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Source code management on UNIX and Linux systems
Identifying and tracking the changes made by multiple developers and merging them into a single, up-to-date codebase makes collaborative, multi-developer projects possible. VCS software, also referred to as revision control systems (RCS) or source code management (SCM) systems, enable multiple users to submit changes to the same files or project without one developer's changes accidentally overwriting another's changes.
Linux® and UNIX® systems are knee-deep in VCS software, ranging from dinosaurs such as the RCS and the Concurrent Versions System (CVS) to more modern systems such as Arch, Bazaar, Git, Subversion, and Mercurial. Like Git, Mercurial began life as an open source replacement for a commercial source code management system called BitKeeper, which was used to maintain and manage the source code for the Linux kernel. Since its inception, Mercurial has evolved into a popular VCS system that is used by many open source and commercial projects. Projects using Mercurial include Mozilla, IcedTea, and the MoinMoin wiki. See Resources for links to these and many more examples.
VCS systems generally refer to each collection of source code in which changes can be made and tracked as a repository. How developers interact with a repository is the key difference between more traditional VCS systems such as CVS and Subversion, referred to as centralized VCS systems, and more flexible VCS systems such as Mercurial and Git, which are referred to as distributed VCS systems. Developers interact with centralized VCS systems using a client/server model, where changes to your local copy of the source code can only be pushed back to the central repository. Developers interact with distributed VCS systems using a peer-to-peer model, where any copy of the central repository is itself a repository to which changes can be committed and from which they can be shared with any other copy. Distributed VCS systems do not actually have the notion of a central, master repository, but one is almost always defined by policy so that a single repository exists for building, testing, and maintaining a master version of your software.
Mercurial is a small, powerful distributed VCS system that is easy to get started with, while still providing the advanced commands that VCS power users may need (or want) to use. Mercurial's distributed nature makes it easy to work on projects locally, tracking and managing your changes via local commits and pushing those changes to remote repositories whenever necessary.
Among modern, distributed VCS systems, the closest VCS system to Mercurial is Git. Some differences between Mercurial and Git are the following:
- Multiple, built-in undo operations: Mercurial's
rollbackcommands make it easy to return to previous versions of specific files or previous sets of committed changes. Git provides a single built-in
revertcommand with its typical rocket-scientist-only syntax.
- Built-in web server: Mercurial provides a simple, integrated web server that makes it easy to host a repository quickly for others to pull from. Pushing requires either ignoring security or a more complex setup that supports Secure Sockets Layer (SSL).
- History preservation during copy/move operations:
movecommands both preserve complete history information, while Git does not preserve history in either case.
- Branches: Mercurial automatically shares all branches, while Git requires that each repository set up its own branches (either creating them locally or by mapping them to specific branches in a remote repository).
- Global and local tags: Mercurial supports global tags that are shared between repositories, which make it easy to share information about specific points in code development without branching.
- Native support on Windows platforms: Mercurial is written in Python, which is supported on Microsoft® Windows® systems. Mercurial is therefore available as a Windows executable (see Resources). Git on Windows is more complex—your choices are msysGit, using standard git under Cygwin, or using a web-based hosting system and repository.
- Automatic repository packing: Git requires that you explicitly pack and garbage-collect its repositories, while Mercurial performs its equivalent operations automatically. However, Mercurial repositories tend to be larger than Git repositories for the same codebase.
Mercurial and Git fans are also happy to discuss the learning curve, merits, and usability of each VCS system's command set. Space prevents that discussion here, but a web search on that topic will provide lots of interesting reading material.
Creating and using Mercurial repositories
Mercurial provides two basic ways of creating a local repository for a project's source code: either by explicitly creating a repository or by cloning an existing, remote repository:
- To create a local repository, use the
hg init [REPO-NAME]command. Supplying the name of a repository when executing this command creates a directory for that repository in the specified location. Not supplying the name of a repository turns the current working directory into a repository. The latter is handy when creating a Mercurial repository for an existing codebase.
To clone an existing repository, use the
hg clone REPO-NAME[LOCALNAME]command. Mercurial supports the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) and Secure Shell (SSH) protocols for accessing remote repositories. Listing 1 shows an example
hgcommand and the resulting output produced when cloning a repository via SSH.
Listing 1. Cloning a Mercurial repository via SSH
$ hg clone ssh://codeserver//home/wvh/src/pop3check wvh@codeserver's password: destination directory: pop3check requesting all changes adding changesets adding manifests adding file changes added 1 changesets with 12 changes to 12 files updating to branch default 12 files updated, 0 files merged, 0 files removed, 0 files unresolved remote: 1 changesets found
Note: To use the HTTP protocol to access Mercurial
repositories, you must either start Mercurial's internal web
server in that repository (
hg serve -d)
or use Mercurial's
hgweb.cgi script to
integrate Mercurial with an existing web server such as
Apache. When cloning via HTTP, you will usually want to specify a
name for your local repository.
After you create or clone a repository and make that repository your working directory, you're ready to start working with the code that it contains, add new files, and so on.
Getting help in Mercurial
Mercurial's primary command is
which supports a set of sub-commands that are similar to those in
other VCS systems. To see a list of the most common commands,
hg command with no
arguments, which displays output similar to that shown in Listing 2.
Listing 2. Basic commands provided by Mercurial
Mercurial Distributed SCM basic commands: add add the specified files on the next commit annotate show changeset information by line for each file clone make a copy of an existing repository commit commit the specified files or all outstanding changes diff diff repository (or selected files) export dump the header and diffs for one or more changesets forget forget the specified files on the next commit init create a new repository in the given directory log show revision history of entire repository or files merge merge working directory with another revision pull pull changes from the specified source push push changes to the specified destination remove remove the specified files on the next commit serve export the repository via HTTP status show changed files in the working directory summary summarize working directory state update update working directory use "hg help" for the full list of commands or "hg -v" for details
This short list displays only basic Mercurial commands. To
obtain a full list, execute the
Tip: You can obtain detailed help on any Mercurial command
by executing the
hg help COMMAND
command, replacing COMMAND with the name of any valid
Checking repository status
Checking in changes is the most common operation in any VCS
system. You can use the
command to see any pending changes to the files in your
repository. For example, after creating a new file or modifying an
existing one, you see output like that shown in Listing 3.
Listing 3. Status output from Mercurial
$ hg status M Makefile ? hgrc.example
In this case, the Makefile file is an existing file that has been
modified (indicated by the letter
the beginning of the line), while the hgrc.example file is a new
file that isn't being tracked (indicated by the question mark
?) at the beginning of the line.
Adding files to a repository
To add the hgrc.example file to the
list of files that are being tracked in this repository, use the
hg add command. Specifying one or more
file names as arguments explicitly adds those files to the list of
files that are being tracked by Mercurial. If you don't specify any
files, all new files are added to the repository, as shown in Listing 4.
Listing 4. Adding a file to your repository
$ hg add adding hgrc.example
Tip: To add automatically all new files and mark any files
that have been removed for permanent removal, you can use
hg addremove command.
Checking the status of the repository shows that the new file has
been added (indicated by the letter
at the beginning of the line), as shown in Listing 5.
Listing 5. Repository status after modifications
$ hg status M Makefile A hgrc.example
Checking in changes is the most common operation in any VCS system. After making and testing your changes, you're ready to commit those changes to the local repository.
Before committing changes for the first time
If this is your first Mercurial project, you must provide some
basic information so that Mercurial can identify the user who is
committing those changes. If you do not do so, you'll see a
message along the lines of
abort: no username
supplied... when you try to commit changes, and your
changes will not be committed.
To add your user information, create a file called .hgrc in your home directory. This file is your personal Mercurial configuration file. You need to add at least the basic user information shown in Listing 6 to this file.
Listing 6. Mandatory information in a user's .hgrc file
[ui] username = Firstname Lastname <firstname.lastname@example.org>
Replace Firstname and Lastname with your first and last names; replace email@example.com with your email address; save the modified file.
You can set default Mercurial configuration values that apply to all users (which should not include user-specific information) in the /etc/mercurial/hgrc file on Linux and UNIX systems and in the Mercurial.ini file on Microsoft Windows systems, where this file is located in the directory of the Mercurial installation.
The standard commit process
After creating or verifying your ~/.hgrc file, you can commit your changes
hg commit command,
identifying the specific files that you want to commit or
committing all pending changes by not supplying an argument, as in
the following example:
$ hg commit Makefile hgrc.example committed changeset 1:3d7faeb12722
As shown in this example output, Mercurial refers to all changes that are associated with a single commit as a changeset.
When you commit changes, Mercurial starts your default editor
to enable you to add a commit message. To avoid this, you can
specify a commit message on the command line using the
-m "Message.." option. To use a different
editor, you can add an
editor entry in
[ui] section of your ~/.hgrc file, following the
editor keyword with the name of the editor
that you want to use and any associated command-line options. For
example, after adding an entry for using
emacs in no-window mode as my default editor,
my ~/.hgrc file looks like that
shown in Listing 7.
Listing 7. Additional customization in a user's .hgrc file
[ui] username = William von Hagen <firstname.lastname@example.org> editor = emacs -nw
Tip: To maximize the amount of information that Mercurial
provides about its activities, you can add the
verbose = True entry to the
[ui] section of your Mercurial configuration
Pushing changes to a remote repository
If you are using a clone of a remote repository, you want to
push those changes back to that repository after committing
changes to your local repository. To do so, use Mercurial's
hg push command, as shown in Listing 8.
Listing 8. Pushing changes via SSH
$ hg push wvh@codeserver's password: pushing to ssh://codeserver//home/wvh/src/pop3check searching for changes 1 changesets found remote: adding changesets remote: adding manifests remote: adding file changes remote: added 1 changesets with 2 changes to 2 files
Pulling changes from a remote repository
If you are using a clone of a remote repository and other users
are also using that same repository, you want to retrieve the
changes that they have made and pushed to that repository. To do
so, use Mercurial's
hg pull command, as
shown in Listing 9.
Listing 9. Pulling changes via SSH
$ hg pull wvh@codeserver's password: pulling from ssh://codeserver//home/wvh/src/pop3check searching for changes adding changesets adding manifests adding file changes added 1 changesets with 0 changes to 0 files (run 'hg update' to get a working copy) remote: 1 changesets found
As shown in the output from this command, this command only
retrieves information about remote changes—you must run the
hg update command to show the
associated changes in your local repository. This command
identifies the ways the repository has been updated, as
shown in Listing 10.
Listing 10. Updating your repository to show changes
$ hg update 0 files updated, 0 files merged, 1 files removed, 0 files unresolved
Undoing changes in Mercurial
Mercurial provides the following built-in commands that make it easy to undo committed changes:
hg backout CHANGESET: Undoes a specific changeset and creates a changeset that undoes that changeset. Unless you specify the
--mergeoption when executing this command, you have to merge that changeset into your current revision to push it back to a remote repository.
hg revert: Returns to previous versions of one or more files by specifying their names or returning to the previous version of all files by specifying the
hg rollback: Undoes the last Mercurial transaction, which is commonly a
pullfrom a remote repository, or a
pushto this repository. You can only undo a single transaction.
See the online help for all of these commands before attempting to use them!
Mercurial and other distributed source code management systems are the wave of the future. Mercurial is open source software, and pre-compiled versions of Mercurial are available for Linux, UNIX, Microsoft Windows, and Mac OS® X systems. This article highlighted how to use Mercurial to perform a number of common VCS tasks, showing how easy it is to get started using Mercurial. For more advanced purposes, Mercurial provides many more advanced commands and configuration options to help you manage your source code and customize your interaction with a Mercurial installation.
- The Mercurial home page is a great starting point for getting information about Mercurial, and it also provides links to many other sources of related information.
- Mercurial: The Definitive Guide by Bryan O'Sullivan is the definitive work on Mercurial. The complete text of the book is available online in HTML and epub formats, which should hold you until your paper copy comes in the mail.
- Joel Spolsky's hginit.com site provides a great introductory tutorial for using and working with Mercurial.
- Projects using Mercurial include Mozilla, IcedTea, and the MoinMoin wiki. See the list at the Mercurial site for many more examples.
- The Linux developerWorks zone and AIX and UNIX developerWorks zone provide a wealth of information relating to all aspects of Linux, AIX, and general UNIX systems administration and expanding your AIX, Linux, and UNIX skills.
- New to Linux or New to AIX and UNIX? Visit the appropriate New to page to learn more.
- Browse the technology bookstore for books on this and other technical topics.
Get products and technologies
- The Mercurial wiki's Download page provides links to compiled versions of Mercurial for all supported platforms.
- TortiseHG provides a shell extension and command-line Mercurial applications for Microsoft Windows systems.
- The MercurialEclipse plug-in provides support for Mercurial within the Eclipse Integrated Development Environment.
- FogCreek Software's Kiln provides free trials and student/start-up versions of its online, Mercurial-based hosting service that is similar to online Git hosting services such as GitHub, Repo.Org.Cz, and so on.
- BitBucket provides free hosting for Open Source projects in its online, Mercurial-based hosting service, as well as paid hosting plans for larger groups of developers.
- Explore msysGit, which is Git for Windows.
- Check out developerWorks blogs and get involved in the developerWorks community.
- Participate in the AIX, Linux, and UNIX forums: | <urn:uuid:5560c277-5b7e-4ac1-a23b-2f7870a473f9> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/aix/library/au-mercurial/index.html?ca=drs- | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560282926.64/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095122-00169-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.85424 | 3,825 | 3.15625 | 3 |
Securing Your Wireless Internet Connection (You Know You Should)Well, it's not really breaking news, security firm Kaspersky Lab is pointing out the obvious: that most home and small business wireless networks run at a low, or no, level of security. Kaspersky Lab also listed a handful of steps that could be taken to enhance your wireless security. And while it's all good advice, it left out one of the most important.
Well, it's not really breaking news, security firm Kaspersky Lab is pointing out the obvious: that most home and small business wireless networks run at a low, or no, level of security. Kaspersky Lab also listed a handful of steps that could be taken to enhance your wireless security. And while it's all good advice, it left out one of the most important.According to the results of the Kaspersky Lab Wireless Internet Access Survey, while 57% of U.K. homes are wirelessly enabled, only 35% of the people they surveyed have taken reasonable precautions to lock down their router.
Here are the five items Kaspersky Lab listed, and they're all wise moves, especially if your wireless router is in an urban area.
1. Change the administrator password for the wireless router. Just 19% of respondents had taken this basic precaution, despite the ease with which a hacker is able to find out the manufacturer's default password and use this to access the wireless network.
2. Avoid using a password that can be guessed easily.
3. Enable encryption: WPA (Wi-Fi Protected Access) encryption is best, if the device supports it. If not, WEP (Wired Equivalent Privacy) should be used. The survey revealed that 11% had the preferred WPA, 18% had WEP, only 6% had WPA2, and 22% did not know what encryption setting they had.
4. Switch off SSID (Service Set Identifier) broadcasting. This prevents the wireless device announcing its presence to the world. Only 4% of respondents to the survey had SSID switched off.
5. Change the default SSID name of the device. It's easy for a hacker to find out the manufacturer's default name and use this to locate your wireless network. Avoid using a name that can be guessed easily: follow the guidelines provided in the section below on choosing a password.
Sure, it's just plain stupid having your router broadcast "name of manufacturer here" with a username of "admin" and the factory password. You may as well leave your front door open. But Kaspersky Lab failed to list using Network Address Translation, or NAT for short, to protect all of your devices that use your wireless connection. All you need to do is make sure you have a NAT-capable router, and set it up.
Basically, when using NAT, from the Internet it appears that only one device is accessing the Internet, and it also goes a long way to making sure a lot of different types of malware don't find their way on your system. For a good explanation on NAT, I recommend reading Steve Gibson's excellent write-up. | <urn:uuid:43ffb0db-ca34-4940-934c-56722eaf6595> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.darkreading.com/risk-management/securing-your-wireless-internet-connection-%28you-know-you-should%29/d/d-id/1069870 | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560279923.28/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095119-00473-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.941418 | 645 | 2.65625 | 3 |
3.6.5 What are SHA and SHA-1?
The Secure Hash Algorithm (SHA), the algorithm specified in the Secure Hash Standard (SHS, FIPS 180), was developed by NIST (see Question 6.2.1) [NIS93a]. SHA-1 [NIS94c] is a revision to SHA that was published in 1994; the revision corrected an unpublished flaw in SHA. Its design is very similar to the MD4 family of hash functions developed by Rivest (see Question 3.6.6). SHA-1 is also described in the ANSI X9.30 (part 2) standard.
The algorithm takes a message of less than 264 bits in length and produces a 160-bit message digest. The algorithm is slightly slower than MD5 (see Question 3.6.6), but the larger message digest makes it more secure against brute-force collision and inversion attacks (see Question 2.1.6). SHA is part of the Capstone project (see Question 6.2.3). For further information on SHA, see [Pre93] and [Rob95b]. | <urn:uuid:9f940bfe-15a5-4308-9baa-d84f7143e87f> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.emc.com/emc-plus/rsa-labs/standards-initiatives/sha-and-sha-1.htm | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560279176.20/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095119-00410-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.901162 | 233 | 3.734375 | 4 |
The Fathers of Modern Databases
When taken together, Bachman, Codd and Stonebraker sound like some 1970s-era arena rock supergroup. Separately, each man contributed to the development of the contemporary database. (Here, “contemporary” is defined as a database management system [DBMS] or a methodical structuring of virtual information accessible to any authorized user who has a computer and connection to a network.) What follows is an overview of who these men were and their respective roles in the evolution of the database.
In 1960, an industrial researcher named Charles Bachman jumped ship from Dow Chemical to General Electric, which was about the same time that the idea of a DBMS began to emerge. Bachman’s research during this period led him to the conclusion that newly developed, direct-access storage devices could change data processing, which had been based on punch cards and magnetic tape.
He was a catalyst for getting the DBMS concept on the ground, as he developed the integrated data store (IDS) and multiprogramming access to it during his tenure at General Electric. He established Bachman Information Systems in 1983, which offered the BACHMAN/Data Analyst as its flagship product. Essentially, it provided graphic support for building and maintaining data structure diagrams.
In his work and life, Bachman touted the power of the navigational database, which combines network and hierarchical configurations. This position made him something of a rival of the next individual.
Edgar Frank “Ted” Codd
Ted Codd, whose defense of relational database models put him at odds with Bachman, performed his groundbreaking work while at IBM during the 1960s and 1970s. In fact, he more or less created the relational database management theory as an employee for the Big Blue when he issued the now-famous “A Relational Model of Data for Large Shared Data Banks” paper in 1970.
IBM, however, did not act on the recommendations he laid out in this opus because of a desire to preserve the position of its IMS/DB (which was influenced by Bachman’s hierarchical database management formulations) in the market. This was a big disappointment for Codd, but he didn’t sit around and wait for his company’s leaders to change their minds. Instead, he took his case to IBM’s clients, who then requested that the organization enact his ideas.
IBM eventually did, sure enough, but kept Codd out of it by handing the System R relational model project over to a group of developers with whom he had no meaningful contact. The result was SEQUEL, a programming (and, incidentally, nonrelational) language that Larry Ellison “borrowed,” renamed SQL and used to turn his new company Oracle into an IT powerhouse.
Codd also made a key contribution to the database field when he coined the term Online Analytical Processing (OLAP) and built on that concept with his own ideas. In addition, he continued to advocate for the relational database model all his life, and his efforts greatly influenced the next giant of the database world.
One of the earliest implementations of a relational database was Michael Stonebraker’s Ingres, which he developed at Berkeley after reading works on information management theories produced by Codd and other IBM employees. (Interestingly, his Ingres came out in 1976, the same year as IBM’s System R project, but the first relational databases designed for commercial consumption wouldn’t come out for another four years.)
Stonebraker’s influence was felt directly in the market through the companies he founded such as Ingres Corp., Illustra and Streambase Systems. He also made an impact in academia, with faculty tenures at Berkeley and MIT. In fact, while at Berkeley in the late 1980s and early 1990s, he launched the Postgres (post-Ingres) project, which would later serve as the coding cornerstone for today’s open Postgre SQL database. For his ingenuity and hard work, Stonebraker was recognized with the first Edgar F. Codd Innovations Award. | <urn:uuid:93d47238-4877-4f80-b57a-74fb6e635903> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://certmag.com/bachman-codd-and-stonebraker-the-fathers-of-modern-databases/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560281069.89/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095121-00042-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.972114 | 852 | 2.8125 | 3 |
1: HDX System on a Chip architecture
2: SoC and Citrix Receiver
3: SoC and RemoteFX
4: SoC and Windows Embedded
1 : HDX System on a Chip (SoC) architecture
In this blog we are going to take a closer look at the SoC architecture, and I will tell you why I think this is going to change the Thinclient industry.
What is a SoC?
A system on a chip (SoC) is an integrated circuit that integrates all components of a computer or other electronic system into a single chip.
This Single Chip contains both hardware and software components. The last one is for controlling hardware components inside the SoC. Please note that the Citrix Receiver software isn’t part of this software, this software contains codecs and other controlling software bound to the SoC itself.
The following components are part of the HDX SoC :
– ARM based CPU
– DSP (Digital Signal Processor)
– DMA (Direct Memory Access)
– NIC, Audio, Video and USB Controller
– Multimedia encoders/decoders
As you can see there is a lot of stuff in the Chip, you can almost say that basically everything you need is on this Chip, only memory and storage are external from the chip. This single chip approach is also taken by many other devices such as phones and tablets.
To make the chip more visual I made a drawing of the SoC architecture, please note that this is not a diagram of how the components interact with each other, but just a basic overview of the components inside the SoC :
The DSP is an interesting one, this component is used for image decoding which would otherwise be done by the CPU. Now that the DSP is taking care of the heavy lifting, CPU cycles are saved for other processing tasks increasing performance. Because the SoC is built from industry standard building blocks, the costs are kept to a minimal, so while the performance is increasing, the costs are being lowered, that’s what I call a win-win situation 😉
2: SoC and Citrix Receiver
Citrix Receiver itself isn’t part of the SoC architecture, this has the huge advantage that the Receiver software can be modified by Citrix without the need to update the SoC, so Citrix can add more features to Citrix Receiver without being slowed down by the SoC vendors to update the SoCs. To leverage the components on the SoC, Citrix provides a modified version of the Citrix Receiver for Linux, the process that takes place is fairly simple :
1: The SoC architecture exposes API’s to the underlying OS, this is done by the SoC vendor
2: The Citrix Receiver checks if this API’s exist when booting up
3: If the API’s are in place, Citrix Receiver will use the components inside the SoC and start offloading image processing to the DSP for example.
To illustrate this, I added the Citrix Receiver into the picture :
3: SoC and RemoteFX
While Citrix started the SoC initiative with a few chip manufacturers, the SoC isn’t reserved for use with Citrix HDX only, Thinclient vendors also support other remoting protocols on Thinclients with the SoC on board, for example RemoteFX can leverage the DSP as well. Now this combination is interesting, because you might think that RemoteFX features only works on windows clients with an supported version of RDP. Since this SoC consists of an ARM CPU and is Linux based you would not expect RemoteFX features there. Well this is done through the open source RDP client named FreeRDP. FreeRDP can leverage the DSP to offload image processing as well. Please note that FreeRDP currently only supports RDP 7 in combination with Win7\2008R2, there is no support for the new Remote FX features in RDP 8 (Win8\2012) yet. There is also no official statement that Microsoft is going to support FreeRDP with the new features in RemoteFX.
4: SoC and Windows Embedded Thin Clients
The first HDX SoC is coming with an ARM based CPU, this means no support for Windows Embedded, also Citrix Receiver for Linux is the only client from Citrix that supports the SoC initially. The x86 based HDX SoC will follow later, as you might know Microsoft will release an ARM based version of Windows 8 (Windows RT). The interesting part is that there will also be a Windows Embedded 8 ARM version, this OS will be more suitable for Thinclient hardware because it’s cheaper and less power consuming. WES nowadays isn’t really made for running on cheap Thinclient hardware, it’s like a big beast in a tiny cage, it’s slow and clunky to say the least. If you are looking for a way to tame the beast you should take a look at Thinkiosk from Andrew Morgan which provides a uniform interface across all your Windows Fat and Thinclients. There is also a interesting comparison between Fat and Thinclient hardware by Kees Baggerman and Barry Schiffer which shows some interesting results and discussions.
While the Linux based SoC Thinclients has much advantages regarding performance, small footprint and costs, there are some special use cases when you need Windows on your Thinclient end-point, for example when you need local printer or scanner redirection based on Windows drivers. I don’t think you need to make the decision based solely on HDX features anymore, because the most important features are covered in both versions (Windows and Linux), but there are certainly use cases that needs Windows Thinclients, my point is don’t buy them only because there is Windows on it which sounds save, but examine the use cases and mix and match!
A little bit off topic but I summarized a few highlights of Windows Embedded 8 that looks very interesting :
– Hibernate-Once-Resume-Many restarts devices the same way every time
– Drive efficiencies by creating a custom image with only necessary functionality included
– Keyboard Filter blocks special key-combinations on both physical and virtual keyboards
– Suppress Windows system dialogs with the Dialog Filter
– Manage and configure lockdown technologies with Unified Configuration Tool
– Embedded Device Manager, together with SCCM, for operating system and application deployment
A lot of Thinclients (especially the more powerful WES variants) are almost in the same price range as a normal Fat client PC. When you are designing a VDI\SBC environment, this can be really a show stopper, because the goal on those projects is often to save money.
Now with the arrival of SoC the Thinclient is finally getting “Thin” again, Thin in form factor and price but not in performance!
5 Reasons why I think SoC Thinclients are going to take over the current Thinclient market :
1: Much cheaper to manufacture, because the SoC consist of industry standard building blocks it’s cheaper to manufacture then individual chips and components
2: The SoC uses far less energy to operate, there are even Thinclients coming that runs on PoE
3: It fits in more and smaller form factors, because it’s one chip it’s easier to integrate into other devices, such as monitors (or even TV’s)
4: The SoC is future proof, it contains standardized codecs and Citrix Receiver can be upgraded apart from the SoC
5: Performance wins, this is one of the biggest enhancements IMHO, because of the offloading and intelligent use of the SoC components performance is dramatically improved
I think with the coming of SoC we are also a step closer to nirvana phones, which I really think is the future together with BYOD. Just dock in your phone and login, maybe Citrix should work together with some Phone manufacturers to get some HDX ready phones on the market 😉
Please note that the information in this blog is provided as is without warranty of any kind, it is a mix of own research and information from the following sources : | <urn:uuid:b5499ee7-6350-409f-80d7-e948a48cf1a2> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://bramwolfs.com/tag/soc/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560279224.13/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095119-00254-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.941443 | 1,715 | 2.625 | 3 |
Its meant to bring a certain agnosticism to technology and standardize the transmission of data and information through XML and SOAP. Despite what web services and the resulting service-oriented architecture (SOA) delivers now and promises to deliver in the near future the technology still has a major hurdle to overcome: Security.
The security concerns that come bundled with SOA are similar to the threats that rose with the growth of the Internet. In fact, there are several security parallels to be drawn for systems between Internet connectivity and SOA.
Mainframe terminal application developers, for example, were most concerned with performance, accidental entries, and reliability because their users were trusted and hard-wired. Connectivity removes trust from the operating environment.
The SOA risks are often very individualized, taking different forms at every instance and in every company. The result is, in many cases, security landmines waiting to be triggered by the treading attacker.
If web services are implemented with security in mind though, they can fundamentally reduce risk through proper filtering and limiting the exposed surface of the application to the outside world.
Data Gone Wild
Most software security vulnerabilities come from assumptions about data not being enforced. As an example, consider an application that processes customer information, and one particular field, Customer Surname, that is assumed to be no longer than 20 characters.
The application typically receives this data from a client application that checks to make sure no more than 20 characters are passed to the server application. Now imagine putting a web services interface on that server application.
Data is transmitted as part of an XML document, with likely no constraint. If a client sends a request with more than 20 characters, the result could be a potentially exploitable application fault such as a buffer overflow.
This means when software is exposed through web services we need to take care that data is properly constrained. The ideal case is, of course, to validate data within the application but, for legacy systems, this filtering may not exist and no longer be a feasible option.
Beyond data being sent to the server, when a web service is created an implicit contract is forged between the provider and user application about the format and range of data exchanged.
Back-end server code may be changed which alters response data. A client may be built assuming it will receive a fixed-sized response. If the implementation changes, client applications may be at risk. When implementing web services then, it is critical to establish a set of data boundaries and those boundaries remain consistent even after plumbing changes of the underlying code. | <urn:uuid:fa93a8bb-9128-4d12-b81b-97c4d0665e00> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.cioupdate.com/trends/article.php/3629386/The-Hidden-Dangers-of-Web-Services.htm | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280801.0/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00556-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.946544 | 520 | 3.34375 | 3 |
ESA prepares to launch GOCE satellite
European Space Agency's Gravity Ocean Circulation Explorer to measure Earth’s gravitational field, ocean currents
- By Patrick Marshall
- Mar 12, 2009
The European Space Agency (ESA) is preparing for a March 16 launch of the Gravity field and steady-state Ocean Circulation Explorer (GOCE).
GOCE will orbit for 20 months mapping the gravitational field by employing six accelerometers. The three pairs of accelerometers are arrayed in three dimensions and respond to variations in the gravitational pull of the Earth.
While it may seem that gravity is a constant on Earth, the fact is the pull of gravity varies measurably in different locations. That is due to several factors, including the rotation of the Earth combined with variations in the planet’s surface, such as mountain ranges and ocean trenches, as well as variations in the density of the planet’s interior. T
hese variations in gravitational pull in turn affect the measurements of ocean circulation and other processes affecting climate change. They may also affect the accuracy of land surveys.
The system is so sensitive that the satellite can have no moving parts that would affect the measurements of the accelerometers.
GOCE is the first in a planned series of Earth observation satellite launches by the ESA.
Patrick Marshall is a freelance technology writer for GCN. | <urn:uuid:6135ecab-311d-48e7-a95a-cf9ef5393b9b> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://gcn.com/articles/2009/03/12/esa-launches-goce-satellite.aspx | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280801.0/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00556-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.924899 | 279 | 3.03125 | 3 |
Modern devices often have “system-on-chip” hardware and use Windows 8.1 or Windows 10. Such computers are capable of Connected Standby (Windows 8) or Modern Standby (Windows 10), which can place the hardware in a deeper standby state than traditional laptops and yet still have network connectivity while in standby. Tablets, 2-in-1’s, convertibles, and similar devices are typical of such modern devices. Some ultrabooks or laptops can also use Connected Standby or Modern Standby. Microsoft’s own Surface Pro and Surface Book devices are prime examples.
Connected Standby enables your computers to enter the lowest hardware power saving state, which for Windows is called Deepest Runtime Idle Power State (DRIPS). Connected Standby also works with the networking hardware to ensure that select incoming network traffic is acted on immediately and other network traffic is processed every 30 seconds. Connected Standby has been available with Windows 8 and better while Modern Standby is available with Windows 10. Modern Standby includes Connected Standby but also Disconnected Standby, which better handles scenarios where the device is sometimes in locations without available network connectivity.
Such devices are more efficient because:
- When idle they consume around 50 milliwatts (mW) per hour, as opposed to the 500 mW per hour of traditional standby
- This should be less than 1% of the battery capacity, meaning that you should be able to leave your device unplugged while on standby for at least 4 days and still be able to use it
- As instant messages, internet phone calls, or similar real-time data are sent out, the device receives them in real-time and can wake the device as much as appropriate, including alerting the user
- Routine network traffic, such as receiving e-mails, is batched and done every 30 seconds in very short bursts. Only enough of the device is powered up as needed to process the data and the user is not alerted
- Because network connectivity is nearly continuous, details such as IP addresses are retained, ensuring the network is ready to use as soon as the device is powered back up
That is a very smartphone-like experience that users love.
