Sunday, October 23, 2016

Another indication that all the recent incidents have been practice for something truly massive? 
Group of hackers claims responsibility for massive cyber attack
On Friday, epic cyberattacks crippled a major internet firm, repeatedly disrupting the availability of popular websites across the United States.  The hacker group claiming responsibility says that the day's antics were just a dry run and that it has its sights set on a much bigger target.
   Members of a shadowy hacker group that calls itself New World Hackers claimed responsibility for the attack via Twitter, though that claim could not be verified.  They said they organized networks of connected devices to create a massive botnet that threw a monstrous 1.2 trillion bits of data every second at Dyn's servers.  Dyn officials wouldn't confirm the figure during a conference call later Friday with reporters.
   Cottrell noted that there are several firms that offer protection against DDoS attacks, by giving companies a way to divert the bad traffic and remain online in case of an attack.  But monthly subscription fees for these services are generally equal to a typical DDoS extortion payment, giving companies little incentive to pay for them.
Meanwhile not much is required in the way of resources or skill to mount a botnet attack, he said, adding that would-be attackers can rent botnets for as little as $100.  Cottrell said the long-term solution lies in improving the security of all internet-connected devices.


I wonder if my students will live-stream my lectures?  What message is Facebook sending?
Facebook’s first Live Video ad campaign encourages you to stream everyday life
Facebook is launching a large-scale ad campaign on the streets of the United States and United Kingdom in a bid to get more people to start streaming using its Live Video service.

(Related) Everyone else better try and catch up?
It looks like Instagram is testing live video on the beta version of its app


Something for Denver?  (Boulder maybe.)
Two-wheel drive: China tech giants bet on 'Uber for bikes' in hunt for next unicorn
China's tech industry giants are sloughing hundreds of millions of dollars into what they're betting will be the country's next big internet craze - 'Uber for bikes'.
A symbol of China's cities long before a boom in cars, snarling traffic and smog, the humble bicycle is making a comeback.  Start-ups equipped with smartphone apps, GPS and scannable codes are selling cheap bike-sharing to city-dwellers as the way to beat jams on China's most clogged streets.
   Riders use smartphone apps to unlock and pay the cost of hire, and they are free to leave the bikes wherever their journey ends, a feature ofo and MoBike say is a major plus over traditional rental services, which require bikes to be returned to a parking station. MoBike's app also allows users to see nearby vacant bikes using a GPS tracking system.


Interesting times.  
Economists never imagined negative interest rates — now they're rewriting textbooks
If you’re a bank, the idea sounds crazy.  Why pay someone to hold your cash?
In 1983, when Frederic Mishkin started writing "The Economics of Money, Banking and Financial Markets," his seminal textbook on macroeconomics, he never thought he'd devote much space to the idea of negative interest rates.
"A million years no," Mishkin told Business Insider.
   And as Mishkin finishes the 12th edition of his textbook, he's devoting a whole lot of space to negative interest rates.
"There's something very shocking about this," Mishkin said.  "I have to talk about how negative rates are something that can be very prevalent."
   the experiences of the past few years suggest that central banks will need more room to maneuver in future crises.  That could mean rates as low as -4 or -5%.
But that's nearly impossible when people could just keep their money in cash and avoid the costs of depositing money.  So, in Rogoff’s mind, in order for central bankers to have the option to set significantly negative rates, we have to get rid of cash — or at least big bills above, say, $10 or 10 euros.  He writes about this in "The Curse of Cash."


Y’all better start reading science fiction!
Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos Believes Outer Space Is The Next Internet
For many, Space is the next frontier, but for Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, it's the next internet, and he and his company wants to be there to see it happen.  He views space as a place that is lacking in infrastructure to support the vast amount of entrepreneurs the Earth has to offer.
Bezos spoke at the Vanity Fair New Establishment Summit in San Francisco.  He talked about Blue Origins, a rocket venture that falls under Amazon.  It's primarily competing directly with SpaceX, but it isn't being talked about on the same level.
The plan is to create the same type of infrastructure for space that Amazon did for the internet back in 1995.

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