cgrant - Slashdot User

Submission + - Your location data, government access and privacy 1

Submitted by pcause on Friday February 12, 2010 @12:25PM

pcause writes: The Department of Justice doesn't think it needs a warrant to get access to your location data. I know everyone's first reaction is outrage but most of you with a smartphone and applications are sharing your location data with random apps so they can feed you ads, providing it to Google for maps and search, Foursquare for check ins and much more. Why in the world would anyone who shares their application data so widely have any expectation of privacy of the data or, for that matter, privacy at all?

We all hate Big Brother, but maybe the biggest threat to our privacy comes not from the government but from ourselves and the unregulated commercial entities we give access to all of this data without ever reading the TOS, or really having a clue what those folks can and will do with the data.

Submission + - IdeaPad U1 what we wanted the iPad to be (engadget.com)

Submitted by Xanator on Friday February 12, 2010 @12:14PM

Xanator writes: With the announcement of the iPad the Lenovo IdeaPad U1 Hybrid appears to go unnoticed, but maybe we ought to pay it more attention, a netbook with a removable screen that turns it into a tablet (swithching OS from Windows 7 to a tablet OS within 3 seconds) looks that it offers what many of us wanted from the iPad, quoting engadget: "When docked, the U1 looks and feels like any other laptop, with an Intel CULV processor and a 128GB SSD running Windows 7 Home Premium. You actually wouldn't know there's a slate hiding in there — until you pull it out and watch it switch to Lenovo's Skylight UI, a process that was smooth and quick for us. Lenovo says the goal is for the full switch to occur in under 3 seconds"

Submission + - Emmerich Plans 'Foundation' As 3-D Epic (mtv.com) 2

Submitted by spuke4000 on Friday February 12, 2010 @12:12PM

spuke4000 writes: Roland Emmerich, the writer/director/producer behind Independence Day, The Day After Tomorrow and 2012 is planning to adapt Isaac Asimov's Foundation series. The plans include using technology developed for Avatar including 3-D and motion capture technology. When asked about the usage of this technology Emmerich responded, "It has to be done all CG because I would not know how to shoot this thing in real."

Submission + - The real-world quality test (pcpro.co.uk)

Submitted by Barence on Friday February 12, 2010 @12:09PM

Barence writes: Can the general public tell the difference between high-end AV equipment and bog-standard supermarket kit? That's the question posed by this PC Pro feature, in which a panel of twenty people independently judge the quality of a selection of portable media players and headphones, then see whether they can tell the difference between standard music encoding and high-quality iTunes Plus files. Finally, a simple video test checked whether they found Blu-ray video more enjoyable than DVD. None of the panel was an "expert" in audiovisual technology, and during the tests they weren'(TM)t told which players and formats they were assessing. In some areas a clear consensus emerged, but there were surprises, too.

Submission + - How to replace FileVault with EncFS (blogspot.com)

Submitted by agoston.horvath on Friday February 12, 2010 @11:29AM

agoston.horvath writes: I've written a HOWTO on replacing MacOS's built-in encryption with the well-known FUSE-based encfs. It worked well for me, and most importantly: it is a lot more handy than what Apple has put together. This is especially useful if you are using a backup solution like Time Machine. Whys, Why nots and step-by-step instructions.

Submission + - Chip and Pin Credit Card Attack Discovered (bbc.co.uk)

Submitted by Fullers on Thursday February 11, 2010 @02:11PM

Fullers writes: The BBC reports that scientists from Cambridge University have discovered an attack for the 'Chip and Pin's system used to verify credit and debit cards in Europe. The hack appears to be a simple man-in-the-middle attack, using a laptop to allow the verification of any random pin for purchases. They are now working on miniaturizing the device to the size of a remote control.

Submission + - IBM's Jeopardy-Playing Machine: "I Want Jennings!" (networkworld.com)

Submitted by twailgum on Thursday February 11, 2010 @01:50PM

twailgum writes: IBM's Jeopardy-playing supercomputer is now capable of beating human Jeopardy contestants on a regular basis, and it has got its sights set squarely on 74-time champion Ken Jennings. IBM announced plans to build a computer that can win on Jeopardy last April, and expects to stage a public tournament involving human players and the machine within the next year or so. The question-answering system, nicknamed "Watson," is already doing trial runs against people who have actually appeared on the Alex Trebek-hosted Jeopardy. Watson's competition includes people who qualified for the show but lost, people who appeared and won once, and people who appeared and won twice.

Submission + - Features of Microsoft Windows Mobile 7 leaked (sizzlingbit.com)

Submitted by farzan1992 on Thursday February 11, 2010 @01:33PM

farzan1992 writes: The Mobile World Congress (MWC) event is set to be held this month. It is expected that in that event Microsoft Windows Mobile 7 will be unveiled. Till now there was no details, specifications and features available.

The PPCGeeks has got some details and features about the Microsoft Windows Mobile 7 platform which will be come pre-installed on upcoming handheld devices. The WM7 could have a lack of compatibility with older apps and no multitasking support. Below are the specifications, details and features of Windows Mobile 7.

Submission + - European credit and debit card security broken (zdnet.co.uk)

Submitted by Jack Spine on Thursday February 11, 2010 @01:18PM

Jack Spine writes: With nearly a billion users dependent on smart banking credit and debit cards, banks have refused liability for losses where an idenification number has been provided.

But now, the process behind the majority of European credit and debit card transactions is fundamentally broken, according to researchers from Cambridge University.

The researchers have demonstrated a man-in-the-middle attack which fooled a card reader into accepting a number of point-of-sale transactions, even though the cards were not properly authenticated.

The researchers used off-the-shelf components, and a laptop running a Python script, to undermine the two factor authentication process on European credit and debit cards, which is called Chip and PIN.

Submission + - Where the Cylons Will Come From (blogspot.com)

Submitted by striphas on Thursday February 11, 2010 @01:12PM

striphas writes: Considers the future of personal information, riffing off of the new SyFy series Caprica and the musings of Stephen Colbert.

Comment Cyber warrior...stupid name... (Score 1) 170

by cgrant on Thursday February 04, 2010 @04:52PM (#31026792) Attached to: House Overwhelmingly Passes Cybersecurity Bill

Please people, tell your Washington representatives and senators that the term is stupid and sounds like it came from a 1980's GI Joe cartoon. Lets come up with something else other than using "cyber" and "warrior" to describe a technical, professional, information security job function.

Comment Primary issue is mail list management (Score 1) 384

by cgrant on Sunday January 11, 2009 @05:18AM (#26406115) Attached to: State Dept E-mail Crash After "Reply-All" Storm

The primary issue here is the ability for one person to send emails out to large distribtion lists. Exchange (and I'm sure others) have the ability to prevent average users from sending company wide or otherwise very large numbers of emails out. Let only certain people at certain roles in the company to send out company wide emails. Reply-All to a distribution list which you have no access won't get you very far...

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