Traditional computers were typically plugged into the wall power and so users would often leave them powered up ‘just in case’ (or without thinking about it). For any one computer that isn’t terribly expensive but if you have thousands, the cost is substantial. And the environmental impact of generating that electricity contributes to the global warming issues we see today.
Battery-enabled devices will power-off when the batteries are drained and they won’t be ready to use, so users are much more conscientious about powering them off when not needed. But that doesn’t mean they don’t have power-related problems.
For DRIPS and Connected Standby to perform their magic, a lot of things have to come together. Components, firmware, device drivers, and networking must cooperate. The operating system and applications must behave correctly.
The trade press is full of stories of such problems. Microsoft’s release of Surface Book and Surface Pro 4 was marred for months by such problems. As an engineer at Microsoft famously said:
NightWatchman 7.1 finds such problems by collecting the data on the client and centrally reporting it. You can check business units, regions, and specific models of computers to see where problems are more common.
With such information you can not only work to correct underlying problems but also determine which devices are actually providing the best experience in your environment; with your applications and your network.
Power Optimization is a new form of power management for your modern devices. Find out more: | <urn:uuid:ec2996a0-9aec-4ad1-9ca7-0fb542303a1a> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.1e.com/blogs/2016/05/26/power-management-different-modern-devices/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280801.0/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00556-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.955172 | 773 | 2.859375 | 3 |
In 1994, citizens of Quebec became the first in North America to have their personal information in the hands of the private sector protected by statute. The federal governments of Canada and the United States, a number of Canadian provinces and some U.S. states all provide similar protection for personal information collected, maintained and used by government, but Quebec was the first -- and continues to be the only -- government to extend those protections to private-sector information. While the United States already has laws that protect privacy in certain business sectors -- most notably banking and credit -- the Quebec law does not distinguish between industries but instead covers all private-sector records.
Most European nations already have privacy laws covering the public and private sectors, commonly referred to as data protection acts. The European Union has developed a directive on data protection that restricts the transfer of personal data from one jurisdiction to another unless the recipient jurisdiction has adequate privacy protections. Before Quebec passed its law, data protection professionals in Europe believed no jurisdiction in North America had adequate privacy protections, since existing laws in North America covered only public-sector records. Quebec broke that mold with its private-sector law, and many North American observers realized that Quebec was the only jurisdiction in North America with adequate protections.
Although George Orwell's vision of a Big Brother government, which snoops and pries into the lives of all citizens, continues to reside in the unconscious of every information society, it has been business that has made the most consistent and systematic use of personal information -- vacuuming it up through numerous direct contacts with consumers, through credit bureaus and public records, analyzing it for demographic advantages and profiling the wide array of likes and dislikes of individual consumers. While many argue that unwanted junk mail is a small burden to bear in exchange for potentially attractive targeted mail, anyone who has been victimized by inaccurate information appearing in a credit report knows first-hand how devastating the use of personal information can be in the private sector.
So in 1993, Quebec's National Assembly took steps similar to those that many European countries took years ago; it created a regulatory scheme that protected the integrity of personal information use by the private sector to complement its existing regulation of the use of such information by the public sector. Government regulation of the private sector's information practices may run counter to the libertarian strains of American political philosophy, but such regulation recognizes the obvious: That in an age where personal information can move virtually anywhere in the blink of an eye, the misuse and inappropriate collection of such information by businesses is every bit as detrimental to civil liberties as is its collection by governments.
Flexible Public Protection
Quebec decided against the European model of data protection, which generally requires the registration of personal information collections with a data commissioner. Instead, the Quebec approach provides that any business operating in the province that collects, uses or disseminates personal information must make available upon a written request any information concerning the existence of a file and its contents. An individual has the right to request correction of the record, and the business must respond within 30 days. Any remaining disagreement may be appealed to the Commission d'acc | <urn:uuid:f9ddf753-268c-44de-8d74-848e53d305bc> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.govtech.com/magazines/gt/Quebecs-PRIVACY-LAW-Impacts-Canadian-BUSINESS.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280835.60/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00244-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.951283 | 623 | 2.578125 | 3 |
Geospatial tool tracks disease outbreaks globally
- By Kathleen Hickey
- May 08, 2008
Contagion among wild animals, which has often resulted in human disease outbreaks, now can be tracked via an improved online geospatial tool.
The U.S. Geological Survey unveiled an updated and expanded version of the Global Wildlife Disease News Map Version 2
. The tool, developed jointly by USGS and the University of Wisconsin-Madison, monitors wildlife diseases that threaten the health of humans and pets. The map, updated daily, shows pushpins marking news stories of wildlife diseases.
The Web tool taps into the organization's electronic library. It searches for all available information related to various diseases and medical conditions. News reports flow from more than 20 online sources. The tool provides information in several formats, including a blog, desktop widgets, e-mail and Really Simple Syndication feeds. Several organizations voluntarily contribute data to the system.
The map's newest version dates to March. USGS and its partner organizations unveiled the tool's first iteration in December 2007. The new version can display material at many levels, including continent, country, administrative unit, county or place. It also offers more detailed geographic information and expanded filters.
The agency expects users of the online map to include state and federal wildlife managers, animal disease specialists, veterinarians, medical professionals, educators and the other people.
The most important diseases now tracked include West Nile virus, avian influenza, chronic wasting disease and monkey pox.
Users can browse the latest reports by geographic location on 50 diseases and other health conditions, such as pesticide and lead poisoning, and filter data by disease type, affected species, countries and dates.
"People who collect data about wildlife diseases don't currently have an established communication network, which is something we're working to improve," said project leader Josh Dein, a veterinarian at the Madison, Wis.-based USGS National Wildlife Health Center.
'But just seeing what's attracting attention in the news gives us a much better picture of what's out there than we've ever had before," Dein added.
West Nile virus served as one of the catalysts to increase communication and awareness among wildlife, human and domestic-animal health professionals, said Cris Marsh, a librarian who oversees wildlife disease news services at the Wildlife Disease Information Node (WDIN), the online map tool's developer.
WDIN is a five-year collaboration of the university with the National Wildlife Health Center and National Biological Information Infrastructure, both operating agencies of USGS. WDIN resides in the university's Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies and USGS.
'People in different areas in the Eastern [United States] began to see isolated incidences of dead and dying crows that seemed abnormally high, but nobody knew other areas were experiencing the same thing,' said Marsh.
Disease outbreaks such as West Nile virus need to be addressed quickly because they also affect humans and other mammals. Health professionals recently have expressed increasing concern about the risks posed by the emergence and spread of animal diseases.
Kathleen Hickey is a freelance writer for GCN. | <urn:uuid:83c0ff47-7986-4b4c-b4e0-266b14a98039> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://gcn.com/articles/2008/05/08/geospatial-tool-tracks-disease-outbreaks-globally.aspx | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280266.9/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00272-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.938547 | 635 | 3.25 | 3 |
Not Everyone is Just Like YouAs a leader in the corporate world, you know that good leadership means recognizing and addressing the needs of employees at all levels of the business model. Oftentimes, however, the employees you need to train are experiencing a different daily workplace atmosphere than you are. It’s surprisingly easy to lose sight of what it’s like to be in someone else’s shoes in the workplace, as evidenced by CBS and Stephen Lambert’s hit TV show, Undercover Boss. There may be a lot you share in common with your employees, but when creating training modules, the most common error is believing that everyone experiences learning the same way you do. This is why classroom teachers who have naturally excelled in school often fail to connect with the learning styles of their students. It all boils down to audience, and what you know about them.
If you’ve ever taken a basic philosophy course, you know that there are different types of persuasive appeals and that if you are trying to get someone to donate money to a cause, for example, you might be better off showing them a video of the starving children, rather than appealing to logic by explaining all of the reasons why a donation would be a good choice or telling the audience that they should feel morally obligated. Most people would feel more compelled by the emotional appeal. There would be other viewers who aren’t drawn to emotional appeals, though, so you’re most likely to catch the attention of all members of the audience by appealing to their emotions, logic, and ethics simultaneously. Addressing learner types applies in a similar way. The three most prominent learning styles are:
- Auditory: Learning through listening to instruction and explanation.
- Visual: Learning through viewing images that provide explanation.
- Kinesthetic: Learning through hands-on practice of a skill or concept.
Everyone has one learning type they connect with best or gravitate toward, but the most effective and complete learning of a topic happens when all three modes are utilized. In his online course entitled “Instructional Design Essentials: Adult Learners,” Jeff Toister gives the example of the GPS. The device gives auditory directions, while providing visual cues, while you do the hands-on driving. The same concept applies to popular virtual reality games like Wii U and Rock Band where the player is involved in the game on all three levels, simulating a life-like experience that captivates the participant from multiple sensory angles. You don’t have to know which learner type applies most directly to each of your participants, you just need to create training that addresses a bit of each of the learning modes. Insert visuals to coincide with the auditory explanations of complex ideas, then pause the instruction to have the trainee execute a task that reinforces their ability to use the material in a practical way.
What else should I know about my trainees?
Part of what engages participants in your delivery of the material is a feeling of personal connection or investment. Validating the individuality of your participants and even teaching them a bit about themselves is an easy way to hook their attention and send the message that you care about providing training that is important to them. It’s essential to ask follow-up questions that lead to personal reflection before moving on. Something like, “What are your personal strengths as a member of your workplace,” or “What is one practice or mindset you’ve observed in a coworker that you would like to emulate in the future?” Think of self-learning and reflection as the way to shake the Etch-a-Sketch and clear away the clutter of the mind before beginning a new training
The first step of building a purpose is to ensure your audience believes that the training materials are specific to their needs, which will be the focus of the next blog post. You need participant “buy-in” to the material for the training to have any influence on the future of your business. Participating in a training that was clearly created for a different audience will immediately shut down engagement, which is almost impossible to recover from within the time frame of a training event. Validating your audience and gauging their needs is an imperative initial step to creating a successful training program. | <urn:uuid:efeb8166-429c-43f8-8f75-565e6cf8c58b> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://blog.contentraven.com/learning/knowing-your-audience-training-your-employees | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280872.69/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00088-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.955383 | 878 | 2.75 | 3 |
Despite the highly profitable nature of the pharmaceutical business and the large amount of R&D money companies throw at creating new medicines, the pace of drug development is agonizingly slow. Over the last few years, on average, less than two dozen new drugs have been introduced per year. One of the more promising technologies that could help speed up this process is supercomputing, which can be used not only to find better, safer drugs, but also to weed out those compounds that would eventually fail during the latter stages of drug trials.
According to a 2010 report in Nature, big pharma spends something like $50 billion per year on drug research and development. (To put that in perspective, that’s four to five times the total spend for high performance computing.) The Nature report estimates the price tag to bring a drug successfully to market is about $1.8 billion, and rising. A lot of that cost is due to the high attrition rate of drugs, which is caused by problems in absorption, distribution, metabolism, excretion and toxicity that gets uncovered during clinical trials.
Ideally, the drug makers would like know which compounds were going to succeed before they got to the expensive stages of development. That’s where high performance computing can help. The approach is to use molecular docking simulations on the computer to determine if the drug candidate can bind to the target protein associated with the disease. The general idea is to find the key (the small molecule drug) that fits in the lock (the protein).
AutoDock, probably the most common molecular modeling application for protein docking, is a one of the more popular software package used by the drug research community. It played a role in developing some of the more successful HIV drugs on the market. Fortunately, AutoDock is freely available under the GNU General Public License.
The trick is to do these docking simulations on a grand scale. Thanks to the power of modern HPC machines, millions of compounds can now be screened against a protein in a reasonable amount of time. In truth, that timeframe is dependent upon how many cores you can put to the task. For a typical medium-sized cluster that a drug company might have in-house, it would take several weeks to screen just a few thousand compounds against one target protein. To reach a more interactive workflow, you need a something approaching a petascale supercomputer.
But not necessarily an actual supercomputer. Compute clouds have turned out to be very suitable for this type of embarrassing parallel application. For example, in a recent test with 50,000 cores on Amazon’s cloud (provisioned by Cycle Computing), software was able to screen 21 million compounds against a protein target in less than three hours.
Real supercomputers work too. At Oak Ridge National Lab (ORNL), researchers there used 50,000 cores of Jaguar to screen about 10 million drug candidates in less than a day. Jeremy C. Smith, director of the Center for Molecular Biophysics at ORNL, believes his type level of virtual screening is the most cost-effective approach to turbo-charge the drug pipeline. But the real utility of the supercomputing approach, says Smith, is that it can also be used to screen out drugs with toxic side effects.
Toxicity is often hard to detect until it comes time to do clinical trials, the most expensive and time-consuming phase of drug development. Worse yet, sometimes toxicity is not discovered until after the drug has been approved and released into the wild. So identifying these compounds early has the potential to save lots of money, not to mention lives. As Smith says, “If drug candidates are going to fail, you want them to fail fast, fail cheap.”
At the molecular level, toxicity is caused by a drug binding to the wrong protein, one that is actually needed by the body, rather than just selectively binding to the protein causing the condition. The problem is humans have about a thousand proteins, so every potential compound needs to be checked against each one. When you’re working with millions of drug candidates, the job becomes overwhelming, even for the petaflop supercomputers of today. To support the toxicity problem, you’ll need an exascale machine, says Smith.
Besides screening for toxicity, the same exascale setup can be used to repurpose existing drugs for other medical conditions. That is, the drug docking software could use approved drugs as the starting point and try to match them against various target proteins know to cause disease. Right now, drug repurposing is typically discovered on a trial-and-error basis, but the increasing number of compounds that are now in this multiple-use category suggests this could be rich new area of drug discovery.
In any case, sheer compute power is not the complete answer. For starters, the software has to be scaled up to the level of the hardware, and on an exascale machine, that hardware is more than likely going to be based on heterogenous processors. But since the problem is easily parallelized (each docking operation can be performed independently of one another), at least the scaling aspect should be relatively easy to overcome.
The larger problem is that the molecular modeling software itself is imperfect. Unlike a true lock and key, proteins are dynamic structures, and the action of binding to a molecule changes their shape. Therefore, physics simulation is also required to get a more precise match.
AutoDock, for example, is only able to provide a crude match between drug and protein. To get higher fidelity docking, more compute-intensive algorithms are required. Researchers, like those at ORNL, often resort to more precise molecular dynamics codes after getting performing a crude screening run with AutoDock.
None of this is a guarantee that virtual docking on exascale machines is going to launch a golden age of drugs. It’s possible that researchers will discover that there are just a handful of small molecule compounds that actually exhibit both disease efficacy and are non-toxic. But Smith believes this approach is full of promise. “This is the way to design drugs since this mirrors the way nature works,” he says. | <urn:uuid:15af568b-f500-4aea-8bb4-52e16d5c58c5> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.hpcwire.com/2012/07/31/drug_discovery_looks_for_its_next_fix/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560282110.46/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095122-00482-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.95818 | 1,259 | 3.03125 | 3 |
IPv6 Neighbor Discovery Protocol
In IPv6 we do not have ARP (address resolution protocol) anymore. ARP is replaced with ICMP based NDP protocol. NDP or ND protocol uses special IPv6 ICMP messages to find and resolve L2 neighbours IPv6 addresses.
It’s a simple way for hosts to learn IPv6 addresses of neighbours on L2 subnet around himself. That includes learning about other hosts and routers on local network. That is the biggest difference between IPv4 and IPv6, there’s no ARP but ICMP takes the function.
NDP is defined in RFC 2461 and this article will introduce you to NDP functions, main features’ lists, and the related ICMPv6 message types.
As the most precise description of NDP is that it belongs to the Link layer of the Internet Protocol suite in TCP/IP model. We can say that Link layer of TCP/IP model is basically a direct combination of the data link layer and the physical layer in the OSI Open Systems Interconnection protocol stack. As in this blog I always try to use OSI model this article was inserted both to Data-link and Physical layer category.
In case of IPv6 networks, the NDP Protocol make use of ICMPv6 messages and solicited-node multicast addresses for operating its core function, which is tracking and discovering other IPv6 hosts that are present on the other side of connected interfaces. Another use of NDP is address autoconfiguration.
Let’s discuss some major roles of IPv6 NDP:
- Stateless address autoconfiguration – SLAAC
- Duplicate address detection DAD
- Router discovery
- Prefix discovery
- Parameter discovery link MTU, hop limits
- Neighbor discovery
- Neighbor address resolution – replaces ARP in IPv6
- Neighbor and router reachability verification
In order to carry out work NDP uses five types of ICMPv6 messages. In the following list you can find the function as well as summary of their goals.
NDP message types:
IPv6 nodes send Neighbor Advertisement (NA) messages periodically or repeatedly in order to inform their presence to other hosts present on the same network as well as send them their link-layer addresses.
IPv6 nodes send NS messages so that the link-layer address of a specific neighbor can be found. There are three operations in which this message is used:
▪ For detecting duplicate address
▪ Verification of neighbor reachability
▪ Layer 3 to Layer 2 address resolution (for ARP replacement) ARP is not included in IPv6 as a protocol but rather the same functionality is integrated into ICMP as part of neighbor discovery. NA message is the response to an NS message. From the figure the enabling of interaction or communication between neighbor discoveries between two IPv6 hosts can be clearly seen.
Router Advertisement and Router Solicitation
A Cisco IPv6 router start sending RA messages for every configured interface prefix as soon as the configuration of the ipv6 unicast-routing command is entered. It is possible to change the default RA interval (200 seconds) with the help of the command ipv6 nd ra-interval. On a given interface the router advertisements include all of the 64-bit IPv6 prefixes that are configured on that interface. This permits stateless address autoconfiguration SLAAC to function and generate EUI-64 address. In case of RAs, link MTU and hop limits are included in the message as well as the info whether a router is a candidate default router or not.
In order to inform hosts about the IPv6 prefixes used on the link and also to inform hosts that the router is available as default gateway the IPv6 routers send periodic RA messages. A Cisco router that runs IPv6 on an interface advertises itself as a candidate default router. This happens by default. If you want to avoid advertising of the router as a default candidate use the command ipv6 nd ra-lifetime 0. A router informs the connected hosts about its presence by sending RAs with a lifetime of 0. It further tells connected hosts not to use it to reach hosts that are located or present beyond the subnet.
It is possible to hide the presence of a router completely in terms of router advertisements by simply disabling router advertisements on that router. It can be done by issuing the command ipv6 nd suppress-ra.
Ipv6 hosts at startup can send Router Solicitation (RS) messages to all-routers multicast address. It is quite helpful for the hosts on a given link to learn the router’s addresses. Sending RS message occurs without any waiting time for a periodic RA message. When there is no configured IPv6 address on host interfaces, RS message is sent from the unspecified source address. On the other hand, if the host has a configured address then the source of RS will be from that address.
Duplicate Address Detection
IPv6 DAD or Duplicate Address Detection is a neighbor solicitations function. When the address autoconfiguration is performed by host, that host does not automatically assume that the address is unique. It will probably be true that the address is unique if we know that EUI-64 process is generating the IPv6 address from MAC address which should be unique. Yes but what if there are some interfaces on that L2 subnet with manually configured IPv6 addresses? They could be configured just the same as the generated address, right? One more check is done just to be sure and that one is called DAD.
DAD works like this
- The host will firstly join the All Nodes multicast address and Solicited-Node multicast address of the address for which the uniqueness is being checked.
- Host then simply send few NS messages (Neighbor Solicitation messages) to the Solicited-Node address as the destination. The source address field will remain undefined with unspecified address which is written like this “::”.
- The address being checked is written inside Target Address field which we simple refer to as tentative address field.
The source of this message is an unspecified address (::) . There is a unique address in the Target Address field in the NS. If the host sending that kind of message receives an NA response it means that the address is not a unique one. The purpose of using this process by IPv6 hosts is to verify the uniqueness of both the addresses i.e. statically configured and autoconfigured.
An example is that when a host has autoconfigured an interface for the address 2001:128:1F:633:207:85FF:FE80:71B8, an NS is sent to the corresponding Solicited-node multicast address, FF02::1:FF80:71B8/104. If there is no answer from other host, the node comes to know that it is fine to utilize the autoconfigured address.
Solicited-node multicast address details and process of generating them from any random IPv6 unicast or anycast address is explained in more detail in article: Solicited-node multicast address from February 2015.
It is the most efficient method described here for a router to perform DAD, due to the reason that on the router same solicited-node address matches all autoconfigured addresses. (see the above section for a discussion of solicited-node addresses about “IPv6 Address Autoconfiguration”.)
Neighbor Unreachability Detection
It is easy for the IPv6 neighbors to track each other, basically in order to ensure that Layer 3 to Layer 2 address mapping stay current, with the use of information found out by different means. It is not only the presence of an advertisement of a neighbor or router that defines reachability but there is further requirement of confirmed, two-way reachability. However, it is not essential for a neighbor to ask another node for its existence and receive a reply directly as a result. Here are the two ways of a node confirms reachability:
- When a host sends a query to the desired host’s solicited-node multicast address then it is responded with an NA or an RA.
- When a host is interacting with the desired host then in response it gets a clue from a higher-layer protocol that two-way communication or interaction is properly functioning. A TCP ACK is one such clue. A point to note is that these clues from higher-layer protocols can only work for connection-oriented protocols. UDP, is such that does not accept frames and, so it cannot be utilized for verifying neighbor reachability. In such event when a host requires confirmation of another’s reachability where only connectionless traffic or no traffic is passing between these hosts then it is important for the originating host to send a query to the desired neighbor’s solicited-node multicast address.
Functions of ND in IPv6
|Message Type||Information Sought or Sent||Source Address||Destination Address||ICMP Type, Code|
|Router Advertisement (RA)||Routers advertise their presence and link prefixes, MTU, and hop limits.||Router’s link-local address||FF02::1 for periodic broadcasts; address of querying host for responses to an RS||134, 0|
|Router Solicitation (RS)||Hosts query for the presence of routers on the link.||Address assigned to querying interface, if assigned, or :: if not assigned||FF02::2||133, 0|
|Neighbor Solicitation (NS)||Hosts query for other nodes’ link-layer addresses. Used for duplicate address detection and to verify neighbor reachability.||Address assigned to querying interface, if assigned, or :: if not assigned||Solicited-node multicast address or the target node’s address, if known||135, 0|
|Neighbor Advertise- ment (NA)||Sent in response to NS messages and periodically to provide information to neighbors.||Configured or automatically assigned address of originating interface||Address of node requesting the NA or FF02::1 for periodic advertisements||136, 0|
|Redirect||Sent by routers to inform nodes of better next-hop routers.||Link-local address of originating node||Source address of requesting node||137, 0| | <urn:uuid:12223ac0-9eda-4fca-af96-3bdc6989191b> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://howdoesinternetwork.com/2012/ndp-ipv6-neighbor-discovery-protocol | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280888.62/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00510-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.910127 | 2,157 | 2.78125 | 3 |
This article is an introduction to different default gateway solutions. Those technologies are enabling devices on IPv4 local subnets to have more than one Default gateway configured or at least some configuration that make them work half the way of ideal redundant solution. Idea behind this article is to be an introduction to a set of articles that will explain different redundancy solutions based on IPv6 technology. Some of those technologies, will be used in future and some of them already existing and suggested to be used from day one on IPv6 implementation.
Default gateway is the next hop address of the device that leads the packets out of the local LAN segment. If there are packets destined to an IP address that is not from local subnet PC will forward those packets usually to router device that will have the information where to forward those packets in order to get them transferred towards the destination.
IP hosts have different ways of deciding which default router or default gateway they will use. Some of the methods are DHCP, BOOTP, ICMP Router Discovery Protocol (IRDP), manual configuration, or sometimes by routing protocol. Though is not normally usual that hosts are running routing protocols, it can be done. Most frequent method is DHCP because is automatic and there is one DHCP server on almost every user LAN segment. The other usual solution is manual configuration that is basically typing the IP address of the default gateway into device. Result with manual configuration is of course in the host knowing a single IP address of its default gateway.
Redundant Default Gateway solutions
The fact that there can be only one default gateway IP address configured on almost every device in the network it’s sometimes a limitation. It basically makes network hosts completely reliant on only one router when communicating with all nodes that are not on the local subnet. There is no redundancy and that’s the issue.
But I have two routers that can be Default Gateway for the subnet?!?
You have a possibility to configure DHCP server to give to the host two different default gateway IP address. It can be done by defining two pools if IP address from one subnet. Let’s say that you have 172.16.20.0/24 and there are R1 with 172.16.20.1 and R2 with 172.16.20.128 routers on your LAN segment edge. You can split the scope to two subnets 172.16.20.1-172.16.20.127 -> 172.16.20.0/25 and other one 172.16.20.128-172.16.20.254 -> 172.16.20.128/25 and then give to first one the router option of R1 and to other scope the router option of R2.
It would mean that on your /24 subnet some devices will receive R1 IP address as their Default Gateway and some others with get R2 IP address for their Default Gateway. If one router goes down at least half of devices will still be able to reach outside networks across R2. This is not really a redundant solution, but is something close to that.
The real solution
VRRP, HSRP, GLBP i.e. Virtual Router Redundancy Protocol, Hot Standby Router Protocol and Gateway Load Balancing Protocol represent protocols that are making default gateway redundancy possible. Issues related to a host knowing a single IP address as its path to get outside the subnet. You configure one IP address on all devices on the subnet and then two routers/L3 switches in VRRP,HSRP or GLBP configuration will work together to act as a single device using different techniques. VRRP and HSRP will do Active-Passive configuration and GLBP will also have a possibility to work in Active-Active config. (More about those protocols in a separate article)
IRDP – ICMP Router Discovery Protocol enables computers inside local LAN to find all routers that can be used for default gateway purposes. If devices running IRDP runs in router mode, router discovery packets are sent to the LAN. If devices running IRDP runs in host mode, router discovery packets are received. | <urn:uuid:e359109b-c253-4eb2-a62f-2bc767996468> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://howdoesinternetwork.com/2014/redundant-gateway-solutions | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280888.62/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00510-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.913014 | 839 | 3.234375 | 3 |
NASA plans Webcast about the sun
- By Doug Beizer
- Mar 19, 2009
NASA scientists will reveal new information and images about the Earth’s sun and its influence on the solar system during a Webcast March 20 at 1 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time.
The Webcast will honor Sun-Earth Day, observed in conjunction with the spring equinox, and will emphasize daytime astronomy, NASA officials said.
"Tremendous strides have been made with satellite and ground-based observations of the sun, which have enabled us to monitor the sun to gain a better understanding of the processes that govern its influence on our solar system," said Eric Christian, a scientist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.
NASA uses celestial events to engage the public through Webcasts, podcasts, space science activities, demonstrations and interactions with scientists, NASA officials said.
The Goddard center is producing the Sun-Earth Day Webcast, and NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., and the Adler Planetarium in Chicago are participating in it. NASA Television and the agency's Web site will broadcast the event live.
Doug Beizer is a staff writer for Federal Computer Week. | <urn:uuid:b0286643-32ff-4402-bfcc-21fa7db40088> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://fcw.com/articles/2009/03/19/nasa-sun-day.aspx | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280746.40/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00446-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.913308 | 249 | 3.25 | 3 |
Oregon’s state universities are embarking on what’s believed to be the state’s largest solar energy project, an effort that will eventually bring solar arrays to all seven campuses in the Oregon University System.
The project — called Solar By Degrees — will begin installation of a total of 27 acres of solar panels generating almost 5 megawatts of power at the Oregon Institute of Technology, Oregon State University and Eastern Oregon University. A staged installation will begin this summer and fall, and will continue in 2012.
Many of the contractors and manufacturers from the project will come from Oregon, according to a press statement from the Oregon University System, which is composed of the University of Oregon, Eastern Oregon University, Oregon State University, Portland State University, Western Oregon University, Oregon Health and Science University, and the Oregon Institute of Technology (OIT).
“OIT will have a unique configuration utilizing both solar and their current geothermal power to generate 100 percent of their electricity and heating needs,” according an announcement of the new initiative. “Their Klamath Falls campus is currently the only university in the world that is completely heated by geothermal water, and it has the first university-based geothermal combined heat and power plant in the world.”
According to OIT’s president, the school will achieve energy independence using entirely renewable resources when its larger geothermal power plant comes online in 2012. Sixteen thousand solar panels will be installed.
Renewable Energy Development Corp., a Utah-based renewable energy development firm, will provide solar power to each of the seven campuses in two phases. State and federal tax incentives will be used to purchase power at or below the current electrical utility rates for the campuses. The Oregon University System estimates savings of $6.6 million in utility rates over a 25-year period, at which point the panels revert to campus ownership.
“We’re excited about the potential for hands-on research and study the solar array will provide for our students and faculty,” said Eastern Oregon University president Bob Davies.
Oregon Gov. John Kitzhaber and other officials announced the program late last week in Klamath Falls, Ore. | <urn:uuid:5f07b47b-13a6-4260-8388-e5e61b39ea39> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.govtech.com/technology/Oregon-Universities-Solar-Energy-Project.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560285001.96/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095125-00078-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.921297 | 450 | 2.59375 | 3 |
Research suggests we chew around 800 times in an average meal; that's almost a million times a year. We put our teeth under huge strain, and often require fillings to repair them. Fillings are typically made of a mixture of metals, such as copper, mercury, silver and tin, or composites of powdered glass and ceramic. Typical metal fillings can corrode and composite fillings are not very strong; Graphene on the other hand is 200 times stronger than steel and doesn't corrode, making it a prime new candidate for dental fillings. In the study, researchers from Iuliu Hatieganu University of Medicine and Pharmacy, the National Institute for Research and Development of Isotopic and Molecular Technologies, and the University of Agricultural Sciences and Veterinary Medicine in Romania, and Ross University School of Veterinary Medicine Basseterre in the West Indies investigated whether different forms of graphene are toxic to teeth. "The idea of the project was to add graphene into dental materials, in order to increase their resistance to corrosion as well as to improve their mechanical properties," explained Dr. Stela Pruneanu, one of the authors of the study from the National Institute for Research and Development of Isotopic and Molecular Technologies in Romania. "There is contradictory information regarding the cytotoxicity of graphene, so we first wanted to determine how toxic it is for teeth." Graphene comes in different forms, including graphene oxide, nitrogen-doped graphene and thermally reduced graphene oxide. The researchers tested how toxic these different types of graphene are in vitro for stem cells found in teeth. Thermally reduced graphene oxide was highly toxic, making it inappropriate as a dental filling material. Nitrogen-doped graphene caused membrane damage at high doses (20 and 40 micrograms per milliliter). However, it was shown to have antioxidant properties, so it could be useful if covered in a protective layer. Graphene oxide was least toxic to cells, making it an ideal candidate. "The results were very interesting and proved that graphene is appropriate for use in dental materials," said Dr. Gabriela Adriana Filip, one of the authors of the study and Associate Professor at Iuliu Hatieganu University of Medicine and Pharmacy Cluj-Napoca in Romania. "We believe that this research will bring new knowledge about the cytotoxic properties of graphene-based materials and their potential applications in dental materials." The next step for this research is for the team to make dental materials with graphene oxide and test how compatible they are with teeth, and how toxic they are to cells. The results are due to be published soon. Explore further: Graphene: A new tool for fighting cavities and gum disease? More information: Diana Olteanu et al. Cytotoxicity assessment of graphene-based nanomaterials on human dental follicle stem cells, Colloids and Surfaces B: Biointerfaces (2015). DOI: 10.1016/j.colsurfb.2015.10.023
Catalano S.,University of Calgary |
Lejeune M.,University of Calgary |
Liccioli S.,University of Calgary |
Verocai G.G.,University of Calgary |
And 6 more authors.
Emerging Infectious Diseases | Year: 2012
Echinococcus multilocularis is a zoonotic parasite in wild canids. We determined its frequency in urban coyotes (Canis latrans) in Alberta, Canada. We detected E. multilocularis in 23 of 91 coyotes in this region. This parasite is a public health concern throughout the Northern Hemisphere, partly because of increased urbanization of wild canids. Source
Wilga C.A.D.,University of Rhode Island |
Stoehr A.A.,University of Rhode Island |
Stoehr A.A.,University of Massachusetts Dartmouth |
Duquette D.C.,University of Rhode Island |
And 3 more authors.
