations or read trade secrets on a report lying on the conference room table.

In this case, the hacker was HD Moore, a chief security officer at Rapid7, a Boston based company that looks for security holes in computer systems that are used in devices like toaster ovens and Mars landing equipment. His latest find: videoconferencing equipment is often left vulnerable to hackers.

Businesses collectively spend billions of dollars each year beefing up security on their computer systems and employee laptops. They agonize over the confidential information that employees send to their Gmail and Dropbox accounts and store on their iPads and smartphones. But rarely do they give much thought to the ease with which anyone can penetrate a videoconference room where their most guarded trade secrets are openly discussed.

– More… ➡

– Research thanks to Gerry B.

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Another life change …

January 23rd, 2012

In line with posting some things that are personal along with the Perfect Storm stuff, I’d like to share with you that I’ve resigned from my job at SLI-Systems as a C++ Software Engineer with effect Friday, January 20th.

It was an amicable separation.  I’ve been wanting to break free and do some of my own software development for some time and, after we returned from our two-month sojourn to the U.S., and I tried to get back into the groove there for a week or so, it seemed like it was time to go.

I completed two large projects for SLI in the time I was there (22 months).  I integrated the Basis Technology Libraries into their main C++ program, Moby, code so that they can process a variety of foreign languages (Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Greek, Polish and German to date) as well as the English processing they were already doing.   And, I converted Moby from 32 to 64 bits.

Leaving a good job for the unknown can make one insecure and I’ve not been immune to that fact.

But I prefer this slightly scared and disoriented feeling I have now to the nagging suspicion that I might have been staying on someplace because I’m letting my fears and insecurities limit my choices.

Stayed tuned, I’ll report if I have a melt-down or if I release a new software product – either way, it should be interesting.

Oh, and I should mention that it’s summer here and I plan to use some of this new free time to ride my motorcycle off to a few locations around New Zealand which is, I think, one of the better ways to use this nice weather.

Cheers.

 

Posted in Personal | 1 Comment »

10 reasons the U.S. is no longer the land of the free

January 18th, 2012

– From John Turley in the Washington Post.   I hope the folks in Washington, D.C. are reading this stuff.

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Every year, the State Department issues reports on individual rights in other countries, monitoring the passage of restrictive laws and regulations around the world. Iran, for example, has been criticized for denying fair public trials and limiting privacy, while Russia has been taken to task for undermining due process. Other countries have been condemned for the use of secret evidence and torture.

Even as we pass judgment on countries we consider unfree, Americans remain confident that any definition of a free nation must include their own — the land of free. Yet, the laws and practices of the land should shake that confidence. In the decade since Sept. 11, 2001, this country has comprehensively reduced civil liberties in the name of an expanded security state. The most recent example of this was the National Defense Authorization Act, signed Dec. 31, which allows for the indefinite detention of citizens. At what point does the reduction of individual rights in our country change how we define ourselves?

While each new national security power Washington has embraced was controversial when enacted, they are often discussed in isolation. But they don’t operate in isolation. They form a mosaic of powers under which our country could be considered, at least in part, authoritarian. Americans often proclaim our nation as a symbol of freedom to the world while dismissing nations such as Cuba and China as categorically unfree. Yet, objectively, we may be only half right. Those countries do lack basic individual rights such as due process, placing them outside any reasonable definition of “free,” but the United States now has much more in common with such regimes than anyone may like to admit.

These countries also have constitutions that purport to guarantee freedoms and rights. But their governments have broad discretion in denying those rights and few real avenues for challenges by citizens — precisely the problem with the new laws in this country.

The list of powers acquired by the U.S. government since 9/11 puts us in rather troubling company.

– Click here:  ➡  to read on and see the list of the ten things we’ve lost.   It’s scary.

Posted in CrashBlogging, Culture - How not to do it, Human Rights, Politics - The Wrong Way, Social Breakdown, The Perfect Storm | No Comments »

The Wealth Gap – Inequality in Numbers

January 17th, 2012

Until protesters took to the streets last year, first in New York and then in financial centres across the world, inequality had been a low-key issue.

Not any more.

With the political temperature rising, a stream of new analysis is revealing how sharply inequality has been growing.

In October, the US Congressional Budget Office (CBO) caused a storm by revealing how big a slice of income gains since the late 1970s had gone to the richest 1% of households.

The message was dramatic.

Over the 28 years covered by the CBO study, US incomes had increased overall by 62%, allowing for tax and inflation.

But the lowest paid fifth of Americans had got only a small share of that: their incomes had grown by a modest 18%.

Middle income households were also well below the overall average with gains of just 37%.

And even the majority of America’s richest households saw gains of barely above the overall average at 67%.

How does that make sense?

Because the CBO found most of the income gains over the past 30 years had gone to the top 1% of US households. Their incomes had almost trebled with rises of 275%.

– More… ➡

 

Posted in CrashBlogging, Financial melt-down, Human Rights, Mental Irrationality, Social Breakdown, The Perfect Storm, Wealth Disparity | No Comments »

Paybacks are hell: Parental spying prompts infiltration of German police system

January 11th, 2012

Der Spiegel published a story in yesterday’s edition of their magazine that the hack on the German police surveillance system “Patras” was prompted by a senior officer spying on his daughter’s internet activities.

The Patras system is used by the police to track suspects using so-called “silent” SMSs and GPS tracking devices planted on automobiles.

It appears that a senior policeman from Frankfurt am Main installed spyware onto his daughter’s computer to keep an eye on her online activities.

It is unclear whether this is legal under German law. It is also unknown whether he used the famous Bundestrojaner or some sort of commercial off-the-shelf spyware.

One of his daughters friends then discovered the spyware on her computer and decided that was justification enough to hack into her father’s computer.

Upon invading her dad’s system he found a selection of sensitive security related emails that enabled access to the Patras system. Two German hackers from a group called n0n4m3 cr3w (noname crew) were arrested after the system was breached in July of 2011.

According to Der Spiegel the policeman had redirected his work emails to his home computer. I expect that this is against the rules and is almost always a bad idea.

The worst part is that such a sensitive network used to covertly track people was accessible without any sort of two-factor authentication.

You would hope that intercepting a few sensitive emails would not provide enough information to allow a VPN connection or access critical infrastructure with such ease.

It is not clear whether this incident is the one that resulted in the successful attack against Patras last summer, or whether they were in fact breached twice.

It is one thing to accept the need of law enforcement to track suspects after receiving the approval of a judge, but it is becoming clear that access to these systems is too easy. It almost invites abuse and could result in criminal cases being compromised.

With great power comes great responsibility, and hopefully the German police have implemented more strict access controls and other authorities with similar power have heard this story and will look into their own security.

– To the original… ➡

 

Posted in CrashBlogging, CyberChaos, Tech-Software, The Perfect Storm | No Comments »

REGRETS OF THE DYING

January 11th, 2012

– This is so beautiful.   I also find it inspiring.  We should all think about this stuff and not just walk through our lives half asleep as the calendar pages riffle by us, unnoticed.   As a country and Western song I heard says, “This ain’t no rehearsal.”   it is all as real as it gets and if you miss it, you’ll have no one but yourself to blame.

– This was written by a woman named Bronnie Ware and her site can be found here.

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For many years I worked in palliative care. My patients were those who had gone home to die. Some incredibly special times were shared. I was with them for the last three to twelve weeks of their lives.

People grow a lot when they are faced with their own mortality. I learnt never to underestimate someone’s capacity for growth. Some changes were phenomenal. Each experienced a variety of emotions, as expected, denial, fear, anger, remorse, more denial and eventually acceptance. Every single patient found their peace before they departed though, every one of them.

When questioned about any regrets they had or anything they would do differently, common themes surfaced again and again. Here are the most common five:

1. I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me. 

This was the most common regret of all. When people realise that their life is almost over and look back clearly on it, it is easy to see how many dreams have gone unfulfilled. Most people had not honoured even a half of their dreams and had to die knowing that it was due to choices they had made, or not made.

It is very important to try and honour at least some of your dreams along the way. From the moment that you lose your health, it is too late. Health brings a freedom very few realise, until they no longer have it.

2. I wish I didn’t work so hard. 

This came from every male patient that I nursed. They missed their children’s youth and their partner’s companionship. Women also spoke of this regret. But as most were from an older generation, many of the female patients had not been breadwinners. All of the men I nursed deeply regretted spending so much of their lives on the treadmill of a work existence.

By simplifying your lifestyle and making conscious choices along the way, it is possible to not need the income that you think you do. And by creating more space in your life, you become happier and more open to new opportunities, ones more suited to your new lifestyle.

3. I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings.

Many people suppressed their feelings in order to keep peace with others. As a result, they settled for a mediocre existence and never became who they were truly capable of becoming. Many developed illnesses relating to the bitterness and resentment they carried as a result.

We cannot control the reactions of others. However, although people may initially react when you change the way you are by speaking honestly, in the end it raises the relationship to a whole new and healthier level. Either that or it releases the unhealthy relationship from your life. Either way, you win.

