teridon - Slashdot User

Comment: WTF /.? (Score 3, Insightful) 66

by teridon on Tuesday January 24, @06:31AM (#38803229) Attached to: Sun Blasts Another CME At Earth and Mars

45 comments, perhaps 3 of which that aren't jokes or AC trolls. /. used to be a place where science could be discussed intelligently...

I guess I'll spend my time at reddit r/askscience instead!

If you want to make your own high-res movies of these kinds of events, get JHelioviewer

Forced to decrypt harddrive-> 6

Submitted by

A Commentor

on Monday January 23, @07:16PM

A Commentor writes "I guess to balance the good news with the Supreme Court ruling on GPS, a judge in Colorado had ordered a defendant to decrypt their hard drive. Apparently, the government doesn't have the technology to break the PGP encryption."
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Sun Blasts Another CME at Earth and Mars-> 0

Submitted by

astroengine

on Monday January 23, @04:30PM

astroengine writes "On Friday, the sun hurled a coronal mass ejection (CME) at our planet that sparked a strong geomagnetic storm and beautiful aurorae at high latitudes. Late on Sunday (EST), the sun unleashed yet another Earth-bound CME after an M9 flare erupted over a particularly active sunspot region — the CME is expected to hit Earth on Tuesday and Mars on Wednesday. This series of flares and CMEs have ignited the strongest period of solar storms since 2005, according to an NOAA space weather advisory."
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Hackers manipulated railway computers, TSA memo sa-> 0

Submitted by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 23, @06:17PM

An anonymous reader writes "Hackers, possibly from abroad, executed an attack on a Northwest rail company's computers that disrupted railway signals for two days in December, according to a government memo recapping outreach with the transportation sector during the emergency."
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Comment: don't let me down /. ... (Score 1) 1

by teridon on Monday January 23, @08:52PM (#38800109) Attached to: Biggest solar shot since 1995 is Earth-bound

All of the solar weather stories on /. have been riddled with jokes and spam. Can we get some real information or intelligent discussion this time? :-P

If you want to make your own high-res movies of these kinds of events, get JHelioviewer

Or if you're lazy, low-res in 6 wavelengths (ok, 5 wavelengths and one magnetogram)

Biggest solar shot since 1995 is Earth-bound-> 1

Submitted by

coondoggie

on Monday January 23, @05:10PM

coondoggie writes "Seems not a week goes by without s big solar flare erupts sending the Earth a massive shot of solar wind, radiation and electromagnetic pulses capable of damaging satellites, GPS and electronics — but this week the blast is large — the largest since 1995, NASA said.

According to spaceweather.com: This morning, Jan. 23rd, the big sunspot 1402 erupted, producing a long-duration M9-class solar flare. The explosion's M9-ranking puts it on the threshold of being an X-flare, the most powerful kind. Solar protons accelerated by this M9-class solar flare are streaming past Earth. On the NOAA scale of radiation storms, this one ranks S3, which means it could, e.g., cause isolated reboots of computers onboard Earth-orbiting satellites and interfere with polar radio communications."
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Comment: Re:These things were too successful. (Score 1) 110

by teridon on Sunday January 22, @12:58PM (#38782691) Attached to: Researchers Find Slew of Flaws In SCADA Hardware, Software

OK, that's fair, I wasn't clear. Obviously the guards should be able to operate the functions required for their job. I was trying to say that you can't assume malicious software doesn't exist on your network; i.e. you cannot leave out basic security controls just because the thing is on a ostensibly private network. No software should be able to open a door by, say, sending a simple ASCII string on the right port (I've seen that kind of stupid crap in other software). Why not specify that you need two-factor authentication to open a door? That would at least prevent attacks any kindergartner could perform.

Comment: Re:These things were too successful. (Score 1, Insightful) 110

by teridon on Sunday January 22, @06:17AM (#38779889) Attached to: Researchers Find Slew of Flaws In SCADA Hardware, Software

The security should be [...] an air gap enforced by a physical barrier [...] [but this is] regularly broken by people disregarding policy and carrying in USB memory sticks.

You admit the fatal flaw, but still think physical security is enough? Even when it appears that all it takes to defeat your "security" is one retarded, or corrupt, security guard?

You might as well cover your ears and scream "LA LA LA I CAN'T HEAR YOU". Obviously these PLCs need to be connected to a network of some kind to be useful. But even when that network is physically secure, those PLCs and their associated IT systems need to be secure against known attacks.

Comment: huh? downloads not wrapped for me (Score 1) 228

by teridon on Tuesday December 06, @06:35AM (#38278130) Attached to: Download.com Bundling Adware With Free Software

I just downloaded nmap and vlc. Both files were identical to what I got from the source. Actually,it looks like cnet redirected me to the nmap.org download link (http://nmap.org/dist/nmap-5.51-setup.exe) using a 'META HTTP-EQUIV="Refresh" ...'. VLC was still from cnet.com. I'm not logged in; I wonder if I have a cookie that prevents the wrapper -- or if download.com changed something. Also, I'm using NoScript and cnet/download.com is not allowed. Perhaps this turns off the wrapper too.

Duqu Virus Detected in Iran-> 0

Submitted by Pierre Bezukhov on Monday November 14, @08:43PM

Pierre Bezukhov writes ""We are in the initial phase of fighting the Duqu virus," said Gholamreza Jalali, the head of Iran's civil defense organization. "The final report which says which organizations the virus has spread to and what its impacts are has not been completed yet."

Jalali added that Iran had developed software to combat the virus, and would thoroughly check all computers at main sites to keep the virus at bay.

Duqu first surfaced when security researchers at Symantec, based in Mountain View, Calif., learned about the threat from a customer. The bug is called Duqu because the files it creates have the prefix "DQ," but Symantec believes the bug is "a precursor to a future Stuxnet-like attack."

Many experts believe Stuxnet was likely designed as an American-Israeli project meant to sabotage computers Iran's nuclear sites.

It is still unknown if Duqu is motivated by politics or state movements, but Symantec believes the virus is designed to gain remote access capabilities and gather data for future cyber attacks.

"If it is the Stuxnet author, it could be that they have the same goal as before," said Symantec CTO Greg Day. "But if code has been given to someone else they may have a different motive.""
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