Cybersecurity
U.S. Under Cyber Attack
Beware Tainted Electronics Products
The FBI as the Ethical Hacker?
Gadgets
President Obama to get his Blackberry upgraded, rated for Top Secret Communications
U.S. Soldiers to get Cool Camo like the James Bond invisible car?
Misc
The Ultimate Geek
Cool Data Visualizations
Saturday, April 25, 2009
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
A Different Search
You know how to search with ASCII characters, but what if you're looking for something else?
Visit THIS SITE to search for Unicode characters. And, BONUS!, here's the ability to convert from Unicode to HTML.
Visit THIS SITE to search for Unicode characters. And, BONUS!, here's the ability to convert from Unicode to HTML.
3D Search Results and Re-Tweet Me Button
Search Cube provides an interesting take on how search results are displayed, creating a cube that you can rotate and select your search results from. Right now, I'd say this isn't much good for anything except for graphical searches - how can you tell what's on the page that made up one of the spots on the cube? Maybe someone out there can help me understand how to use this better ... but for now, it's just a fun way to display results, but it doesn't help me search any better.
For all you Twitter fans out there, add some simple script language to your blog or webpage and let people easily "retweet" your stuff. And- the site says there's some tracking features. Cool. I'll have to let you know how some trials go. Check out ReTweet Me HERE.
For all you Twitter fans out there, add some simple script language to your blog or webpage and let people easily "retweet" your stuff. And- the site says there's some tracking features. Cool. I'll have to let you know how some trials go. Check out ReTweet Me HERE.
Sunday, April 12, 2009
An Easter Egg For You
David Ramel over at ComputerWorld collected 10 "Easter Eggs"** - fun programs hidden inside operating systems.
My favorite is for the Windows XP crowd:
Star Wars Episode IV in ASCII
All I can say is - Wow. That's the Mittness.
OK- one more. If you have Chrome (which you should try), type "about:internets" in the address bar. If you're not sure what the tab title and next screen means, let me know...
**not all are true Easter Eggs.
My favorite is for the Windows XP crowd:
Star Wars Episode IV in ASCII
All I can say is - Wow. That's the Mittness.
OK- one more. If you have Chrome (which you should try), type "about:internets" in the address bar. If you're not sure what the tab title and next screen means, let me know...
**not all are true Easter Eggs.
Saturday, April 11, 2009
Weekend Reads: 04/11/2009
Defense Tech: DARPA Wants To Be Superman, See Through Concrete
Auto: GM, Segway collaborate and create 2-wheeled city transit vehicle
Internet Security: "Vision Test" For Conficker Virus
Internet Security: Increased Risk for Cyber Attack...
Software Gadgets: Make Your Desktop Look and Act Like a Real Desk
Random: Oldest Living Human Celebrates 115th Birthday
Auto: GM, Segway collaborate and create 2-wheeled city transit vehicle
Internet Security: "Vision Test" For Conficker Virus
Internet Security: Increased Risk for Cyber Attack...
Software Gadgets: Make Your Desktop Look and Act Like a Real Desk
Random: Oldest Living Human Celebrates 115th Birthday
Tuesday, April 7, 2009
Friday, April 3, 2009
A Who's Who of Hackers
Emails have been ciruclating discussing the Conficker virus. Although not packing the punch it was thought to deliver, it still infected 1 in 25 computers, or about 4%, are infected.
I was reading about the worm and other cyber crimes, and stumbled across this Top 10 list of Blackhat and Whitehat hackers.
So, without further ado, I direct you this list of The Top 10 Most Famous Hackers of All Time.
I was reading about the worm and other cyber crimes, and stumbled across this Top 10 list of Blackhat and Whitehat hackers.
So, without further ado, I direct you this list of The Top 10 Most Famous Hackers of All Time.
No pictures, says this village
Google continues its march towards global domination in all things search-related as it recently released Street View for Google Maps in the UK. Coninuing to snap photos from the public roadways, Google employs contractors (I suppose) to drive their car around with a nifty camera on top taking pictures.
While I continue to be amazed that people don't know about Street View and all the amazing things it offers (from OSINT that ousted a U.S. spy plane base to finding directions to your friends house to the randomness of life), there are some who feel threatened by the views Street View has to offer.
In fact, The Times Online reported that a "Village mob thwarts Google Street View car." The article states, "Angry villagers formed a human chain to thwart the progress of a Google Street View car that was in the process of taking photographs of their homes."
Now, Google is very conscious of your privacy and has an easy way to request that pictures you feel invade your privacy be removed or blurred.
The townspeople argued that it would promote theft, targeted at the more affluent homes in the area. Balderdash! says one of the commenters:
Have you tried Street View yet? What do you think?
While I continue to be amazed that people don't know about Street View and all the amazing things it offers (from OSINT that ousted a U.S. spy plane base to finding directions to your friends house to the randomness of life), there are some who feel threatened by the views Street View has to offer.
In fact, The Times Online reported that a "Village mob thwarts Google Street View car." The article states, "Angry villagers formed a human chain to thwart the progress of a Google Street View car that was in the process of taking photographs of their homes."
