Submission + - Earth Gets Another Quasi-Moon 1
The Bad Astronomer writes: Astronomers have found a new asteroid, 2014 OL339, that is a quasi-moon of the Earth. Discovered accidentally earlier this year, the 150-meter asteroid has an orbit that is more elliptical than Earth's, but has a period of almost exactly one year. It isn't bound to Earth like a real moon, but displays apparent motion as if it did, making it one of several known quasi-moons.
Submission + - Hundreds of Police Agencies distributing spyware and keystroke logger
realized writes: For years, local law enforcement agencies around the country have told parents that installing ComputerCOP software is the “first step” in protecting their children online.
As official as it looks,ComputerCOP is actually just spyware, generally bought in bulk from a New York company that appears to do nothing but market this software to local government agencies.
The way ComputerCOP works is neither safe nor secure. It isn’t particularly effective either, except for generating positive PR for the law enforcement agencies distributing it. As security software goes, we observed a product with a keystroke-capturing function, also called a “keylogger,” that could place a family’s personal information at extreme risk by transmitting what a user types over the Internet to third-party servers without encryption.
EFF conducted a security review of ComputerCOP while also following the paper trail of public records to see how widely the software has spread. Based on ComputerCOP’s own marketing information, we identified approximately 245 agencies in more than 35 states, plus the U.S. Marshals, that have used public funds (often the proceeds from property seized during criminal investigations) to purchase and distribute ComputerCOP. One sheriff’s department even bought a copy for every family in its county.
Some of the agencies that have used it include U.S. Marshals — Under Director John Clark, Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office gave out the program for "free" to 6,700 foster parents, Riverside County District Attorney's Office, San Diego County District Attorney's Office, Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office,
Complete list of agencies that use the software compiled by the eff click here
As official as it looks,ComputerCOP is actually just spyware, generally bought in bulk from a New York company that appears to do nothing but market this software to local government agencies.
The way ComputerCOP works is neither safe nor secure. It isn’t particularly effective either, except for generating positive PR for the law enforcement agencies distributing it. As security software goes, we observed a product with a keystroke-capturing function, also called a “keylogger,” that could place a family’s personal information at extreme risk by transmitting what a user types over the Internet to third-party servers without encryption.
EFF conducted a security review of ComputerCOP while also following the paper trail of public records to see how widely the software has spread. Based on ComputerCOP’s own marketing information, we identified approximately 245 agencies in more than 35 states, plus the U.S. Marshals, that have used public funds (often the proceeds from property seized during criminal investigations) to purchase and distribute ComputerCOP. One sheriff’s department even bought a copy for every family in its county.
Some of the agencies that have used it include U.S. Marshals — Under Director John Clark, Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office gave out the program for "free" to 6,700 foster parents, Riverside County District Attorney's Office, San Diego County District Attorney's Office, Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office,
Complete list of agencies that use the software compiled by the eff click here
Submission + - DARPA Working on 'Unhackable' Embedded Software
Trailrunner7 writes: DARPA is the birthplace of the network that eventually became today’s Internet, and the agency has spent the decades since it released that baby out into the world trying to find new ways defend it. That task has grown ever more complex and difficult, and now DARPA is working on a new kind of software that is provably secure for specific properties.
Arati Prabhakar, the director of DARPA, said that the agency, which performs advanced research and development for the United States military and government, has been working on the software in the hopes that it can run on some embedded systems. The software isn’t meant as a general purpose operating system for servers or desktops, but Prabhakar said that the agency believes it has plenty of applications.
“Unfortunately there’s not going to be a silver bullet. There are pieces of this we think can become tractable. One of our programs is working on software that’s unhackabale for specific security properties,” said Prabhakar, who was speaking at the Washington Post Cybersecurity Summit on Wednesday. “We’re working on a mathematical proof that the software can’t be hacked from the outside. It’s for embedded systems with a modest number of lines of code.”
Arati Prabhakar, the director of DARPA, said that the agency, which performs advanced research and development for the United States military and government, has been working on the software in the hopes that it can run on some embedded systems. The software isn’t meant as a general purpose operating system for servers or desktops, but Prabhakar said that the agency believes it has plenty of applications.
