Keyloggers on the rise
Browsing Posts published in February, 2006
Using Ruby on Rails for Web Development on Mac OS X
Apple Developer Connection: “It should come as no surprise that Mac OS X is a favored platform for Rails development. Rails and its supporting cast of web servers and databases thrive on the rich Mac OS X environment.”
New York Times sues DoD over Domestic Spying:
“Yahoo News is reporting that the New York Times has filed suit against the U.S. Defense Department. The suit is seeking the release of all relevant documents and a list of people targeted by the NSA domestic spying program. As stated in the article: ‘The Times had requested the documents in December under the Freedom of Information Act but sued upon being unsatisfied with the Pentagon’s response that the request was being processed as quickly as possible, according to the six-page suit filed at federal court in New York.’”
You must be kidding, right? What the HELL are they smoking in NYC?
This short article looks at how to get a fully functional IPSec VPN up and running between two fresh OpenBSD installations in about four minutes flat.
Until recently, setting up an open-source IPSec solution has been woefully complex and involved wading through an alphabet soup of committee-designed protocols. Many people give up on IPSec after their first peek at the horrible and complex software documentation, opting instead to install some sort of commercial SSL VPN which seems much simpler. For those who have been through this exercise, a jumble of SAs, ESPs, AHs, SPIs, CAs, certs, FIFOs, IKEs and policy jargon inside RFCs is enough to give anyone a headache. However, there is good new on the IPSec front: it has all finally been covered up with a nice, simple way to set it up under OpenBSD.
Shortflip.com has an interesting article on the history, present, and future of 3D satellite imaging applications. Obviously they focus on Google Maps, but they make a good case for Google’s competitors, although it’s hard to imagine anyone being able to challenge Google’s market share in the near future. Emphasis is on user features, map accuracy, and future technology.
Open WiFi hotspots are everywhere, but their use is often limited by legal and ethical considerations. Where should the lines be drawn?
IBM and Novell announce support for open-source identity manager:
IBM and Novell announced today that they are lending support to an open-source identity manager called Higgins. Is it a viable challenger to Microsoft’s InfoCard?
Steve Wozniak criticizes Apple for iPod, Intel:
The always-quotable Steve Wozniak sat down for an interview and spoke his mind on the company he co-founded. Does the creator of the Apple ][ still have useful advice for today’s Apple?
36% of households not on-line, and most don’t care to be. A significant portion of the U.S. households that are not on-line have little interest in the Internet, indicating that Internet usage penetration has stalled, reports Information Week. About 36% of households are not on-line, and only 2% intend to ..
Help save the endangered time servers:
Someone stops you on the street and asks “Hey, do you know what time it is?” You tell him and continue on your way. But what if it was hundreds of thousands of people every day, because they didn’t know who else to ask? You might decide to not answer any more. That’s the situation that some important Internet time servers are in, and some simple changes in your computer’s configuration can help ease the strain.
Network Filtering by Operating System:
Some operating systems are better networking citizens than others. Depending on your network, you may want to prioritize traffic from certain machines over traffic from other operating systems–especially when the latest Windows worm strikes. Avleen Vig shows how to use pf, altq, and Squid on FreeBSD to shape your bandwidth with respect to the systems you run.
Fundamentals of Massive Linux Scaling:
This introductory article encapsulates four of the top things I learned about major enterprise Linux scaling. They are foundational aspects for a robust scaled server complex using Linux. They also address issues I see fairly consistently in some Linux enterprises. My hope is that these insights will help administrators overcome obstacles with their massive Linux scaling projects.
Antivirus researchers have discovered what’s claimed to be the first computer virus to infect Apple Mac OS X computers. The malware, dubbed Leap-A, spreads via the iChat instant messaging system as a file called latestpics.tgz that infected machines send to contacts on an infected user’s buddy list. The malicious file is disguised as a jpeg, and users who open it will find their machines infected. Mac viruses were relatively common at the dawn of personal computing, but these days the overwhelming majority of viruses are Windows specific. Leap-A shows other platforms are also vulnerable.
Network Monitoring with Ethereal:
If you’re familiar with network analysis tools but still haven’t taken Ethereal for a spin, here’s a quick look at what it can do.
“Rather than spend millions of dollars for an array of hard drives when you can have all that storage on just one drive? A story at P2P.net US inventor Michael Thomas, owner of Colossal Storage, says he’s the first person to solve non-contact optical spintronics which will in turn ultimately result in the creation of 3.5-inch discs with a million times the capacity of any hard drive – 1.2 petabytes of storage, to be exact. According to the article, In the past, data storage has only been able to orient the direction a field of electrons as they move around a molecule, Thomas said. ”But now there’s a way to rotate or spin the individual electrons that make up, or surround, the molecule,“ he says. He expects a finished product to be on the market in about four to five years, adding the cost would probably be in the range of $750 each.”
But only in developments in San Antonio. Time Warner Cable is offering 30Mbps Cable tiers to some upscale apartment dwellers in San Antonio. In that market, the company will offer 10 Mbps service to Xtreme users for $69.95 a month, 15 Mbps service for $129.95 a month, and its 30 Mbps servi..
CLI Magic: ifup, ifdown, ifstatus:
I’ve always assumed that ifup and ifdown were conditional commands that performed their assigned duties only if the interface device in question was up or down, as the command might be. I was dead wrong.
Brief: Company requires RFID injection:
Company requires RFID injection
