Think of the network as a
conveyor belt for messages. If you are sending postcards
(unencrypted mail) your messages can be read by anyone who happens to
look.
Laws
on Wi-Fi sniffing still up in the air, say specialists
Got a Wi-Fi network? If someone, say
Google or the government, sniffs your open network, you may think
you're legally protected. Don't be so sure.
It remains unclear whether the law
protects your unencrypted Wi-Fi from interception, because there are
differing interpretations and lack of court precedent, Kevin
Bankston, senior counsel at the Center
for Democracy and Technology, said in a session at Defcon
yesterday.
The federal wiretap statute prohibits
sniffing of contents of communications by a device unless
the contents are readily accessible to the general public.
If the network is password-protected you're fine. But under the
definition of "readily accessible to the general public,"
unencrypted radio communications may not be covered,
Bankston said.
(Related) Do tools like this make data
“accessible to the general public?” (You may want to forward
this article to your security manager)
Tools
boast easy cracking of Microsoft crypto for businesses
Cryptography specialist Moxie
Marlinspike released tools at Defcon today for easily cracking
passwords in wireless and virtual private networks that use a popular
encryption protocol based on an algorithm from Microsoft called
MS-CHAPv2, news that will no doubt worry many a network
administrator.
The tools crack WPA2 (Wi-Fi Protected
Access) and VPN passwords used by corporations and organizations
running networks that are protected by the PPTP (Point-to-Point
Tunneling Protocol), which uses MS-CHAPv2 for authentication.
Yeah, it's called reality. Deal with
it.
Surprisingly
Good Evidence That Real Name Policies Fail To Improve Comments
YouTube has joined a growing list of
social media companies who think that forcing users to use their real
names will make comment sections less of a trolling
wasteland, but there’s surprisingly good evidence from South
Korea that real name policies fail at cleaning up comments. In 2007,
South Korea temporarily mandated that all websites with over 100,000
viewers require real names, but
scraped it after it was found to be ineffective at cleaning up
abusive and malicious comments (the policy reduced unwanted comments
by an estimated .09%). [So for every 10,000 “bad”
comments, a real name policy eliminates nine? Bob]
A technology whose time
has come?
July 28, 2012
The
social economy: Unlocking value and productivity through social
technologies
"While 72 percent of companies use
social technologies in some way, very few are anywhere near to
achieving the full potential benefit. In fact, the most powerful
applications of social technologies in the global economy are largely
untapped. Companies will go on developing ways to reach consumers
through social technologies and gathering insights for product
development, marketing, and customer service. Yet the McKinsey
Global Institute (MGI) finds that twice as much potential value
lies in using social tools to enhance communications, knowledge
sharing, and collaboration within and across enterprises. MGI’s
estimates suggest that by fully implementing social technologies,
companies have an opportunity to raise the
productivity of interaction workers—high-skill knowledge
workers, including managers and professionals—by 20
to 25 percent."
Think of this as a way to
use Behavioral Advertising techniques on local politicians. Also,
how to write a scraper...
July 28, 2012
Sunlight
Foundation - Beta of Open States Legislator Tracking
"Discover politics in your state.
Find your legislators, see how they've voted and browse upcoming
legislation and events. While Open
States is in beta this site is only available for Alaska,
Arizona, California, District of Columbia, Delaware, Florida, Hawaii,
Idaho, Illinois, Louisiana, Maryland, Minnesota, Montana, North
Carolina, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Ohio, Texas, Utah and
Wisconsin."
[From the website:
Just want data?
We gather legislative data from all 50
states, Washington D.C. and Puerto Rico, and then make it available
in a common format via our API
and bulk downloads.
You can also check out our contributor's
guide and join our Google
Group to get involved.
Tool for building textbooks?
Hexonic ScanToPDF is a free to use
desktop application for Windows computers. The app converts image
files into PDF documents. Supported image file formats include JPEG,
TIFF, Multipage-TIFF, BMP, PNG, and GIF. You can install the app,
import the images, and choose whether to create individual PDF files
for each image or simply merge them all together.
Similar site: AlbumsToPDF.
For my Ethical Hackers. You heard
them, go earn some bucks...
"Nearly a year ago, Facebook
introduced its bug
bounty program, inviting security researchers to poke around the
site, discover vulnerabilities that could compromise the integrity or
privacy of Facebook user data, and then responsibly disclose them to
the company. Still, when the social network's security team received
a tip from a researcher about a vulnerability in the company's own
network which would allow attackers to eavesdrop on internal
communications, they made an unprecedented choice by broadened the
scope of the bug bounty program and inviting
researchers to search for other holes in the corporate network.
Nobody expects malicious attackers to have a
change of heart and hand over information about a vulnerability for a
few thousand dollars when they could sell the stole information for
much more. [My
hackers would never go over to the dark side... Bob]
It should, therefore, come as no surprise that Ryan McGeehan, the
manager of Facebook's security-incident response unit, stated that if
there's a million-dollar bug, they will pay it out."
For my Math students. As the Quarter
nears an end, those who are behind try 16 hours Math days, causing
their brains to implode.
Using a computer for too long can be
hazardous to your health. You never think about it because you are
just sitting in a chair, but there is actually some serious risks
that can come from sitting in front of a computer for too long. You
may suffer from headaches, eye problems and even back issues. With
this in mind, you might want to consider a light, Windows-based
program called BreakTaker.
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