4. I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends. 

Often they would not truly realise the full benefits of old friends until their dying weeks and it was not always possible to track them down. Many had become so caught up in their own lives that they had let golden friendships slip by over the years. There were many deep regrets about not giving friendships the time and effort that they deserved. Everyone misses their friends when they are dying.

It is common for anyone in a busy lifestyle to let friendships slip. But when you are faced with your approaching death, the physical details of life fall away. People do want to get their financial affairs in order if possible. But it is not money or status that holds the true importance for them. They want to get things in order more for the benefit of those they love. Usually though, they are too ill and weary to ever manage this task. It is all comes down to love and relationships in the end. That is all that remains in the final weeks, love and relationships.

5. I wish that I had let myself be happier. 

This is a surprisingly common one. Many did not realise until the end that happiness is a choice. They had stayed stuck in old patterns and habits. The so-called ‘comfort’ of familiarity overflowed into their emotions, as well as their physical lives. Fear of change had them pretending to others, and to their selves, that they were content. When deep within, they longed to laugh properly and have silliness in their life again.

When you are on your deathbed, what others think of you is a long way from your mind. How wonderful to be able to let go and smile again, long before you are dying.

Life is a choice. It is YOUR life. Choose consciously, choose wisely, choose honestly. Choose happiness.

– To the original… ➡

 

Posted in And Now for Something Completely Different, Personal, Philosophical | 1 Comment »

Time to end the war on drugs

January 11th, 2012

– This is from Richard Branson’s Blog.   That’s Richard Branson of Virgin fame.  I say, “Bravo” for what he’s written here.

– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –

Visited Portugal, as one of the Global Drug Commissioners, to congratulate them on the success of their drug policies over the last 10 years.

Ten years ago the Portuguese Government responded to widespread public concern over drugs by rejecting a “war on drugs” approach and instead decriminalized drug possession and use. It further rebuffed convention by placing the responsibility for decreasing drug demand as well as managing dependency under the Ministry of Health rather than the Ministry of Justice. With this, the official response towards drug-dependent persons shifted from viewing them as criminals to treating them as patients.

Now with a decade of experience Portugal provides a valuable case study which you can learn more of by reading this post of how decriminalization coupled with evidence-based strategies can reduce drug consumption, dependence, recidivism and HIV infection and create safer communities for all.

I will set out clearly what I learned from my visit to Portugal and would urge other countries to study this:

In 2001 Portugal became the first European country to officially abolish all criminal penalties for personal possession of drugs, including marijuana, cocaine, heroin and methamphetamines.

Jail time was replaced with offer of therapy. (The argument was that the fear of prison drives addicts underground and that incarceration is much more expensive than treatment).

Under Portugal’s new regime, people found guilty of possessing small amounts of drugs are sent to a panel consisting of a psychologist, social worker, and legal adviser for appropriate treatment (which may be refused without criminal punishment), instead of jail.

Critics in the poor, socially conservative and largely Catholic nation said decriminalizing drug possession would open the country to “drug tourists” and exacerbate Portugal’s drug problem; the country has some of the highest levels of hard-drug use in Europe. The recently realised results of a report commissioned by the Cato Institute, suggest otherwise.

The paper, published by Cato in April 2011, found that in the five years after personal possession was decriminalized, illegal drug use among teens in Portugal declined and rates of new HIV infections caused by sharing of dirty needles dropped, while the number of people seeking treatment for drug addiction more than doubled.

It has enabled the Portuguese government to manage and control the problem far better than virtually every other Western country does.

Compared to the European Union and the US, Portugal drug use numbers are impressive.

Following decriminalization, Portugal has the lowest rate of lifetime marijuana use in people over 15 in the EU: 10%. The most comparable figure in America is in people over 12: 39.8%, Proportionally, more Americans have used cocaine than Portuguese have used marijuana.

The Cato paper reports that between 2001 and 2006 in Portugal, rates of lifetime use of any illegal drug among seventh through ninth graders fell from 14.1% to 10.6%. Drug use in older teens also declined.  Life time heroin use among 16-18 year olds fell from 2.5% to 1.8%.

New HIV infections in drug users fell by 17% between 1999 and 2003.

Death related to heroin and similar drugs were cut by more than half.

The number of people on methadone and buprenorphine treatment for drug addiction rose to 14,877 from 6,040, after decriminalization, and the considerable money saved on enforcement allowed for increase funding of drug – free treatment as well.

Property theft has dropped dramatically (50% – 80% of all property theft worldwide is caused by drug users).