Now, Google is very conscious of your privacy and has an easy way to request that pictures you feel invade your privacy be removed or blurred.
The townspeople argued that it would promote theft, targeted at the more affluent homes in the area. Balderdash! says one of the commenters:
Wouldnt it be easier and much more effective for a burglar to just walk past the front of your house? street view is after all, the view from the street? how can you invoke privacy laws when the photos are taken in a public place? I wonder if we'll see all the angry people in the pictures!! hope so.
Have you tried Street View yet? What do you think?
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
More Twitter
A while back I read a post about why you should follow everyone on Twitter who follows you. I thought it was an interesting argument, but I was not convinced. I like to keep things organized and sorted and I didn't want to have to scroll through dozens of posts that I just didn't care about... That's why, although I daily have 500-1000 new items in my Google Reader account, I can pick and choose what I want to read through the navigation panel - scrolling through my folders/categories, or even selecting individual authors/RSS feeds.
But I can't do that with Twitter. And with only the last 25, or whatever it is, tweets showing on the home page, it's a pain to scroll back and see if you missed something from someone you really care about hearing from ... you have to get past the dozen @replies that some twitterfiend just spouted off in the last 5 minutes. Can I get a temporary gag order on some of them? I mean, I've tried to only follow people who had interesting prior tweets and/or interesting blogs/websites listed on their twitter profile. Others I've added for informational services, such as @RedCross for weather/disaster updates or @NTARC for national terrorism alerts, or for fun, like @DarthVader.
For a few days, I was inundated with requests to follow from "new media" marketers. They probably noticed that I followed someone from their "crowd." At first, I followed most of them back. But then I realized that that first follow gave me something these follow-up follows didn't have: real substance. For example, one guy is constantly "mad as ----" or some variation on madness and constantly spits out the same URL to drive people to his blog so that they can read about his critique about all the marketer posers out there who don't know what they're talking about, and to sign up for a webinar to learn about how he built his 5-figures-a-month-business. I swear he has his tweets scheduled to tweet recurrently. It's the same stuff, spread out throughout the day, always using some hyperbole to try to get people to click on his stock group of 2-3 links. Yawn. I continue to scroll right past his tweets, and really couldn't tell you if he's posted something new or interesting. I've considered unfollowing, but, sometimes out of vanity (got to keep my meager follower count high!) or out of laziness (when I'm just thinking about how annoying he is but don't want to get on Twitter to fix it), I haven't done it yet.
That doesn't mean I haven't ever unfollowed anyone. In fact, some follows were instant regrets and unfollowed, and others came down the road in our Twitterverse "relationship."
Then I read this article today, ironically(?) by the same author of the I'll-follow-anyone-who-follows-me post. In it, he gives several reasons why he'll unfollow you:
9. You're a conceited, self-serving twitterer. Every other tweet out of your account is "Do I add value to your network? Click here and vote for me!" If you added value to my network, I'd probably tell you and would re-tweet your stuff. If you have to ask this every day, I start to wonder if you're just in the community to build stats; it's a new "game" and you want to be a high-scorer. Sorry- you don't add value to my network. Gone!
10. You conceal your marketing status in an attempt to trick people and get more followers. For example, I got a follow request recently that had a blog address in the bio section. Visit the blog - and it has a bunch of posts...all saying the blog had moved (not that it had ever really existed) to a new page - click here! Voila! You're on their company's home page. This might not be so bad, but this particular person had blocked their updates (I have mine blocked), had a fake blogspot link, and offered no other information. Perhaps I acted too hastily, but I did not allow them to follow. I might give them a chance, but may have to repent if they start breaking some of the other things on this post. It's not that I have anything against these marketers, per se, but I think they often classify as humans violating Rule #1 - a company not contributing to the community.
11. You're boring. This one isn't as likely to get you "banned" as fast as most of the other rules above, but I can only hang in there with you so long. Surprise me sometime! I'll keep giving you chances, but at some point I'll just give up on you.
12. You're not tweeting in a language I can read. I may be multi-lingual, but I'm not omniscient nor a babel-fish. And until Twitter incorporates some Google-style auto-translate-my-tweeple functions, I'll unfollow you if I can't understand your tweets. Feel free to keep following me if you have greater linguistic ability than me, or send me some free online courses to learn your language. =)
[UPDATE] Apparently I'm not alone in this whole marketer thing. The following quotes come from Peter Cohen's "Social networking isn’t for spamming"(emphasis mine):
But I can't do that with Twitter. And with only the last 25, or whatever it is, tweets showing on the home page, it's a pain to scroll back and see if you missed something from someone you really care about hearing from ... you have to get past the dozen @replies that some twitterfiend just spouted off in the last 5 minutes. Can I get a temporary gag order on some of them? I mean, I've tried to only follow people who had interesting prior tweets and/or interesting blogs/websites listed on their twitter profile. Others I've added for informational services, such as @RedCross for weather/disaster updates or @NTARC for national terrorism alerts, or for fun, like @DarthVader.
