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Technology Industry News & Career Management information, brought to you by BrainWave Consulting Company.
February 2008 - Posts
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Pictures from the 2008 Dartmouth Winter Carnival.... Share Post: Read More...
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This one was from Computerworld Hong Kong.... Share Post: Read More...
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In this week's Keep the Joint Running ("The portal," 2/25/2008) I described the contrast between IT's view of the PC as a business computing device and the average end-user's perspective - that it's a portal to a universe of possibilities - I received this suggestion. I'll be interested in everyone's Read More...
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How kids learn to lie. (Maybe it's a bit off the security topic, but with all my reading on the psychology of security, I don't think so.) So when do the 98 percent who think lying is wrong become the... Share Post: Read More...
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In "Underlying Reasons for Success and Failure of Terrorist Attacks: Selected Case Studies" (Homeland Security Institute, June 2007), the authors examine eight recent terrorist plots against commercial aviation and passenger rail, and come to some interesting conclusions. From the "Executive... Share Post: Read More...
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I suppose it was inevitable. As was the Playmobil Security Check Point.... Share Post: Read More...
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Wine Therapy is a web bulletin board for serious wine geeks. It's been active since 2000, and its database of back posts and comments is a wealth of information: tasting notes, restaurant recommendations, stories and so on. Late last year... Share Post: Read More...
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A comment in response to a comment in response to my recent KJR and Advice Line discussing Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMI):Stephen wrote:"The problem is that "one size fits all" can easily turn into "one size fits none". Innovation is easily stifled when all changes have to go through layers Read More...
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I'd love to get details on this: A television documentary team said it had made a bomb by mixing a series of odourless and colourless chemicals that could be brought into an aircraft by passengers. The liquids that were mixed... Share Post: Read More...
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Does this really come as a surprise? "There's been some overreaction to the new technology, especially when it comes to the danger that strangers represent," said Janis Wolak, a sociologist at the Crimes against Children Research Center at the University... Share Post: Read More...
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Interesting: Among their conclusions are that the majority of malware distribution sites are hosted in China, and that 1.3% of Google searches return at least one link to a malicious site. The lead author, Niels Provos, wrote, 'It has been... Share Post: Read More...
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They advertise 128-bit AES encryption, but they use XOR. This is why evaluating security products is hard: the devil is in the details.... Share Post: Read More...
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Dear Bob ...How do you feel about compressed work weeks? As an employee I love working 4x10s. But as an IT manager it's a real headache. I work as an IT supervisor for a large, 24x7 service organization. Its staff work compressed work weeks, 4x10s starting on various days of the week.Most of my IT staff Read More...
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I've already written about secret forensic codes embedded in color laser printers. Seems like these codes may breach European privacy laws.... Share Post: Read More...
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Dear Bob ...In this week's Keep the Joint Running, "Capability Maturity Model revisited," (2/18/2008), I think the most thought-provoking point of the whole interview was the statement that "CMMI is a model, not a standard." I would really love to see you explore that thought a bit more, because I suspect Read More...
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How squids and other cephalopods camouflage themselves: A clue to how cephalopods disguise themselves so quickly came to Dr. Hanlon when he and his colleagues reviewed thousands of images of cuttlefish, trying to sort their patterns into categories. "It finally... Share Post: Read More...
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Amtrak is going to start randomly screening passengers, in an effort to close the security-theater gap between trains and airplanes. It's kind of random: The teams will show up unannounced at stations and set up baggage screening areas in front... Share Post: Read More...
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There have been a lot of articles about the new attack against the GSM cell phone encryption algorithm, A5/1. In some ways, this isn't real news; we've seen A5/1 cryptanalysis papers as far back as ten years ago. What's new... Share Post: Read More...
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If you're a 64-bit Vista user, that is... It looks as though the users of Vista x64 can obtain Service Pack 1 via Windows Update . I've already started down the MSDN path for obtaining the Service Pack , but that has presented its own set of issues. ...( read more ) Share Post: Read More...
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Nice piece of research: We show that disk encryption, the standard approach to protecting sensitive data on laptops, can be defeated by relatively simple methods. We demonstrate our methods by using them to defeat three popular disk encryption products: BitLocker,... Share Post: Read More...
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The post office is launching a new barcode on first class mail that will enable the sender to track mail through the system: With the new bar code, companies will be able to track mail delivery and know when their... Share Post: Read More...