America has the highest rates of cocaine and marijuana use in the world, and while most of the EU (including Holland) has more liberal drug laws than the US, it also has less drug use. In America, sites like https://syntheticurinereview.com/how-to-keep-pee-warm/are very popular, people from all walks of life need to hide in plain sight from the prying eyes of big brother in order to keep their  jobs.

Current policy debate is that it’s based on “speculation and fear mongering”, rather than empirical evidence on the effect of more lenient drug policies. In Portugal, the effect was to neutralize what had become the country’s number one public health problem.

Decriminalization does not result in increased drug use.

Portugal’s 10 year experiment shows clearly that enough is enough. It is time to end the war on drugs worldwide. We must stop criminalising drug users. Health and treatment should be offered to drug users – not prison. Bad drugs policies affect literally hundreds of thousands of individuals and communities across the world. We need to provide medical help to those that have problematic use – not criminal retribution.

By Richard Branson. Founder of Virgin Group

– To the original… ➡

 

 

Posted in CounterCurrents, General | No Comments »

Smart Phone Makers Gave India Spy Tools, “Leaked” Memos Say

January 11th, 2012

People doubt the deep evil inherent in unbridled Capitalism.   But consider this story.   They are selling our inherent rights to personal privacy in exchange for access to markets for their own, and their shareholder’s, profit.

dennis

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Purported Indian intelligence memos also state that the backdoors provided by Apple, Nokia and RIM allowed India to spy on U.S. government officials

Apple, Nokia and Research In Motion (RIM) gave Indian intelligence agencies secret access to encrypted smartphone communications as the price of doing business in the country, according to what appear to be leaked Indian government documents.

The purported documents, if they are real, indicate that the smartphone giants gave India’s Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and Indian military intelligence “backdoor” tools that would let the Indian agencies read encrypted emails sent to and from RIM’s BlackBerrys, Apple’s iPhones and Nokia smartphones.

“Military Intelligence and the CBI have been conducting bilateral cellular and Internetsurveillance operations since April 2011,” reads a document allegedly from the Directorate General of Military Intelligence and publicly posted online.

The memos refer to an agreement between India’s Ministry of Defense and RIM, Nokia and Apple, that considers data interception and surveillance part of the “general framework” allowing the smartphone makers to sell their devices in India.

A “decision was made earlier this year to sign an agreement with mobile manufacturers (MM) in exchange for the Indian market presence,” the military intelligence document reads.

– More… ➡

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Doomsday Clock Moved 1 Minute Closer to Midnight

January 11th, 2012

The Fukushima nuclear disaster and interest in nuclear power from Turkey, Indonesia and the UAE raised scientists’ concern about the threat of humanity’s destruction

In a sign of pessimism about humanity’s future, scientists today set the hands of the infamous “Doomsday Clock” forward one minute from two years ago.

“It is now five minutes to midnight,” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (BAS) director Kennette Benedict announced today (Jan. 10) at a press conference in Washington, D.C.

That represents a symbolic step closer to doomsday, a change from the clock’s previous mark of six minutes to midnight, set in January 2010.

The clock is a symbol of the threat ofhumanity’s imminent destruction from nuclear or biological weapons, climate change and other human-caused disasters. In making their deliberations about how to update the clock’s time, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists focused on the current state of nuclear arsenals around the globe, disastrous events such as the Fukushima nuclear meltdown, and biosecurity issues such as the creation of an airborne H5N1 flu strain.

The Doomsday Clock came into being in 1947 as a way for atomic scientists to warn the world of the dangers of nuclear weapons. That year, the Bulletin set the time at seven minutes to midnight, with midnight symbolizing humanity’s destruction. By 1949, it was at three minutes to midnight as the relationship between the United States and the Soviet Union deteriorated. In 1953, after the first test of the hydrogen bomb, the doomsday clock ticked to two minutes until midnight.

The Bulletin — and the clock ­— were at their most optimistic in 1991, when the Cold War thawed and the United States and Russia began cutting their arsenals. That year, the Bulletin set the clock at 17 minutes to midnight.

From then until 2010, however, it was a gradual creep back toward destruction, as hopes of total nuclear disarmament vanished and threats of nuclear terrorism and climate change reared their heads. In 2010, the Bulletin found some hope in arms reduction treaties and international climate talks and nudged the minute hand of the Doomsday Clock back to six minutes from midnight from its previous post at five to midnight.

With today’s decision, the Bulletin repudiated that optimism. The panel considers a mix of long-term trends and immediate events in the decision-making process, said Benedict. Trends might include factors like improved solar energy technology to combat climate change, she said, while political events such as the recent United Nations climate meeting in Durban play a role as well. This year, the Fukushima nuclear disaster made a big impression.