Environmental Biology of Fishes | Year: 2012
Feeding behavior in the species of captive chondrichthyans is studied to clarify the functional mechanisms responsible for feeding ecology. Kinematics and pressure in the buccal, hyoid and pharyngeal regions were quantified in Squalus acanthias, Chiloscyllium plagiosum and Leucoraja erinacea using sonomicrometry and pressure transducers. Means and coefficients of variation were analyzed by species and by behavior to test for stereotypy and flexibility in the feeding mechanism. Several instances of mechanical stereotypy as well as flexibility were found in the feeding kinematics and pressure of the three chondrichthyan species. In general, Squalus acanthias shows more stereotyped feeding behavior than C. plagiosum and L. erinacea. Different aspects of feeding behavior stand out among the three species. Chiloscyllium plagiosum generates lowest pressures, S. acanthias achieves the greatest area changes, and L. erinacea has longer durations for manipulating prey. Capture events are functionally and behaviorally stereotyped while processing events are functionally and behaviorally flexible with the ability to use suction or compression to process the same food item. Squalus acanthias is a functional specialist and C. plagiosum is functionally a generalist, with both species exhibiting behavioral flexibility. Leucoraja erinacea is a functional and behavioral generalist. Using functional morphology to explain mechanical stereotypy and flexibility in the feeding behavior of three suction feeding chondrichthyan species has allowed a better understanding of specialist and generalist trophic behaviors. © 2011 Springer Science+Business Media B.V. Source
Herin D.V.,University of Texas Medical Branch |
Bubar M.J.,University of Texas Medical Branch |
Seitz P.K.,University of Texas Medical Branch |
Thomas M.L.,University of Texas Medical Branch |
And 5 more authors.
Frontiers in Psychiatry | Year: 2013
The dopamine mesocorticoaccumbens pathway which originates in the ventral tegmental area (VTA) and projects to the nucleus accumbens and prefrontal cortex is a circuit important in mediating the actions of psychostimulants.The function of this circuit is modulated by the actions of serotonin (5-HT) at 5-HT2A receptors (5-HT2AR) localized to the VTA. In the present study, we tested the hypothesis that virally mediated overexpression of 5-HT2AR in the VTA would increase cocaine-evoked locomotor activity in the absence of alterations in basal locomotor activity. A plasmid containing the gene for the 5-HT2AR linked to a synthetic marker peptide (Flag) was created and the construct was packaged in an adeno-associated virus vector (rAAV-5-HT2AR-Flag). This viral vector (2 μl; 109-10 transducing units/ml) was unilaterally infused into the VTA of male rats, while control animals received an intra-VTA infusion of Ringer's solution.Virus-pretreated rats exhibited normal spontaneous locomotor activity measured in a modified open-field apparatus at 7, 14, and 21 days following infusion. After an injection of cocaine (15 mg/kg, ip), both horizontal hyperactivity and rearing were significantly enhanced in virus-treated rats (p < 0.05). Immunohistochemical analysis confirmed expression of Flag and overexpression of the 5-HT2AR protein. These data indicate that the vulnerability of adult male rats to hyperactivity induced by cocaine is enhanced following increased levels of expression of the 5-HT2AR in the VTA and suggest that the 5-HT2AR receptor in the VTA plays a role in regulation of responsiveness to cocaine. © 2013 Herin, Bubar, Seitz, Thomas, Hillman, Tarasenko, Wu and Cunningham. Source
Oosterik L.H.,Catholic University of Leuven |
Tuntufye H.N.,Catholic University of Leuven |
Tuntufye H.N.,Sokoine University of Agriculture |
Janssens S.,Catholic University of Leuven |
And 4 more authors.
BMC Research Notes | Year: 2015
Background: Avian pathogenic Escherichia coli (APEC) are the major cause of economic losses in the poultry industry worldwide. Traditionally, antibiotics are used to treat and prevent colibacillosis in broilers. Due to resistance development other ways of preventing/treating the disease have to be found. Therefore during this study the nebulization of low concentrations of hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) was tested in the presence of chickens to lower pathogenicity of APEC. Results: Significantly higher total lesion scores and higher E. coli concentrations were found in the spleen of chickens exposed to 2 % H2O2 compared to those exposed to 1 % H2O2 and control chickens which had been exposed to nebulization with distilled water. Higher total lesions scores and E. coli concentrations in the spleen were found in chickens exposed to 1 % H2O2 in comparison to control chickens (not significant). Conclusion: H2O2 is rendering animals more prone to APEC infection contraindicating H2O2 nebulization in the presence of chickens. © 2015 Oosterik et al. Source | <urn:uuid:1b2dceee-b81b-4bca-b674-35c7784a24f4> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.linknovate.com/affiliation/ross-university-569175/all/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560279923.28/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095119-00474-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.910921 | 1,946 | 3.796875 | 4 |
Best practice: Coding for different languages and regions
Store text strings in separate
resource files and use unique identifiers (string IDs) for each text string.
Avoid concatenating partial strings to form a sentence. When translated, the strings might not produce a logical sentence. Create a new string for the sentence instead.
Avoid using variables in place of nouns (for example, "The <X> is locked."). Instead, create a specific string for each noun. Even if the sentence appears correctly in English, in some languages, if a noun is
singular or plural and masculine or feminine, the rest of the
string might need to change. Only use variables for strings that can only be known at runtime (for example, file names).
Avoid making part of a sentence into a link. When translated, the words in the link might appear in a grammatically incorrect order. For example, use "For more information, click the following link: <link>" instead of "Click on <link> for more information."
Avoid using a common string if the context of usage differs. Depending on the context, a word could require different translations. For example, the word "new" might require a different translation depending on the gender of the noun.
Avoid hard-coding spaces, punctuation marks, and words. Include these items in translatable strings instead. This approach allows translators to make changes according to the rules for each language.
Avoid hard-coding strings of any kind, including weekdays and weekends. Verify that the start of the week matches the convention for each locale.
Guidelines for numbers
Make arrangements for singular and plural nouns on a per-language basis. Nouns in some languages can have one form for both singular and plural, one form for singular and another form for plural (for example, "1 day" and "2 days"), or multiple forms, depending on the number of items (for example, one item, two items, a few items, and many items).
Avoid hard-coding number separators. For example, 1,234.56 appears in United States English but 1 234,56 appears in French.
Avoid hard-coding the number of digits between separators. For example, 123,456,789.00 appears in the United States but 12,34,56,789.00 appears in India.
Avoid hard-coding the display of negative numbers. For example, negative numbers can appear as -123, 123-, (123), or .
Provide options for currencies. For example, currencies can appear as $12.34, 12,34€, or 12€34. In addition, some currency symbols require more space.
Verify that numbers, measurements, dates, and time formats reflect the locale of your users. | <urn:uuid:4fe8a2d0-ba5e-4229-b04e-2ae80274b0ae> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://developer.blackberry.com/devzone/design/playbook/bp_coding_languages_regions_tablets_1748543_11.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560281426.63/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095121-00529-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.841149 | 579 | 3.265625 | 3 |
All network systems and devices like Windows/Linux desktops & servers, routers, switches, firewalls, proxy server, VPN, IDS and other network resources generate logs by the second. And these logs contain information of all the system, device, and user activities that took place within these network infrastructures. Log files are important forensic tools for investigating an organizations security posture. Analysis of these log files provide plethora of information on user level activities like logon success or failure, objects access , website visits; system & device level activities like file read, write or delete, host session status, account management, network bandwidth consumed, protocol & traffic distribution; and network security activities like identifying virus or attack signatures and network anomalies.
Security Information Event Management (SIEM) refers to the concept of collecting, archiving, analyzing, and reporting on information obtained from all the heterogeneous network resources. SIEM technology is an intersection of two closely related technologies, namely the Security Event Management (SEM) and Security Information Management (SIM).
According to Wikipedia "Security Information Management (SIM), is the industry-specific term in computer security referring to the collection of data (typically log files; e.g. eventlogs) into a central repository for trend analysis. This is a basic introductory mandate in any computer security system. The terminology can easily be mistaken as a reference to the whole aspect of protecting one's infrastructure from any computer security breach. Due to historic reasons of terminology evolution; SIM refers to just the part of information security which consists of discovery of 'bad behavior' by using data collection techniques..." So, to a large extent SIM is concerned with network systems, like Windows/Linux systems, and applications. As a technology SIM is used by system administrators for internal network threat management and regulatory compliance audits.
SEM on the other hand is concerned with the "real time" activities of network perimeter devices, like firewalls, proxy server, VPN, IDS etc. Security administrators use SEM technology for improving the incident response capabilities of the perimeter/edge devices through network behavioral analysis. The target audience for SEM technology is NOC Administrators, Managed Security Service Providers (MSSP), and of course the Enterprise Security Administrators (ESA).
ManageEngine® Firewall Analyzer (www.fwanalyzer.com) is a firewall log analysis tool for security event management that collects, analyses, and reports on enterprise-wide firewalls, proxy servers, and VPNs to measure bandwidth usage, manage user/employee internet access, audit traffic, detect network security holes, and improve incident response.
Firewall Analyzer helps you to:
ManageEngine® EventLog Analyzer (www.eventloganalyzer.com) is a web-based, agent-less syslog and windows event log management solution for security information management that collects, analyses, archives, and reports on event logs from distributed Windows host and, syslogs from UNIX hosts, Routers & Switches, and other syslog devices. EventLog Analyzer is used for internal threat management & regulatory compliance, like Sarbanes-Oxley, HIPAA, GLBA, PCI, and others.
EventLog Analyzer is used to:
Enabling Management Your WayT
Founded in 1996, ZOHO Corp. is a software company with a broad portfolio of elegantly designed, affordable products and web services. ZOHO Corp. offerings span a spectrum of vertical areas, including network & systems management (ManageEngine.com), security (SecureCentral.com), collaboration, CRM & office productivity applications (Zoho.com), database search and migration (SQLOne.com), and test automation tools (QEngine.com).
ZOHO Corp. and its global network of partners provide solutions to multiple market segments including: OEMs, global enterprises, government, education, small and medium-sized businesses and to a growing base of management service providers. www.manageengine.com, www.zoho.com
"The implementation was so easy and the Firewall Analyzer immediately started showing me how much inbound and outbound traffic was passing through our firewalls.I now use Firewall Analyzer daily!" | <urn:uuid:d6b839e4-d136-4d3a-a3bf-d2e842e11d80> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.manageengine.com/products/firewall/Analyzing-Logs-for-SIEM-Whitepaper.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560281084.84/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095121-00465-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.882973 | 865 | 2.625 | 3 |
As we all know that with time things to get wearied-down thus likewise fiber cables also get damaged as the time passes by. Thus it need to get them tested on regularly basis, so that possibilities of hindering data transmission efficiency can be lowered down or eliminated. This is where a crucial aspect of fiber optic tester is needed to be conducted.
Fiber optic inspection: With the increasingly higher data rates are driving decreasingly small loss budgets, fiber optic inspection and cleaning are growing more and more important. If we want to decrease the overall light loss, the only way is to hence our job of properly inspection and cleaning. There are two types of problems that will cause loss when doing the fiber optic connection with the adapters, one is contamination, the other is damage.
We also know that when we checked optical equipment, it generally requires fiber optic cleaning.
Cleaning aid: Its most essential to clean the fiber optic cables and machinery. This is important because wear and tear and forces of nature might case a lot of dust and grime to accumulate on the surface and the heads of the fiber optics. Its essential to keep them clean from time to time, otherwise there are chances of it hampering the working of the same in the long run. This may include simple things like cotton swabs and lint free wipes, to alcohol, because it’s a residual free cleaning agent.
Basically, the main purpose of testing is to evaluate how the cables are working, and to eliminate the faults, if perceived. Thus via this way quality of standards, as well as overall functioning of system gets improved. Usually, the components that are needed to be tested are: connectors, receiver, light source or LED, detectors and splices etc. Fiber optic inspection is the most important in the testing.
Firstly, before starting with the testing process you need to make sure that the equipment are working properly. This is because if devices are not working properly, then you won’t be able to judge where the problem occurs in the cable. However, some people think of performing it by themselves, if they are aware of its working, but if not then it’s advisable to call professional fiber optic tester.
Next comes the understanding of network layout. A person should be aware of the network design, structure and layout, so that troubleshooting can be performed accurately. Various inspections made under it are:
Fiber inspection: In order to make out fault in the cable, it’s important to first of all inspect the fiber cable carefully. During this process, a tester needs to first of all isolate the cables from each other without breaking the link.
Loss point: After isolating the cables next step is to see where the loss point in the cable is? There may be break, crack, tight bend etc. which would be hindering the process of data transmission in the cables.
Connector verification: Likewise faults are inspected in the cables, it’s also important to verify the connectors, as well, so that overall functioning of the cables can be maintained.
If you have a look at things around you then you will see that fiber optic technology surrounds us everywhere. From electronic equipment to our modern day fast-end communication tools, everything uses these amazing optical fiber.
One of the most important aspects is testing which is related to fiber optic testing devices. To make sure that these tools are running steadfastly, you need to perform regular check-ups and inspections. There are various tools available in the market that you can purchase to complete an inspection kit for the task, or you can even buy these modern day automated kits (which are a much costlier option). | <urn:uuid:4d6a5ecb-d9c9-4a91-8ae6-95dac82d7549> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.fs.com/blog/the-importance-of-fiber-optic-inspection.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280221.47/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00007-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.950522 | 749 | 2.59375 | 3 |
Beginning around 2011, the mainstream media and activist outlets began paying attention to data centers, putting the pressure on industry leaders like Apple, Microsoft, and Google to clean up their power sources. These companies were already pursuing efficient operations – after all, every saved watt is saved money. But the increased coverage did seem to push them towards using renewables, as the general public realized that data centers use a staggering amount of energy and produce thousands of tons of greenhouse gas emissions.
We’ve covered all that before, and we’ve also touched on the swelling focus on data center water use, as well (facilities often require significant water use for cooling systems). But the environmental footprint of a data center goes beyond electricity or water. With systems this complex and engineering designed for 24/7, year-round operation, there are many additional factors that can often have negative impact on the planet.
Here are eight overlooked areas of the data center that have significant environmental implications.
Data center Uninterruptible Power Supply systems require some pretty huge batteries that kick in when power fluctuates or goes out, keeping systems alive for minutes to hours. These batteries have a limited lifespan, usually between two and three years, although some last up to ten. The majority of them are lead-acid, which means their manufacture usually involves destructive mining and hazardous conditions for workers. Nickel-metal hydride batteries do not contain heavy metals but they are not common in data centers.
Just like your AA batteries, these large units need proper disposal at the end of their life. There are many companies who will recycle UPS batteries. In the United States, 80% of lead manufacturing comes from recycled batteries alone.
UPS systems can also improve or degrade the energy efficiency of the entire facility.
If a data center isn’t in a good location for free cooling or indirect evaporative chillers (which simply filter outside air through water and circulate it throughout the data center floor, exchanging heat almost directly with outside air), then it will require coolant for CRAC (computer room air conditioning). Coolant might also be used for liquid cooling, which can be more efficient but does necessitate chemicals.
Coolant is often Freon / halocarbon or chlorofluorocarbons, which are mildly to highly toxic and can cause ozone depletion. Newer materials cause less damage to the ozone layer. HFCs, or hydrofluorocarbons, are the current most common refridgerant and while they have zero ozone depletion potential (ODP) they do have global warming potential (GWP), meaning they can trap heat within the atmosphere.
Our strategically designed wind-powered data centers utilize Energy Star equipment to provide low PUEs and energy cost savings.
Data centers must remain clean in order to operate efficiently. Dust is the enemy of computing equipment. However, when cleaning, technicians must also minimize static discharge, using materials that are safe for electronics. Therefore a variety of specialized cleaning solutions have emerged, and many of them, as you might guess, are toxic. Water system cleaners could contain bleach, ammonia, or chlorine.
Data centers burn a whole lot of diesel fuel. Because it goes bad after sitting for too long, generators must burn off unused fuel periodically. In addition, the systems must be checked at least quarterly for proper function, which includes running them for a semi-extended period. These are massive generators even at smaller data centers, each capable of generating multi-megawatts.
For example, Green House Data combusted 6,347 gallons of diesel fuel just in Cheyenne, WY in 2014. That’s 140,903.4 pounds of carbon dioxide. It’s currently an unavoidable cost of operation within the industry right now, as battery technology has to catch up to our immense electric demands.
Computing equipment has a finite lifespan, even if we didn’t need to keep up with performance requirements. The rule of thumb in IT has traditionally been somewhere between 3 and 5 years to replace a server or even a personal computer. Beyond upgrades, there are broken hard drives, cracked monitors, and so forth. Computers contain substances that can be harmful to the environment if simply dumped in a landfill. Responsible data centers (and regular businesses) should seek to resell usable equipment or recycle what they can. Offshore disposal is especially harmful as it also involves transportation.
Your data has to remain safe with your service provider, and to that end all data centers worth their salt have extensive and fast fire suppression systems. After all, we’re dealing with high voltage. Some of the chemicals used for fire suppression can be environmentally harmful. Others, like Novec, do not deplete the ozone layer and have a low GWP, meaning they don’t contribute as much to global warming.
These chemicals often remain highly toxic and can even find their way into rainwater runoff. Some studies do suggest that the byproducts of a large fire are themselves more toxic than fire suppression chemicals, however. Because these systems do not need to be regularly tested, the harm is minimized.
Alongside electronic waste is regular old garbage and/or recyclable boxes from equipment packaging. Customers and our own data center operations teams have to ship equipment and supplies to and from data centers frequently. A large data center processes literally tons of boxes each year. Some companies like Dell have begun to explore sustainable packaging that is 100% recycled or made from renewable resources. Otherwise, we have to recycle as much as we can, from cardboard to plastic bags.
Finally, office areas have their own set of emissions and waste from daily use. That includes personal computers, packaging, transportation to and from work, water from bathrooms and kitchens, and anything else that might cause emissions in your own home. Some office supplies, like flourescent bulbs, also contain some toxic materials like mercury.
All together, it doesn’t paint the prettiest picture of our industry. But improvement can be made in all of these areas, as well, by minimizing the use of toxic chemicals where possible, limiting testing to the least amount possible to guarantee service, and practicing a policy of reduce-reuse-recycle across the entire operation. As new technologies and products become available, largely due to international agreements and national legislation to lower greenhouse gas emissions and global warming factors, we’ll likely see harmful chemical use decrease throughout data centers as well. | <urn:uuid:14741f59-0fe3-499f-aa76-cb5591b3c7dd> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.greenhousedata.com/blog/data-center-environmental-impact-goes-beyond-emissions | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280834.29/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00401-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.948978 | 1,313 | 3.5 | 4 |
Ever wondered what happened to cassette tapes? When Sony announced a new magnetic tape with 3,700 times more storage than a Blu-ray disc in April 2014, this antiquated technology was brought back in the spotlight. But many were left wondering; why all this investment in making tape bigger and better, especially when there are so many other storage options to choose from?
Magnetic tape has been around for nearly a century. It was first invented for recording sound in 1928, but it has evolved into one of the most ubiquitous and reliable mediums for storing data. In a world crowded with sophisticated means of storage, such as SSDs and the cloud, it’s easy to forget the crucial role that magnetic tape plays in managing bank information.
There are many reasons magnetic tape could be a superior data storage solution – one being longevity. Unlike other forms of storage, tapes are built to last and are less susceptible to the risks modern drives face. In fact, tapes can still be read reliably after thirty years, whereas the average disk lasts a mere five years.
Modern storage mediums are also an expensive solution, especially considering the higher up-front costs and ongoing maintenance. The energy requirement to keep disks in HDDs safe is a contributing factor – consider how much cooling is needed to keep a data storage warehouse running. And, while the cloud has lower up-front costs, the ongoing expense can quickly add up. Tapes, on the other hand, are less expensive and don’t need sophisticated warehouses to keep them safe.
[For More On Securing Critical Data: Six Ways Banks Can Defeat Hackers and Reduce Data Breaches]
Not only are modern storage mediums expensive, but there are inherent security risks with newer technology. Data uploaded to a server or cloud could be at risk for cyber-attacks or an outage. On the other hand, data that isn’t managed in a virtual environment is usually stored off-site and infrequently backed up. Therefore, proper data management is an ongoing balancing act: how can banks store confidential information in a way that’s protected from external threats, while still providing readily available access to the data when needed?
Undoubtedly, magnetic tape still has its place in many banks. The BSA record retention requirements mandate storing large amounts of confidential information for an extended period of time—data that can have a significantly longer shelf-life on tape than on other short-lived IT systems.
The Right Way to Save
The most important rule in data archiving is always to think long term. Tapes are designed to be maintained for an extended period of time, so data can be accessed when necessary, even if its 30 years down the road. In one instance, a bank was being audited and asked to produce over 35,000 records dating back to the 1980’s. Even though the bank took the business of archiving very seriously, the hardware used to store the tapes was no longer operational and they couldn’t access their records without the help of data recovery experts. Fortunately, the archived data could be recovered in a laboratory and migrated to newer media formats.
The appropriate tape reading hardware and software is critical, but so is making sure tapes are correctly labeled and cataloged so they can be easily located when needed. At another bank, nearly 300 tapes were accidently overwritten before their end of life, putting the bank at risk for non-compliance. The bank in turn required help to create a tape catalog confirming what was on the tapes and that it could be recovered in case it was needed.
If the data being stored on tape is no longer needed, companies need to know how to permanently and securely delete the highly sensitive information. Since tapes were designed with durability and longevity in mind, merely crushing the tape will not destroy information. To ensure proper disposal of the data, banks should demagnetize the storage media through degaussing. The degausser produces an extremely strong electromagnetic field destroying all the magnetic structures on the tape.
Old fashioned magnetic tape has a big future in the modern world as companies struggle to find ways to manage the rise of big data. Safe and reliable tape archiving involves more than just saving data to tape. It requires managers to work within retention periods and to create back up plans for when things go wrong. Banks need to have a clear data management policy in place, so that IT management understands what they need to do to safeguard information, and most importantly, who needs to take responsibility when data disasters strike.
Robert McKenzie is a senior tape engineer for Kroll Ontrack, a provider of solutions for managing and recovering data. | <urn:uuid:080caf4b-1753-4f43-8250-d2f33429fd51> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.banktech.com/data-and-analytics/the-return-of-tapes-protecting-retro-data/a/d-id/1297075 | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560281162.88/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095121-00309-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958706 | 942 | 3.25 | 3 |
Yi D.-L.,Applied Chemistry Research Institute Office |
Wang J.,Applied Chemistry Research Institute Office |
Li Y.-P.,Applied Chemistry Research Institute Office |
Liu M.,Applied Chemistry Research Institute Office |
And 5 more authors.
Corrosion and Protection | Year: 2010
In order to replace the toxic chromate passivation, a composite passivation film was prepared on the galvanized steel by tracking the hydrolysis process of vinyl triethoxy silane (A-151) via conductivity tests and then adding the hydrolysis solution into the basic passivation bath. The corrosion resistance and mechanism of the composite passivation film were studied by neutral salt spray tests(NSS), polarization curve tests and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS). SEM/EDS were used to analyze the appearance and elements of passivated galvanized steel. The NSS results show that the corrosion area percentage of treated samples was only 4% after 72 h NSS. The SEM/EDS results indicate that a film about 8μm was formed on the galvanized steel, and the constitutes were Si, Mo,P and O. The composite passivation film blocks the anodic reaction of corrosion process. EIS results show that the total impedance of the composite film at the lowest frequency increased by more than one order of magnitude compared with the galvanized steel. Source | <urn:uuid:b974360d-03d5-4226-9425-f81b71a51749> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.linknovate.com/affiliation/applied-chemistry-research-institute-office-1803889/all/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560281649.59/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095121-00217-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.898098 | 286 | 2.734375 | 3 |
Technology and process upgrades implemented since the controversial 2000 presidential election have made electronic voting machines more secure and reliable to use, the Caltech-MIT Voting Technology Project said in a report last week.
Even so, the only way to ensure the integrity of votes cast with the systems is to have mandatory auditing of the results and of all voting technologies used in an election, the 85-page report cautioned.
Rather than setting security standards for election equipment, the better approach for safeguarding ballot integrity is to hand-count a sufficiently large and random sample of the paper records of votes cast electronically, it said. "The 2000 United States presidential election put a spotlight on the fragility and vulnerability of voting technology," the report said. "It became clear that providing robust, accurate, and secure voting systems remained an important open technical problem" for the United States.
The Voting Technology Project is a joint initiative between MIT and Caltech. It was launched originally to investigate the causes of the voting problems in Florida in 2000 and to make recommendations based on the findings.
Some progress has been made since 2000, said Michael Alvarez, professor of political science at Caltech and co-director of the Voting Technology Project. The antiquated lever-activated punch-card voting systems that led to the infamous hanging chad fiasco in Florida have been mostly replaced with newer, more reliable optical scan and electronic voting systems, he said.
In the upcoming Nov. 6 elections, nearly three out of five counties will use optical-scan technology, with the rest relying on some form of direct-record electronic systems. A very small number of counties will use purely hand-counted paper ballots.
In the past 10 years, there has also been a move away from all-electronic voting systems to electronic systems that support a voter verifiable paper ballot trail, the report noted. That trend has been driven largely by security concerns related to direct-record electronic (DRE) voting machines from companies such as Diebold.
DRE machines processed and stored all ballots electronically and offered little way for voters and election officials to determine for certain whether votes were being recorded and counted correctly. Studies conducted by numerous researchers over the past few years have shown DRE systems to be highly vulnerable to all sorts of tampering and compromises because of their poor design and engineering.
Because of such concerns, much attention has been paid to ensure that votes cast electronically this year have a paper record that can be counted and verified manually if needed. States such as California in particular have led the effort to get voting machine vendors to implement better security. The report pointed to California's decertification of all DRE machines in 2007 as one example of such efforts.
Post-election auditing technologies and approaches have also improved substantially since 2000, thanks mainly to efforts by security researchers and cryptographers, Alvarez said. This year, he said, at least half of all states will conduct post-election audits based on sound statistical principles. Others, including California, have been conducting pilot risk-limiting audits to identify potential issues before votes are cast.
Another big improvement since 2000 is the growing use of centralized statewide voter registration databases. Those databases have enabled quicker voter identification and have given states a better way to address vote loss due to registration problems, Alvarez said. Voter registration databases have also made it easier for state election officials to roll out early voting facilities, he said.
In 2000, between 4 million to 6 million votes were lost nationwide because of voting equipment and ballot problems and because of voter registration problems. But thanks to new technologies and improved processes implemented since then, the number of lost votes is expected to be dramatically lower.
Even so, concerns remain. The increased interest in Internet voting and voting by mail is worrisome, Alvarez noted. Both methods are inherently insecure and vulnerable to tampering and fraud. The federal system to certify electronic voting technologies to specific security standards has also been costly to implement and not particularly effective, he said.
When voters go to the polls this year they will see little that is new in terms of technology Alvarez said. "We haven't had an opportunity to improve voting technology" because of the recession, he said. "The problem that states and counties have had with public finances have made it difficult for election officials to invest in new technologies. We will hopefully see that change as public finances improve."
Jaikumar Vijayan covers data security and privacy issues, financial services security and e-voting for Computerworld. Follow Jaikumar on Twitter at @jaivijayan or subscribe to Jaikumar's RSS feed . His email address is email@example.com. | <urn:uuid:c0ffa531-70a4-4b15-a7d5-48a1e3fdacfd> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.computerworld.com/article/2492684/government-it/despite-e-voting-improvements--audits-still-needed-for-ballot-integrity.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560279468.17/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095119-00365-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.965317 | 938 | 2.609375 | 3 |
Major Characteristics of Simulation
Simulation is a specialized type of modeling tool. Most models represent or abstract reality, while simulation models usually try to imitate reality. In practical terms, this means that there are fewer simplifications of reality in simulation models than in other quantitative models. Simulation models are generally complex.
Second, simulation is a technique for performing "What-If" analysis over multiple time periods or events. Therefore, simulation involves the testing of specific values of the decision or uncontrollable variables in the model and observing the impact on the output variables.
Simulation is a descriptive tool that can be used for prediction. A simulation describes and sometimes predicts the characteristics of a given system under different circumstances. Once these characteristics are known, alternative actions can be selected. The simulation process often consists of the repetition of a test or experiment many times to obtain an estimate of the overall effect of certain actions on the system.
Finally, simulation is usually needed when the problem under investigation is too complex to be evaluated using optimization models. Complexity means that the problem cannot be formulated for optimization because assumptions do not hold or because the optimization formulation is too large and complex. | <urn:uuid:377384b9-a623-483d-9d24-802f219f8b1e> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://dssresources.com/subscriber/password/dssbookhypertext/ch9/page20.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280266.9/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00273-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.915422 | 232 | 3.46875 | 3 |
In order to understand how to create security culture, it is important to know what it is and how we define it, so that we can look beyond the basics.
Taking into consideration the Oxford Dictionary definition of culture, we may define security culture as “behavior, thoughts and practices that impact security in a positive or negative way, and that are common for a group of people or an organization.”
The culture part of that definition is about people – their behavior, thoughts and practices. The security side of the definition is how said behavior impact the security – positively or negatively. Your organisation’s risk matrix and risk acceptance level will help you determine to what extent your current security culture is good or bad.
After working on establishing security culture in organizations around the world, I have found that there are three vital parts / prerequisites needed for creating and maintaining good security culture.
The first part of the puzzle is technology. In order to create security culture, you need security technology. This includes all the basics like firewalls, antivirus, VPNs, access management and so forth. Equally important is to remember that the technology should be supporting the employees in doing their jobs – which means there will be trade-offs between security and usability. Another important point about technology is that it should support and enforce the next part of the puzzle: your policies and regulations.
These are all the rules you put in place – either by writing them down or by sharing them orally – to set up the boundaries of acceptable actions your users can and should perform. One thing to keep in mind is that policies are worthless if they come without incentives. If there is no defined and explained reason to adhere to the rule, the possibility that people won’t do it is great. Also, the policies should be clear and make sense to everyone that has to follow them.
As noted above, technology can and should be used to enforce the policies. By that I do not mean that you should use technology to spy on your employees so you can catch them doing something wrong. What I mean is that technology should be implemented in such a way that it helps the user get the policies right, and that it makes it easier to adhere to the policies than not to.
Take password policies for example. You write them down, distribute the text, and then you expect people to change passwords every X day. We both know that very few do so, unless you also implement reminders before the due time, and lock users out if the haven’t changed the password and until they do so. Try to use technology to enhance your policies just like you do with passwords. It makes it easier for the user to follow the rules, and it also makes your job easier.
We all have a large amount of policies we have to adhere to. Some make sense, others do not (or are not easy to understand), and that brings us to the third part of the puzzle: competence.
We all know that when we are presented with something new and we do not have the knowledge of how to use it, we can be neither effective nor fault-free in our dealing with the tech. There is a reason military forces spend a large amount of time working and training with the tools and weapons that are used in combat. If they don´t, they won’t know hot to use them when the time comes, and they are less likely to get out alive.
Soldiers also have rules on how to use those tools and weapons, what to do in specific situations, and whose orders to listen. You can think of these as policies. They combine technology, rules on how to use it, and competence on both the technology and the rules.
Why do we think we do not need all three components when it comes to corporate security culture? We expect our employees to use the technology with a minimum of training, to actually understand and pay attention to all the policies and regulations we put in place, and all that with a bare minimum of security training.
Instead, we should incorporate training designed to work in our organization – on all levels. The training should be adapted to our needs, risk acceptance level, and current and target security behavior. That means we have to learn how to adopt a holistic approach to security culture, and not to rely just on the yearly mandatory phishing training we send employees out for, knowing in advance that the results will be poor. | <urn:uuid:8804161b-c41d-47da-a3c8-113a374dfe7d> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.helpnetsecurity.com/2013/12/20/what-are-the-building-blocks-of-security-culture/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280718.7/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00181-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961105 | 905 | 2.78125 | 3 |
Juggling Packets: Floating Data Storage
Polish researchers hope one day to provide virtual storage by juggling bits of information across the Internet. Through a technique dubbed distributed parasitic data storage, the researchers intend to exploit the delay between sending a piece of information and receiving a reply.
