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Security

Study Shows Many Sites Still Failing Basic Security Measures 103

Orome1 writes with a summary of a large survey of web applications by Veracode. From the article: "Considered 'low hanging fruit' because of their prevalence in software applications, XSS and SQL Injection are two of the most frequently exploited vulnerabilities, often providing a gateway to customer data and intellectual property. When applying the new analysis criteria, Veracode reports eight out of 10 applications fail to meet acceptable levels of security, marking a significant decline from past reports. Specifically for web applications, the report showed a high concentration of XSS and SQL Injection vulnerabilities, with XSS present in 68 percent of all web applications and SQL Injection present in 32 percent of all web applications."
Slashdot.org

Rob "CmdrTaco" Malda Resigns From Slashdot 1521

After 14 years and over 15,000 stories posted, it's finally time for me to say Good-Bye to Slashdot. I created this place with my best friends in a run down house while still in college. Since then it has grown to be read by more than a million people, and has served Billions and Billions of Pages (yes, in my head I hear the voice). During my tenure I have done my best to keep Slashdot firmly grounded in its origins, but now it's time for someone else to come aboard and find the *future*. Personally I don't have any plans, but if you need to get ahold of me for any reason, you can find me as @cmdrtaco on twitter or Rob Malda on Google+. You could also update my mail address to be malda at cmdrtaco dot net. Hit the link below if you want to read some nostalgic saccharine crap that I need to get out of my system before I sign off for the last time.

Comment Re:Ha ha (Score 1) 307

I took that oath myself and served honorably, so I can say with some authority that you are correct. The oath is to defend and uphold the Constitution of the United States of America against all enemies, both foreign and domestic.

It is most certainly not to obey any individual. The UCMJ takes care of that.

Comment Re:It's our fault the program is over (Score 2) 80

That's pretty much my point. I doubt many Americans WANT a huge department of justice/prison-filling-machine but many Americans continue to go with the status quo instead of demanding change. I'm of the opinion that our democracy is failing principally because the people won't get (and stay) engaged on matters of substance.
Security

Time To Close the Security Theater 457

An anonymous reader writes "An editorial at Forbes calls for the dismantling of the TSA, pointing to recent headlines as the latest examples of 'security theater' at its worst. From the article: 'The problem isn't that the TSA is harassing the wrong people. The problem is that the TSA is harassing anyone. The TSA is encroaching on fundamental liberties and providing no discernable benefit. ... Naturally, the TSA responds to incidents like these by saying that the agents are highly trained and that they have followed proper procedure. This indicates a signal failing for the agency: if "doing it by the book" involves touching people in ways that would be considered sexual assault in virtually any other context or telling a 90-year old breast cancer survivor to remove her bra lest it contain explosives (as happened to a friend's grandmother), then the book needs to be shredded and rewritten. Better yet, it needs to be replaced with a competitive market for air travel in which the airports, the airways, and the airliners are in private hands. Some might object that private firms will have incentives to cut corners on safety. It is a legitimate concern, but competitive mechanisms tend to weed this out.'"
AT&T

AT&T: Meet the New US GSM Monopoly 189

itwbennett writes "Why should consumers care about the AT&T/T-mobile merger? Already, Verizon has dropped unlimited data plans and the US trails Japan, South Korea, and others in variety and performance of mobiles. Don't think for a second that those aren't the direct result this new monopoly, says blogger Tom Henderson. '...Those pesky State agencies that used to have regulatory authority has been usurped by the US Federal Government,' writes Henderson. 'This wasn't an accident. Who would you rather deal with, 43 different state regulatory authorities, or those convenient people on Capitol Hill?'"
Firefox

Firefox Is For "Regular" Users, Not Businesses 555

nk497 writes "Some have argued that Mozilla's switch to a faster release cycle has made it more difficult for companies to use Firefox, but the open-source browser maker isn't too bothered, according to one employee. Asa Dotzler, community coordinator for Firefox marketing and founder of Mozilla's quality assurance scheme, said Firefox is for 'regular users' — not businesses. 'Enterprise has never been (and I'll argue, shouldn't be) a focus of ours,' he said. 'A minute spent making a corporate user happy can better be spent making many regular users happy. I'd much rather Mozilla was spending its limited resources looking out for the billions of users that don't have enterprise support systems already taking care of them.'"

Comment Not a good long-term move (Score 1) 538

I work in the healthcare vertical. I've seen 2 major health systems attempt this form of outsourcing over the last few years. In both cases, the short-term cost savings were far outweighed over the long term by down times and a complete lack of true integration between the tech implementers and the business units (e.g. doctors and nurses).

This is the exact opposite of the experience detailed in TFA.

You think your IT is glacial? Try to get an IT org to move for you when they don't even work in the same company. Lawyers can sue to enforce the contract and all that, but by the time your case gets to court you've already lost your competitive advantage.

Comment Re:Lost interest when I saw the feces trailer (Score 1) 462

It's due to the ongoing pussification of our society. Everything must be hyper politically correct for anyone to be allowed to say they enjoy it. We DO enjoy high- and low-brow humor. We're just not allowed to admit it in public, else someone will sue or publicly shame you. For example, if you say, "DNF was mildly enjoyable", a common response from the politically correct crowd might be, "Well, that means you like murdering rape victims. You're a monster and you don't deserve any cake*". Most people decide to keep their mouth shut, and the vocal minority who run all things politically correct win. This is a slight tangent but I think this concept actually makes us less "free" than people in countries where sticks are not surgically implanted in their asses at birth.

On topic, I've played through about half the game. It's a barely average shooter with a few chuckle-worthy moments - all due to "childish" humor. I am enjoying the game as much as I enjoyed playing the last Call of Duty game though, because DNF has more personality and is completely not serious in how it presents itself. I can actually *gasp* mindlessly relax in this game. Call of Duty, et al, are SRS BZNS and it takes more mental energy to play them through.

That said, the game is not worth $60, even the PC version I'm playing. I bought it on Steam for $44US and I think that's overpriced, too.

*Please note that the cake is actually a lie.
Security

Sony Suffers Yet More Security Breaches 288

Oldcynic writes "As Sony struggles to restore the Playstation Network we receive news today of another breach, this time at Sony Ericsson in Canada. 'Sony Corp. spokesman Atsuo Omagari said Wednesday that names, email and encrypted passwords may have been stolen from the Sony Ericsson Canada website, but no credit card information was taken.' Another group managed to penetrate Sony Entertainment Japan yesterday as well. I almost feel bad for them.

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