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What in the world is going on here? Foreign hackers, primarily from Russia and China, are increasingly seeking to steal Americans' health care records, according to a Department of Homeland Security analyst. Mark Walker, who works in DHS' Critical Infrastructure... Share Post: Read More...
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There are a couple of interesting things about the hijacking in New Zealand two weeks ago. First, it was a traditional hijacking. Remember after 9/11 when people said that the era of airplane hijacking was over, that it would no... Share Post: Read More...
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Dear Bob ...Responding to this week's Keep the Joint Running, "Capability Maturity Model revisited," 2/18/2008), perhaps I am being pessimistic. But when I start hearing things like "process acculturation" and "fundamental shift in expectation and experience", my BS alarm starts going off.I do not know Read More...
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This story is a year and a half old, but the lessons are still good: Kim Hyten, emergency management director in Putnam County, said he didn't realize homeland security grants can now be used to prepare for tornados. As a... Share Post: Read More...
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This is a stupid idea: Milan Vojnovic and colleagues from Microsoft Research in Cambridge, UK, want to make useful pieces of information such as software updates behave more like computer worms: spreading between computers instead of being downloaded from central... Share Post: Read More...
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Petty crime and identity theft, but both fascinating and impressive. Social engineering works even in places that take security seriously.... Share Post: Read More...
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Story of a sonic blaster: Here's how it works: Inferno uses four frequencies spread out over 2 to 5 kHz. The idea behind it is that unlike a regular siren, these particular frequencies have a uniquely disturbing effect on people... Share Post: Read More...
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Dear Bob ...You were quite critical of Service Level Agreements in your recent column, "Run, IT run ... but not as a business," (Keep the Joint Running, 1/28/2008), describing them as formal contracts between IT and the rest of the business.My opinion is that the concept of a Service Level Agreement Read More...
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Comment on a previous Advice Line: "Balancing strategic and tactical improvements," 1/28/2008:I like this analysis and have used a similar method to prioritize projects, but I have one problem with Bob's version - Cost and Risk are not always necessarily correlated, and this version suggests that they Read More...
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A day late: Cuddlefish Junction Kissing Squidograms.... Share Post: Read More...
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HotPlug allows you to seize and move a computer without losing power. (Video demos.) See also: MouseJiggler.... Share Post: Read More...
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Cryptographer Stefan Brands has a new company, Credentica, that allows people to disclose personal information while maintaining privacy and minimizing the threat of identity theft. I know Stefan; he's good. The cryptography behind this system is almost certainly impeccable. I... Share Post: Read More...
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Canon has filed a patent on embedding an iris scan of the photographer in the metadata of photographs, presumably secured with a digital signature.... Share Post: Read More...
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Offshore oil rig evacuated after someone dreamed of a bomb. Sheridan College under lock-down because someone notices a tripod. Man arrested for posession of an MP3 player.... Share Post: Read More...
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First paragraph: Terrorists increasingly favor using women as suicide bombers to thwart security and draw attention to their causes, a new FBI-Department of Homeland Security assessment concludes. Photo caption: Female suicide bombers can use devices to make them appear pregnant,... Share Post: Read More...
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I need to be smarter about something. I'm electing you to help me. (Okay, really, I need to be smarter about everything. I have something specific in mind, though.)I've written two Keep the Joint Runnings ("Carr-ied away," 2/4/2008, and "Carr-toonish engineering," 2/11/2008) and one Advice Line ("Just Read More...
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Many people say that allowing illegal aliens to obtain state driver's licenses helps them and encourages them to remain illegally in this country. Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox late last year issued an opinion that licenses could be issued only... Share Post: Read More...
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I've heard many anecdotal stories about U.S. Customs and Border Protection seizing, copying data from, or otherwise accessing laptops of people entering the country. But this is very mainstream: Today, the Electronic Frontier Foundation and Asian Law Caucus, two civil... Share Post: Read More...
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Dear Bob ...I am a manager for an IT team for 17 years. I have just been given my separation notice and I am being asked to do performance reviews for my previous team. The team already knows I have been let go. I am struggling with whether I should be giving these reviews. Impacting this decision is Read More...
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Buying an iPhone isn't the same as buying a car or a toaster. Your iPhone comes with a complicated list of rules about what you can and can't do with it. You can't install unapproved third-party applications on it. You... Share Post: Read More...