It works much like juggling oranges. Just as a juggler keeps at least one orange in the air at all times, distributed parasitic data storage would keep a certain amount of data continually in transit between Internet nodes.
Researchers Wojciech Purczynski and Michal Zalewski presented the idea in a paper that discusses several storage techniques. The full text can be found at Web site.
By establishing a mechanism for cyclic transmission and reception of data packets to and from a number of remote Internet hosts, it is possible to maintain an arbitrary amount of data constantly 'on the wire,' thus establishing a high-capacity volatile medium, the researchers say. That medium could be used as regular storage for memory-expensive operations, or for handling sensitive data that are expected not to leave a physical trail on a hard disk or other nonvolatile media.
Although researchers have used parasitic computing to perform simple operations, the results so far have been impractical. But distributed parasitic data storage may prove more useful.
Unlike traditional methods of parasitic data storage -- such as P2P abuse, open FTP servers, binary Usenet postings -- this method does not noticeably tax any single system, according to the researchers, and therefore, the chance of being detected and considered an abuse is lower.
Move over Segway
Commuters may soon drive to work in a one-wheeled, eco-friendly machine. The EMBRIO Advanced Concept recreational and commuting vehicle uses a complex series of sensors and gyroscopes to balance one or more human passengers on a single wheel. The 360-pound vehicle is partly made of recycled aluminum and polyethylene, and uses a hydrogen fuel cell as the main power source.
In standby configuration, the vehicle's front wheels deploy to the ground like jet plane landing gear to increase longitudinal stability. With a riding position similar to a motorcycle, the bike is approximately 4 feet by 2 feet by 4 feet.
A digitally encoded key starts the engine, and to move forward, the rider activates a trigger on the left handlebar. The landing gear retracts when the speed reaches 20 km per hour. To turn, the rider leans in the desired direction, and a trigger on the right handlebar activates the brake. When the speed drops to 20 km per hour again, the landing gear redeploys automatically. Even without the landing gear, a gyroscope will keep the vehicle stable when motionless, according to Bombardier, EMBRIO's manufacturer.
Other features include a high-performance braking system, active suspension, night vision and robotic assistance.
Bombardier, which manufactures a range of recreational vehicles such as snowmobiles and ATVs, asked its engineers and designers to come up with a concept of a recreational vehicle to meet the needs of people in the year 2025. EMBRIO was one of several concepts proposed by the company's design teams. -- Bombardier
Researching Reversible Computing
A group of University of Florida (UF) researchers is working to make computers more energy efficient, smaller and faster.
The goal is to re-engineer the integrated circuits that perform all computing operations to reuse most of the large amount of wasted energy currently thrown off in the form of heat.
"Reversible computing" would not only reduce computer chips' power consumption, it could boost their speed because chips now work so fast their generated heat causes chips to overheat and malfunction.
Computers are estimated to consume as much as 10 percent of electricity in the United States, said Michael Frank, a UF assistant professor of computer and information science, and engineering.
"The fastest processors available today dissipate on the order of 100 watts of power in the form of heat," he said, comparing that heat to what a large light bulb dissipates. "The main reason you can't run them faster is because they get too hot. If you could make them produce less heat in the first place, you could run them faster overall, especially if you want to pack a lot of chips together."
Frank, who first worked on reversible computing as a doctoral student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, heads the UF's Reversible & Quantum Computing Research Group.
The reversible computing concept dates back to the early 1960s and involves creating logic operations -- which manipulate the zeros and ones at the core of digital computation -- so they can be undone or reversed. The process differs from the current approach, which performs operations but later discards the result.
When a computer "erases" something, it physically grounds one part of a circuit that holds a charge, in effect converting the stored energy -- and the information it represents -- into heat, Frank said.
Reversible computing seeks to configure integrated circuits in such a way that they can use their current state to recover previous states. Rather than building up and throwing away unwanted information, the chips "uncompute" data fluidly, with little power expenditure or heat generation.
Researchers hope to achieve such results by incorporating tiny oscillators, or springlike devices, in the circuits. In theory, these oscillators could recapture most energy expended in a calculation and reuse it for other calculations.
Without reversible computing, computer chips are expected to reach their maximum performance capabilities within the next three decades, effectively halting the rapid advances in speed that have driven the IT revolution, Frank said.
"Reversible computing is absolutely the only possible way to beat this limit," he said.
Frank currently is trying to persuade major chipmakers to direct more research-and-development resources toward reversible technologies. He recently delivered a talk on the subject at IBM's research facility in Yorktown Heights, N.Y. A number of managers there agreed that IBM should take a closer look at reversible computing, he said. -- Aaron Hoover, University of Florida
Gimme Some Skin
Applied Digital Solutions' CEO told attendees of the ID World 2003 in Paris held in late November, that the company's newest subdermal radio frequency identification (RFID) application is nearly ready for market.
VeriPay, a secure, subdermal RFID payment technology for cash and credit transactions, could make physical money obsolete. The payment technology relies on the company's VeriChip, which is about the size of a grain of rice. VeriChip is a subdermal RFID microchip already used in a variety of security, financial, emergency identification and other applications.
Currently the company sells RFID chips to people with medical conditions, such as diabetes or allergies to common medications. Since the chips are implanted under the skin, emergency response personnel have a nearly foolproof way to access data about a person's medical needs.
The company said VeriPay's unique, subdermal format offers a much more secure, tamper-proof and loss-proof RFID solution to payment technologies. Applied Digital Solutions said the company is working with banking and credit companies to develop specific commercial applications -- beginning with appropriate pilot programs and other market tests -- for the VeriPay subdermal RFID solution. | <urn:uuid:3dc61f98-7c95-465a-9187-a4089eb14722> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.govtech.com/products/99415214.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280888.62/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00511-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.934363 | 1,490 | 2.9375 | 3 |
There is so much about MPLS and how MPLS works. Here I wrote some simple introductory lines about it but only from one perspective. The costumer side one. There is nothing here about BGP and all the things that need to be done and configured in order for MPLS to function in ISP cloud. As an introductory in MPLS this text will take you to the central office and branch side of the MPLS configuration and in this way it will be simpler to explain and enter in the world of MPLS networking technology.
In MPLS networks, packets are sending with special MPLS prefix before IP packet data. With an MPLS header that is sometimes mentioned as a label stack. In MPLS header there are labels, every label with some value:
- Traffic-class field, important for quality of service – QoS
- Bottom-of-stack flag
- 8-bit time-to-live – TTL field
Only thing that is important for MPLS switches and the only thing that they are examining is the label stack. In MPLS there is no need for IP routing table. MPLS is becoming more and more popular in networking. These days it is very important and used in almost every network that previously used Frame Relay or ATM for connecting remote branches. ATM is a thing of the past, mostly because overhead in the packet headers. Frame Relays Virtual Circuits VCs that can connect only two end point are also become to expensive and consequently not very popular. MPLS in other hand offered simplicity and speed with less in price.
The technology behind MPLS is based on entire packets prefixed with an MPLS header. MPLS network can connect unlimited number of networks as virtual networks in one MPLS cloud. We can also say that there are no virtual circuits in an MPLS network if we look from customer perspective.
MPLS is not only faster than other technologies but is a big improvement over the Frame Relay and ATM in other ways. The bigger improvement is that each remote local network can be directly connected to all other locations without the need for PVCs – Private Virtual Circuits. This means that every branch office connected with MPLS is able to communicate directly with every other branch office without communicating through central office location. If we want to implement VoIP solution this is a big deal. We all know that the biggest VoIP enemy is delay, even more than slow link.
If you take a peek in the ISP (or Internet) cloud, you will see that there are MPLS paths within the cloud, of course. Not only there are, sure that there are there but this communication path in the cloud and the configuration can get pretty complicated, but from the other, customer perspective, there are no virtual circuits to support.
But the branches are communicating and there are no links connecting them, is that normal or we have missed something? If we send something from one place to another one across MPLS network cloud, the IP addressing will tell us next hop for reach the destination. How this possible if is there is a line in this text in the beginning that is telling us that for MPLS there is no need for routing table?
The true is that there is no need for your Routing table to support MPLS communication across the WAN. The WAN technology, BGP routing protocol and all that is provided by the ISP. That is the name standing for, they are providing us virtual network for communication between distant branches. The provider look at labels in order to make MPLS function, and our network has no labels.
The provider simply takes our packet and puts a label to that packet. After that the packet is forwarded through the cloud with help of that label. You private local LAN network can use the same subnet like some other company that uses the same provider and the same cloud for communication (for example 192.168.10.0/24). Customers from that other company that are also using 192.168.10.0/24 subnet are not able to connect to our routers. They are unable to connect to our branch routers because they have they own labels, those labels are different than ours. Is somehow similar to a VPN. Customers can see its own equipment but not anything else; even they are connected to the same Internet. Be careful, MPLS networks are not Virtual Private Networks or VPNs. MPLS has no encryption involved.
The best thing in MPLS beside the transparent functionality and simplicity is the support for QoS. There is the label in the MPLS label stack called traffic-class field, with the use of this label stack MPLS networks are supporting classes of service. The support for priority queue makes MPLS the best choice for companies that use VoIP across their WAN link. The best thing in this part of the story is that you don’t need to configure MPLS in order for him to work. The provider equipment is the place where the magic is done.
There are some things that you will still need to know for most implementations of MPLS. You will need some knowledge about BGP, and QoS. At least you will need to know how to configure them. Here is a sample MPLS router configuration for the router at our branch office that will use MPLS to connect our LAN segment to other LAN segments in other locations:
A little QoS configuration and in which VoIP RTP and call control will get first priority, and other stuff will be in second line, in default queue. In this example the priority queue will be able to use not more than 60 percent of the link, while call control will get 10 percent:
class-map match-any VoIP-RTP match ip dscp ef class-map match-any VoIP-Call-Control match ip dscp cs3 match ip dscp af31 policy-map MPLS-QoS class VoIP-RTP priority percent 60 class VoIP-Call-Control bandwidth percent 5 class class-default fair-queue
Here’s the configuration for the MPLS link. Notice that there’s nothing MPLS-specific in this configuration:
interface Serial0/2/0 description [ Branch 10 MPLS ip address 10.255.10.2 255.255.255.252 encapsulation ppp auto qos voip trust service-policy output MPLS-QoS
Here’s the inside Ethernet interface:
interface FastEthernet0/0 description [ Branch 10 LAN ] ip address 10.10.10.1 255.255.255.128 duplex auto speed auto auto qos voip trust service-policy output MPLS-QoS
Next, I’ll add a loopback address for routing, which will be useful for VPN failover (not shown here):
interface Loopback0 description [ Branch 10 Loopback ] ip address 10.10.10.129 255.255.255.255
Finally, we need some BGP configuration so that we can learn and advertise routes
through the cloud:
router bgp 65035 no synchronization bgp log-neighbor-changes network 10.10.10.0 mask 255.255.255.128 network 10.10.10.129 mask 255.255.255.255 aggregate-address 10.10.10.0 255.255.255.0 summary-only neighbor 10.255.255.1 remote-as 65035 neighbor 10.255.255.1 update-source Serial0/3/0 neighbor 10.255.255.1 version 4 neighbor 10.255.255.1 prefix-list Aggregate out no auto-summary ! ip prefix-list Aggregate seq 5 permit 10.10.10.0/24 | <urn:uuid:33592ee2-23f5-4577-9e07-12fb3d511f63> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://howdoesinternetwork.com/2012/mpls | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280888.62/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00511-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.904464 | 1,593 | 2.90625 | 3 |
Speak to IT security experts and ask questions about what they consider to be one of the most difficult challenges they face and coming quite close to the top of the list, along with user education, will probably come encryption key management.
Not normally associated with the role of the DBA, encryption keys enable us to secure databases but still provide managed access to approved users.
Securing SQL Server Data
Of course it is silly sending a person data from a SQL Server database that is encrypted without giving them the means to decrypt the data and view it in plain text. This decryption process is facilitated by the use of cryptographic keys. In fact there are two types of keys - symmetric and asymmetric. With symmetric keys the same key is used to both encrypt and decrypt the data. In an asymmetric model different keys are used to encrypt and decrypt the data.
Why bother with two separate keys and the asymmetric model? Well, keys are at the heart of the encryption algorithm. If a key used to encrypt data is the same as the key to unencrypt data then anyone with access to the key can unlock my cipher text. In the asymmetric model I issue a public key that enables a user to encrypt the SQL Server data but only I have the private key to decrypt the data. That way I can receive secured data in the knowledge that only I can see the plain text data.
SQL Server 2005 supports three types of data encryption.
- Symmetric key encryption. As we have seen this is a risky encryption method to support as the key used to encrypt and decrypt the data is the same. It can have a use if you are using encryption to secure data wholly inside the SQL Server, and the use of AES or Triple DES algorithms is recommended.
- Asymmetric encryption. SQL Server uses the RSA algorithm and supports 512-bit, 1,024-bit and 2,048-bit keys
- Certificates, which is similar in approach to asymmetric key encryption. SQL Server uses the IETF (Internet Engineering Taskforce) X.509v3 specification along with RSA for data encryption.
As keys are so crucial to SQL Server encryption, their careful management is vital.
Imagine I have encrypted some SQL Server data using my private key. I then decide to leave the company and go and work elsewhere, taking my private key knowledge (i.e. my password) with me. The data I leave behind is all in cipher text and is now lost to my former colleagues. Imagine another scenario where the DBA has encrypted a SQL Server table and stored the data on a backup tape. A few years later there is a requirement for discovery, due to a legal action, and the data needs to be recovered. If the private key has been lost then the data can not be accessed, which will cause a storm of legal issues.
Even the basic issuing of keys is fraught with difficulty. Many years ago vetted couriers were dispatched by airplane, with a briefcase secured to their wrist containing the month's keys for that remote office. Now key distribution can be facilitated automatically but, even so, it is very easy to make mistakes and get into a horrible confusion.
SQL Server 2005 Key Management
We have already discussed some of the difficulties with key management and the knots that you can end up being tied in if your key management should go wrong. The good news is that SQL Server does provide some basic key management tools, reducing the need for other key management products in the more simple deployments. In more complex deployments, SQL Server can be a good citizen of third party key management products.
Keeping private keys secure is vital to the integrity of a secure SQL Server. Many wonderfully complex encryption algorithms have been rendered useless as the associated keys have been leaked. SQL Server 2005 uses an encryption hierarchy to protect its keys.
The first security layer is the Windows Data Protection API, referred to as DPAPI. This enables keys to be secured discretely in Windows and provides support for the Crypto API. It was introduced with Windows 2000 and protects the SQL Server 2005 service master key which is the root key for each instance of SQL Server installed on a specific computer. If this root key is compromised then all other keys on that computer will be vulnerable. The service master key needs little maintenance by the DBA but should be backed up and stored securely away from the SQL Server it applies to. The service master key is a bit like energy - it can't be created or destroyed. There is only ever one per instance of SQL Server. The key is secured using the credentials of the logged in user, and is managed under the same account as the SQL Server service. Therefore, anyone that has access to that service account will have access to the service master key so be careful in allocating accounts and users.
Next in the hierarchy is the database master key. This is a database-specific version of the service master key and, as such, secures all keys in a specific database and protects all the user keys, symmetric /asymmetric keys and certificates. If this is compromised then all other keys in the same database will be vulnerable.
The built in keys (service master key and database master key) are not generally used directly for encryption but will be used internally by SQL Server as part of the internal key management infrastructure.
The scale of a database key hierarchy can be as straightforward or complex as you like, but bear in mind the more complex a key hierarchy the more that can go wrong, as well as possible performance implications if a large key hierarchy needs to be traversed on a regular basis.
User keys in SQL Server comprise certificates, asymmetric keys, symmetric keys and pass phrases. These are the keys that the DBA will use to protect database data.
A certificate is a digitally signed object that keeps the public key associated with the owner of the private key. SQL Server can create certificates for use within the database server but certificates for use outside the server need to be obtained from one of the trusted third-party certificate issuers. Certificates can be created and managed using T-SQL in much the same way that you create and manage other database objects.
Asymmetric keys are created and managed much the same way as certificates and are useful if you don't want the full overhead of certificate management but still want to issue public keys.
Symmetric keys are useful when performance may be an issue, as they require less processor cycles to implement and manage - asymmetric key management algorithms can take up significant server resources. The significant downside of symmetric keys is the fact that the keys need to be shared, and shared secrets are difficult to protect - as many people know!. That said, symmetric key encryption does have a part to play when securing data inside a SQL Server, as the key never actually leaves the server.
Pass phrase keys are useful if you are happy to look after a suitable pass phrase yourself, outside the remit of SQL Server. They are implemented using the T-SQL functions
Encryption and key management in SQL Server 2005 need not be too difficult as long as you take a sensible and measured approach. Not all solutions will need every last bit of data encrypted and if you do need to implement encryption think through the possible performance implications. Like everything in the world of databases, there is always a compromise, but for many security must, quite rightly, be a number one objective. | <urn:uuid:5acf0fa3-1c5b-4c4e-a52f-854558a5355a> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.bloorresearch.com/analysis/database-key-management-an-introduction/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560285001.96/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095125-00079-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.932684 | 1,507 | 3.015625 | 3 |
Managing Data With Database Tools
Of all the tools in the information technology arsenal, none is arguably more important to business operations than the databases used to organize, store, access, update and manage large structured collections of information. Today, there are four major models that represent how databases are organized:
- Hierarchical: Database records are organized into a classic tree structure, where a single record or set of data acts like the root, and other records may be children of that root, or children of its children, and so on. Parent-child relationships are indicated by pointers, where parents have links to all their children, and children may have links to their parent. Hierarchical databases handle one-to-many relationships well, but don’t handle many-to-many relationships well.
- Network: Also known as the entity-relationship model, or ER model, this approach uses sets to represent relationships, rather than hierarchy. The network model is a subset of the hierarchical model, but also allows child records or sets of data (also called tables) to have more than one parent. This makes it easy to represent many-to-many relationships. Though more flexible and powerful than the hierarchical model, this model proved too difficult for ordinary end users to employ.
- Relational: This model is built around structured collections of data called tables. (Horizontal rows in the table are records; vertical columns in the table are fields or attributes.) Storage location is no longer important. One need only know that tables have unique names, so that names lead users to data without requiring them to navigate around inside tree structures or using notions of structure to access, insert, update or delete records from a database. Instead, search criteria may be used to locate unique tables, and to extract data from such tables.
- Object-oriented: This model defines database contents in terms of classes, subclasses and the relationships among them. Also, properties define data item (like attributes or fields) characteristics, and methods define the operations that can be applied to records or their component parts. Object-oriented (OO) databases are typical extensions of relational databases, but are able to support more complex and varied types of data, and to perform more specialized and complex operations on such data.
The first two models were developed in the 1960s and haven’t been used much since the 1980s (except in Information Management System, or IMS, and similar database management systems, or DBMSs, which remain in wide use to this day). The second two models enjoy a considerable degree of overlap, so that while some databases may be purely relational and not OO, nearly all OO databases also are relational.
Understanding What DBMSs Do
A DBMS is a computer-based system that provides mechanisms for storing, retrieving and updating structured data. A DBMS also provides lots of additional capabilities that cover a broad range of features and functions:
- Logical database views: Sometimes, database contents may be confidential or sensitive, so that only those with a need to know should be allowed to see, add or update such information. Sometimes, users might be allowed to create statistical views of such data without being allowed to see individual, underlying records. At other times, only authorized personnel might be allowed any interaction with such data. Most modern databases support logical views, which show users only the database structure and contents they’re allowed to see, and deny them access to other parts of the database.
- Database administration: This category of activity includes designing database structures and logical views, and managing user rights and permissions. It also may occasionally involve importing data into the database from other sources, or exporting data into other applications or services for re-use or analysis. Only trained, authorized database professionals are generally allowed to define database structures or to manipulate and maintain them. The same goes for managing users and access, importing or exporting data and so forth. This is usually the province of a class of professionals known as DBAs, or database administrators. Lots of DBMSs offer certification programs to make sure people tasked with the DBA role are prepared for and qualified to do the job.
- Reporting: Complex, systematic database queries produce special documents called reports, many of which are run at weekly, monthly, quarterly or yearly intervals to meet internal or external reporting requirements. Somebody has to design and build reporting tools (usually DBAs and other database professionals or database programmers). Somebody also has to run those reports as needed (usually DBAs or their subordinates, sometimes called database technicians or database operators).
- Data integrity management and availability: For legal, regulatory, financial or business reasons, companies and organizations not only must store important data in their database, but also must keep its contents safe from loss and harm. Backup, shadow copies, rollback and recovery are all mundane but important capabilities that most modern databases support in various ways. Above and beyond protecting the contents of databases, making them available to users as quickly and reliably as possible also has spawned all kinds of interesting database technologies for clustering, failover, and real-time mirroring and shadowing capabilities.
- Application support: For everything from generating reports to driving human relations, accounting, manufacturing, warehousing, shipping and other business operations, databases often provide the storage for key business information, while various types of custom applications provide the “in and out” functions for such data and permit it to be used in all kinds of creative ways.
- Web access: There’s a huge class of application programming interfaces (such as .NET, Java 2 Enterprise Edition, ASP, Java Server Pages and so forth) designed to bring database-driven information and services to the Web, and to interact with users over the Web to ferry data back the other way. This also helps to explain the nearly universal support for XML in most DBMSs and application development environments as well—and often, the two do meet on the Web these days.
As data collections get bigger and more complex, most DBMSs are designed to scale to match related storage, management and access needs. Thus, it’s also true that most serious DBMS environments can work in distributed fashion, as well as from a single database server (or cluster of servers). This means that multiple collections of data can be managed and accessed from multiple database servers that work together to provide a consistent and coherent logical view of the whole shooting match, also while managing concurrency and access controls, ensuring data and transaction integrity, and so forth.
In short, a modern database management system is a large and complex processing environment. It’s usually host to all kinds of tools and services for managing and administrating, but also for supporting numerous line-of-business applications and services for everything from accounts payable to enterprise resource planning (ERP). Many large-scale deployments cost millions, if not tens of millions of dollars, so it’s no wonder that nearly all of the major DBMS platforms covered in Figure 1 also are buttressed by comprehensive training and certification programs for database administrators, and often for database operators and application developers as well.
Where the DBMS Market Stands
On one side of the DBMS market, you’ll find a handful of companies and platform | <urn:uuid:e65c272e-40cb-49d2-b30c-1529b32645d9> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://certmag.com/managing-data-with-database-tools/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280929.91/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00199-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.931729 | 1,478 | 3.5625 | 4 |
The new device uses ‘spin waves’ rather than optical beams
Researchers at University of California (UC) Riverside have developed a new ‘Holographic’ memory tool, which they claim could boost data storage capacity and data processing potential in electronic devices such as computers or mobile phones.
The new device uses ‘spin waves’ rather than optical beams, as they are attuned with the traditional electronic devices and could be operated at smaller wavelength compared to optical devices.
UC Riverside research professor Alexander Khitun said that the results open a new field of research, which may have tremendous impact on the development of new logic and memory devices.
The research also suggested that the holographic techniques developed in optics to magnetic structures could be feasibly applied to develop a magnonic holographic memory device.
Associated with images being generated via light, holography is a method-based on the wave nature of light allowing using wave interference between the object beam and the coherent background.
Researchers carried out experiments on a 2-bit magnonic holographic memory prototype device, in which a pair of magnets were lined up in different positions on the magnetic waveguides. | <urn:uuid:a43324ce-5bb5-4387-b63d-6d5f3de8c708> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.cbronline.com/news/enterprise-it/storage/holographic-memory-tool-to-boost-data-storage-capacity-in-electronics-devices-210214-4182291 | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560279176.20/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095119-00412-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.939649 | 237 | 2.953125 | 3 |
Education Department sets up new Web site for data display
ED Data Express showcases dropout rates, achievement, demographics
- By Alice Lipowicz
- Aug 11, 2010
The Education Department has created a new interactive Web site to showcase its data on student achievement, dropout rates and other educational data in a single location, officials have announced.
The ED Data Express Web site allows visitors to collect data from multiple sources to create individual reports. For example, people could compare graduation rates at high schools in their state. Users can also create charts and graphics with the data.
This is the first time the data has been made accessible from a single Web page. The site was created to conform with the goals of the department’s open-government plan, which was developed to meet the White House’s aims for transparency and accountability, Education officials said.
HHS starts sharing health care data
Education Department launches Web site offering public data
“Robust data gives us the road map to reform," Education Secretary Arne Duncan said. "This new Web site will give parents and educators reliable, accurate and timely data that they can use to evaluate reforms."
Users can get data from the department's program offices, the National Center for Education Statistics and the College Board. The information includes the results of state tests and the National Assessment of Educational Progress, graduation rates, budget figures, and demographics.
In June, the department created a separate site, Data.ed.gov, that offers large datasets to the public and program developers. It allows advanced users to download entire datasets for their exploration.
In April 2009, the White House created Data.gov as a single source for federal data and encouraged departments to make more data available to the public.
Alice Lipowicz is a staff writer covering government 2.0, homeland security and other IT policies for Federal Computer Week. | <urn:uuid:a8bca098-7909-495a-8cfd-f2c6799bf90a> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://fcw.com/articles/2010/08/11/education-department-set-up-new-web-site-for-data-display.aspx | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560279176.20/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095119-00412-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.93092 | 380 | 2.625 | 3 |
Cyber warfare expert and researcher John Bumgarner claims to have traced the Stuxnet and Duqu virus timelines back as far as 2006, an assertion that would mean the malware has been active for much longer than previously suspected.
The Stuxnet virus, first identified in 2010 by German researcher Ralph Langner, is a highly sophisticated designer-virus that wreaks havoc with SCADA systems which provide operations control for critical infrastructure and production networks.
The initial attacks are thought to have caused severe damage to Iranian uranium enrichment facilities, setting back the nation's nuclear weapons program by as much as several years.
Iran is still struggling with the aftermath of the Stuxnet virus attacks more than a year after the infestation was discovered. The virus specifically targeted Siemens PLCs used to control uranium enrichment centrifuges.
While Duqu is similar in may respects to Stuxnet, some research team have concluded that its main purpose is to harvest data, not affect physical control systems such as those impacted by Stuxnet.
Other researchers are working under the assumption that Duqu is still in development, and that the authors are working to perfect the malware prior to unleashing its full potential - such as the delivery of a potentially devastating payload.
According to reports, Bumgarner's timeline is as follows:
- May 2006 - Engineers compile code for a component of Stuxnet that will allow them to attack programmable logic controllers, or PLCs, manufactured by Siemens of Germany. Iran's nuclear program uses Siemens PLCs to control the gas centrifuges in its uranium enrichment facilities.
- 2007 - Duqu, a data-stealing piece of malware, is deployed at targeted sites in Iran and some of its allies, including Sudan.
- Late 2007 - Engineers write the code for the "digital bomb" component of Stuxnet, allowing those behind the attack to force the gas centrifuges to rotate at faster-than-normal speeds, which is what damaged the sensitive equipment when the cyber weapon was eventually deployed.
- November 2008 - Conficker appears, starts to spread rapidly.
- December 2008 - Actors behind Stuxnet start running www.mypremierfutbol.com, a website appealing to soccer fans that will eventually be used to cloak traffic traveling between machines infected with Stuxnet and the server controlling them.
- January 2009 - They start running www.todaysfutbol.com, which will be used for the same purpose.
- January 2009 - Spread of Conficker peaks and engineers continue writing code for key components of Stuxnet.
- March 2009 - Conficker Variant C is deployed. This version will be used to deliver Stuxnet to Iran.
- April 1, 2009 - Attackers begin to deploy Stuxnet to Iran on the 30th anniversary of the declaration of an Islamic republic in Iran.
- January 2010 - Operators of Stuxnet accelerate program by adding new malware components that make it spread faster and also make it more dangerous.
- March 2010 - Stuxnet operators add additional components to the malware to make it even more powerful.
- June 2010 - Computer security firm VirusBlokAda identifies Stuxnet as a piece of malware after reviewing a sample that was found in Iran.
- July 2010 - Cyber security blogger Brian Krebs breaks news of Stuxnet on his website.
- November 2010 - Iran President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad discloses that a cyber weapon had damaged gas centrifuges at his nation's uranium enrichment facility. "They did a bad thing. Fortunately our experts discovered that," he said. | <urn:uuid:de0ce77d-9904-465d-950e-05864401137d> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.infosecisland.com/blogview/18486-Researcher-Traces-StuxnetDuqu-Timeline-Back-to-2006.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280128.70/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00164-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.952844 | 746 | 2.5625 | 3 |
One problem at the heart of the EU’s proposal is the very scope of personal data. The existing definition broadly defines personal data as data that can be used to identify a natural person. But, says the European Network and Information Security Agency (ENISA), it doesn’t specify whether that identification can be with a high degree of probability but not absolute certainty (such as “a picture of a person or an account of a person’s history”) or even whether it includes the identification of a person not uniquely, “but as a member of a more or less small set of individuals, such as a family.” Incidentally, this issue will only get more complex with the growth of big data analytics, where an individual may never be overtly specified, but may still become recognizable through the accumulation and association of different items.
Another difficulty concerns who can request the deletion of data. One example given is a photograph of two people, where one party would like it removed and the other party would like it retained. “Who gets to decide if and when the photo should be forgotten?” asks ENISA. And what about embarrassing news reports? “Should a politician or government be able to request removal of some embarrassing reports?”
ENISA then moves to the technical difficulties involved in the right to be forgotten. It notes that in an open global system such as the web, anybody can copy any data and store it anywhere. In short, “enforcing the right to be forgotten is impossible in an open, global system, in general... [since] unauthorized copying of information by human observers is ultimately impossible to prevent by technical means.” It can only be achieved within ‘closed systems’ such as access-controlled public networks entirely within the jurisdiction of the EU.
One approach to data expiration currently being explored is encryption. The basic principle is that the personal data is stored in an encrypted manner, viewable via a public/private key pair. On demand, or at a pre-specified date, the relevant public key is deleted, making the data concerned either unviewable or unintelligible. There are technical issues, such as the scalability of the public key management system and indeed the security of the public keys – if they can be compromised, then the content is accessible even after it has been ‘forgotten’. But even without these issues, the data or photos can be copied or captured while in plaintext and stored outside of the closed system either privately or publicly on the internet.
A final suggestion offered by ENISA is hiding rather than removing the data. Since most data is found via the major search engines, removing the data from the search engines – such as Google, Yahoo and Bing – would make it difficult to find. “A possible partial solution,” suggests ENISA, “may be a legal mandate aimed at making it difficult to find expired personal data, for instance, by requiring search engines to exclude expired personal data from their search results.”
ENISA’s report effectively says that the right to be forgotten cannot be guaranteed by technical means. It suggests that the EU should tighten its definitions of what is meant by personal data, and what is meant by ‘forgotten’ (is it, for example, merely making that data inaccessible to the public, or actually deleting it). It also points to its earlier report on privacy and behavioral tracking, noting that a tighter control on the personal data that is collected will lead to better control over their personal data by the data subjects – which is, after all, the purpose underlying the right to be forgotten. | <urn:uuid:0cd64932-c65d-4e9f-a157-47cf66f47c10> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/problems-with-the-eus-proposed-right-to-be/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280128.70/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00164-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.944216 | 746 | 2.796875 | 3 |
Government’s big data efforts are manifesting in new ways: When an ice storm threatened New Orleans in January, the city contacted residents with medical conditions, warning how they might soon be affected and advising to take preventative measures. Other cities send text messages to known parents, reminding them to get their children vaccinated.
