Category: Internet

Internet, technology, Web

lulzsec hacks PBS in support of wikileaks.

| be3n

After PBS’s documentary on wikileaks “Wikisecrets” painted alleged cablegate leaker Bradley Manning in a seemingly negative light some hacktivists have set their sights on PBS. A group going by the name “LulzSec” posted some fake news stories and pages on PBS’s site and published database dumps of usernames, passwords, email, and other confidential information here. Though they claim not to be affiliated with Anonymous, the style is certainly similar. They even included a taunting statement, “Hey Anonymous, we heard you were having trouble!” in reference to the recent anonymous split and anonops.net hack. I suspect these are more 4chan hackers, possibly even the ones responsible for the anonops.net hack.

links:
Oficial Lulzsec Statement:
http://pastebin.com/B3gmw5NS
other press:
Huffington Post
IT News

Culture, Internet, Soapbox

anonops.net Hacked! Users Unmasked!

| be3n

anonymous doesn't like to be unmaskedyesterday, anonymous’s irc server was hacked and user’s ip addresses and private messages were posted here. Looking at the logs, it is clear to me that many of their users use proxies, VPNs, or some other way to obscure their actual address. It is doubtful that any serious hacktivists were actually unmasked. With rumors of an internal conflict within anonymous ablaze online, it is still unclear who was responsible or when their operations will be back online.

UPDATE:
here was https://sites.google.com/site/lolanonopsdead/ and it’s since offline.

Internet, Software, technology, Web

Vupen broke Google’s Sandbox!

| be3n

After 3 straight years of pwn2own invincibility, someone finally bested all of chrome’s mighty security to downloaded and run code. French security research firm @vupen used two exploits to bypass ASLR, DEP, and leave the sandbox to run a calculator (in this demo). The calculator might be innocuous, but method is quite significant. Impressive work by the good guys.

hardware, Internet, technology

Retired my router after nearly a decade of service

| be3n

My router/firewall for years, NitrogenFor nearly 10 years, all my home internet traffic has flowed through the capable interfaces of Nitrogen.  Through the years linux routing grew increasingly more powerful, but this little Dimension PC did not.  It’s 700Mhz Celeron CPU and PCI network interfaces (literally nothing onboard) had always met my needs.  However in these times of ever increasing speeds, i began to wonder.  After a few pesky error messages, “eth0: Too much work at interrupt” i knew it was time for an upgrade.  From ipfwadm through ipchains, and eventually to iptables, this unit continued to teach me the linux kernel firewall.   QOS, Network monitoring, intrusion detection, even Tor’s anonymous proxy relay, we’d been through it all together.  What am i going to do with him now? Replaced with a newer (but far from new) PC.  Rebuilt from the ground up to be tighter, faster, and i don’t even mind saying… prettier.  Now i have Phosphorus.  Nitrogen will receive the most honorable sendoff i can give it.  To be stripped of its few remaining useful parts and recycled.  No moment of silence for this one.  It was recognized with a 5 minute internet blackout.  While i reset my cable modem.

Internet, Soapbox, technology, Web, Wisdom

Gawker fiasco and what we’ve learned about password reuse.

| be3n

Segment from Gawker's defaced site

Gawker Media (Lifehacker, Gizmodo, etc.) was hacked by a group calling themselves and their entire user database (as well as source code for the sites) was posted to a popular torrent site.  Downloaded already no doubt by hundreds or even thousands of would be nar do wells.  What does this mean?  what can we learn?  More then 50,000 users used “password” for their password.  Read the oficial statement here.  I did enjoy the irony of Facebook connect users being safe from this.  If you had an account on any of these sites, your information is compromised and i prey you don’t reuse your password.  Change it, change it fast.  Millions of user’s Data was exposed (names, emails, passwords). The ramifications of this breach will continue over the next few weeks as users accounts on other services begin to wreak havoc.

here is a humerious comic about password reuse:
http://xkcd.com/792/

Corporations, Internet, Politics, Soapbox, technology, Web

Enemies of freedom don’t get my business!

| be3n

When amazon dropped wikileaks from it’s servers under government pressure without any actual criminal or copyright wrongdoing they showed where they stood in regards to the first amendment.  Anyone who disregards their principals at the approach of a powerful adversary is spineless.  Without proof, or at least due process, we are innocent in this country.    At least that is how it is supposed to be.  I encourage all holiday shoppers to avoid amazon.com.  These are scary times and we don’t need our interent providers abusing their authority and helping censor our internet.  Now dyndns.com joins the ranks of the enemies of freedom.  I did business with them for years, but no longer.  If you stand against freedom, i will vote in the most powerful way i have:  with my wallet.

When COICA came up it looked dangerous, however it turns out that it’s power was already granted inside the DMCA.  The government can already seize any website that they even suspect of copyright infringement.   however, the US government does not copyright its documents, and thus wikileaks was a terrible target.  These laws should not apply at all.  Using these methods to silence dissenters is NEVER effective.  especially in this: the information age.

Corporations, hardware, Internet, Politics, Soapbox, technology, Wi-Fi

May i borrow a cup of wifi?

| be3n

The internet went out again.  it seems that time warner is made of sugar or wicked witches.  They melt in the rain.  last time we traced the run from pole to modem, but it seems that water continues to find a way in.  Luckily i set a little something up with the neighbors.  It had to be put in place after the last time when i ran off my iphone using tethering.  Believe me, edge at home is ONLY for desperate people.  A time warner serviceman made it out this morning to fix it.  Knowledgeable workmen AND speedy service, this is a side of time warner i’ve never seen before.  I’d still like to see less of these glitches and of course the 8Mbit we’re paying for!  Even more then that, i’d like to see a real solution.

Real Solution

What i’d like to see, is a solution to the fundamental internet problem once and for all.  What problem?  The lack of free and available internet to ANYONE throughout public spaces (and even private ones).  That is a stimulus with a real and tangible benefit.  Our wireless communications carriers have failed us.  We gave them the very air and they repay us with early termination fees and dropped calls.

The powers that be could bring the internet in through the power lines.  You can get incredible bandwidth though existing infrastructure and utility poles make great places for hanging access points.  Heck, i wouldn’t even mind if they snooped (you know they spy already).  In fact people would probably line up to be snooped on free wifi all over town! once we have a nation wide public wifi network and everything plugged into the wall was also connected to that network, things will really start to get interesting.  Imagine a world where our gadgets conspire to improve out daily life?  What if you never had to set an alarm clock?  Simply plugging it into the wall gets it online and sets the time.  Imagine a world where wireless communications doesn’t require faustian contracts with providers full of marketing and empty promises.  What if a txt didn’t cost 20¢?  What if you could make a call or send a message from your pocket for free?  What if this actually happened?  These simple ideas will extend the functionality and integrate our devices and networks in ways we cannot even comprehend.  I honestly believe that combined with IPv6 and other great implementations, these foundations of technology that will pave the way to the future we’ve seen in science fiction.

Culture, Internet, Links, movies, technology, television

Panasonic Begins Taking Orders On Full HD 3D Camcorder!

| be3n

it’s retail price of $21,000 seems a bit steep for a “Prosumer” device, but it’s the start i have been waiting for.  Read more here:

http://videomaker.com/community/blogs/videonews/2010/02/6782-panasonic-begins-taking-orders-on-full-hd-3d-camcorder/

Thanks James, for pointing this out to me.