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Interesting speculation from Nicholas Weaver: All that is necessary is that the MPAA or their contractor automatically spiders for torrents. When it finds torrents, it connects to each torrent with manipulated clients. The client would first transfer enough content to... Share Post: Read More...
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Ignore the laughable "100% accurate" claim; this is an interesting idea: Mike Burton, Professor of Psychology at Glasgow, and lecturer Rob Jenkins say they achieved their hugely-improved results by eliminating the variable effects of age, hairstyle, expression, lighting, different camera... Share Post: Read More...
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I received this prediction in response to my recent Keep the Joint Running, "Carr-ied away," (2/4/2008). I won't tell you I agree with it. I will say I find it as provocative as Carr's prediction that the application side of IT will move into the business, and more plausible.- BobDear Bob ...As always, Read More...
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But, of course, you all knew this already.... Share Post: Read More...
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Excellent: We must all do whatever we can to preserve America by refocusing our priorities back on the contemplation of lethal threats—invisible nightmarish forces plotting to destroy us in a number of horrific ways. It is only through the vigilance... Share Post: Read More...
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Last week I gave the keynote talk at Linux.conf.au. Here's an article on my talk, here's the video in OGG and SPX, and here's a Q&A I did afterwards.... Share Post: Read More...
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Mujahideen Secrets 2 is a new version of an encryption tool, ostensibly written to help Al Qaeda members encrypt secrets as they communicate on the Internet. A bunch of sites have covered this story, and a couple of security researchers... Share Post: Read More...
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Recently the Associated Press obtained hundreds of pages of documents related to the 2006 "Cyber Storm" exercise. Most interesting is the part where the participants attacked the game computers and pissed the referees off: However, the government's files hint at... Share Post: Read More...
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Why does anyone think this is a good idea? In the first counterterrorism strategy of its kind in the nation, roving teams of New York City police officers armed with automatic rifles and accompanied by bomb-sniffing dogs will patrol the... Share Post: Read More...
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Criminals are using cloned trucks to bypass security: Savvy criminals are using some of the country's most credible logos, including FedEx, Wal-Mart, DirecTV and the U.S. Border Patrol, to create fake trucks to smuggle drugs, money and illegal aliens across... Share Post: Read More...
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"The Top 5 VoIP Security Threats of 2008." A nice little list of things to worry about.... Share Post: Read More...
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A comment on "How an Advice Line situation turned out," (1/21/2008), about an employee who learned he was on the chopping block, and instead left under his own steam:Bob, while your advice has once again been proven right, I think you devalue the act of whistleblowing (assuming Venting was able to meet Read More...
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The first two affected India, Pakistan, Egypt, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, and Bahrain. The third one is between the UAE and Oman. The fourth one connected Qatar and the UAE. This one may not have been... Share Post: Read More...
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Poor security for everyone except the rich and powerful: The security of the online computer system used by more than three million people to file tax returns is in doubt after HM Revenue and Customs admitted it was not secure... Share Post: Read More...
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They're paying for open source software to be scanned for security bugs, and then fixing them. All the software scrutinized was found to have significant numbers of security flaws, Coverity said on Wednesday. Since 2006 the project has helped fix... Share Post: Read More...
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This is both clever and very weird: Swedish police are quizzing "people of limited stature" with criminal records following a spate of robberies from the cargo holds of coaches - possibly carried out by dwarves smuggled onboard in sports bags.... Share Post: Read More...
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I have mixed feeling about this, but in general think it is a good idea: President Bush signed a directive this month that expands the intelligence community's role in monitoring Internet traffic to protect against a rising number of attacks... Share Post: Read More...
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Dear Bob ...Through the grapevine, (actually my boss) I have heard that I am about to be let go. I say through the grapevine because apparently my boss was directed by the board to not inform me of my impending doom until later this year.The back story is that two co-workers have been talking to the Read More...
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This link is from 2004, but still.... Peruvian police say they have seized nearly 1,540 pounds (700 kilograms) of cocaine hidden in frozen giant squid bound for Mexico and the United States.... Share Post: Read More...
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Okay, this is clever: Such a system could blanket the nation with millions of cell phones equipped with radiation sensors able to detect even light residues of radioactive material. Because cell phones already contain global positioning locators, the network of... Share Post: Read More...
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And plans are to use malware to do it.... Share Post: Read More...
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