These and other programs are the result of better intelligence on behalf of government, enabling agencies to perform their functions more effectively and helping citizens in the process. But some people view the programs as being somewhere between unsettling and invasive.
Emergency medical service providers and medical facilities in San Diego are sharing data to identify people who habitually dial 9-1-1 as a result of mental illness. In two years of operation, the San Diego Resource Access Program (RAP) reported curtailing such behavior among 51 such people, reducing costs by an estimated $314,306 and saving workers 263 hours of task time. The savings were the result of information sharing across various agencies, and while it’s hard to dispute the quantifiable benefits of such a program, privacy experts fight hard to preserve the anonymity of the public, particularly those compromised by mental afflictions.
In New Orleans, a health-care information exchange notifies primary care physicians when their patients are admitted to hospitals. The exchange also shares data with insurers so they can identify expensive patients, according to The New York Times. Officials reported that such programs are designed with privacy standards in mind, but such developments raise unprecedented scenarios, enabled by new technologies only recently.
The BioSense program, run by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), provides health officials at local, state and national levels a common platform that allows them to collect, share and evaluate patient data. The program is intended to give public health officials a view of data that spans across government agencies and jurisdictional boundaries, particularly when disasters occur, like the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. The New York Times reported that the program was created so officials could be proactive in finding patients with known mental health conditions or people with other health conditions who might be made particularly vulnerable by an event like a hurricane. Following Hurricane Sandy and Hurricane Katrina, government officials used the program to search out such individuals so they could verify their data and gauge reactions of those being contacted.
Some admit that the program sounds well-intentioned, but they object because such sharing of information is a violation of patient privacy.
“I think it’s invasive to use their information in this way,” Christy Dunaway, who works on emergency planning for the National Council on Independent Living, told The New York Times. One concern, she said, is that the same information that is used to find people with disabilities who might need help could also be used to discriminate against them. Other officials argued that there is always a balance between privacy and sharing information to save lives.
While such programs may be seem creepy or invasive to some, they tend to be created as responses to real need. Following Hurricane Sandy, many patients who relied on electric-powered medical equipment were faced with a potentially-fatal problem – they needed power before their battery back-ups ran out. Dr. Nicole Lurie, assistant health secretary for preparedness and response at Health and Human Services, told The New York Times that it’s the government’s job to be aware of people with such needs, and that if the local government can’t help them in a time of crisis, then the federal government should step in.
In New Orleans last June, local officials used Medicare records to identify the names and addresses of more than 600 beneficiaries who had been billed for oxygen equipment or ventilators. The New York Times reported that while a few people refused to open their doors when contacted by government officials checking to see if the residents were indeed using oxygen or a ventilator, the vast majority were grateful that someone was looking out for them.
The exercise was also revealing because in one neighborhood, a report published in the American Journal of Public Health shows that not one electronic breathing device user had a battery backup. More than half of those interviewed said they would probably need help during a hurricane, but only 15 of the 611 residents had actually enrolled in the city’s special needs registry. | <urn:uuid:42b42eb5-57de-4efd-97e8-1a504b133702> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.govtech.com/public-safety/Balancing-Privacy-and-Information-Sharing-to-Save-Lives-in-Emergencies.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280801.0/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00558-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967027 | 868 | 2.75 | 3 |
The Beginner's Guide to HTML & CSS and the Advanced Guide to HTML & CSS cover both the fundamentals and the latest techniques for web design and development in ten lessons each. They're good skills to have, even if you just want to create your own personal website or landing page.
Created by designer and front-end developer Shay Howe, these e-courses offer examples and descriptions of pretty much everything you need to know to get started creating web pages.
The first lesson of A Beginner's Guide to HTML & CSS, for example, talks about the difference between HTML and CSS and common terms you'll likely hear. The course introduces topics like positioning elements on a page, embedding media, creating forms, and organizing data with tables.
The advanced version is newer, with new lessons posted every Monday until the ten lessons are completed. It starts with developing a strategy to organize your code base, and will include lessons on jQuery, animations, and accessibility.
The site has an elegant, simple design. With the great examples and recommendations for best practices, this is a terrific site to bookmark to further expand your web development skills. See course 101 and course 201 here. [via Hacker News] | <urn:uuid:c632292c-d40e-4c2b-8204-9fe9bc3d240d> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.itworld.com/article/2714942/consumerization/learn-html-and-css-with-these-free-beginner-and-advanced-guides.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560281492.97/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095121-00374-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.904255 | 243 | 2.96875 | 3 |
Public Tech Etiquette Almost Non-Existent
Texting while driving, sending emails while walking, and using mobile devices on your honeymoon ... these are among the top pet peeves cited by U.S. adults in the recent Mobile Etiquette survey conducted by Ipsos and sponsored by Intel to uncover the current state of mobile etiquette.
As the number of mobile devices continues to grow, awareness of how people use these gadgets around others is on the rise. A 2011 report from the Pew Internet & American Life Project states that 85 percent of U.S. adults own a cell phone, 52 percent own a laptop computer, four percent own a tablet, and only nine percent do not own any of these items.
As the innovator behind the processors, or "brains," and complementary technologies that power many of today's mobile devices, Intel tapped its team of social scientists, anthropologists, psychologists and industrial designers to provide a glimpse into how people use, will use or would like to use technology, including mobile devices, well into the future, across different cultures.
"At Intel, we try to start with people first - we ask questions about who they are and what they care about, we also ask questions about technology: What do you love about it, how does it frustrate you, what do you hate about it, what can't you live without?, said Genevieve Bell, Intel fellow and head of interaction and experience research at Intel Labs in a statement.
"We use this research and our understandings about what people care about to help make technology even better; to drive innovation and revolution in technology development. It is important to remember that most digital technology is still quite new to consumers."
"For instance," Bell continued, "the mobile technology is still relatively novel. After all, it was just eight years ago that Intel integrated Wi-Fi into the computer with its Intel Centrino processor technology, thus enabling the unwired laptop. Smart phones, tablets and other mobile devices are really still in their infancy, so it's no surprise that people still struggle with how to best integrate these devices into their lives."
Key survey findings
While connectivity at one's fingertips has enabled people be more productive, how people use technology in the presence of others can lead to frustration. The majority of those surveyed agree that they wish people practiced better etiquette when it comes to using their mobile devices in public areas. Roughly 1 in 5 admits to poor mobile behavior but continues the behavior because everyone else is doing it.
The desire to be more connected to family, friends and co-workers, combined with devices that are "always on," contributes to an innate need to have mobile devices available all day, every day, from early morning to late night. In fact, 1 in 5 adults admits to checking their mobile device before they get out of bed in the morning.
With a choice of sleek, small and powerful mobile devices on the market, people can easily take mobile devices with them wherever they go; making it easy to commit "public displays of technology." The survey revealed that people see an average of five mobile offenses every day and top mobile pet peeves remain unchanged from Intel's first examination of the state of mobile etiquette in 2009.
"The premise of etiquette and how we socialize with one another is not a new concept. Whenever we interact with another person directly or through the use of mobile technology, etiquette is a factor," explained author and etiquette expert Anna Post of The Emily Post Institute, in a statement. "We can all be more cognizant of how we use our mobile technology and how our usage may impact others around us - at home, in the office and whenever we are in public."
As mobile etiquette guidelines continue to evolve, Post offers these tips to those who use a variety of mobile devices on a daily basis:
- Practice what you preach: If you don't like others' bad behavior, don't engage in it.
- Be present: Give your full attention to those you are with, such as when in a meeting or on a date. (No matter how well you think you multi-task, you'll make a better impression if you don't.)
- The small moments matter: Before making a call, texting or emailing in public, consider if your actions will impact others. If they will, reconsider, wait or move away first.
- Some places should stay private: Don't use a mobile device while using a restroom, for example.
About the survey
The survey was conducted online within the U.S. by Ipsos on behalf of Intel from Dec. 10, 2010 to Jan. 5, 2011 among a nationally representative sample of 2,000 U.S. adults ages 18 and older with a margin of error of plus or minus 2.2 percentage points. | <urn:uuid:3ce36c0c-97dc-4499-bba3-83f71998519f> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.cioupdate.com/print/research/article.php/3926831/Public-Tech-Etiquette-Almost-Non-Existent.htm | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560279368.44/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095119-00100-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.944266 | 980 | 2.59375 | 3 |
Before we even start to consider why a common data model might be important we had better be clear what it is. A data model defines the relationships between disparate data entities within a particular environment, thus establishing the context within which those entities have meaning. Thus you will have a data model underpinning your CRM system and your databases will each be predicated upon their own data model (in this case called a schema).
Going beyond vanilla flavoured data models you can have a federated data model that spans multiple databases. Thus suppliers of EII (enterprise information integration) platforms provide federated query capabilities that are based upon defining data relationships that span multiple data sources. However, the virtual schemas or views that these products use tend to be physical in nature rather than generalised or conceptual.
A common data model goes beyond all of these other more limited deployments and provides a data model that spans an enterprise's applications and data sources. In other words it defines all the data relationships and meanings that exist within an organisation. As one might imagine such things are not simple to build and for this reason common data models are not common. However, their importance is increasingly being recognised and it is the telecommunications sector that is leading the way.
The TM Forum has published the Shared Information/Data telecommunications model for its industry. This is commonly known as "the SID" and it is increasingly being adopted by companies in that sector. As it proves its value it is likely that other industry groups will roll out similar models and, no doubt, there will be a variety of companies across all sectors that roll their own.
So, that's what a common data model is but what do you do with it and why is it important? Well, in the first case it defines the terminology that the company uses for all of its data sources and the relationships that exist between different data items. Now, if you know all of that from a conceptual standpoint then you can map your existing applications and data definitions to the common data model. So, if you have different applications that define customers in different ways, for example, you can map each of these to the common data model so that, in effect, the common data model provides a bridge between the different meanings associated with each of the customer applications. Thus the common data model enables data interoperability between applications.
In practical terms this means that you can use the common data model as the basis for building data services as a part of your SOA (service oriented architecture) environment, you could use it to replace or augment (depending on your approach) your MDM (master data management) system, you could use it to enable data migration or ETL (extract, transform and load) process and you could probably use it for a whole bunch of other things that I haven't though of yet.
Of course there are three main challenges to using a common model. First, there is getting a common data model in the first place. Secondly, there is the issue of defining all of those mappings between your applications and the common data model. And, thirdly, there is the management of change on an on-going basis: both the common model (and application-specific models) will evolve throughout the entire development and maintenance lifecycle to reflect changes in business requirements.
If you don't happen to be a telco and don't already have an internal architecture group creating a common model, you may have to build your own common data model (iteratively) or start from one of the industry models available from standards bodies or data warehousing vendors. However, from the mapping and change management perspective help is more immediately at hand because Progress Software offers a solution specifically for this purpose, called the DataXtend Semantic Integrator. As far as I know, this is the only such product of its kind available from anyone. This makes it a market leading product albeit that the market is in its infancy. Briefly, DataXtend allows you to import definitions for a common model, create the relevant mappings, govern the use of a common data model in SOA, and manage change. DataXtend SI also includes the ability to validate the semantic consistency of data exchanged between applications. That is to say, you can build data consistency rules into the mapping when required to ensure data interoperability. If you want more details look at www.progress.com/dataxtend/dataxtend_si.
Anyway, the bottom line is that if you are interested in a common data model then a discussion with the DataXtend people at Progress should be regarded as mandatory. | <urn:uuid:d6ad0e7c-9efb-4d5a-ad2f-18f50209e71b> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.bloorresearch.com/analysis/the-importance-of-a-common-data-model/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280221.47/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00008-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.950237 | 934 | 2.703125 | 3 |
The original hacker stereotype is a smart, lonely deviant - a teenage or adult male who's long on computer smarts but short on social skills. But like most stereotypes, it doesn't begin to tell the whole story.
Some computer criminals are techie mavericks who take pleasure in writing and releasing destructive viruses. Others are suit-wearing professionals who steal copies of their employers' customer databases to take with them when they quit. Some are con artists with plans to scam personal information from consumers and use it for financial gain.
Experts agree knowing more about the different skills, personality traits and methods of operation of computer criminals could help the folks pursuing these criminals. But a lack of information hinders efforts to create substantive, reliable profiles of the people behind today's computer crimes.
"Like in traditional crimes, it's important to try to understand what motivates these people to get involved in computer crimes in the first place, how they choose their targets and what keeps them in this deviant behavior after the first initial thrill," says Marcus Rogers, an associate professor at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Ind., where he heads cyberforensics research in the university's department of computer technology.
Rogers' expertise spans technology and behavioral sciences. He has identified eight types of cybercriminals, ranging from "newbies" with limited programming skills who rely on pre-written scripts to conduct their attacks, to well-trained professional criminals and cyberterrorists with state-of-the-art gear (see graphic, below).
In addition to skill, these criminals differ in their motivations. Some computer criminals are motivated by status or money, others by revenge, says Rogers, who worked as a detective in a computer crimes unit in Canada and earned his doctorate in forensic psychology at the University of Manitoba.
"The kid who's running pre-written scripts, his motivation is not to collapse the American economy. He's usually driven by experimentation, looking for a thrill. It's like cyberjoyriding." Whereas for a professional criminal, the motivation is income, Rogers says. "He doesn't want to brag or be all over the press. He wants to be very quiet and fly under the radar as long as possible."
One man’s hacker taxonomyMarcus Rogers has identified eight types of cyber-criminals, distinguished by their skill levels and motivations. Rogers is an associate professor at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Ind., where he heads cyberforensics research in the university's department of computer technology.
Companies aren't going to solve computer security issues just by throwing technology at the problem, agrees Steven Branigan, president of security company CyanLine and author of High-Tech Crimes Revealed: Cyberwar Stories from the Digital Front. "It's about understating where the risks are and understanding how people behave," he says.
Hackers are motivated to do what they do for different reasons, such as money, ego, revenge and curiosity, says Branigan, a founding member of the New York Electronic Crimes Task Force. "My experience has been that those who get into computers first, and then start hacking, are more motivated by curiosity," he says. "Those who have criminal tendencies to begin with, when they learn about using computers, they then figure out how to apply that to their trade."
Some wind up being more destructive than others. Script kiddies aren't generally driven to be destructive, but they'll take advantage of some weakness that exists in an operating system, Branigan says. Cybercriminals looking to make money aren't bent on being destructive either, he says. "[Like] any parasite, they don't want to kill the host."
"The people I've found to be the most dangerous are the ones seeking revenge," Branigan says.
Insider criminals - those who go after things like customer and supplier databases, business pipeline information, future product prototypes and strategic business plans - are particularly good at exploiting companies' vulnerabilities. "They have the most access, they know how systems work, and they really know where to hit you," Branigan says.
Of course, not all experts view the hacker nation through the same discriminating lens. For Patrick Gray, there's really only one driver that matters today: Money.
Motivations have changed dramatically in the last decade, says Gray, who is director of X-Force operations at Internet Security Systems (ISS). X-Force is the R&D division of ISS, responsible for vulnerability and threat research.
"We've gone from five or 10 years ago, where hackers were dabbling in other people's systems to see how they were configured and really not doing anything wrong in those systems, to now where it's become incredibly malicious. We've come a full 180 degrees."
Instead of being driven by curiosity, hackers today are driven by money. "They're trying to get anything of value that they can market," Gray says. "The stereotypical image of the lone hacker sitting up in a loft somewhere, eating Ding Dongs, drinking Jolt cola until it comes out of his ears, and just hacking away, is gone."
The hard part
Digging into the parallels that exist between crimes committed in the physical and electronic worlds could unlock some of the mystery of who's behind the computer crimes.
Rogers and others like him want to see traditional criminal profiling adapted for use in computer forensic investigations. "It's about looking at the computer and the Internet as an electronic crime scene, and looking for indicators of signature behaviors and MOs that allow us to paint a picture of the individual who's responsible," Rogers says. "We can do a fairly good job of this in the physical world - can we do a fairly good job in the electronic world?"
The next step is to take that understanding and use it in practical ways, such as to harden systems and improve investigation techniques.
But what's missing is sound data. People have spent a lot of time developing theories, but there isn't a lot of solid information, Rogers says. "We really have to . . . study it with scientific rigor."
Branigan agrees. "Ultimately, right now we don't have enough information to make that really good profile," he says. "We're at the anecdotal stage, where we've collected some information, but I don't think we have enough."
One obstacle is victims' reluctance to report computer crimes.
"My biggest gripe is that we don't share information very well," Gray says. "The hacking community shares info with each other all the time. If a hacker is having a problem accessing a router, or getting through a firewall, he'll throw it on the table, into the channels, looking for help. People are more than willing to help him complete the hack."
The same type of information sharing doesn't happen among businesses, Gray says. "Until we recognize the need to share information with one another, we're going to continually be reacting to the whims of this hacking community," he says.
Extortion, in particular, goes unreported, says Marty Lindner, a senior member of technical staff at the CERT Coordination Center at Carnegie Mellon University. "That's very hard to document, very hard to prove. Most companies won't talk about that," he says.
But experts agree it's on the rise. Organized criminals in areas such as Eastern Europe are increasingly penetrating businesses' systems and threatening to release sensitive corporate data if they aren't paid money, Gray says. They're also launching denial-of-service (DoS) attacks to interrupt companies' electronic business operations. "Then they say, 'We'll stop this DoS attack on your company and let you back on the Internet if you pay me.'"
From conversations with law enforcement, Gray estimates only about 10% of online extortions are being reported.
Hoping to reverse the trend of unreported computer attacks, CERT offers a venue for companies to talk without being identified publicly. Companies understand they can talk to CERT without worrying what they say will be attributed to their companies, Lindner says. "We can take that info, make it non-attributional and then push it out to others so that they know what to look for now."
When companies don't report crimes, they miss an opportunity to potentially protect the criminals' next targets. "I've seen cases where three or four companies - all of a similar kind - have been attacked in the exact same way," Lindner says. "But none of them was willing to tell the others about the style of the attack. If they had, the first guy would have been hit, but the other guys might have had a better chance."
In today's world, the number of computer criminals successfully captured and prosecuted is embarrassingly low, says Gary Jackson, founder and CEO of Psynapse Technologies. A spinoff of the American Institutes for Research, Psynapse makes intrusion-protection products that are designed to respond to the behavior of attackers - even anticipate the actions of site visitors by assessing their intent.
"Very few cases actually come to trial. I've seen estimates as low as one out of 300 or 400 actually get caught," Jackson says. That's one reason more traditional criminals are getting into computer crimes. "There aren't the penalties. If you get caught, more often than not it's a misdemeanor," he says.
Plus the small percentage of computer crimes that do get attention tend to be those perpetrated by less-skilled deviants, which doesn't do much to shed light on the highly skilled and more dangerous criminals operating in the world.
"I'm not really worried about the kid sitting in his basement running the latest SQL Slammer attack," Rogers says. "I'm concerned about organized crime. I'm concerned about its use in white-collar crime and in the dark side of information warfare - that being the ability to launch terrorist attacks. But the groups that we unfortunately only tend to see are at the real low end of the skill spectrum."
Changing that scenario is going to require a concerted effort to collect and share data about the types of computer crimes being committed and the people doing it. But it won't be easy.
"Trying to obtain enough data that we can start making enough meaningful comparisons is not an overnight effort," Rogers says. "Collecting good data is important, and it has to be done worldwide."
In the past, global roadblocks have contributed to hackers' veils of anonymity, Rogers says. "There are issues with jurisdiction, issues with extradition. Computer criminals can throw up a lot of smokescreens between themselves and their victims, and the authorities on the other end."
Fortunately that's starting to change. There's some momentum behind international movements to harmonize computer crime statutes, Rogers says.
And those pursuing the bad guys are getting better at what they do. "Law enforcement is a lot more technically savvy than the public and underground community give them credit for," Rogers says.
Vigilance is a must. "What we've learned as professionals is that we can never, ever underestimate the creativity out there," Jackson says. "A lot of hackers tend to be very bright, very focused. They might have a string of college degrees behind them, and they might be as good as the people protecting the systems," he says.
Senior Editor Phil Hochmuth contributed to this story. | <urn:uuid:57cdd23e-89d3-4276-8777-af603d96b242> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.networkworld.com/article/2327820/lan-wan/profiling-cybercriminals--a-promising-but-immature-science.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560281263.12/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095121-00576-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.972634 | 2,327 | 2.6875 | 3 |
IT Management Slideshow: 10 Technologies that Changed HollywoodBy CIOinsight | Posted 02-27-2009
10 Technologies that Changed Hollywood
Before the Lumiere brothers developed a machine that could project moving pictures onto a screen, movies were seen on novelty toys and devices that allowed only one viewer at a time.
10 Technologies that Changed Hollywood - Page 2
Its first incarnation as a home-projection system flopped, but it was repurposed in 1924 to help editors splice their reels and dominated for decades. Only in the digital age has the Moviola been mostly retired.
10 Technologies that Changed Hollywood - Page 3
With help from Western Electric, Warner Brothers introduced a system that allowed audiences to hear actors speak. The talkie was born, and The Jazz Singer was a smash in 1927.
10 Technologies that Changed Hollywood - Page 4
Not the first, but the most successful, Technicolor changed the palette of movies forever. Color took off when it introduced a three-strip process that didn't need special projectors. Early adopter: Walt Disney, with the animated short Flowers and Trees.
10 Technologies that Changed Hollywood - Page 5
Officially known as chroma key technology, it lets directors filter out solid color backgrounds and add fantastic scenery during editing. Developed for The Thief of Baghdad in 1940.
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Computer Generated Imagery
Matte-painting artists painted realistic backgrounds, but they were limited by the static nature of the medium. CGI helped usher in a new era of realistic and kinetic scenery.
10 Technologies that Changed Hollywood - Page 7
The 1970s saw, er, heard the introduction of Dolby Surround Sound, which let moviemakers to immerse audiences in a whole new level of auditory experience.
10 Technologies that Changed Hollywood - Page 8
Introduced in the late 1970s, videotape brought movies into the homes of millions of viewers, changing the perception that commercial-free movies could only be enjoyed at the theatre.
10 Technologies that Changed Hollywood - Page 9
Star Wars: Episode II Attack of the Clones was the first Hollywood blockbuster shot completely on digital. It provides editing flexibility, and is cheaper than film - thus advancing the art of cinema by letting more people participate.
10 Technologies that Changed Hollywood - Page 10
Streaming movies, downloading them, and sharing via P2P networks via broadband has changed consumption habits. In some ways, we've reverted to watching flicks all by our lonesome, just like the pre-cinematographe days. | <urn:uuid:ced055e2-6513-4a77-ac69-ef8f82e85ccc> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.cioinsight.com/print/c/a/IT-Management/10-Technologies-that-Changed-Hollywood | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560284376.37/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095124-00392-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.925412 | 528 | 2.59375 | 3 |
The term “Bytes” (which sounds like “bites”) was first to used in July 1956 by a PhD at IBM. He spelled it that way to keep typos of “bites” from becoming “bits”. The short answer is that bits measure the amount of data sent on a network, and bytes measure data stored in the computer memory and drives.
The word “bit” is short for binary digit. It is a single one or zero. If it is a 1, the bit is “on” or has a position value. If it is 0, the bit is only a place marker and has no position value. The term was contracted to “bit” in a Bell Systems Technical Journal in July 1948 by J.W. Tukey. The Bell System, named for telephone inventor Alexander Graham Bell, was key in developing communications standards.
Let’s get back to the question, what do bits and bytes do? When any device on a network sends data, it sends bits. We usually measure those bits as how many are going each second by saying things like “a hundred megabits,” which means 100 million bits per second.
That brings up another recent question, what’s the difference between “kilo,” “mega,” and “giga,” and what’s next?” The term “kilo” is a prefix that refers to 1,000 as in kilogram. “Mega” refers to millions and is usually abbreviated with a capital M (100 Mbps = 100 Megabits per second).
“Giga” is the prefix we use to identify 1,000 million. In the US, that would be a billion though in other countries, a billion is 1,000,000 million. The abbreviation is a capital G (40 Gbps = 40 Gigabits per second).
From there, the names for faster speeds are just names, for now. Some cables can do higher speeds, though we are waiting for the standards to catch up to them so vendors will implement those speeds.
Back to “bytes,” after a lot of different sizes from six to ten bits claiming to be a byte, it was settled that 8 bits equals a byte. Each of those bits has its own position value in the byte.
Starting with the lowest value (2 to the power of zero) as the least significant bit and moving to the most significant bit (2 to the seventh power), each bit position has a fixed value. This way, the range of values in a single byte is zero through 255. If a bit is set to one, that position’s value gets added to the total for the byte. If a bit is set to zero, that position is held and the value is ignored. This means a binary value of 01111001 is 64+32+16+8+1 and that is a decimal total of 121.
Each of the letters, digits, spaces, and special characters we use fit into its own individual byte by the American Standard Code for Information Interchange (ASCII, pronounced ass-key). The 121 value in the previous paragraph translates to a lowercase “y”.
Common places to find bytes used are in the data stored in a storage device, like a disk drive or a solid-state drive (SSD). Bytes are also used in measuring the speed of writing data and retrieving data that’s been stored on one of those drives.
Since bytes are larger than bits, the shorthand for a byte is a capital “B” and the lowercase “b” is used for bits. (i.e. 500 Gigabyte drive = 500GB).
Understanding Networking Fundamentals | <urn:uuid:d4db98de-e483-4e8a-8add-0b04629f9b7e> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://blog.globalknowledge.com/2012/05/10/what-do-all-these-bits-and-bytes-do/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280730.27/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00026-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.828438 | 798 | 4.09375 | 4 |
3.1.11 Is the RSA system a de facto standard?
The RSA system is the most widely used public-key cryptosystem today and has often been called a de facto standard. Regardless of the official standards, the existence of a de facto standard is extremely important for the development of a digital economy. If one public-key system is used everywhere for authentication, then signed digital documents can be exchanged between users in different nations using different software on different platforms; this interoperability is necessary for a true digital economy to develop. Adoption of the RSA system has grown to the extent that standards are being written to accommodate it. When the leading vendors of U.S. financial industry were developing standards for digital signatures, they first developed ANSI X9.30 (see Question 5.3.1) in 1997 to support the federal requirement of using the Digital Signature Standard (see Section 3.4). One year later they added ANSI X9.31, whose emphasis is on RSA digital signatures to support the de facto standard of financial institutions.
The lack of secure authentication has been a major obstacle in achieving the promise that computers would replace paper; paper is still necessary almost everywhere for contracts, checks, official letters, legal documents, and identification. With this core of necessary paper transaction, it has not been feasible to evolve completely into a society based on electronic transactions. A digital signature is the exact tool necessary to convert the most essential paper-based documents to digital electronic media. Digital signatures make it possible for passports, college transcripts, wills, leases, checks and voter registration forms to exist in the electronic form; any paper version would just be a "copy" of the electronic original. The accepted standard for digital signatures has enabled all of this to happen. | <urn:uuid:d4c078da-8bf5-40f9-a0c2-798995be2fb0> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.emc.com/emc-plus/rsa-labs/standards-initiatives/de-facto-standard.htm | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280730.27/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00026-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.91502 | 356 | 3.390625 | 3 |
The digitization of critical infrastructures has provided substantial benefits in terms of socio-economic developments – improved productivity, better connectivity, greater efficiencies. Yet some of these attributes also carry significant risks.
Always-on Internet connectivity has ushered in a new cyber-age where the stakes are higher. Disruption and destruction through malicious online activities are the new reality: cyber-espionage, cyber-crime, and cyber-terrorism.
Despite the seemingly virtual nature of these threats, the physical consequences can be quite tangible.
The cyber protection of critical infrastructure has become the most immediate primary concern for nation states. The public revelation of wide-spread state-sponsored cyber-espionage presages an era of information and cyber warfare on a global scale between countries, political groups, hacktivists, organized crime syndicates, and civilian society – in short, to anyone with access to an Internet-connected device.
The focus on cyber security is becoming imperative. While some industries have had highly advanced cyber-defense and security mechanisms in place for some time (i.e. the financial sector), others are severely lacking and only just starting to implement measures (i.e. energy, healthcare).
The drivers for the market in related products and services are numerous, but in large part many will be propelled by national cyber security strategies and policies.
ABI Research estimates that cyber security spending for critical infrastructure will hit $46 billion globally by the end of 2013. Increased spending over the next five years will be driven by a growing number of policies and procedures in education, training, research and development, awareness programs, standardization work, and cooperative frameworks among other projects.
These findings are part of ABI Research’s Cyber Security Research Service (log-in/purchase required). | <urn:uuid:83e11ebb-64b1-4740-9d19-a41a6fc1d652> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.helpnetsecurity.com/2013/07/17/cyber-security-spending-in-critical-infrastructure-to-hit-46-billion/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280730.27/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00026-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.926125 | 362 | 2.578125 | 3 |
Even the often far-reaching researchers at Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) seems to think this one is a stretch: Develop what's known as mobile ad-hoc wireless technology that lets 1000- 5000 nodes connect simultaneously and securely connect in the field.
For the past 20 years, researchers have unsuccessfully used Internet-based concepts in attempts to significantly scale mobile ad hoc network (MANET), DARPA said. A constraint with current MANETs is they can only scale to around 50 nodes before network services become ineffective. Some believe that with just a little more work on the current approach they can increase the maximum size of the MANET. Others believe that large scale MANETs are impossible.
With that information as a backdrop, the agency today issued an industry-wide Request for Information (RFI) to find out what it will take to finally break through current MANET limitations. DAARPA said while the Internet facilitated far-reaching technical advances, in this technology area the Internet may be the roadblock. The MANET scaling goals will not be satisfied with incremental improvement using existing protocols and concepts. Truly revolutionary ideas will explore new paradigms that allow users to effectively share information unshackled from existing constraints.
"A MANET of a thousand nodes could support an entire battalion without the need for manual network setup, management and maintenance that comes from 'switchboard'-era communications," said Mark Rich, DARPA Program Manager. "This could provide more troops with robust services such as real-time video imagery, enhanced situational awareness and other services that we have not yet imagined."
For this project DARPA wants a clean slate stating that "compatibility with existing networking protocols is not required; it may even be detrimental.
"DARPA asks you to take a new look at the MANET problem, unencumbered by existing protocols. All software from the hardware interface to the applications is open for discussion. Even the desirability of network layers may be debated."
DARPA said it is looking for protocols that take advantage of features of the MANET environment-broadcast radios, high information correlation between peers, duplicity of roles, and many-to-many distribution patterns-and that overcome the difficulties-interference, unreliability, and range limitations. It may also be advantageous to explore the use of protocols that blend MANET operations with the capabilities of mobile, semi-mobile, or transient support platforms being developed by DARPA. With these platforms, broadcast, sector cast, and asymmetric communications may be available and useful.
DARPA says it intends to discuss the MANET concepts at a Novel Methods for Information Sharing in Large-Scale Mobile Ad-hoc Networks Symposium on August 7-8, 2013 at the DARPA Conference Center in Arlington, Virginia.
Check out these other hot stories: | <urn:uuid:86ee13f4-a14d-4374-a838-8a8feed514db> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.networkworld.com/article/2224560/wi-fi/darpa-wants-huge-holy-grail-of-mobile-ad-hoc-networks.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560281419.3/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095121-00264-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.9186 | 578 | 2.609375 | 3 |
A Brief Overview of Service Oriented Architectures (SOA)
Service oriented architecture (SOA) aims to deliver flexible and reusable software services in support of core business functions. To accomplish this, a suite of single purpose application modules (SOA services) is created that take advantage of existing IT resources (e.g. applications and infrastructure) to automate business processes.
Services are modular applications and are built to embody specific functions that arise in multiple business processes: for example, getting customer information (Figure 1). They are delivered through an application neutral platform – usually Web based – and can be reused and combined in different ways to create more complex business applications that support business processes. | <urn:uuid:788fbd8e-bc94-45d4-98ee-6e91584442ec> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.infotech.com/research/build-soa-on-a-foundation-of-mdm | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280763.38/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00292-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.89814 | 137 | 2.84375 | 3 |
Computer Underground Pounds Windows Source Codes
17 Feb 2004
Kaspersky Lab, a leading information security software developer warns users about a new vulnerability in Internet Explorer (5.0, 5.5 and 6.0) and Outlook Express 5.0. The new vulnerability allows cyber-criminals launch malicious programs on breached computers using files in BMP format.