“Unfortunately there’s not going to be a silver bullet. There are pieces of this we think can become tractable. One of our programs is working on software that’s unhackabale for specific security properties,” said Prabhakar, who was speaking at the Washington Post Cybersecurity Summit on Wednesday. “We’re working on a mathematical proof that the software can’t be hacked from the outside. It’s for embedded systems with a modest number of lines of code.”
Submission + - Firejail – A Security Sandbox for Mozilla Firefox (wordpress.com)
ttyX writes: Firejail is a SUID sandbox program that reduces the risk of security breaches by restricting the running environment of untrusted applications. The core technology behind Firejail is Linux Namespaces, a virtualization technology available in Linux kernel. It allows a process and all its descendants to have their own private view of the globally shared kernel resources, such as the network stack, process table, mount table, IPC space.
Submission + - Unexplained out-of-band WIndows DVD patch
davidwr writes: Microsoft released September 2014 update for DVD playback in Windows 7 SP1
as an out-of-band "Important" update yesterday without explaining why it was rushed instead of waiting two weeks.
Microsoft knows that patching annoys system administrators and others and typically doesn't do out of band updates without a good reason. Unlike the recent out-of-band Russian Time Zone update, there isn't an obvious to be a "you must install this by a certain date or something will break" reason to rush this.
Does anyone know why Microsoft didn't either 1) wait two weeks or 2) provide a clearer explanation of why this is important enough to push out early?
Submission + - Apple Stock falls 3-4% after "Nude Celeb Scandal" (businessinsider.com)
retroworks writes: Both the Wall Street Journal (paywall http://blogs.wsj.com/moneybeat...), USA
Today, and Business Insider are all running stories about the big dip in Apple stock, close to the eve of the iPhone 6 rollout. Huffington Post's Headline is "Apple Stock Getting Killed" http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...
There are two different explanations given for the tanking Apple stock. To be sure, potential liabilities over The iCloud photo scandal and leaked celebrity nude photos gets its share of the blame. But and a note from Pacific Crest analyst Andy Hargreaves telling investors to sell Apple shares seems to carry more weight.
"Last week, the company was flying high as anticipation built for the iPhone 6, and the iWatch, which are expected to be announced next week. The stock was hitting new all-time highs...It all came to a screeching halt over the weekend for Apple, when nude photos of celebrities hit the web. Apple's weak security on iCloud, where the photos were backed up, was blamed for the photos hitting the web."
Apple's new mobile payments feature, as well as health tracking data tied to the iPhone, may feel the pinch from the data security breach (although most of that data is likely to be stored right on the phone, not in the iCloud, BusinessInsider points out). Pacific Crest's Hargreaves says, "We recommend taking profits in Apple."
Today, and Business Insider are all running stories about the big dip in Apple stock, close to the eve of the iPhone 6 rollout. Huffington Post's Headline is "Apple Stock Getting Killed" http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...
There are two different explanations given for the tanking Apple stock. To be sure, potential liabilities over The iCloud photo scandal and leaked celebrity nude photos gets its share of the blame. But and a note from Pacific Crest analyst Andy Hargreaves telling investors to sell Apple shares seems to carry more weight.
"Last week, the company was flying high as anticipation built for the iPhone 6, and the iWatch, which are expected to be announced next week. The stock was hitting new all-time highs...It all came to a screeching halt over the weekend for Apple, when nude photos of celebrities hit the web. Apple's weak security on iCloud, where the photos were backed up, was blamed for the photos hitting the web."
Apple's new mobile payments feature, as well as health tracking data tied to the iPhone, may feel the pinch from the data security breach (although most of that data is likely to be stored right on the phone, not in the iCloud, BusinessInsider points out). Pacific Crest's Hargreaves says, "We recommend taking profits in Apple."
UK Prisons Ministry Fined For Lack of Encryption At Prisons 74
Bruce66423 (1678196) writes The Guardian reports that the UK Information Commissioner has levied a fine of £180,000 on the Ministry of Justice for their failure to encrypt data held on external hard drives at prisons. The fine is nominal — one part of government fining another is rather pointless, but it does show that there's a little bit of accountability. Of course it's interesting to consider the dangers of this hopefully old way of storing backups; but the question of whether we do a lot better now is quite pointed.
