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Submission + - Why It's Time to Invest in Quantum Cybersecurity

Submitted by Esther Schindler
Esther Schindler writes: If quantum computing is happening — and it is — so are cybersecurity concerns. You’d best get underway preparing for them, says Brian Witten, the Chief Product Security Officer at Aptiv.

Encryption systems that protect data today will become vulnerable when practical quantum computers arrive in seven to 10 years. But while that may sound like a long way off, Witten says, preparation for quantum threats must begin now, not once they have already materialized. Organizations need time to implement post-quantum cryptography (PQC) transition plans methodically, which applies to both those with existing IT infrastructures and those building software-defined systems.

Witten shares a few steps companies can take today to prepare for potential quantum security threats, including building an inventory (what needs to change across toolchains?) and ensuring suppliers are quantum ready.

Comment Re:More wasted RAM (Score 1) 149

by Whiney Mac Fanboy (#64907539) Attached to: Apple Makes 16GB RAM Standard on MacBook Air

The original Macbook in 2006 had only 512 megabytes

A 512 MB module cost $100-$200 in 2006. Sold in an $1000 machine. 10% of the cost.

And now a macbook air costs order of magnitude the same, but the RAM they're putting in it.... $10-20 (1-2% of the cost).

I wonder if that difference in cost is going to some other part of the machine or into margins?

(I know Apple don't pay retail prices for their RAM, which is what I quoted here, the actual percentage of cost will be lower)

Comment Re:It's called automation. (Score 1) 203

10 years ago, SHA1 was something you could sensibly store your passwords in.

Uh? No. SHA1 has been vulnerable to faster-than-brute-force attacks since 2005

NIST and most other real security professionals were recommending against using SHA1 since 2010/2011-ish.

Unlike you, I do not claim to be a security professional, but even I know SHA1 has been unsafe for a far longer than a decade.

I feel sorry for your clients.

Comment Re:Not up to us now (Score 1) 147

rich western nations, which at this point cannot producing meaningful CO2 reductions *snip* Well except Germany of course, fuck you

CO2 (metric tons in 2020) per capita:

Germany's: 7.72
US: 13.68
Australia: 15.22
Singapore: 9.45

But Germany gets the fuck you? I don't think I'd hire you for your critical thinking skills.

Comment Re:Misinformation (Score 3, Insightful) 160

"Jacob Blake was unarmed"

I think the actual quote most people used was "Jacob Blake didn't have a gun".

But I guess him having a knife was justification enough to shoot him seven times in the back? Or was it because he was a scumbag? Was that enough justification to shoot him in the back & leave him a paralyzed burden on his family & wider society for the rest of his life?
Sci-Fi

Pentagon Official Floats a Theory For Unexplained Sightings: Alien Motherships (politico.com) 118

Posted by BeauHD from the open-to-speculative-ideas dept.
The official in charge of a secretive Pentagon effort to investigate unexplained aerial incursions has co-authored an academic paper that presents an out-of-this-world theory: Recent objects could actually be alien probes from a mothership sent to study Earth. Politico reports: In a draft paper dated March 7 (PDF), Sean Kirkpatrick, head of the Pentagon's All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office, and Harvard professor Avi Loeb teamed up to write that the objects, which appear to defy all physics, could be "probes" from an extraterrestrial "parent craft." It's unusual for government officials, especially those involved in the nascent effort to collect intelligence on recent sightings, to discuss the possibility of extraterrestrial life, although top agency officials don't rule it out when asked. After Loeb posted it online, the paper gained notoriety from a post on Military Times and has also circulated among science-focused news outlets.

More than half of the five-page paper is devoted to discussing the possibility that the unexplained objects DoD is studying could be the "probes" in the mothership scenario, including most of the page-long introduction. One section is titled: "The Extraterrestrial Possibility" and another "Propulsion Methods." Kirkpatrick's involvement in the academic paper demonstrates that the Pentagon is open to scientific debate of the origins of UFOs, an important signal to send to the academic world, experts said. But they add that his decision to attach his name to a theory considered in most academic circles to be highly unsubstantiated also raises questions about AARO's credibility.

The paper explains that interstellar objects such as the cigar-shaped "Oumuamua" that scientists spotted flying through the galaxy in 2017 "could potentially be a parent craft that releases many small probes during its close passage to Earth." The paper goes on to compare the probes to "dandelion seeds" that could be separated from the parent craft by the sun's gravitational force. It examines the physics of how the smaller craft could move through the Earth's atmosphere to reach the surface, where they could be spotted by humans. The paper notes that the "probes" could use starlight to "charge their batteries" and the Earth's water as fuel. It also speculates on the motive for aliens to send exploratory probes to Earth. "What would be the overarching purpose of the journey? In analogy with actual dandelion seeds, the probes could propagate the blueprint of their senders," the authors write. "As with biological seeds, the raw materials on the planet's surface could also be used by them as nutrients for self-replication or simply scientific exploration."

Submission + - A collection of fun databases for programming exploration

Submitted by Esther Schindler
Esther Schindler writes: When you learn a new tool/technology, you need to create a sample application, which cannot use real in-house data. Why not use something fun for the sample application’s data, such as a Star Wars API or a data collection about World Cup contests? Esther Schindler, slashdot user #16185, assembled a groovy collection of datasets that may be useful but also may be a source of fascinating internet rabbit holes.

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