Patrick Talmadge

These two comics are a very good example of how people do not pick very good passwords.

Thank you Dilbert.com

Computers, Security

An article in the Epoch Times (a Chinese newspaper) about a brilliant Chinese professor who has cracked her fifth encryption scheme in ten years. She and her team have cracked the SHA-1 scheme. As a result, the U.S. government and major corporations will cease using the scheme within the next few years.

Read the full article here.

Hacking, Security

I am a huge Netflix fan. I watch and return my movies the same day most of the time. Now it gets even better. I found this video on hackingNetflix.com that shows how the new Netflix watch now system works. According to Netflix this new online movie download system will be spread out to all users by the end of June 2007. According to the Netflix press release the hours will very depending on your membership level. Users at the entry level $5.99 plan will recieve 6 hours of movies. The more popular 3 disc at a time plan will recieve 18 hours of streaming movies.

General

This just made me laugh so I had I add it to my blog.

Hope you enjoy it.

General

I stummbled on this article from Peter Gutmann explaining the copy protection built into Windows Vista. The article states that Vista will down grade video and audio reproduction on protected media if Vista can not protect the media.

Vista also has built in tilt bits to help protect from hacked hardware. Vista checks its hardware regularly against these tilt bits to see if it is still valid. It sounds like Microsoft is a little paranoid about getting sued or being hacked. I am not sure any of this extra code will make Vista more secure from hackers and malware. In fact it might make it easier for hackers to mess with your system. Vista’s tilt bits might have opened a door for hackers to change a hardware configuration on your system which would cause Vista to do a “Reboot” in order to restore correct functionality.

Check out Peter Gutmann’s full article here.

Computers, General

It has finally been released the Apple iPhone will be out in June for Cingular. The phone looks very cool and looks like it has a great user interface. I will have to play with one before I plop down my $599. I like several of the features in the iPhone: multi touch screen, random access voice mail, full iPod, and the new internet browser.

I do have mixed feelings with Apple saying that they invented the multi touch display because several months ago I saw the video of Jeff Han at TED. Jeff Han is a research scientist for NYU’s Media Research Lab, and the inventor of an “interface-free” touch-driven computer screen. I hope that Jeff Han and NYU made a lot of money off Apple since they are saying they invented this technology.

Here is the video of Jeff Han demoing this UI at TED.

Here is the video of the iPhone.

You make your own judgments about this multi touch technology. Is Apple stealing this technology like it did with its Original Macintosh OS. I guess this is how the technology industry works everyone reverse engineers other products.

Computers, General

I found this article on SC Magazine that reminded me of Hackers the movie because in the movie the hackers hack into the street lights so they have all green lights. Here is the article that can be found at SC Magazine.

Ericka Chickowski Jan 9 2007 18:29

Two Los Angeles municipal traffic engineers were arraigned and charged with hacking city systems to disable traffic lights, all in connection with a labor dispute.

The two men, Gabriel Murillo and Kartik Patel, were charged by the Los Angeles district attorney’s newly-formed High Technology Crimes Division. The district attorney alleged that the men illegally accessed the city’s Automated Traffic Surveillance Center last August and disconnected four signal control boxes at key intersections.

Murillo allegedly accessed the system and found a way to block other managers from fixing the changes. Prosecutors reported it took four days to repair the signals.

According to the DA’s office, the disruption occurred hours before a job action by members of the Engineers and Architects Association, a union representing employees, such as Murillo and Patel, that run the city’s traffic center.

“This amounts to sabotage and is not to be tolerated no matter what the dispute or cause,” Los Angeles District Attorney Steve Cooley said.

Hacking, Security

Google was using javascript to store Gmail address books while the user was logged in. As a result if a user is logged into Gmail, a malicious website could request your Gmail addressbook.Google has resolved this flaw, but it does point out the danger of javascript.

Security