To make matters worse, one of the unencrypted backup hard drives walked away.
Comment Re:This is going to end so well for them! (Score 3, Informative) 147
You play WoW on your phone or use your phone as your only home internet connection? Seems unlikely.
At least they are being honest and upfront about the services they provide and that gives the customer the freedom to choose appropriately.
At least they are being honest and upfront about the services they provide and that gives the customer the freedom to choose appropriately.
Comment Original video link (Score 1) 142
Original video with a less annoying voice.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FKXOucXB4a8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FKXOucXB4a8
Submission + - Google Spotted Explicit Images Of A Child In Man's Email And Tipped Off Police 1
mrspoonsi writes: A Houston man has been arrested after Google sent a tip to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children saying the man had explicit images of a child in his email, according to Houston police. The man was a registered sex offender, convicted of sexually assaulting a child in 1994, reports Tim Wetzel at KHOU Channel 11 News in Houston. "He was keeping it inside of his email. I can't see that information, I can't see that photo, but Google can," Detective David Nettles of the Houston Metro Internet Crimes Against Children Taskforce told Channel 11. After Google reportedly tipped off the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, the Center alerted police, which used the information to get a warrant.
Submission + - Flying Donkey Challenge on hold as Kenyan authorities cope with Westgate fallout (robohub.org)
Hallie Siegel writes: The Flying Donkey Challenge — a competition that aimed to spur a new transport industry using cargo drones in order to solve the problem of supply delivery in places where infrastructure is poor or non-existent — has been put on hold. Preliminary sub-challenges were slated to begin this November in Kenya, but have been put on hold indefinitely due to delays in obtaining final approvals from Kenyan authorities who are concerned about airspace security following the Westgate Mall incident and other more recent attacks.
Submission + - A Convicted Hacker and an Internet Icon Join Forces to Thwart NSA Spying (wired.com)
An anonymous reader writes: The internet is littered with burgeoning email encryption schemes aimed at thwarting NSA spying. Many of them are focused on solving the usability issues that have plagued complicated encryption schemes like PGP for years. But a new project called Dark Mail plans to go further: to hide your metadata.
Metadata is the pernicious transaction data involving the âoeToâ, âoeFromâ and subject fields of email that the NSA finds so valuable for tracking communications and drawing connections between people. Generally, even when email is encrypted, metadata is not. Dark Mail ambitiously aims to revamp existing email structures to hide this data while still making the system universally compatible with existing email clients.
Metadata is the pernicious transaction data involving the âoeToâ, âoeFromâ and subject fields of email that the NSA finds so valuable for tracking communications and drawing connections between people. Generally, even when email is encrypted, metadata is not. Dark Mail ambitiously aims to revamp existing email structures to hide this data while still making the system universally compatible with existing email clients.
Submission + - This wearable Robot will give 2 extra fingers to our Hand.
rtoz writes: Researchers at MIT have developed a robot that enhances the grasping motion of the human hand. This wrist-wearable robot gives two extra fingers to our hand.
The robotic fingers are at either side of the the hand — one outside the thumb, and the other outside the little finger.
A control algorithm enables it to move in sync with the wearer's fingers to grasp objects of various shapes and sizes.
With the assistance of these extra fingers, we can grasp objects that are usually too difficult to do with a single hand.
The robotic fingers are at either side of the the hand — one outside the thumb, and the other outside the little finger.
A control algorithm enables it to move in sync with the wearer's fingers to grasp objects of various shapes and sizes.
With the assistance of these extra fingers, we can grasp objects that are usually too difficult to do with a single hand.
Comment Re:Much better board layout (Score 3, Interesting) 202
Yes, a respectable line-in would be really nice. For now I have been using the Wolfson Audio Card but it costs as much as the Raspberry Pi itself, and you have to patch the OS to get it to work (but the quality is great). I've tried some of the USB audio devices but found the quality to be not good enough, probably because they are really designed for microphones and even with gain at minimal settings there is too much distortion for line-in. 48kHz is good enough IMO, the Pi doesn't really have enough CPU power to do much more than that if recording and compressing in real time.
