Saturday, June 22, 2013

Sometimes it's the little things...
Here’s The Security Breach Email Facebook Is Sending To 6M Users
Facebook has started sending out warning emails to users whose personal information has been compromised by the security bug it confirmed yesterday, confirming which pieces of data were exposed. The bug exposed some six million Facebook users’ email addresses and telephone numbers to other site users because Facebook had “inadvertently stored [it] in association with people’s contact information as part of their account on Facebook”. [Oops! Bob]
… The bug had apparently been live since last year, before being brought to Facebook’s attention last week. Its security team then fixed it within 24 hours of it being flagged, according to the social network.


How fragile is a “fully integrated” system.
Southwest cancels 57 flights after computer glitch
A system-wide computer failure forced Southwest Airlines to ground its entire fleet of airplanes preparing for departures late Friday, and at least 57 flights had to be canceled even after service was fully restored hours later, a company spokeswoman said.
The glitch impaired the airline's ability to do such things as conduct check-ins, print boarding passes and monitor the weight of each aircraft.


Well Secretary Stimson, apparently "Gentlemen do read each other's mail." If you recall that these techniques and procedures are designed for the military, they make sense. It's when they bleed over to your own citizens that the government seems Big Brother like...
Ewen MacAskill, Julian Borger, Nick Hopkins, Nick Davies and James Ball report:
Britain’s spy agency GCHQ has secretly gained access to the network of cables which carry the world’s phone calls and internet traffic and has started to process vast streams of sensitive personal information which it is sharing with its American partner, the National Security Agency (NSA).
The sheer scale of the agency’s ambition is reflected in the titles of its two principal components: Mastering the Internet and Global Telecoms Exploitation, aimed at scooping up as much online and telephone traffic as possible. This is all being carried out without any form of public acknowledgement or debate.
One key innovation has been GCHQ’s ability to tap into and store huge volumes of data drawn from fibre-optic cables for up to 30 days so that it can be sifted and analysed. That operation, codenamed Tempora, has been running for some 18 months.
Read more on The Guardian.
[From the article:
This includes recordings of phone calls, the content of email messages, entries on Facebook and the history of any internet user's access to websites – all of which is deemed legal, even though the warrant system was supposed to limit interception to a specified range of targets.
The existence of the programme has been disclosed in documents shown to the Guardian by the NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden as part of his attempt to expose what he has called "the largest programme of suspicionless surveillance in human history".

(Related) What, you thought we only shared with a few English speaking countries?
No PRISM for Dutch security bodies, but yes to information swaps
The Dutch security services AIVD and MIVD do not make direct use of the US internet spy system PRISM or similar programmes, home affairs minister Ronald Plasterk told reporters after Friday’s cabinet meeting.
However, the Netherlands does exchange information with foreign security services and this information may well have been collected by PRISM, Plasterk is quoted as saying by Nos television.
Read more on DutchNews.nl

(Related) Why sealed? Did he commit a “Secret Crime?”
Peter Finn and Sari Horwitz report:
Federal prosecutors have filed a sealed criminal complaint against Edward Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor who leaked a trove of documents about top-secret surveillance programs, and the United States has asked Hong Kong to detain him on a provisional arrest warrant, according to U.S. officials.
Snowden was charged with espionage, theft and conversion of government property, the officials said.
Read more on Washington Post.
Update: A copy of the sealed complaint, without the supporting affidavit, is here.
[From the article:
The Obama administration has shown a particular propensity to go after leakers and has launched more investigations than any previous administration. This White House is responsible for bringing six of the nine total indictments ever brought under the 1917 Espionage Act. Snowden will be the seventh individual when he is formally indicted.
… Snowden’s defense team in Hong Kong is likely to invoke part of the extradition treaty with the United States, which states that suspects will not be turned over to face criminal trial for offenses of a “political character.”


Another reason why I think that (sooner rather than later) everyone will surveil everyone. Add wings from a 3D printer and encrypted upload and download and you can “spy like Big Brother!”
The democratization of the drone
… Parallax sells six main kits on its Web site, but it's the Elev-8 quadcopter kit that is skyrocketing in popularity. Based on the company's newer chip, the multicore, C-programmable Propeller, the Elev-8 can be expanded to a hexcopter, and can carry payloads, like cameras, of up to 2.5 pounds.


Definately worth a read!
Cyber Security in the Internet of Things
Every enterprise will be affected by the Internet of Things (IoT), the growing phenomenon by which not only people, but also "things" — vehicles, commercial and industrial equipment, medical devices, remote sensors in natural environments — are linked to networks that are connected to the internet. Expect the impact on your business to be profound.
In particular, expect it to challenge your conception of cybersecurity and your ability to deliver it
… Succeeding in the IoT era will depend on defining and deploying not only the right cybersecurity technologies, but also the right policies and operations.


For my Ethical Hackers...
For a long time I've been a fan of N2A Cards, which sells a simple plug-and-play way to turn Barnes & Noble's Nook tablets into full-blown Android tablets. After all, if you've got good hardware, why not unlock its maximum potential?
Now Kindle owners can get in on the action. N2A's new N2Aos service will install Android 4.2 (Jelly Bean) on your first- or second-generation Kindle Fire, replacing Amazon's heavily customized -- and, some would say, limited -- operating system with the real deal.


Expanding research options for my students... Similar to “Similar Sites”
NextStories makes it easy to discover content you’re interested in reading based on any one site of your choice.
To use NextStories you don’t have to sign up for an account. Simply visit the site, drag the bookmarklet to your bookmarks bar and you’re ready to go. Next, go to a site that you like to read. We tested it out with MakeUseOf, of course, and clicked the bookmarklet while on the website’s homepage. We were instantly presented with a grid of articles from sites like Lifehacker, 9to5 Mac, and The Verge, among many others. The topics were on point and looked like they would definitely interest a MakeUseOf reader (or writer for that matter).
… In addition to browsing NextStories on the web, you can also take the browsing feature with you on the go using the free iPad app, which offers a similar experience.

No comments: