Monday, July 16, 2018

How large a part it played is open for debate. Still, plenty of lessons for my Computer Security students.
Death by leaks: Russian hacking helped sink Clinton 2016 campaign
In September 2015 an FBI cybersecurity agent called up the Democratic National Committee, just gearing up for the coming presidential election, to report that Russia-linked hackers had penetrated their network.
The agent was passed on to the help desk, where his message died.
… in March 2016 hackers from the military intelligence agency, the GRU, broke into computers of the DNC and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, using phishing techniques against staffer emails – including the account of campaign chairman John Podesta – and inserting malware to keep the access open.
And they began sweeping up gigabytes worth of materials.
- Hacking ignored until too late -




Is this Instagram’s fault or did users fail to RTFM.
Instagram users mistakenly believe new question feature is anonymous
Instagram’s constant kamikaze launch of new features, in which they desperately try to hold on to their sizeable but fickle user-base by throwing new story modes and face filters at them, installed an interesting new question and answer function this week.
The feature is similar to sites like Ask.fm and the now-defunct Formspring, where users could ask anonymous questions of each other, with the answers made public. Some people used these sites to secretly tell someone they had a crush on them, or ask something they’d be too frightened to say in public, but they also became hotbeds of high school bullying and were blamed for a spate of suicides.
The big difference with Instagram’s version of the feature, is that the questions aren’t anonymous, you can see which of your followers asked it – although this isn’t made explicit. In fact Instagram confuses users by telling them that if their question is shared, their username won’t be displayed.
It’s true that if the person you’re sending a question to decides to share your question publicly, your username is removed. However, what is not made clear is that the recipient is still able to see your username.




Good use, bad use; can you tell them apart?
Facial Recognition Cameras Challenged in Britain
Police in Britain are testing cameras that scan faces in public spaces and match them in real-time to the faces of wanted criminals. On Friday, Big Brother Watch, a London-based civil liberties group, said it would seek to stop the use of these cameras, lest Britain become a surveillance state, like China.
As early as next week, Silkie Carlo, the director of Big Brother Watch, said the group’s attorneys will challenge the use of the cameras in a process known as judicial review in Britain’s High Court.
“Our legal challenge will be the first in the world against the police use of automated facial recognition,” Carlo said in a telephone interview.
… The plaintiffs say that police use of the technology is unlawful and a violation of human rights. They say the technology has a chilling effect on democracy and freedom of expression and erodes the right to privacy.
… “There is no legal basis for it,” Carlo said.




Perspective. So my Computer Security class is learning to secure smartphones.
The PC Industry (Barely) Grew for the First Time in 6 Years
Both Gartner and IDC agree that the PC industry grew—if very slightly—in the quarter ending June 30, the first that’s happened in years.
I’ll have a deeper analysis of this situation for Premium members soon. But to be clear, this does not mean that the PC industry is “back,” or that we will now see growth in subsequent quarters, let alone this or future calendar years.
“PC shipment growth in the second quarter of 2018 was driven by demand in the business market, which was offset by declining shipments in the consumer segment,” Gartner’s Mikako Kitagawa wrote, noting that consumer PC market is still shrinking at an alarming rate thanks to smartphones.




A national health system. What could possibly go wrong?
My Health Record: privacy, cybersecurity and the hacking risk
From Monday, Australians will have three months to opt out of a new digital medical record that can hold on to information for up to 30 years after they die.
The digital record, called My Health Record, will be automatically set up for every Australian unless they opt out before 15 October.
It will track Australians’ allergies, medical conditions, previous or current medication, test results and anything else that is uploaded by your doctor – and share it between medical providers.
Doctors say it will improve the quality of care but others are urging people to opt out due to privacy and cybersecurity concerns.


(Related)
My Health Record systems collapse under more opt-outs than expected
Australians attempting to opt out of the government's new centralised health records system online have been met with an unreliable website. Those phoning in have faced horrendous wait times, sometimes more than two hours, often to find that call centre systems were down as well, and staff unable to help.
The Australian Digital Health Agency (ADHA), which runs the My Health Record system, is reportedly telling callers that they weren't expecting the volume of opt-outs.
… Cannold, a research ethicist and health regulator, said she'd like to see government prove the value of My Health Record, as well as their capacity to keep it secure, before she opts in to have one. The system should also be designed to allow users to withdraw their record at any time. Currently, opting out merely marks your data as "unavailable", while actually keeping it on the system until 30 years after your death.
… "I can absolutely categorically state that none of the apps and none of the use of the My Health Record data will be able to be sold to third parties – that's absolutely prohibited," he said.
And yet earlier this month, the My Health Record partner app HealthEngine was caught doing exactly that.
We know full well that prohibiting something doesn't mean it won't happen.




Perspective. Is China at or near a tipping point? Will the rest of the world follow?
As China goes increasingly cashless, PBOC says cash payment is still alive
The banking regulator reminds businesses to accept cash payments even as mobile payment transactions reached a record US$12.8 trillion




Perspective.
In about 20 years, half the population will live in eight states
… The Weldon Cooper Center for Public Service of the University of Virginia analyzed Census Bureau population projections to estimate each state’s likely population in 2040, including the expected breakdown of the population by age and gender.
… Eight states will have just under half of the total population of the country, 49.5 percent, according to the Weldon Cooper Center’s estimate. The next eight most populous states will account for an additional fifth of the population, up to 69.2 percent — meaning that the 16 most populous states will be home to about 70 percent of Americans.
… 30 percent of the population of the country will control 68 percent of the seats in the U.S. Senate. Or, more starkly, half the population of the country will control 84 percent of those seats.




A resource for my students.
NIH NNLM Gov Doc/Database: Data Thesaurus
Data Thesaurus: All – Welcome to the Data Thesaurus, a resource connecting and defining concepts, services, and tools relevant to librarians working in data-driven discovery. A definition, relevant literature, and web resources accompany each term along with links to related terms. Search by term or keyword on the right or browse the 70 terms below.”




Did I remember that quote correctly? Often I add my own interpretation.
The Open Library – Search Full-Text within 4M+ Books
The Open Library Blog: “Open Library now lets you search inside the text contents of over 4M books. Many book websites, like Amazon and Goodreads, give you the ability to search for books by title and author, but they don’t make it easy to find books based on their contents. This type of searching is called “Full-Text Search”… When you search across 40M documents, it can be a challenge to find the one you’re looking for. One feature which Open Library has been missing is a way to limit Internet Archive’s full-text search to only include results from books on Open Library. So for the last two years, Open Library has patiently waited to take full advantage of full-text search for its users. Earlier this week, Giovanni Damiola (@giovannidamiola) released an improvement to our full-text search engine which lets us get around this historical limitation — and so we jumped on this opportunity to improve our search on openlibrary.org! With the help of Razzi Abuissa, Open Library volunteer, and Mek, Open Library’s project lead, you can now search inside more than 4M Open Library books…”


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