For a few days, I was inundated with requests to follow from "new media" marketers. They probably noticed that I followed someone from their "crowd." At first, I followed most of them back. But then I realized that that first follow gave me something these follow-up follows didn't have: real substance. For example, one guy is constantly "mad as ----" or some variation on madness and constantly spits out the same URL to drive people to his blog so that they can read about his critique about all the marketer posers out there who don't know what they're talking about, and to sign up for a webinar to learn about how he built his 5-figures-a-month-business. I swear he has his tweets scheduled to tweet recurrently. It's the same stuff, spread out throughout the day, always using some hyperbole to try to get people to click on his stock group of 2-3 links. Yawn. I continue to scroll right past his tweets, and really couldn't tell you if he's posted something new or interesting. I've considered unfollowing, but, sometimes out of vanity (got to keep my meager follower count high!) or out of laziness (when I'm just thinking about how annoying he is but don't want to get on Twitter to fix it), I haven't done it yet.
That doesn't mean I haven't ever unfollowed anyone. In fact, some follows were instant regrets and unfollowed, and others came down the road in our Twitterverse "relationship."
Then I read this article today, ironically(?) by the same author of the I'll-follow-anyone-who-follows-me post. In it, he gives several reasons why he'll unfollow you:
1. You follow me merely because I'll follow you.I agree wholeheartedly. I'd add a few others:
2. You're a company that doesn't contribute to the community.
3. You're a music lover (to a fault).
4. You're an adult film star.
5. You're a cursing fool.
6. You're a bot.
7. You're a celebrity impostor.
8. You're a constant updater.
9. You're a conceited, self-serving twitterer. Every other tweet out of your account is "Do I add value to your network? Click here and vote for me!" If you added value to my network, I'd probably tell you and would re-tweet your stuff. If you have to ask this every day, I start to wonder if you're just in the community to build stats; it's a new "game" and you want to be a high-scorer. Sorry- you don't add value to my network. Gone!
10. You conceal your marketing status in an attempt to trick people and get more followers. For example, I got a follow request recently that had a blog address in the bio section. Visit the blog - and it has a bunch of posts...all saying the blog had moved (not that it had ever really existed) to a new page - click here! Voila! You're on their company's home page. This might not be so bad, but this particular person had blocked their updates (I have mine blocked), had a fake blogspot link, and offered no other information. Perhaps I acted too hastily, but I did not allow them to follow. I might give them a chance, but may have to repent if they start breaking some of the other things on this post. It's not that I have anything against these marketers, per se, but I think they often classify as humans violating Rule #1 - a company not contributing to the community.
11. You're boring. This one isn't as likely to get you "banned" as fast as most of the other rules above, but I can only hang in there with you so long. Surprise me sometime! I'll keep giving you chances, but at some point I'll just give up on you.
12. You're not tweeting in a language I can read. I may be multi-lingual, but I'm not omniscient nor a babel-fish. And until Twitter incorporates some Google-style auto-translate-my-tweeple functions, I'll unfollow you if I can't understand your tweets. Feel free to keep following me if you have greater linguistic ability than me, or send me some free online courses to learn your language. =)
[UPDATE] Apparently I'm not alone in this whole marketer thing. The following quotes come from Peter Cohen's "Social networking isn’t for spamming"(emphasis mine):
I've been using Twitter for a while, and have amassed a few hundred people whose Tweets I follow. [...] [T]he reasons I follow people on Twitter are varied. But one way or the other, they're all people with whom I share common interests or some kind of connection.
In the past day, I've lost count of the number of times I've seen this Tweet:
"I bought the @MacHeist 3 Bundle. 12 Top Mac apps worth $900+ for just $39 AND I just got Delicious Library 2 FREE!"
This is beyond irksome. It irritated me into a frothing rage last night, [...].
MacHeist has induced its customers to abuse relationships, personal and professional, they've developed with other Twitter users.
Let's just hope this isn't part of a larger trend to clutter up Twitter and other social networking services with advertisements disguised as personal communications. [...]
But back to my rant: I sure as ---- didn't follow anyone on Twitter to see them spam me with advertisements, and I don't suspect anyone else did, either. Make no mistake, this is spamming, pure and simple. And to that end, it's an ugly, abusive way to advertise which lowers the value of the communications medium upon which it depends.
Trackers are cool
As some of you know, much of the last 12 months of my life have been spent using Excel to track just about everything in my last job. In fact, there were so many trackers, there were trackers for the trackers!
A friend gave us a heads up on a sweet deal from Domino's last night: Order an 8-piece Cinnastix online, use code "SWEET", and get it for Free!
So we did, and I got to watch the Domino's tracker track the progress of my free Cinnastix.
(I know, this has been out for a while, I've just never used the Domino's site, much less eaten their food).
Anyway - trackers are everywhere.
A friend gave us a heads up on a sweet deal from Domino's last night: Order an 8-piece Cinnastix online, use code "SWEET", and get it for Free!
So we did, and I got to watch the Domino's tracker track the progress of my free Cinnastix.
(I know, this has been out for a while, I've just never used the Domino's site, much less eaten their food).Anyway - trackers are everywhere.
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