“We’re trying to weight whether that was a wake-up call, whether it will make people take a closer look at this new and very powerful technology, or whether people will go on with business as usual,” Benedict told LiveScience on Monday in an interview before the announcement of the “doomsday time” decision. [Top 10 Alternative Energy Bets]

Other factors that played into the decision included the growing interest in nuclear power from countries such as Turkey, Indonesia and the United Arab Emirates, Benedict said.

The Bulletin panel found that despite hopes of global agreements about nuclear weapons, nuclear power and climate change in 2010, little progress has been made.

– more… ➡

 

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Settling back into life in New Zealand

January 11th, 2012

We got in about midnight on Saturday from a trip that began in Los Angeles, jumped to San Francisco, then to Sydney and finally ended in Christchurch, New Zealand after what seemed like days of traveling.  Indeed, it’s hard to work out just how long you have been traveling when there are International Date Lines and so many time zone changes in play.

Sunday, we got up and spent much of the day unpacking until about 3 PM when I suggested that we go out for a ride in the nice summer weather.

I came back from that ride fairly depressed.   Partly because I’m at the end of a long and idyllic vacation and seeing all my American friends and family.   But, in a large measure too because of Christchurch.

Your author - 2011

My beautiful city on the Southern Island of New Zealand is still a deeply wounded entity.  As we drove around, the city center is still predominately an upsetting scene of destruction and demolition.   Wounds that will likely take five years, and more likely 10, to begin to get sorted out so that it regains some of what made it so very special.

So, I was back and feeling sad and twisted by all of this.   Part of me wants to pull up stakes and move on to a place not so wounded.  And another very considerable part of me knows that Colette would probably not opt to leave this city that’s been her home for 30 years.   It’s one of those quandaries you just have to look at and live with until it resolves one way or the other.   But, it left me unsettled and when we returned to the house, I had a good long lie down on the couch and just let the feelings wash over me.

I’m never one to be down long, though.   Monday morning, I was up and away to work to see what lay in store for me there.   All of that is yet another quandary for me.

They treat me very well and the job’s provided me with a good income these last 18 months or so.   But, maintaining old and cranky software that’s been agglutinating for years has never been a favorite of mine.   So, do I go or do I stay?   Security and a regular paycheck sit on one hand.  And, the on the other hand, sit freedom to write my own software and take a shot at entrepreneurship with all the economic and emotional risks that go with that.   And in the back of my mind, a small voice that says, “If not now, when?”

Not knowing yet what I really want, I went into work Monday thinking, “I’ll wait and see what new thing they offer me to do.   If it’s something I’d really find interesting to do, then I’ll take  serious look.   But if it’s more spaghetti wrestling and digging through messes that should never have been coded that way, then I’m going to take a flyer.”   That was Monday and today’s Wednesday and I’m still thinking about it all.   ‘Waiting is’.

In Stranger in a Strange Land, Heinlein introduces this concept: “Waiting is”.  (http://jassnight.wordpress.com/2009/11/17/waiting-is/)

To me, it means patiently waiting, with no time frame in mind, until the decision simply makes itself because all the necessary parts needed to make the decision, have arrived.  And, when they are there, the decision virtually makes itself.  Even though we think we are the agent of decision, we are in fact, simply the vessel within which the decision assembles and makes itself.

Little is to be gained by forcing decisions.

A good friend of mine, who said she much enjoyed the personal side of what I’ve been writing these last two months, suggested, that as I go forward and resume with my normal fare, that I might leaven it with more of the personal and not such a steady diet of renditions of all that is so badly broken in our world.

After thinking about what she said, I agree and I am going to try to do more of that.

In truth, I deeply value being able to look squarely at the world and the mess that it’s in.   But, being such a ‘looker’ is not all that I am.   I’m a poet, a lover, a good friend to many people, a father and a grandfather and someone who, in spite of several scars and setbacks, deeply likes myself and my life and I think that I am one of the luckiest and most blessed people I know.   And, each morning, when I get up, I feel deep thankfulness that I am still here with my heart, my mind and my body mostly intact.   And thus, I rise to love the day intensely.

Somehow, I can keep the doom and gloom of the “Perfect Storm” hypothesis, which I believe now is more on the money that ever, separate from my joy and my love of life and love for those around me.

Perhaps, what Katy was telling me, is to share more of both sides of that.   And she’s right and I will.   I hope it pleases you, dear readers.

dennis

 

Posted in Personal | 1 Comment »

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