The vulnerability was discovered by an unknown individual nicknamed 'GTA' and published on several security web sites. The author provided an example of a possible attack and went on to comment that the proposed scenario was based on a detailed analysis of the Windows source code (details
"This report confirms our worst fears; the computer underground is pouncing on the Windows source code in search of new attack methods. The speed at which the first discovery appeared forces us to seriously re-evaluate the immediate future of the Internet", comments Eugene Kaspersky, Head of Anti-Virus Research at Kaspersky Lab, "From now on, we can expect similar surprise any minute."
The lack of patches for Internet Explorer and Outlook Express make this new vulnerability particularly dangerous. Only users who have Windows XP with Service Pack 1 can relax for now: tests have demonstrated that this configuration is immune.
At the same time, the new vulnerability poses a serious threat to all Internet users. It turns out that virus writers can create BMP files which load malicious programs onto victim machines while users are looking at images. In fact, infection can occur both while reading mail in Outlook and while surfing the web. 'At this point in time, we have not detected any viruses that use this exotic new method to attack computers. However, the chances of one appearing in the near future are very real indeed', added Eugene Kaspersky.
Kaspersky Lab has already released a special anti-virus database update protecting against malicious programs utilizing this vulnerability. The contents of BMP files are scanned and potentially dangerous objects are detected when they attempts to breach computers via either the Internet or emails. | <urn:uuid:3ec95bfa-c092-45c4-a5f9-576b09c7cc3d> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.kaspersky.com/au/about/news/virus/2004/Computer_Underground_Pounds_Windows_Source_Codes | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280791.35/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00137-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.907586 | 406 | 2.765625 | 3 |
As director of the biophysics program at Stanford University, Vijay Pande understands that cloud is no replacement for supercomputers like the petascale Blue Waters machine, but the scientist is having success using loosely-coupled cloudy cores for molecular dynamics research.
Pande has been using the Blue Waters system at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) to study protein folding errors to determine which errors are correlated with diseases like Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, Mad Cow disease and many cancers. By determining which errors lead to disease and what kinds of drugs can target the folding errors, there is great potential to treat or cure these classes of debilitating and deadly diseases.
Large-scale molecular dynamics (MD) simulations have traditionally been run on tightly-coupled, fast-networked supercomputers, considered necessary because the slowest link in the process is transferring data between cores. Pande, however, has pioneered an alternate method that leverages the efficient parallelization of distributed computing but avoids the communication bottleneck. Pande determined that shorter, independent simulations run on heterogeneous hardware, like cloud computing. As a bonus the infrastructure also handled hardware failures better because when a single simulation terminates, the rest continue. It’s a complementary approach to traditional MD simulation that completes many short runs in the same time envelope.
For the initial stages of the work, the researchers in Pande’s group utilize Folding@home and Google Exacycle to execute detailed molecular dynamics (MD) simulations of protein folding. Folding@home is the long-running volunteer computing project, powered by the spare cycles of its contributors, most of whom are using desktops or laptops. Each computer runs a set of independent MD simulations and returns its results to Folding@home. Google Exacycle uses essentially the same architecture except that all the cycles are supplied by Google researchers. This kind of grid or distributed computing, considered a flavor of cloud computing by some, is good for workloads with low I/O and communication requirements.
For the next step, researchers take the results of the first generation runs and pass these to Blue Waters. At this point, a tool called MSMBuilder identifies molecules that are similar in structure and clusters them into microstates. It then determines which molecules have reached a long-lived, or metastable, state. The microstates that pass through this screening provide the starting point for the second round of model runs. This molecule subgroup is passed back to Folding@home for a second generation of runs. It’s a process that may iterate several times during a single experiment.
Pande’s work is yet another example of the trend towards heterogeneity in HPC, where a workflow, or in this case, a part of a workflow, is matched up with the most appropriate resource.
But Pande does not see his work as competing with traditional approaches. In fact, the Stanford researcher thinks a combination of both approaches will be necessary to exploit next-generation computing resources as they head toward exascale.
More information about the project is available here. | <urn:uuid:f64973bc-036e-4761-a480-bb258ba50b1e> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.hpcwire.com/2014/05/22/heterogeneous-approach-molecular-dynamics/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560282937.55/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095122-00439-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.924357 | 638 | 2.71875 | 3 |
Growing Mobile Phone Use Hurts Energy Security, IEA Says
With increased mobile phone and computer use, says the International Energy Agency, comes increased energy use. Unplugging mobile devices once they're charged, and disconnecting a not-in-use charger from the wall, are just two ways to help, according to Nokia.
By 2010 there will be more than 3.5 billion mobile phone
subscribers, 1 billion personal computers and 2 billion televisions in
use around the world, according to the International Energy Agency
(IEA), an energy policy advisor to 28 member countries.
As the numbers of these devices increase, so, too, does the demand for energy.
Presenting a new IEA publication, "Gadgets and Gigawatts" in Paris on May 13, IEA Executive Director Nobuo Tanaka remarked that "despite anticipated improvements in the efficiency of electronic devices, these savings are likely to be overshadowed by the rising demand for technology in OECD and non-OECD countries."
The OECD, or the Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development, was established in 1961 and consists of 30 democratic member countries that discuss answers to common problems and coordinate domestic and international policies.
"Without new policies, the energy consumed by information and communications technologies as well as consumer electronics will double by 2022 and increase threefold by 2030 to 1,700 Terawatt hours (TWh). This will jeopardize efforts to increase energy security and reduce the emission of greenhouse gases," the IEA wrote in a statement on the book launch.
In "Gadgets and Gigawatts," the IEA reports that electricity consumption from residential information and communications technologies, and from consumer electronics, can be cut by more than half through the use of available technologies and processes.
Nokia, the largest mobile device manufacturer in an industry of more than 4 billion users, according to Kirsi Sormunen, Nokia's vice president of environmental affairs, is among the many companies taking steps toward being an environmental steward - which she said has been an interest for Nokia since long before green became trendy.
"It's in Nokia's DNA," Sormunen told eWEEK. "And I should know, I've been at Nokia for 28 years myself!"
While companies throughout the supply chain need to do their parts, Sormunen says there are simple steps end-users can take as well. For example, unplugging the charger from the wall when it's not in use.
According to data from Nokia, the amount of energy lost when a charger is plugged in but not connected to a phone is equivalent to two-thirds of the energy used by a fully charged device.
Another energy-saving tip, particularly for those who tend to charge their devices overnight, is to unplug the charger and device as soon as the device is finished charging.
In a market of 4 billion devices, Sormunen says: "There are 1 billion users using our devices. If just those people would unplug the charger, it would provide enough energy [to power] 100,000 homes."
Nokia additionally reports that if all 3 billion people using mobile phones around the world recycled one mobile phone a year - the presumption being that each of us has an old phone or two in a drawer - those devices could save 240,000 tons of raw material and reduce greenhouse gases by an amount equivalent to taking 4 million cars off the road.
Decreasing the brightness of the phone's screen, turning off Bluetooth and WLAN capabilities when not in use, and turning off or disabling sounds on keypads are also ways to increase the energy efficiency of a mobile device.
The IEA's "Gadgets and Gigawatts," in another environmentally friendly move, is additionally available in a PDF format. | <urn:uuid:6b084f3e-a562-42f1-8fe2-9e5da14e9859> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Green-IT/Growing-Mobile-Phone-Use-Hurts-Energy-Security-IEA-Says-561088 | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280221.47/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00009-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.952121 | 774 | 2.546875 | 3 |
Photo of the Week -- German Researchers Create Elastic 'Invisibility Cloak'
/ July 1, 2014
In years past, cloaks that make objects appear invisible or let heat or sound pass uninfluenced have been developed. But researchers at Germany's Karlsruhe Institute of Technology have created a new type of invisibility cloak -- one that prevents an object from being touched.
According to the university, the cloak is based on a metamaterial – one that exhibits properties not typically found in natural materials – that consists of a 3-D polymer microstructure formed by needle-shaped cones. This metamaterial structure is built around the object to be hidden, with its mechanical properties dictated by those of the object.
As Gizmag reported, to make an "unfeelability cloak," you need a rigid wall around which a structure can be wrapped to make the interior feel identical to the surrounding. To accomplish this, the researchers "placed a hard cylinder beneath the spring-like elastic metamaterial and found it to be undetectable to the touch of a finger or through tactile pressure with a measurement instrument. It was, to all intents and purposes, "invisible," as was anything placed inside the hollow interior."
This "invisibility cloak" the university says, may open up the door to interesting applications in a few years, such as very thin, light -- yet still comfortable -- camping mattresses or carpets hiding cables and pipelines below. | <urn:uuid:065d515c-71c2-440b-9e42-856b75ae56df> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.govtech.com/photos/Photo-of-the-Week-German-Researchers-Create-Elastic-Invisibility-Cloak.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280872.69/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00091-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.943579 | 300 | 3.4375 | 3 |
Abraxas was a word of mystic meaning in the system of the Gnostic Basilides, being there applied to the “Great Archon” , the princeps of the 365 spheres . The seven letters spelling its name may represent each of the seven classic planets—Sun, Moon, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn.The word is found in Gnostic texts such as the Holy Book of the Great Invisible Spirit, and also appears in the Greek Magical Papyri. It was engraved on certain antique gemstones, called on that account Abraxas stones, which were used as amulets or charms. As the initial spelling on stones was 'Abrasax' , the spelling of 'Abraxas' seen today probably originates in the confusion made between the Greek letters Sigma and Xi in the Latin transliteration. The word may be related to Abracadabra, although other explanations exist.There are similarities and differences between such figures in reports about Basilides's teaching, ancient Gnostic texts, the larger Greco-Roman magical traditions, and modern magical and esoteric writings. Opinions abound on Abraxas, who in recent centuries has been claimed to be both an Egyptian god and a demon. The Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung wrote a short Gnostic treatise in 1916 called The Seven Sermons to the Dead, which called Abraxas a god higher than the Christian God and devil that combines all opposites into one being. Wikipedia.
MacKay S.,Center for Addiction and Mental Health |
Feldberg A.,Abraxas |
Ward A.K.,Ryerson University
Criminal Justice and Behavior | Year: 2012
Firesetting by juveniles results in billions of dollars of property loss, thousands of burn injuries, and hundreds of deaths each year. A review that specifically focuses on adolescents' role in this devastating and costly behavior is not available. To address this gap, the current article reviews the past 30+ years of literature on adolescent firesetters, examining topics such as models of firesetting behavior, risk factors and correlates of adolescent firesetting, diagnostic issues, assessment tools and approaches, and current interventions. The article concludes with a discussion of goals for the field, including the development of relevant criteria for pathological firesetting. © 2012 International Association for Correctional and Forensic Psychology. Source
Energy Engineering: Journal of the Association of Energy Engineering | Year: 2013
At the risk of seeming very, very old, I recall the "Oil Embargo of 1973" and it seems like the world water crisis is frighteningly similar. Right now water is more in demand and shorter in supply than ever. Will we need something like the long gas lines to make us aware we have a problem? A few visionaries have been willing to step forward to address this issue. Unfortunately, a huge number of people are in denial.As heart wrenching as it is to think of children in an African village without drinkable water, we need to recognize that this is not just a problem in far-off lands. Las Vegas' water source, Lake Mead, is dropping dramatically. San Diego is spending billions on a new desalination plant, the aquifer in the Midwest is dropping alarmingly.We have found "alternative energy" over the years. Finding "alternative water" will not be so easy.It seems imperative to alert many of our energy colleagues as to the critical water crisis we have before us. It is very difficult to seriously address yet another major problem when economic conditions are so uncertain around the world, but address it we must. The longer we wait, the more costly it will be. We can cut back on water, we can use it more efficiently, we can process grey water for non-potable (and maybe potable) purposes, but we cannot do without it! It is absolutely essential to life. Believe me when I say, "No water is as costly as NO WATER!" © Taylor & Francis. Source
Energy Engineering: Journal of the Association of Energy Engineering | Year: 2013
There are a few problems that work against you when trying to find a company to perform a good energy audit. • Everybody and their brother now claims to do energy audits.• Nobody quite agrees on exactly what an energy audit is. In this article, I will cover these problems and tell you how to select a quality energy auditor without being ripped off. © Copyright Taylor & Francis. Source
News Article | August 17, 2012
Conspiracy theorists have linked Abraxas Applications' TrapWire to anonymous web browsing software Anonymizer via Abraxas Corp. -- while Cubic Corporation, parent company of Abraxas Corp. has denied any affiliation to TrapWire. Open and shut case, right? Not so fast. History and shareholder responsibilities might be telling a different story. Technically, Cubic has nothing to do with Abraxas Applications, which is behind TrapWire. But there are some historical vestiges as well as current shareholder arrangements that make the connections between Cubic, Abraxas Applications and Abraxas Corp. far more muddled than initially portrayed. People are saying that TrapWire is linked to Anonymizer -- popular among activists and at-risk populations -- because Abraxas Corporation acquired Anonymizer in 2008. Abraxas Corporation's parent company Cubic Corporation issued a statement saying that Cubic -- and its Abraxas Corporation -- have no affiliation with TrapWire, which they say is the product of a separate company, Abraxas Applications. Cubic Corporation acquired Abraxas Corporation in November 2010 for $124 million. Cubic has three units focused on defense systems, mission services and transportation for military operations. Trapwire's software is designed to thwart terrorist threats and criminal attacks. In other words, Cubic and the two Abraxas companies live in opposite ends of the same neighborhood. It's also true that Abraxas Applications was spun off -- out of Abraxas Corporation -- into its own software business in 2007, before the Anonymizer acquisition. Abraxas Corporation developed TrapWire beginning in 2004 (PDF link to report of work shared between Abraxas Corporation and Abraxas Applications). When TrapWire became ready to sell as a commercial product, Abraxas Applications was launched to do so in 2007. The intent for Abraxas Applications at the outset was to have both Abraxas projects play together under the direction of both companies' former CEO, Hollis Helm, former chief of the CIA's National Resources Division. The Abraxas twins certainly shared the same playground for the first three years of Applications -- and TrapWire's -- development. Cubic Corporation wasn't the Abraxas Applications parent company during the development of TrapWire. But here's where the ties between the three companies become a bit more nuanced. It's important to note that as part of the 2010 merger, Ntrepid Corporation was assigned to Abraxas Corporation shareholders, which in turn received apparent control of Abraxas Applications. As a condition of the merger, these shareholders were made to change the name of Abraxas Applications to something else: it became TrapWire, Inc. Perhaps three different company names breaks the ties between the entitities, but that's doubtful. Why? Anonymizer Inc. is a wholly owned subsidary of Ntrepid, owned by Cubic Corporation.
News Article | July 6, 2015
SAN ANTONIO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Abraxas Petroleum Corporation (“Abraxas” or the “Company”) (NASDAQ:AXAS) will host its second quarter 2015 earnings conference call on Thursday, August 6, 2015 at 10 AM Central Time (11 AM Eastern Time). Abraxas plans to announce second quarter 2015 operating and financial results prior to the call. The conference call can be accessed by dialing 888.713.4205 and entering conference code 76710027. A live webcast of the conference call can be accessed under the “Investor Relations” portion of the Company’s website at www.abraxaspetroleum.com. If you are unable to participate in the live conference call, a replay will be available through August 13, 2015 and can be accessed by dialing 888.286.8010 and entering conference code 29902751. Abraxas Petroleum Corporation is a San Antonio based crude oil and natural gas exploration and production company with operations across the Rocky Mountain, Permian Basin and onshore Gulf Coast regions of the United States. Safe Harbor for forward-looking statements: Statements in this release looking forward in time involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties, which may cause Abraxas’ actual results in future periods to be materially different from any future performance suggested in this release. Such factors may include, but may not be necessarily limited to, changes in the prices received by Abraxas for crude oil and natural gas. In addition, Abraxas’ future crude oil and natural gas production is highly dependent upon Abraxas’ level of success in acquiring or finding additional reserves. Further, Abraxas operates in an industry sector where the value of securities is highly volatile and may be influenced by economic and other factors beyond Abraxas’ control. In the context of forward-looking information provided for in this release, reference is made to the discussion of risk factors detailed in Abraxas’ filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission during the past 12 months. | <urn:uuid:9eefd504-0359-420f-ab00-6ff847d0026e> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.linknovate.com/affiliation/abraxas-281603/all/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560284376.37/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095124-00393-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.950714 | 1,933 | 2.546875 | 3 |
Here's another academic take on the financial implications of social media: Earlier in a Risky Business contribution I discussed the finding by a team of researchers at Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Business that traders acting in sync with one another, via instant messaging, are more likely to dodge losses. Now, a paper to be published in an upcoming Review of Economic Studies takes this line of inquiry a step further. It shows that large social networks in general often are quite efficient at aggregating the information that is so widely dispersed in society.
MIT professors Daron Acemoglu, Munther A. Dahleh and Asuman Ozdaglar teamed up with Ilan Lobel of NYU's Stern School of Business to study "Bayesian" learning -- a nineteenth century statistical theorem that shows how to predict the probability of any one of a set of possible causes of a given outcome from knowledge of each of their probabilities. They bring this concept to bear on more modern social networks, and they analyze the conditions under which these networks, as they become larger, are more likely to take "the right action."
Previous research -- not to mention common wisdom -- have suggested that when people make decisions after observing each others' actions, they often fall into "information cascades," leading to counterproductive "herd" behavior. Think of asset price bubbles or the rush to stampede out of a burning theater.
But the MIT and Stern professors show that these cascades are unlikely to occur in a world in which people can observe the actions of their social network friends.
For example, let's say a TV personality like Oprah Winfrey selects a technology to adopt, and a few of our friends rush out to buy it. We are likely to know that our friends' actions were based on this single source of information and as a result are less likely to copy our friends' decisions than if our friends had independently chosen the same action.
This type of "learning" is possible even when there are "influential agents" or "information leaders" who are observed by "many, most or even all agents, while others may be observed not at all or much less frequently," they argue.
The paper concludes: "It is only when individuals are excessively influential -- loosely speaking when they act as the sole source of information for infinitely many agents" -- that social networks fail to deliver. | <urn:uuid:401dfc84-628e-41e6-b445-60a5a5deeef9> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.cio.com/article/2407124/social-media/following-the--social-network--herd.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280292.50/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00119-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.959856 | 478 | 2.53125 | 3 |
With video conferencing, you can bring the world into the classroom. Lifesize is leading the way to a more interconnected learning experience, and our background working with school districts and universities all over the world has helped us tailor our technology to meet the particular needs of educators. Here are just a few of the many things schools can do with HD video collaboration technology:
Enhance curriculum with virtual field trips. When time or budget issues make physical travel impossible or impractical, video conferencing saves the day. We worked with the Museum of Nature and Science in Dallas to create a special video conferencing field-trip program, and now 5,000 schools across Texas can visit the museum without having to leave town.
Bring experts to the classroom—virtually. Inviting experts into the classroom is a great way to bring meaning to a lesson, but their job requirements and busy schedules often preclude taking too much time out of their busy days. Luckily, video conferencing eliminates the time and hassle of travel, making it easy to beam subject-matter experts directly into the classroom from anywhere in the world. Using Lifesize video conferencing technology, the Technical University of Munich was able to connect robotics experts with engineering students for an in-depth, two-week workshop. Video conferencing created an opportunity for these two groups to interact that would have otherwise been prohibitively expensive.
Expand access to students in rural communities. In the past, students in sparsely populated rural areas have missed out on many of the opportunities that their urban and suburban peers have taken for granted; when simply busing to school can take hours, it’s no surprise when education takes a back seat to other obligations. Connecting these rural students via video conferencing—both allowing them to attend school from home and giving them access to field trips and experts they would otherwise never have the opportunity to experience—can dramatically improve the quality of their learning experience, ensuring that their rights to a public education are finally met in practice and not just in theory.
Connect classrooms in different countries and expand students’ worldview. In our increasingly global society, it’s more important than ever for students to have a greater appreciation for the world around them. With video conferencing, Alief ISD connects its schools with other schools around the globe to cross traditional classroom boundaries and celebrate literacy and reading. Instantly connecting to other classrooms in countries all over the globe puts a face to geographically distant peoples and cultures, preparing students to be citizens and stewards of the more open, more tolerant and more interconnected world of tomorrow.
Record and archive sessions for future playback. Whether a student missed a class due to absence or just wants to go over the content during their study time, Lifesize recording and playback makes it easy to stay on track and reinforces knowledge transfer. This benefit extends beyond just the students. District staff meetings can be held over video to eliminate travel and recorded for anyone unable to participate live.
Conduct parent/teacher conferences remotely. Avoid scheduling conflicts by meeting with parents remotely. With tools like guest invites and web apps, parents just need an Internet connection and a webcam in order to dial in to a parent/teacher conference. This method is easier on your schedule and theirs.
At Lifesize, we are committed to providing educators, from those at K–12 schools to those at upper-level institutions, with the solutions they need to adapt to an ever-changing world. These were just a few of the many ways video conferencing can improve the quality and scope of the education you provide your students. For more ways to offer enriching programs beyond the four walls of the classroom, download our guide on the 6 Reasons Why Video Conferencing Is Essential for Education.
Want to learn more about K–12 and higher education video conferencing solutions? Book a demo and talk to an education video conferencing expert. | <urn:uuid:92540982-1da0-477c-8ede-98a6df337796> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.lifesize.com/video-conferencing-blog/video-in-education/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280888.62/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00513-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.957534 | 799 | 2.515625 | 3 |
United Nations Organization (UNO)
The UNO is an association of sovereign states bound by a Charter (Constitution) to maintain international peace and security. It is the worlds largest international organization; a successor to the league of Nation.
On June 26, 1945, the delegates of 50 countries at San Francisco (USA) signed the United Nations Charter (Constitution).
Foundation Day of the UNO
The UNO Formally came into existence on October 24, 1945 when governments of China, France, and the United Kingdom, the former USSR, the United States and a majority of other states ratified the UNO Charter. October 24 is celebrated as the United Nations Day throughout the world.
First Regular Session of the UNO
The first regular session of the UNO was held in London in January 1946 and Trygve Lie (Norway) was elected the first Secretary General of the UNO.
Headquarters of the UNO
These are located on the First Avenue, UN Plaza, New York City, and United States of America.
The UNO Flag
The UNO General Assembly adopted the UNO flag on October 20, 1947. The white UNO emblem is superimposed on a light blue background. The emblem consists of the global map projected from the North Pole and embraced in twin olive branches (symbol of peace). The UNO flag is not to be subordinated to any other flag in the world.
Aims and Objectives
The main objectives of the UN are:
- To maintain peace and security in the world
- To work together to remove poverty, disease and illiteracy and encourage respect for each other?s rights of basic freedom
- To develop friendly relations among nations.
- To b a centre to help nations achieve these common goals.
Membership of the UNO
Admission of Members: New members are admitted to the General assembly on the recommendation of the Security Council and two-third of the members should vote in favor. Members are expelled or suspended in the same manner.
Permanent Members: There are five permanent members of the Security Council: China, France, Russia, UK and USA.
Veto: A negative vote by a permanent member bars action by the Security Council and is called a veto. Each permanent member enjoys the power were veto.
Membership: When the UNO Charter was signed, there were only 50 members. By 1994 the membership rose to 185. The following nations were admitted to the UNO in 1993:
In 1994: Palau, a newly independent Pacific nation which had been under the trusteeship of the USA.
Non-members: (1) Switzerland (2) Taiwan. In addition several other small states like Nauru. Tonga, Vatican City are also not members of the UNO.
Organization of the UNO
The principal bodies of the UN are:
- The General Assembly
- The Security council
- The Economic and Social Council
- International Court of Justice
- Trusteeship Council
General Assembly (GA)
Headquarters: New York
Membership: Consists of all member states of the UNO. Each member can send five delegates but each nation has only one vote.
Functions: All other UNO bodies report to the General Assembly. It discusses and makes recommendations on any subject covered under the UNO Charter except those with which the Security Council may be dealing.
Meetings: The General Assembly meets every year in regular sessions beginning on the third Tuesday in September.
UN Security Council (SC)
Headquarters: New York
Membership: The Security Council has 15 members- five permanent members enjoying veto power (China, France, Russia, UK and USA) and 10 non-permanent elected members. The non-permanent members are elected by the General Assembly. They retire on rotation every two years.
Function: The Security Council is responsible for international peace and security. Any nation, irrespective of its membership of the UNO, can put forth its problem before the Council. The Security Council can recommend peaceful solutions or, if necessary, may order use of force to restore peace.
The Economic and Social Council
Headquarter: New York
Membership: Consists of representatives of 54 member-countries elected by a two-third majority in the General Assembly. One-third of the members are elected every year to serve for a period of three years and one-third of the members retire annually.
Functions: The Economic and Social Council carries on the functions of the UNO with regard to international economic, social, cultural, educational, health and related matters.
International Court of Justice (ICJ)
Headquarter: The Hague (Netherlands)
Membership: Consists of 15 judges who are elected by the General Assembly and the Security Council for a term of nine years.
Function: It gives advisory opinion on legal matters to the bodies and special agencies of the UNO and considers the legal disputes brought before them.
Justice R. S. Pathak, Chief Justice of India, was elected Judge of the ICJ on April 18, 1989. He became the third Indian on whom this honour has been bestowed. The other two were Mr. Justice B.N. Rao and Mr. Justice Nagendra Singh.
Headquarter: New York
Membership: There are five permanent members of the Security Council plus those nations, who administer Trust Territories.
Functions: To safeguard the interest of inhabitants of territories which are not yet fully self-governing and are governed by an administering country.
Headed by: Secretary General which is appointed by the General Assembly on the recommendation of the Security Council.
Tenure: Five years and eligible for re-election after the tern expires.
Functions: It is the Chief administrative office of the UNO, which coordinates and supervises the activities of the UNO.
Secretary Generals of the UN
|1. Trygve Lie||1946-52|
|2. Dag Hammarskjold (He was killed in an Air Crash)||1953-61|
|3. U. Thant||1962-71|
|4. Dr. Kurt Waldheim||1972-81|
|5. Javier Perez De Cuellar||1982-91 (Two Terms)|
|6. Dr. Boutros Ghali||1992-1997|
|7. Kofi Annan||1997-2007 (Two Terms)|
|8. Ban Ki-moon||2007-Till Date|
Official Languages of the UNO
There are now six official languages recognized by the UN:
This list is based on the content of the title and/or content of the article displayed above which makes them more relevant and more likely to be of interest to you.
We're glad you have chosen to leave a comment. Please keep in mind that all comments are moderated according to our comment policy, and all links are nofollow. Do not use keywords in the name field. Let's have a personal and meaningful conversation.comments powered by Disqus | <urn:uuid:fd96df85-154c-47ce-b9cb-3aa52666dcd1> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.knowledgepublisher.com/article-676.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280899.42/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00357-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.942854 | 1,455 | 3.25 | 3 |
Sophos has released its Mid-Year 2011 Security Threat Report, which reveals that since the beginning of 2011, the company has identified an average of 150,000 malware samples every day.
This equates to a unique malware file being created every half-second, a 60 percent increase since 2010. In addition, around 19,000 malicious website addresses (URLs) are now identified daily, with 80 percent of those URLs being pages on legitimate websites that have been hacked or compromised.
High-profile hacking attacks against governments and corporations have dominated the security landscape in 2011. The result is that other security issues which could pose a greater threat to businesses, governments and consumers have received less attention.
Among the key threats identified by the report are:
- Search engine poisoning, also known as Black Hat SEO, is on the rise, threatening businesses of all sizes. Cybercriminals manipulate search results from Google, Bing and Yahoo to lure web surfers to malicious pages that place viruses, worms, Trojans or fake anti-virus software on computers. Search engine poisoning attacks are extremely effective, and account for more than 30 percent of all malware detected by Sophos’s Web Appliance (SWA).
- Fake AV. Recently, the FBI busted a cybergang that tricked nearly a million people into buying its fraudulent software. With a price point ranging from $50 to $130 the scam netted more than $72 million.
- Social media threats have sharply escalated while mass scale email-focused attacks are diminishing. Facebook users in particular are weary of the social network’s safety. As Facebook holds so much personal information on users, scam attacks have been severe in 2011. The scams include cross-site scripting, clickjacking, bogus surveys and identity theft.
- The rise of mobile banking malware. Each mobile phone developer has its own strategy for security, some more effective than others. Understand how a smartphone’s operating system can help protect you, or let malware attack. | <urn:uuid:1d20e479-87f2-4e49-8da2-0f09c93cb34a> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.helpnetsecurity.com/2011/08/01/a-unique-malware-file-is-created-every-half-second/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280899.42/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00357-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.945047 | 406 | 2.578125 | 3 |
“Just as teachers and parents teach children physical safety skills – such as looking both ways before crossing a street – they must model this behavior in the cyber world,” said Julie Peeler, director of the (ISC)² Foundation, which focuses on childrens' cyber safety. “Unfortunately, they don’t always have the skills and knowledge they need to guide children as they navigate the online threats they face every day at school and at home.”
To that end, the (ISC)² Foundation has beefed up its Safe and Secure Online Program and has launched a new, interactive website, with the goal of enlisting and empowering those who have the greatest influence on children’s time and outlook – their parents and teachers.
Safe and Secure Online for Parents and Teachers features an interactive presentation and educational workshops that will give parents and teachers the specialized skills and knowledge they need to know what’s going on in their children’s cyber world. The idea is to teach children to be good digital citizens and to help them recognize and protect against not always clear but ever-present cyber dangers. Using cutting-edge, interactive presentation materials, (ISC)²-certified cybersecurity experts work directly with the children in a classroom setting to tackle timely, critical topics, including online identities and reputations, malware, cyber bullying, online predators, gaming and social media pitfalls.
Meanwhile, the new Foundation website will act as a resource for parents and teachers looking to inform themselves and their children about cyber threats and online safety. They’ll be able to access awareness and educational materials, stay up to date on new risks to children and easily request and schedule a Safe and Secure Online presentation for their children’s school or parent/teacher group, as well as get access to the tools they need to take a more active role in their children’s cyber security education.
“Knowledge can truly empower a person,” said Tony Vargas, president and chairman of (ISC)²’s Sacramento chapter. “(ISC)²’s Safe and Secure Online programs for children, adults and teachers are very powerful because they teach people how to think differently and question what they see online. Thinking differently or questioning what you see and do before clicking on a Website, opening an email attachment or following a hyperlink is what can truly make a difference in enabling a person to have the safest online experience possible.” | <urn:uuid:c26ce310-7aa4-49fb-9ef0-6837bf8ee686> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/isc2-revamps-programs-for-childrens-cyber-safety/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560281419.3/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095121-00265-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958872 | 502 | 2.828125 | 3 |
The Facebook Voter Experiment
September 28, 2012
Discover Magazine hosts in interesting read on the impact of information within social networks. The Not Exactly Rocket Science Blog post is titled “A 61-Million-Person Experiment on Facebook Shows How Ads and Friends Affect Our Voting Behaviour.” Blogger Ed Yong describes the huge experiment in which, on congressional election day 2010, Facebook worked with researcher James Fowler from the University of California, San Diego.
Fowler’s team wanted to see if they could influence Facebook users to vote by applying social (media) pressure. Almost everyone who visited the site on that day saw a special Election Day message which displayed an “I Voted” link, a link to find their polling place, and a counter with a running total of users who (claimed they) had voted by that point. The vast majority also saw the profile pictures of any of their friends who had already voted. One control group saw the election messaging minus the pictures of their friends. Another control group missed out on the special message altogether.
See the article for specifics, but the upshot is this: users who saw that their friends had cast a vote seem to have been prodded to head to the polls themselves. Mobilizing voters is indeed a noteworthy thing, and this was a clever experiment. I’m most interested, though, in the following glimpse of the future:
“The internet, and social networks like Facebook, could [allow] scientists to carry out research on an unprecedented scale. It’s cheap and the results have ‘external validity’, meaning that they’re relevant to what people actually do in life, rather than in a stark controlled laboratory.
“‘It’s a brand new world!’ says Fowler. He thinks that such experiments could help psychologists to do detailed studies on very specific groups of people. ‘[That] is the first step in understanding not just average human behaviour, but the behaviour of specific types of individuals in specific types of environments,’ he says. ‘There are many human psychologies, not just one.'”
Advancing psychological understanding is a worthy goal. But how do we all feel about being unwittingly, if anonymously, enrolled in such experiments? We had better figure that out, because I see many more coming our way. Figuratively, of course; we won’t know such projects exist until (and unless) they are trumpeted in the news.
Cynthia Murrell, September 28, 2012 | <urn:uuid:8e89b29c-8122-46b8-aec0-5c89659be531> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://arnoldit.com/wordpress/2012/09/28/the-facebook-voter-experiment/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560285001.96/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095125-00081-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.953515 | 524 | 2.53125 | 3 |
A Star is Born
/ November 26, 2013
The thus-far elusive activities that occur during the birth of a new star have been uncovered, thanks to the combined observations from NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope and the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) in Chile.
These high-powered telescopes captured an image of an object known as HH (Herbig-Haro) 46/47, which occurs in conjunction around a star’s birth. HH objects are created when jets shot out by newborn stars collide with surrounding material. This produces small, nebulous regions usually obscured by the gas and dust that envelops the object, but visible due to the light seen by the telescopes.
In this image, the blue light shows the gas that is energized by the outflowing jets of the newborn star. The green lights show the boundary of the hydrogen and dust gas cloud that surrounds the fledgling star. The red color is created by excited carbon monoxide gas, and it helps reveal that the gas blown out by the star’s jets is expanding much more rapidly than was previously thought. This extra speed is thought to have an effect on the surrounding area’s turbulence, which can impact its likelihood of birthing new stars.
Photo credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ALMA | <urn:uuid:c9447394-c2e9-42d0-878d-421225803c79> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.govtech.com/photos/Photo-of-the-Week-Newborn-Star.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280763.38/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00293-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.954204 | 275 | 3.0625 | 3 |
- IP Camera Systems
- IP Camera Recording Systems
- IP Camera Selection Chart
- IP Camera Review
- Video Management Software
- Network Video Recorders
- Components of the IP Camera System
- More FAQs about IP Cameras
Frequently Asked Questions or FAQs about IP Camera Systems
Q: What is an IP camera system?
A: An IP camera system consists of a number of network attached cameras, which are generally called IP cameras. The system also includes some type of video recording system, and a number of viewing workstations. The video recording system can be either a computer running video management software (VMS, or a Network Video Recorder (NVR).
Q: How do you record the video from IP cameras systems?
Video Management Software (VMS) is software only that runs on your Windows computer and can be scaled to any size of system.
Network Video Recorder (NVR) is a complete system that includes the computer and software and is typically proprietary and not expandable.
Cloud service provides remote recording (over the Internet) for IP cameras at many different locations.
For more details take a look at our review and comparison of a number of these IP video recording systems.
Q: What is a Video Server?
A: The network video server is a computer that runs special Video Management Software (VMS) and is used to record video from IP cameras. A Windows computer is usually used as the platform for the VMS. Video is recorded onto the computer’s hard drives in a special video format. Learn more about Video Management Software.
There has been some confusion with this term because a number of years ago a device that attached an analog camera to the network was also called a video or camera server. A video camera server, is now usually referred to as a Video Encoder.
Q: What is a Network Video Recorder (NVR)
A: The Network Video Recorder (NVR) is a complete IP Camera recording device. It is similar to the Video Server system, but instead of using a standard Windows computer, it uses a dedicated special computer with an operating system and application software that is dedicated to recording the video. It also allows many people to view real time and recorded video. The term evolved from the older DVR (or Digital Video Recorder). The NVR includes both the computer and special Video Management Software (VMS). The computer usually uses Linux, but there are some that use Windows as well.
For a comparison of the Computer Server using VMS and the Network Video Server (NVR), take a look at our review and comparison of various systems.
Q: What is the Difference between a network video server and the Network Video Recorder
A: The Video Server is similar to the Network Video Recorder (NVR) in that they both record the video. The Network Video Recorder comes with the VMS software already installed, while the Video Server does not include the VMS software. You can select the VMS you like and then load it on the Video Server. The Video Server usually runs Windows operating system and is more flexible than the NVR because it is easier to expand and add cameras. The NVR usually has a fixed limit to the number of cameras it will support.
Q: What is a Digital Video Recorder (DVR)?
A: The DVR is a device that records video from analog cameras to one or more hard drives. The term DVR is also used by the consumer TV market. The DVR used in the security market has a fixed number of BNC connections to attach cameras. DVRs are available with 4, 8 16, 32 and 64 channels (or connections). This means that you have a maximum number of cameras that can be supported by one unit. Once you exceed the number of connections available on the DVR, you will need to add another DVR to your system. Some DVRs connect to the network and can be viewed using a Windows computer.
Q: What is the difference between a DVR and a NVR?
A: Here are a few of the many differences between these devices.
– The NVR connects to the computer network and so does all the IP cameras. This allows you to take advantage of the existing network infrastructure instead of running wires from a “home base” location to all the cameras.
– The DVR uses coax connections to each of the analog cameras
– The NVR supports high resolution megapixel cameras
– The DVR supports only cameras with VGA resolution
There are many more differences between systems that use analog cameras and those that use IP cameras. To learn more take a look at our article that compares an analog system to the new IP camera systems..
Q: What software do I need?
A: If you want to view many cameras on the same screen, or need to record the video, you must select a video management software product (VMS) or select one of the network video recorder (NVR) systems.
There are a number of different Video Management Software (VMS) products available. The primary job of the VMS is to record the video from many IP cameras on the network. It is very important to select software that is very reliable and doesn’t crash. You certainly don’t want to lose important video. It is also important to use a dedicated computer system to run the VMS.
The various software products available have many additional functions including motion detection, special alerts that tell you when something important has happened. Flexible display of real time and recorded video, and easy locating and display of multiple recorded video channels to name a few. The exact feature set depends on your objectives. Take a look at the table of VMS that compares a number of different products.
Q: How much bandwidth is required on my network to support IP Cameras?
A: Calculating bandwidth used by IP cameras is complicated, but it can be estimated. Bandwidth used by an IP camera system is determined by the number of cameras, camera resolution, frame rate, compression used, amount of motion seen by each camera, and sometimes even the lighting.
For example one frame of video uses about 30K Bytes when using MJPEG compression. If we require 10 frames per second, it takes up 10 frames/sec. X 30K Bytes = 300 K Bytes/sec. which equals 2400 K bits/sec. (using 8 bits per Byte). This can be reduced over 20 times when using the latest H.264 compression, so you use only 120 K bits/sec. To learn more about calculating bandwidth take a look at our article about “IP Camera Bandwidth“.
Q: What is Power over Ethernet or PoE?
A: The latest IP cameras get power over the network. This is referred to as Power over Ethernet (PoE). You can also add a PoE mid span or power injector between the switch and the camera. This means that you only need to run one network cable to each camera, making installation very easy.
Security systems can be complex because they include many different components that have to work together. Kintronics is a resource for engineering and integration of all your security projects. We can design your complete system so don’t hesitate to contact us for assistance.
After purchasing your system we make sure that it works exactly the way you expect. You can contact us for help with your installation and any technical support you may need.
We provide technical support and warranty support. Contact us at 1-800-431-1658 or 914-944-3425 whenever you need assistance. | <urn:uuid:552673bf-b5e9-4087-8bda-0796759311c3> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://kintronics.com/resources/faqs-ip-camera-systems/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280763.38/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00293-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.924733 | 1,576 | 2.515625 | 3 |
As technology continues to advance at lightning speed, microprocessors keep getting smaller and more efficient. This is good news because it means computers and mobile devices get faster and use less energy. However, this is also bad news because these newer chips have higher soft error rates (i.e., read/write or computation errors) which can cause the software running on them to fail.
Good news on this front, though, comes from researchers at MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab (CSAIL), who’ve developed a software-based approach to managing this efficiency/reliability tradeoff. Reasoning that some software, in reality, can allow for small amount of errors and still work just fine (like in video rendering), they’ve developed a new programming language and analysis framework that enables programmers to account for unreliable hardware and specify an acceptable level of errors in their software.
They call this new language Rely. It supports a number of standard programming constructs, such as integer, logical and floating point expressions, as well as arrays, conditionals, while loops, and function calls. Developers can write programs that allocate variables to unreliable memory, indicate potentially unreliable computations using a simple notation (putting a dot after operators, e.g., x = y +. z) and specify reliability thresholds for functions. Given this code and a specification of hardware unreliability (i.e., the probabilities that read/writes or arithmetic/logical operations are correct), Rely can then do a reliability analysis and indicate the likelihood that a program will run correctly.
Using this framework, programmers can decide just how much error they’re willing to tolerate in their program. It may be that a certain level of software unreliability is worth the gain in performance from running on more efficient, unreliable hardware. However, if the benefit isn't worth the cost, then the developer can choose to sacrifice performance for increased software reliability.
This software is still in the research phase and isn’t something you can get ahold of yet, as more work needs to be done. But it’s a significant first step in allowing developers to better take advantage of leaps in hardware performance - and freeing hardware manufacturers to keep creating smaller/better/faster chips without fear of impacting software. As the researchers wrote:
"By enabling developers to better understand the probabilities with which this hardware enables approximate computations to produce correct results, these guarantees can help developers safely exploit the significant that unreliable hardware platforms offer."
[h/t MIT News]
Read more of Phil Johnson's #Tech blog and follow the latest IT news at ITworld. Follow Phil on Twitter at @itwphiljohnson. For the latest IT news, analysis and how-tos, follow ITworld on Twitter and Facebook. | <urn:uuid:e0b78064-c77b-4111-93e0-b700de0527cb> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.itworld.com/article/2702555/security/more-efficient-hardware-could-be-bad-for-your-software.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280929.91/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00201-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.909405 | 573 | 3.4375 | 3 |
Static floating route is static route like any other but with added administrative distance in the configuration
R1(config)#ip route 172.16.10.0 255.255.255.0 10.10.10.2 200
Defining the packets route using Static Floating Routes is very interesting topic so I decided to give you a short description of Static floating routes with an example. Static floating route is the same as normal static route except that this kind of static route has Administrative distance configured to some other value than 1.
Remember that if we configure normal static route like this:
R1(config)#ip route 172.16.10.0 255.255.255.0 10.10.10.2
It will send all packets destined for 172.16.10.0/24 network to the neighbor with interface address 10.10.10.2 and of course that static route will have Administrative distance (AD) of 1 by default. If we make the configuration like this:
R1(config)#ip route 172.16.10.0 255.255.255.0 Serial 0/0
In this case the AD will be zero (0). Pretty cool right? I didn’t know that difference for a long time but there is another article in the process of writing that explains why that is so.
In either cases of course, this would be normal because almost every time we configure the static route to override some routing protocol decision. But what if we want to use a static route to make something completely opposite? If we want to use static route only to be a backup route to some subnet then we will need to give the precedence to the path learned by some IGP (Interior Gateway Protocol) like OSPF for example. We know that most paths (routes) learned by OSPF protocol have Administrative Distance of 110. In that case the Administrative distance of some static route needs to be bigger than 110 if we don’t want to kick out the OSPF route from routing table.
If we configure the route like this:
R1(config)#ip route 172.16.10.0 255.255.255.0 10.10.20.2 200
If you see this configuration above, you will notice that after next-hop address 10.10.10.2 there is number 200 added. This part of the command will override the default Administrative distance of the route 1 and configure the same static route with Administrative distance of 200. That’s why this static route will not enter the routing table until there is OSPF path to the subnet 172.16.10.0/24. If for some reason the router R1 loses the prefix 172.16.10.0 learned by OSPF it will then use the static FLOATING route configured above.
From there is the name static floating? Yes! This kind of static route is able to enter and exit the routing table base on other routes to the same subnet learned from some IGP in the process.
So that is the main difference between „normal“ static route and floating one. Normal static route is permanently entered in the routing table and the other one is not.
I made a simple example to show how this works. Let’s say that R1 is a branch router that will use a floating static route to send Enterprise traffic across the Internet but only if the leased line is broken or when the IGP-learned path across the private link fails. This is a normal situation where some branch office is connected to the company infrastructure with private link and uses Internet connection for the backup.
In this example R1 is using OSPF over the leased line (connection to R2 S0/0 – S0/0) and there is a configuration of a floating static route to 172.16.10.0/24 that routes traffic over the Internet connection (S0/1 – S0/1). Router R1 would prefer an OSPF learned, AD 110 route for 172.16.10.0/24 instead, until that route through S0/0 fails.
Basically if there would be any communication break on the leased line, the static floating route would direct that traffic across the Internet. In that way the communication will not experience any outage and the leased line will be used at his best using IGP protocol when online. | <urn:uuid:43f9614f-9f0d-4ce2-a016-d253f3435b0d> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://howdoesinternetwork.com/2013/static-floating-route | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560281424.85/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095121-00109-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.897734 | 916 | 2.90625 | 3 |
The awareness of the importance of proper management of SSH user keys is growing, but confusion still abounds within organizations.
They put great emphasis on finding and controlling all the private keys in their environment. The idea behind this emphasis is that private keys are similar to passwords, so keys can be managed by the same principles.
There are several reasons why this is not the case. For starters, think of the private key as the key to your house and the public key as the lock to your door. When you lose the key to your house, to truly be safe, you need to change both the lock and the key. You need to know who owns the key and, more importantly, what the user of the key may do when they enter your house.
One of these things is not like the other
It’s critical to understand that SSH user keys are not passwords. Significant differences exist between them that warrant us handling them differently. There are five key differences to consider:
- Passwords can’t be generated without oversight. SSH user keys often can.
- Passwords are related to user accounts. SSH user keys don’t have to be.
- Passwords usually expire on a certain date. SSH user keys don’t.
- Passwords grant access to the operating system level without additional restrictions. SSH user keys can control both access and privilege levels.
- Passwords are primarily used for interactive authentication. SSH user keys are most often used for machine-to-machine authentication.
Even if we could locate all the private keys and store them all in a secure central vault, problems remain. Unless we can actually prohibit the ability to generate new key pairs by administrators, it is very easy to come through the intended jump host or privileged access management architecture, access the target server and drop in a new key pair, which would allow you now to bypass that architecture in the future. This is an all-too-common scenario.
Controlling the locks
What alternatives exist, then? Going back to the principle of controlling the locks to your house, the most important controls related to access are placed on the public key side of the equation.
There are several options available when we provision a key pair. First, it is possible during the generation of an SSH user key pair to place what is known as an IP source restriction on that key. This means that for that key pair, the private key may only access that target server from that specific IP. So, if the private key was stolen and it attempted to authenticate from another IP, the authentication would not work. In a simple step, we have just decreased the attack vector of the key significantly.
The second option is to put a command restriction on the public key. This restricts the authenticated session to running the commands it is intended to. For example, if we lock down a key from a command point of view to only allow that authenticated session to run SFTP, then we have eliminated the possibility, should the private key be stolen or lost, of it being misused to run other commands, which could affect the resilience of our environment.
Lastly, when it comes to SSH configuration management, there are numerous controls at our disposal. SSH configuration is not a very electrifying topic. However, it is again something that lies well within our control to help decrease risk within our environments.
Monitor What You Value
Key-based authentication can potentially impact numerous applications and platforms; this is why it is important for enterprises to have visibility, understanding and continuous monitoring of them. SSH user keys are frequently being used for remote administrator access and application-to-application connections for our most critical infrastructure. It is a question of risk, compliance and resilience that ultimately directly impacts our brand reputations.
Getting a handle on our environments necessitates looking at which things we have control of. This includes the server side configuration of our SSH servers and the public key component of the authentication equation. The idea of finding and controlling all the private keys is a bit of a pipe dream, so emphasis should instead be placed on restricting access and managing public keys effectively. | <urn:uuid:90331c84-9d86-4431-8901-84bbee55db80> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/opinions/ssh-key-management-what-to-focus/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560281424.85/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095121-00109-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.944059 | 837 | 2.875 | 3 |
More than 27% of applications tested contain a web vulnerability.
NTA Monitor has reported a 10% increase in the total number of web applications found to have at least one high-risk security issue in its 2009 Annual Web Application Security Report.
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The three most popular forms of hacking were SQL injection, cross-site scripting and cross-request forgery. A SQL injection attack enables attackers to modify the database queries initiated from an application. A cross-site scripting attack enables a hostile website to cause potentially malicious code to be executed in a user's browser. In a cross-request forgery attack, a hostile website can make arbitrary HTTP requests to applications.
Roy Hills, technical director at NTA Monitor, said, "All user-supplied data should be properly sanitised before returning it to the browser or storing it in a database."
NTA Monitor urged organisations to switch from a persistent authentication method to a transient authentication method to help prevent cross-request forgery attacks.
Hills also recommended that business put in place an account lockout mechanism to lock out accounts permanently or temporarily, to help prevent brute force attacks cracking user accounts. | <urn:uuid:6c3502c7-0295-42b8-bbde-a5c9d2a3f8c9> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.computerweekly.com/news/1280090646/One-in-three-websites-fail-security-test | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280292.50/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00120-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.903271 | 258 | 2.59375 | 3 |
As 3-D effects continue to pop up in movie theaters worldwide, emergency responders are finding more practical uses for the technology, like in Durham, N.C., where officials have started using 3-D technology to observe the locations of residents in trouble.
In April, the Durham Emergency Communications Center (DECC), launched advanced tools that show the exact origins of 911 calls in a 3-D, aerial image. Communications officers can view any property, building, highway or other structure in Durham County from 12 different angles, and obtain measurements and elevation from the imagery. This technology is critical when it comes to GIS mapping, transportation and community planning. And in the case of Durham, its usefulness includes missions for first responders, who can better assess the scene of an incident.
"Sometimes people [who call 911] either don't give us all the information we need or they don't know where they are exactly," said James Soukup, director of the Durham Emergency Communications Center. "This gives us another method to try and pinpoint the location and know more about what's going on. It means we'll be able to see what is around you."
Developed by a company called Pictometry International Corp., based in Rochester, N.Y., the software is used in about 800 counties and six states, according to Dante Pennacchia, the company's chief marketing officer. Unlike the satellite images and aerial shots that point straight down, Pictometry captures images from a 40-degree angle. According to Pennacchia, the software saves time and money by making users more efficient in their respective jobs.
In Durham, communication officers can give first responders remote guidance, find alternate traffic routes, direct them to alternate entrances and exits at the scene, monitor foot chases based on landmarks and more. For instance, police recently responded to an incident where a suspect was seen running from a house into the woods. Communications officers used the technology to locate the exit points of the woods. When the suspect emerged, police were waiting.
View Full Story | <urn:uuid:c0063df6-cfec-44d7-9afa-9dc80585eea5> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.govtech.com/e-government/3-D-Technology-Helps-Emergency-Responders-Observe.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560279923.28/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095119-00478-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.953867 | 414 | 2.5625 | 3 |
Location-based mobile applications such as Facebook, Google and others are used by a large percentage of adults and teenagers. Applications that pinpoint a user's physical location introduce unprecedented new risks. The potential threats range from fraud and identity theft to crimes such as burglary or physical violence.
Geolocation is your physical location and is derived by technology using data from your computer or mobile device. It could relate to your physical location (position on the earth's surface) or the virtual (internet) environment. Both can be collected in many ways:
- Web browsing via your computer (IP address is your identification)
- Mobile phone usage
- GPS (Global Positioning System) devices
- Credit/debit card transactions
- Tags in photographs and postings (Facebook and Twitter).
Location can be collected in an active or passive mode. The active mode is a user device that provides the Geolocation using software to determine the user's position by wireless, GPS or by "request and response". The passive mode is server-based and determines the position via IP (internet protocol), 3G or 4G and wireless positioning.
What are the benefits location brings?
- To the Customer: optimal request routing or navigation, instant purchasing decisions (shopping, restaurants), nearest station or bus stop and social networking opportunities.
- To Business: targeted marketing, delivery and asset management, insurance risk management, logistics etc. The list is endless.
Location, combined with other personally identifiable information, can be used or abused. The capabilities of this technology empower social networking, support law enforcement, enable many mobile services and also provide a serious concern in the hands of criminals.
Location information can be seriously abused. For example, an individual who announces holiday plans or activities on a social networking site may be signalling to a criminal that their house is currently unoccupied, leading to a higher risk of being burgled, whilst more general personal information could be used in social engineering attacks against them.
For organisations, location information can lead to unwarranted surveillance of their current activities. An example could be tracking the location of a company's executives. This could provide its competitors with pointers regarding ongoing business negotiations, such as potential mergers or acquisitions. This could affect the organisation's brand and reputation, or even dent it financially if the competitor were able to scupper the deal. Organisations must also be wary themselves when using location-based services. They should be careful that information collected regarding the location of their employees does not constitute illegal tracking of their activities outside of business hours. In addition, any location-based services offered to customers or suppliers should take into account the privacy and ethical concerns of those parties.
In dealing with such risks, ISACA, which provides issues and guidance with regard to the governance, security and audit of information systems, cautions that the legal obligations of users and developers of geolocation data are currently unclear. In the absence of legal guidelines, it cautions that organisations need to carefully consider what controls are appropriate. These could be strong access controls and anonymisation techniques or the use of encryption for all personally identifiable information. It urges all organisations using geolocation to develop its own framework to address privacy and security locations, making use of existing information security frameworks such as CobIT.
How to safeguard yourself? We quote the ISACA recommends this 5-step practice:
- Read your mobile application agreements to see what information you are sharing.
- Only enable Geolocation when the benefits outweigh the risks.
- Understand that others can track your current and past locations.
- Think before posting tagged photos to social-media sites.
- Embrace the technology, and educate yourself.
With such safeguards in place, you will be in a much better position to embrace the exciting benefits that are offered by geolocation technologies.
This article was prompted by the discussion within "Why geolocation apps can be dangerous" and the ISACA's new white paper, "Geolocation: Risk, Issues and Strategies."
IP - Internet Protocol
GPS - Global Positioning Systems
ISACA - Information Systems Audit Control Association
CobIT - Control objectives for Information and related Technology | <urn:uuid:a4e4a6d1-93a9-45b4-8f7a-dc8866f7ec40> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.bloorresearch.com/analysis/security-location-dangers/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280929.91/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00202-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.919677 | 845 | 2.90625 | 3 |
NASA is watching closely a 2,000 foot asteroid that will come within 334,000 miles of Earth at 3:33 a.m. Jan. 29.
So if you are a numbers person you might lay down some money on 3s in Las Vegas. While that distance is “close” in space terms, experts weren’t predicting an Armageddon moment.
Asteroid 2007 TU24 was discovered by the NASA-sponsored Catalina Sky Survey on Oct. 11, 2007. Scientists at NASA's Near-Earth Object Program Office at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., have determined that there is no possibility of an impact with Earth in the foreseeable future, NASA said in a release.
"This will be the closest approach by a known asteroid of this size or larger until 2027," said Don Yeomans, manager of the Near Earth Object Program Office at JPL. "As its closest approach is about one-and-a-half times the distance of Earth to the moon, there is no reason for concern. On the contrary, Mother Nature is providing us an excellent opportunity to perform scientific observations."
NASA noted that on Jan.29 the asteroid will be observable at night from dark locations that have clear skies. A telescope with apertures of at least 7.6 centimeters (3 inches) should be able to see the asteroid.
NASA detects and tracks asteroids and comets passing close to Earth. The Near Earth Object Observation Program, commonly called "Spaceguard," discovers, characterizes and computes trajectories for these objects to determine if any could be potentially hazardous to our planet.
NASA has a cool little interactive application here detailing the asteroid’s motion.
Coincidentally, NASA is also tracking the trajectory of an asteroid streaking toward Mars that is expected to pass within 30,000 miles of Mars at about 6 a.m. EST Jan. 30. Asteroid 2007 WD5 was first discovered Nov. 20 and put on a "watch list" because its orbit passes near Earth. NASA has determined the asteroid is not a danger to Earth.
"We estimate such impacts occur on Mars every thousand years or so," NASA said last month in a statement.
The agency said the asteroid could hit Mars at about 30,000 miles per hour and create a crater more than a half-mile wide.
Layer 8 in a box
Check out these other hot stories: | <urn:uuid:7b0c3f82-7db6-4439-8094-6729a554dbca> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.networkworld.com/article/2350529/security/astronomers-watch-asteroids-streaking-toward-earth--mars.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560281426.63/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095121-00533-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.930182 | 495 | 3.484375 | 3 |
Vehicle technology is advancing rapidly: Soon, all cars on the road will talk to each other, avoiding collisions, and some day, we may see driverless cars become mainstream. And when it comes to car basics that make plug-in electric vehicles (PEVs) more affordable, the U.S. Department of Energy wants to play a role, which is why in late January, U.S. Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz last announced nearly $50 million in funding for research and development of new vehicle technologies -- more specifically, providing added environmental protection in the nation’s communities.
The Energy Department’s EV Everywhere Grand Challenge features an example of these options; it is a broader initiative launched in March 2012, and within the next 10 years, aims to make PEVs more affordable and convenient to both drive and own in comparison to today’s vehicles.
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Significant advances have already been achieved in universities and national laboratories; in the last four years, the cost of manufacturing electric vehicle batteries has been cut by 50 percent.
“Today, the American auto industry is on the rise, experiencing the best period of growth in more than a decade. Moniz said during the announcement. "The new research and development funding announced today will help support our domestic automakers’ continued growth and make sure that the next generation of advanced technology vehicles are built right here in America."
These advances entail accomplishments like the reduction of the size and weight of PEV batteries by 60 percent, as well as the improvement of overall vehicle performance and durability. In addition, Americans purchased nearly 100,000 PEVs in 2013 -- nearly twice as many as were sold in 2012. This number means the PEV market is on track to pass the 200,000 sales milestone two years before hybrid electric vehicles reached this goal. | <urn:uuid:112dcba0-9dc6-42e2-8d41-27721e7b389a> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.govtech.com/federal/Energy-Department-Helps-Advance-High-Tech-Autos.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560282937.55/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095122-00441-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961788 | 382 | 2.828125 | 3 |
Vanderbilt University researchers say they have come up with a way to store electricity on a silicon-based supercapacitor that would let mobile phones recharge in seconds and let them continue to operate for weeks without recharging.
The researchers said in a paper that instead of storing energy in chemical reactions the way batteries do, silicon supercapacitors store electricity by assembling ions on the surface of a porous material. As a result, they tend to charge and discharge in minutes, instead of hours, and operate for a few million cycles, instead of a few thousand cycles like batteries, the researchers stated.
"These properties have allowed commercial supercapacitors, which are made out of activated carbon, to capture a few niche markets, such as storing energy captured by regenerative braking systems on buses and electric vehicles and to provide the bursts of power required to adjust of the blades of giant wind turbines to changing wind conditions. Supercapacitors still lag behind the electrical energy storage capability of lithium-ion batteries, so they are too bulky to power most consumer devices. However, they have been catching up rapidly," the researchers said.
The Vanderbilt team said they used porous silicon -- a material with a controllable and well-defined nanostructure made by electrochemically etching the surface of a silicon wafer. This let them create surfaces with optimal nanostructures for supercapacitor electrodes, but it left them with a major problem: Silicon is generally considered unsuitable for use in supercapacitors because it reacts readily with some of chemicals in the electrolytes that provide the ions that store the electrical charge, the researchers said.
[HALLOWEEN: World's craziest Halloween coffins]
To remedy the situation, the researchers said they coated the porous silicon surface with carbon and found that it had chemically stabilized the silicon surface. When they used it to make supercapacitors, they found that the graphene coating improved energy densities by over two orders of magnitude compared to those made from uncoated porous silicon and significantly better than commercial supercapacitors.
Cary Pint, the assistant professor of mechanical engineering who headed the development said the group is currently using this approach to develop energy storage that can be formed in the excess materials or on the unused back sides of solar cells and sensors. The supercapacitors would store excess the electricity that the cells generate at midday and release it when the demand peaks in the afternoon.
Check out these other hot stories: | <urn:uuid:d7a11233-eb2a-4bce-955d-61fc67d22e88> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.networkworld.com/article/2225630/data-center/researchers-tout-electricity-storage-technology-that-could-recharge-devices-in-minutes.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560281162.88/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095121-00313-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.93453 | 506 | 3.75 | 4 |
I’ve been working on an article on some cool, advanced or even odd-ball uses of RSS feeds lately and I figured not everybody may be on the same page and understand the concept behind RSS and its benefits. Before, I got to the advanced things to do with RSS, I figured we should cover the basics.
“RSS is a simple format which enables web sites to tell you when they have new content. Instead of visiting your favorite sites to find out if they’ve been updated, you simply subscribe to them and let them come to you.”
An RSS feed is a list of items like articles, pictures, or videos but it really could be any thing. There are even digital picture frames that can automatically update the pictures they show through the RSS feed from Flickr. You’ll frequently see RSS feeds available on websites where it contains the last few articles and automatically updates when new posts are published. They’re usually denoted by an icon that looks like this:
(although usually not in pillow form)
An RSS feed is written in XML, meaning that you can use tons of different programs, including Notepad, to open the file and read what’s inside. However, for a feed to be truly useful, formatted properly, and automate how you are updated of new content, you’ll want to use a feed reader. There are tons of feed readers available from web services to stand-alone desktop applications. Many e-mail clients like Outlook and Thunderbird also double as feed readers as do web browsers like Firefox.
My favorite feed reader is the web service from Google, Google Reader.
The greatest feature that I like about Google Reader is that it just works. It’s ubiquitous so anywhere I can check the web, I can also check Google Reader. This helps me know if anything new has been posted on any of my favorite sites; these can be urgent messages, new movie trailers, or the latest webcomic. Google Reader works as a mobile device and they just released an official Android app to access the site.
To add a feed to your Google Reader, you can use the Add a subscription and copy / paste the feed’s address. If you have a feed reader client like FeedDemon, it will automatically activate when you click on a feed link. Fortunately, Firefox makes it a lot easier and automates the process. If you’re using Firefox, don’t have a feed reader client installed, and click on an RSS feed link, you’ll see the screen below pop up.
From the drop-down, you can select to use a number of different services to subscribe to the RSS feed. For my use, I chose Google.
After hitting the Subscribe Now button, you’ll get the following two choices from Google: Add to Google homepage or Add to Google Reader. Adding to the Google homepage will give you a little widget on your iGoogle page while adding to Google Reader will obviously add the feed to your Google Reader account.
I tried out FeedDemon for a while as a desktop client but it just didn’t mesh with my habits and my working across multiple machines. The great thing about FeedDemon is that it can synchronize with Google Reader. This allows you to keep all of your subscriptions “in the cloud” and you don’t have to reread any messages if you sit down at a different computer.
FeedDemon is a 3.6MB free download that works on Windows XP or later and requires Internet Explorer 7 or later. You can import from BlogLines, RSS Bandit, an OPML file, or the Windows Common Feed that tends to get in the way with Vista or Windows 7. FeedDemon uses IE to provide a built-in browser so you can easily transition from your feed to the full content while supporting tabs. FeedDemon can be minimized to the system tray with an icon that will show when you have unread items. FeedDemon can also be perfect for notebooks/netbooks as it can allow you to do offline reading of your feeds.
There are plenty of choices out there feed readers on all sorts of devices. For the Palm Pre, I liked Feed Free because of its Google Reader synchronization. Feedly is becoming a big means of accessing feeds and Flipboard for the iPad can make your feeds a visual masterpiece. If you run a website, you have to know about FeedBurner. Google acquired it a few years ago and it’s become pretty much the de facto feed analytics service.
A lot of understanding RSS feeds and how they work for you will take some time and practice on your part to see what you like and don’t like. If you’re doing it right, RSS feeds should ensure you never miss an update and will make your browsing more efficient. If you want to start right away, you can subscribe to 404 Tech Support with this link here so you’ll be notified of every new article: http://feeds.feedburner.com/404t3chsupport
Stay tuned next week for the Advanced RSS tricks article. | <urn:uuid:0da111d5-c7c9-4136-85f3-0934bc774bbf> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.404techsupport.com/2010/12/the-basics-of-rss-feeds/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280266.9/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00277-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.910957 | 1,055 | 2.609375 | 3 |
Definition: A connected graph such that deleting any k-1 vertices (and incident edges) results in a graph that is still connected.
See also biconnected graph, triconnected graph, cut vertex.
Note: Informally, there are at least k independent paths from any vertex to any other vertex.
If you have suggestions, corrections, or comments, please get in touch with Paul Black.
Entry modified 19 April 2004.
HTML page formatted Mon Feb 2 13:10:39 2015.
Cite this as:
Paul M. Sant, "k-connected graph", in Dictionary of Algorithms and Data Structures [online], Vreda Pieterse and Paul E. Black, eds. 19 April 2004. (accessed TODAY) Available from: http://www.nist.gov/dads/HTML/kconnectedGraph.html | <urn:uuid:8ce60bff-8a96-4bce-8b12-5b120c3a9ff2> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.darkridge.com/~jpr5/mirror/dads/HTML/kconnectedGraph.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280718.7/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00185-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.875394 | 184 | 2.828125 | 3 |
Being an information security enthusiast/professional I am often asked how one can go about hiding their IP address while on the Internet. Here’s the analogy I give them:
What would happen if you were to give a fake address when making a pizza delivery order? Simple — you wouldn’t get a pizza. While you could pretty easily fool the pizza place, you ultimately wouldn’t accomplish much. The very thing that you wanted (the pizza) would get sent to some other guy’s house, and you’d go hungry.
It’s the same with the Internet. You need a valid IP address in order to receive web pages and email — just like you need a valid house address in order to receive a pizza delivery or a package from the post office. If you didn’t have an address people simply wouldn’t know how to bring you the things you wanted.
One popular way of obscuring your IP address is by using a proxy. But proxies don’t break the rules; they just add a bit of complexity. Using our pizza delivery analogy, a proxy is like calling your buddy at his house and having him order your pizza. Then, when the pizza gets there, he brings it to YOU.
But guess what? You still need an address. If your buddy didn’t know where you lived he couldn’t bring you your pizza. So you hid from the pizza place, but not from everyone.
The key here is that the pizza shop didn’t hear your voice (what browser you’re using), your accent (your operating system), or get your mailing address (your IP). They got your friend’s information instead, and that’s what people like about proxies.
Just remember that proxies aren’t magical; they simply add extra hops in the middle. Each person still has an address (you, your buddy, and the pizza place). So don’t think of it as “hiding” or “becoming invisible”; this isn’t how the Internet works.
The Internet needs to know your IP addressees or else you can’t use it. If you were truly hidden, nobody would be able to bring you the stuff you asked for — whether that something was a pizza or an email from a friend.:
[ Jan 2007 ] | <urn:uuid:a3a760ff-0472-4142-84de-b80f235db5b1> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://danielmiessler.com/study/hiding_your_ip/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280718.7/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00185-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.954788 | 496 | 3.03125 | 3 |
In our last Mac Security Tip, Securely Erase Trash, we explained that you can securely overwrite files, but pointed out that this may not be as secure as it seems.
When a computer writes a file to a hard disk the first time - when you first save a new file - it is stored in one location. When you next save the file, such as after you've written some text or entered some data in a spreadsheet, your Mac saves it in a different location, because it cannot safely overwrite the first version. And the next time you save the file, the same thing happens again. So each time you save a file, the new version gets written to a new location. Because of this, the final file that you securely delete is not the only trace of the contents of that file.
Let's say that you've saved a file ten times, then securely deleted the final version; there are still a possible nine other versions of the file on your hard disk. The spaces where this data are written are not protected; other files can be written there. But you cannot be sure that this is the case, and there is the possibility that the free space on your hard drive contains confidential data that may be recoverable by disk rescue software.
With Apple's Disk Utility (located in your /Applications/Utilities folder), you can erase the free space on your hard disk. Launch the program, select your disk in the sidebar, then click on the Erase icon in the toolbar. Click on the Erase Free Space button to see your options:
- Zero Out Deleted Files: this writes zeroes over all the free space on your disk.
- 7-Pass Erase of Deleted Files: this writes zeroes seven times over the free space, and takes seven times as long.
- 35-Pass Erase of Deleted Files: this is for the truly paranoid; it writes zeroes 35 times, and takes a very long time.
In most cases, the first option is sufficient, but even if you zero out the deleted files, some disc recovery software may be able to recover data. So the 7-pass erase is probably safer if you're worried about very confidential files.
This is certainly not an everyday operation. However, if you work with confidential files and are selling a computer, giving it to someone, or even sending a computer for service, you might want to do this. The same options are available from the Erase tab when you erase the entire disk or partition. | <urn:uuid:6d919321-2be4-4ffc-b72d-0b67cbae665b> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.intego.com/mac-security-blog/mac-security-tip-securely-erase-free-space-and-hard-disks/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560282110.46/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095122-00487-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.936979 | 517 | 2.59375 | 3 |
The health care industry has a lot to gain from the fruits of big data. There’s more potential than ever before as we begin to analyze and use the wealth of data that is available to us today.
Careful and timely collection of massive data as it relates to person, place, and population can reveal new and exciting insights that will result in more intelligent and effective patient care globally.
In the near future, a full set of all available information from multiple systems should be in place at the individual patient level. This should include all clinical encounter data, personal health, and genetic information.
Genomic sequencing tests are predicted to be as low as $100. Therefore, this affordability will create a new paradigm whereby crunching genetic data sets to generate precision and personalized treatments will become common practice.
At the point of care, we’ll be able to compare our genetics with “patients like us” for real-time clinical decision support to make the most appropriate decisions in our care plan. We’ll know what to expect and how to better care for ourselves and our loved ones.
A complete set of de-identified data should be available for population health assessment and identification of trends for research, planning, and population health management.
Ultimately, data-driven intelligence — including predictive models that are generated from correlations and commonalities across person, place and population — will help us to create new prevention and treatment innovations that capitalize on previously untapped insights.
This article is published as part of the IDG Contributor Network. Want to Join? | <urn:uuid:1d6a12e0-ff48-44f1-9676-d3fdb27ad0a8> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.cio.com/article/3027645/analytics/concentric-use-of-information.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560279915.8/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095119-00057-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.925669 | 319 | 2.515625 | 3 |
Yahoo recently reported the theft of some 400,000 user names and passwords to access its website, acknowledging hackers took advantage of a security vulnerability in its computer systems.
The Mountain View, California-based LinkedIn, an employment and professional networking site which has 160 million members, was recently hacked and suffered a data breach of 6 million of its clients and is now involved in a class-action lawsuit.
These sites did something wrong that allowed those passwords to get hacked. However passwords themselves are too hackable. If multi-factor authentication was used in these cases, then the hacks may be a moot point and the hacked data useless to the thief.
"2,295: The number of times a sequential list of numbers was used, with '123456' by far being the most popular password. There were several other instances where the numbers were reversed, or a few letters were added in a token effort to mix things up."
"160: The number of times '111111' is used as a password, which is only marginally better than a sequential list of numbers. The similarly creative '000000' is used 71 times."
Second: spyware, malware and viruses on a user’s device can easily record passwords. Which means this username (which is often a publicly known email address) and password is easy to obtain from an infected device.
The numerous scams which entice users to cough up sensitive data is a proven con that works enough to keep hackers hacking.
Multi-factor authentication, which your bank uses is far better and more secure and it requires a username, password and “something you have”—a personal security device separate from the PC
While additional authentication measures might be a burden to some, it’s a blessing to others who recognize the vulnerabilities of their online accounts otherwise. | <urn:uuid:11c09977-4233-4e4c-b1e5-2a8a767b5c7c> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://infosecisland.com/blogview/22096-Is-a-Password-Enough-A-Closer-Look-at-Authentication.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560281419.3/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095121-00267-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967439 | 369 | 2.859375 | 3 |
NJIT Provides Gaming Students With Technical, Hands-On Training
It isn’t often that parents root for their kids’ “Guitar Hero” skills or encourage them to devote more time to video games, let alone inspire them to focus on gaming as a career path.
Contrary to the unhealthy practices of video game-addicted couch potatoes, however, students who select the recently developed video-game programming concentration at the New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT) develop a background in computer science theory with the practice of applied programming, allowing them to become well-versed in multimedia, including graphic design, game design, level editing and 3-D modeling. They graduate with a greater advantage than their peers in an industry that is growing quickly, even in the face of a potential recession.
Donald J. (D.J.) Kehoe, 28-year-old adjunct professor and assistant to the director for IT at NJIT, heads a 12-class, game-programming concentration that the school officially launched last fall. “[There’s a] high demand from the students, and there’s a growing industry for it,” Kehoe said, “[so] when I had the opportunity to create it, I went for it.”
The school hosted its semi-annual “Game Expo” this month, giving students a chance to show off their proficiency in video-game development, as well as their skill at playing popular video games — from Rock Band and Guitar Hero to Smash Brothers and other fighting games.
“[The atmosphere] is pretty laid-back, except for the occasional outcry of triumph and defeat,” Kehoe said.
Not All Fun and Games
One of the basic skills required of a game programmer is software design. Higher-level programming skills include problem solving, analytical thinking, dealing with target hardware and target markets.
Kehoe designs his classes to give students a command of programming in C and C++, as well as other scripting languages such as UnrealScript, XML, Lua and Python, all of which are commonly used in game development. He also teaches them to write their own programs using programming language C and development libraries.
Students edit existing games, such as one of id Software’s “Quake” games, and make their own 2-D and 3-D games. The more artistic or design-oriented students opt for courses in 3-D modeling animation or level-editing world creation.
Students work on game modification projects and often design games from scratch. “[They] come up with the idea, flesh it out, write it on paper, sometimes on a bar napkin,” Kehoe said. “It’s all part of the design process; figure out what the requirements are for the game. Maybe they’ll use an existing game engine and figure out what the requirements are going to be in terms of content.”
Kehoe is directing five students as they create an educational video game for Pearson Education. The goal is to use the game as a tool or supplement to help reinforce basic reading skills from early to eighth-grade reading. “There are plots [to the game], and throughout the adventure, the players are forced to make reading inferences and predictions and understand what’s going on [within] different types of words,” Kehoe said. “Basically, to play through this game, they’re going to be challenged to understand what’s going on through the reading, through text dialogues, etc.”
Job Opportunities Abound
Many NJIT graduates walk away with the choicest jobs on the market. For instance, one alum is a game designer for Gameloft, a subcompany of Ubisoft, which made “Splinter Cell” and “Assassin’s Creed.” Another graduate will be responsible for maintaining all the games that are developed for T-Mobile.
Greg Wagner, a computer science major who will graduate this semester, has lined up a job programming video, poker and blackjack machines for Gaming Labs International.
But the aptitude NJIT is developing goes beyond the gaming sphere. One of Kehoe’s students will work for a company that handles security for the government, another is programming embedded software for surveillance cameras and still others are working in the media industry.
“We’re not just giving our students a degree in game design, we’re giving them a Bachelor of Science in information technology, which they can then take to the gaming industry or another traditional industry,” Kehoe said. | <urn:uuid:eb363627-75ac-463d-ae34-88a138cf8701> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://certmag.com/njit-provides-gaming-students-with-technical-hands-on-training/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560282935.68/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095122-00019-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.955125 | 967 | 2.578125 | 3 |
The robots that can self-assemble when heated.
Daniela Rus, the Andrew and Erna Viterbi Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at MIT, said that, once heated, the printable robotic components automatically fold into prescribed three-dimensional configurations.
Rus and her colleagues have detailed their discovery in two papers – one of which describes a system that takes a digital specification of a 3D shape, such as a computer-aided design, or CAD, file, and generates the 2D patterns that would enable a piece of plastic to reproduce it through self-folding.
The other paper explains how to build electrical components from self-folding laser-cut materials. The researchers present designs for resistors, inductors, and capacitors, as well as sensors and actuators – the electromechanical ‘muscles’ that enable robots’ movements.
Rus said: "We have this big dream of the hardware compiler, where you can specify, ‘I want a robot that will play with my cat,’ or ‘I want a robot that will clean the floor,’ and from this high-level specification, you actually generate a working device.
"So far, we have tackled some sub-problems in the space, and one of the sub-problems is this end-to-end system where you have a picture, and at the other end, you have an object that realises that picture. And the same mathematical models and principles that we use in this pipeline we also use to create these folded electronics."
Both papers build on previous research that Rus did in collaboration with Erik Demaine, another professor of computer science and engineering at MIT. This work explored how origami could be adapted to create reconfigurable robots.
The key difference in the new work, according to Shuhei Miyashita, a postdoc in Rus’ lab and one of her co-authors on both papers, is a technique for precisely controlling the angles at which a heated sheet folds.
Miyashita sandwiches a sheet of polyvinyl chloride (PVC) between two films of a rigid polyester riddled with slits of different widths. When heated, the PVC contracts, and the slits close. Where edges of the polyester film press up against each other, they deform the PVC. | <urn:uuid:fda2de2c-57f6-4c1b-b3ad-163673bd93f9> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.cbronline.com/news/enterprise-it/print-and-bake-your-own-robot-4282703 | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560279176.20/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095119-00416-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.934817 | 481 | 3.28125 | 3 |
So how prepared are Americans for a disaster that is likely to befall them in their area? Well, given our history…9/11, Katrina, Joplin, LA/San Diego fires…just to name a few, you think we would all be ready. The good news is that we are making progress!
And that simple things like household preparedness measures, such as having a 3-day supply of food, water, and medication and a written household evacuation plan, can improve a population’s ability to cope with service disruption, decreasing the number of persons who might otherwise overwhelm emergency services and health-care systems.
To estimate current levels of self-reported household preparedness by state, the CDC analyzed Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) survey data collected in 14 states during 2006–2010. Here is what they found:
- 94.8% of households had a working battery-operated flashlight
- 89.7% had a 3-day supply of medications for everyone who required them
- 82.9% had a 3-day supply of food
- 77.7% had a working battery-operated radio
- 53.6% had a 3-day supply of water
- 21.1% had a written evacuation plan.
Non-English speaking and minority respondents, particularly Hispanics, were less likely to report household preparedness for an emergency or disaster, suggesting that more outreach activities should be directed toward these populations.
BRFSS is a state-based, random-digit–dialed telephone survey of the noninstitutionalized U.S. civilian population aged ≥18 years. The survey collects information on health risk behaviors, preventive health practices, health-care access, and disease status. The General Preparedness module was included in BRFSS surveys conducted by 14 states during 2006–2010.
During 2006–2010, preparedness data were collected (with Council of American Survey and Research Organizations response rates indicated) from the following states: 2006, Connecticut (44.3%), Montana (54.8%), Nevada (50.1%), and Tennessee (56.7%); 2007, Delaware (43.2%), Louisiana (41.0%), Maryland (31.4%), Nebraska (65.4%), and New Hampshire (37.7%); 2008, Georgia (55.1%), Montana (48.3%), Nebraska (65.5%), New York (40.0%), and Pennsylvania (45.6%); 2009, Mississippi (49.3%); and 2010, Montana (65.4%) and North Carolina (41.1%).
Household disaster preparedness measures, as defined by the BRFSS questionnaire, included the following items:
- 3-day supplies of food
- Prescription medications
- Written evacuation plan
- Working battery-powered radio
- Working battery-powered flashlight.
Respondents were asked the following six questions:
1) “Does your household have a 3-day supply of nonperishable food for everyone who lives there? By nonperishable we mean food that does not require refrigeration or cooking.”
2) “Does your household have a 3-day supply of water for everyone who lives there? A 3-day supply of water is 1 gallon of water per person per day.”
3) “Does your household have a 3-day supply of prescription medications for each person in your household who takes prescription medications?”
4) “Does your household have a working battery-operated radio and working batteries for use if the electricity is out?”
5) “Does your household have a working flashlight and working batteries for use if the electricity is out?”
6) “Does your household have a written evacuation plan for how you will leave your home in case of a large-scale disaster or emergency that requires evacuation?”
In general, as the age of respondents increased, reported household preparedness increased. With the exceptions of having a 3-day supply of water and a written evacuation plan, persons with a high school diploma were more likely to indicate preparedness than those with less than a high school diploma. With the exception of having a written evacuation plan, which was most prevalent among respondents who were unable to work, in general, retired respondents were most likely to indicate that their household was prepared.
Respondents who requested that the survey be conducted in Spanish (68.2%) were less likely to report their households had a 3-day supply of food than those administered the survey in English (83.2%) However, respondents who requested the survey be conducted in Spanish were significantly more likely to report their households had a 3-day supply of water (Spanish, 64.5%; English, 53.6%) and were as likely as those interviewed in English to report that the household had a written evacuation plan (Spanish, 25.6%; English, 20.6%; p=0.066).
Not ready?!?!? Get on it!!!!! | <urn:uuid:4368be9f-17ad-4d3c-9072-faa73d3a01ee> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://ems-solutionsinc.com/blog/u-s-household-preparedness-for-emergencies-how-are-we-doing-cdc-survey-has-surprising-results/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280065.57/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00324-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.974321 | 1,026 | 2.71875 | 3 |
You know you need to make your products as secure as possible – but how will you do it? Read below to review key software security concepts to help protect your intellectual property.
Software security is a hot topic in the news, and my conversations with both software producers and intelligent device manufacturers (producers) echoes this reality. They want to ensure their software is secure so they don’t jeopardize their customers, products, revenues and reputation.
The reality is that the word security in software security is used to encapsulate everything from privacy prevention to software compliance and software licensing controls. Moreover, there are a lot of opinions on security from experts in the area, which can leave producers confused and trying to chase too many objectives.
Concepts and Core Principles
While the range of information and their sources vary, there are some standard security concepts you can follow that are universally accepted:
- The strongest security is layered security, an analogy is security on a commercial building: there’s a lock on a doorknob, deadbolt on the same door, alarm system when the door is opened, a security guard to stop the intruder once they’re in. There are multiple layers of security.
- Security protocols should be open for public scrutiny (e.g., RSA, ECDSA, SHA-2)
- Between people, process and technology – people are the weakest link in security.
- Security and usability tend to be inversely related, meaning that the more secure a product is, the harder it is to use. Finding the middle ground is one of the “secret sauces” to success.
- Confidentiality – preventing the disclosure of information
- Integrity – preventing the alteration of information
- Availability – preventing the destruction of information. The “A” shifts to Authenticity when we talk about encryption — information being available only to known and trusted sources.
With an understanding of the basic concepts and core principles it follows that many producers want best-in-breed security; however, in reality there is no single solution that provides a complete and comprehensive software security portfolio.
With such a huge opportunity why isn’t there a security company handling all aspects of security, end-to-end? The reason is because security threats are so diverse in nature, including these security threat areas:
- Target of security: devices, applications, network or communication, data in transit, data at rest
- Platform/operating system support: application code runs differently between Windows (PE32 or .NET) vs. Unix (ELF-32 or ELF-64)
- Compiler support: High-level languages compiled to assemble (C/C++) vs. interpreted byte code (Java)
- Application target point of attack: DLL/Shared Object or direct binary
Further, application security is critical to ensuring that the code inside the application isn’t viewed, replaced or modified since hackers can sell or publicize the proprietary algorithms if they can get to the code.
Now let’s focus on the “target for security” being an application - your intellectual property. While some security companies may have solutions for some of the above, it should again be emphasized that no single solution can totally guarantee complete or impenetrable software security - it’s simply not possible.
With the exception of the human element in regards to security maxims, most software attacks are directed at the weakest link of the software, which is typically the binary application itself and embedded security controls. Attacks are typically not directed at the enforcement product or license key associated with it unless those are found to use weak algorithms.
Commonly known attacks involve either reverse engineering how license keys are generated or reverse engineering the application binary with a debugger and/or disassembler. Some producers look to bolster security with software protection including additional security hardware such as tokens, but these do not change the discussion because they are simply another component. While layered security is good, even hardware requires software to talk to it, which could be bad since that’s another potential weak link.
Stay tuned for our next installment in the series where we’ll talk about an oft-overlooked topic – license key cryptography.
More info on securing your software: | <urn:uuid:03a15c00-4bcd-41e4-9f9e-cc6315ae4cf4> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://blogs.flexerasoftware.com/ecm/2016/03/what-you-need-to-know-about-software-licensing-security-part-1.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560282937.55/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095122-00442-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.929416 | 875 | 2.546875 | 3 |
Baztan J.,Observatoire de Versailles Saint Quentin en Yvelines |
Carrasco A.,Observatorio Reserva de Biosfera |
Chouinard O.,Marine science For Society |
Chouinard O.,University of Moncton |
And 11 more authors.
Marine Pollution Bulletin | Year: 2014
Coastal zones and the biosphere as a whole show signs of cumulative degradation due to the use and disposal of plastics. To better understand the manifestation of plastic pollution in the Atlantic Ocean, we partnered with local communities to determine the concentrations of micro-plastics in 125 beaches on three islands in the Canary Current: Lanzarote, La Graciosa, and Fuerteventura. We found that, in spite of being located in highly-protected natural areas, all beaches in our study area are exceedingly vulnerable to micro-plastic pollution, with pollution levels reaching concentrations greater than 100. g of plastic in 1. l of sediment. This paper contributes to ongoing efforts to develop solutions to plastic pollution by addressing the questions: (i) Where does this pollution come from?; (ii) How much plastic pollution is in the world's oceans and coastal zones?; (iii) What are the consequences for the biosphere?; and (iv) What are possible solutions?. © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. Source | <urn:uuid:b3a2db63-b9f3-447e-824f-c612e4e9f204> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.linknovate.com/affiliation/marine-science-for-society-1328896/all/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560285315.77/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095125-00350-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.835067 | 288 | 2.875 | 3 |
Kaspersky Lab, a leading developer of secure content management solutions, has released its latest article, entitled ‘Changing Threats, Changing Solutions: A History of Viruses and Antivirus’. The article is authored by David Emm, the company’s senior technology consultant.
The article provides an overview of the changing threat landscape from the late 1980s, when the first PC viruses appeared, to the evolution of mobile threats in the first decade of the 21st century. It also examines how antivirus solutions have evolved to keep pace with the changes in malicious code by implementing new technologies.
The author analyzes a shift in the motivation of virus writers: from writing and spreading malicious code simply to cause damage, to doing so in order to earn money illegally. A consequence of this shift is the decline in global epidemics since 2003, and a rise in tailor-made Trojans designed to target a specific system and malicious programs designed to steal user data such as logins and passwords for bank accounts and online games.
David Emm discusses the role of mobile threats in today’s threat landscape: since the first worm for smartphones was detected in 2004, new viruses, worms and Trojans for mobile devices have also emerged. In the space of a few years, threats for mobile devices have evolved as much as PC malware did over the course of 20 years.
The author concludes by emphasizing that the threat landscape has changed beyond recognition, making it more important than ever for users to have effective protection. Security solutions must deliver timely protection against the hundreds of new threats which appear daily, while also implementing technologies which can block unknown threats as they appear.
The complete article can be found on Viruslist.com. The Executive Summary is available on the Kaspersky Lab corporate website. | <urn:uuid:8eef4b9b-92d4-468a-8c80-cac9f7c68f34> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.kaspersky.com/au/about/news/virus/2008/Kaspersky_Lab_releases_a_new_article_about_the_evolution_of_malicious_programs_and_antivirus_software | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280128.70/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00168-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.946307 | 365 | 2.640625 | 3 |
Question 2) Management Professional Certification
Single Answer Multiple Choice
You are the project manager for a large IT consulting firm. You are calculating activity durations for a development project using weighted average durations.
Which technique are you using?
C. critical chain method
D. Monte Carlo
You are using PERT. With PERT (Program Evaluation and Review Technique), task durations are calculated using a weighted average. The optimistic, most likely, and pessimistic duration estimates are weighted and used to determine the activity duration estimates. The formula for calculating a PERT estimate is: (Pessimistic + 4 x Most Likely + Optimistic) / 6.
You are not using CPM. CPM (Critical Path Method) estimates activity duration using an analysis of the network diagram. The sequence of activities is analyzed to determine which path has the least amount of float. Then, forward and backward passes are used to determine early dates and late dates for each activity.
You are not using critical chain method. Critical Chain Method helps to accommodate limited resources by using duration buffers.
You are not using Monte Carlo simulation. Monte Carlo simulation estimates activity duration using a complex, usually computer-based, simulation. The simulation uses the network diagram but does not use the PERT formula. This type of estimating simulates many different scenarios in a project and determines the probable results. A Monte Carlo simulation would be useful to determine the probability of a project completing on time or on budget, the probability of a task being on the critical path, or the overall risk of a project.
Note that PMI has removed all references to PERT in the 3rd edition of PMBOK because PERT is rarely used today.
1. A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge – PMBOK Guide 3rd Edition – Project Time Management – 6.5.2 Schedule Development: Tools and Techniques
2. Max Wideman Comparative Glossary of Project Management Terms v3.1 – Program Evaluation and Review Technique (“PERT”) – http://maxwideman.com/pmglossary/PMG_P08.htm
3. NetMBA Business Knowledge Center, Operations, PERT – http://www.netmba.com/operations/project/pert/
These questions are derived from the Self Test Software practice test for the Project Management Institute’s exam #PMP3ED: Project Management Professional, Third Edition. | <urn:uuid:c3d7752f-2375-429e-a70a-38512d5f459b> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://certmag.com/question-2-test-yourself-of-project-management-professional-certification/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280221.47/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00012-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.816052 | 499 | 2.53125 | 3 |
Table of Contents
This tutorial focuses on using GParted, or Gnome Partition Editor, a free and open source partition editor. To use GParted, you must first download the CD Image file (.iso file) of GParted Live for this program. Instructions on where to find and how to burn the GParted ISO file are covered in the Preparation step. In this tutorial we will be using Microsoft Windows XP for certain steps. If you use a different version of Windows, some of these steps and screens may be a bit different.
This tutorial outlines the process of changing the volume structure of your hard drives and therefore has the potential of damaging the data stored on them. With this said, the actions and methods described in this tutorial can be potentially dangerous. While this tutorial endeavors to instruct you on how to safely resize your partitions with no data loss, it is important to read and follow all instructions carefully.
This tutorial also assumes that you, the reader, have a basic understanding of computers and are comfortable with using system management tools. Also, a basic understanding of the terminology is required. For those who need a primer on this material, an introduction to Hard Disk Partitions can be found in the Understanding Hard Disk Partitions tutorial.
When you purchase a computer it is not uncommon for the computer's partitions to be setup in a way that you have a small C: drive and a large D: drive. Over time you will quickly find that you do not have any free space on your C: drive, but your D: drive has plenty of space available. As most programs, by default, are installed in the C drive and because you need space on your C: drive for certain Windows functions, like printing, you find that your lack of space has become a problem. What is frustrating is that you have all of this space on your other partition, but can't use it.
Thankfully, this is not true. In fact, it is possible to resize partitions so that you can take space away from one partition that has a lot of free space and add it to another that does not. This tutorial will walk you through resizing your computer's partitions using the GParted program. GParted, or Gnome Partition Editor, is an open source partition editor that allows you to manipulate a computer's partition tables, including resizing them, and can be used on almost all partitions created by Windows or Linux. In this tutorial we will use the GParted Live CD, which allows you to create a bootable CD that contains the GParted programs. As already stated, this tutorial should only be used by advanced users who understand the technology behind volumes, partitions, file systems, and bootable CDs. If you feel comfortable with this material, please continue.
The first step is to download the latest version of GParted Live. GParted is distributed as a CD image, or ISO, file that needs to be burned onto a CD. For information about ISO files and how to write them to a CD please read the How to write a CD/DVD image or ISO tutorial. The latest version of GParted as of this writing is 0.4.1-2 and can be downloaded from the following link:
Once the file is downloaded please burn the image to a CD and then store the CD in a safe place. We first need to perform some basic maintenance on the hard drive before we use GParted. These steps will make the entire process safer, smoother, and faster.
The first maintenance task is to run chkdsk or fsck to repair any errors that may currently be present in the file system. Even under ordinary use your average file system gets errors. Normally, operating systems such as Windows or Linux are able to either correct these errors silently, or ignore them altogether. When this is not the case, though, chkdsk for Windows or or fsck for Linux will be forced to run at boot time in order to attempt to repair these errors. Another important reasons to do a disk check before we run GParted is that GParted will usually refuse to do anything to a partition whose file system has errors or is damaged.
To perform a full disk check in Windows 2000/XP do the following:
Figure 1. Setting Up The Disk Check
Figure 2: Windows XP performing Check Disk on the C: Drive
When the operating system finishes perform the disk check it will continue booting like normal. Therefore, when you are at your desktop or login prompt, you know the disk check has been completed. If you would like to know what was found during the CHKDSK, you can open the Event Viewer to see a log of the activity. To access the event viewer, open your Control Panel, and then double-click on the Administrative Tools folder. In this folder you will find the Event Viewer program. Double-click on that program to start it, and when it opens, click on the Applications category. In the panel on the right click on the latest entry that has a source of Winlogon. This will open up the log for the latest Chkdsk scan.
The next step is to defragment the partitions that we will be resizing. Defragmenting will reduce the time required to resize significantly. For more information on defragmenting and why you should do it, you can read The Importance of Disk Defragmentation tutorial.
To start the Defragmenter utility in Windows 2000/XP, do the following:
Figure3: Defragmenting Under Windows XP
When it has finished you can close the Disk Defragmenter program and continue with the rest of the tutorial.
By now you should have defragmented and run checkdisk on the hard drives you want to resize. You should now insert the GParted Live CD you created in the previous steps into your CD/DVD drive and restart your computer.
Note: You may need to change the boot sequence in you BIOS to boot from the CD drive.
Once you boot from the CD, you'll see the GParted boot menu, as shown in the Figure below.
Figure 4: GParted Boot Menu
For most computers, you can simply press the Enter key here to accept the defaults.
From here GParted gets to work on creating a mini-Linux setup that runs entirely in memory and from the CD itself. You'll be asked about two things during this period: your keymap and language.
The default settings for these are a standard QWERTY keyboard and US English respectively. To use these, simple press Enter when asked (see Figures 5 and 6.)
Figure 5. Selecting the keymap
Next, it will ask you for your language.
Figure 6: Select Language
After selecting your keymap and language preferences, wait for GParted to finish booting. When it's finished, you should see a screen similar to Figure 7 below.
Figure 7: GParted is ready
This is the main screen of GParted. Note the green-edged box. This represents the Primary Master hard drive (hda) and all the partitions currently on it. At this point, there is only one partition on our example drive. Your drive may have more.
Note: If you are going to be working on a disk other than the Primary Master, you should select the appropriate drive from the drop-down menu on the upper right as shown designated by the red arrow. On a standard system with two drives connected to the Primary IDE channel, the drives should be labeled hda (master) and hdb (slave). For more information on determining which drive is which, see here.
Now that you have selected the drive you want to work on, it's time to get to work.
Unless your hard drive is brand new, your hard drive likely already has one or more partitions on it. In order to add a partition, or enlarge an existing one, you must first shrink one to create some free space. Right-click on the partition you want to shrink, as shown in figure 8 below, and select Resize/Move.
Figure 8: Right-click menu
This will open a smaller window with another box which represents your hard drive as seen in the figure below.
Figure 9: GParted's Representation of Your Hard Drive
At this screen there are two ways in which you can change the size of the existing partition. The first is by by clicking and dragging either of the black arrows to make the partition smaller or larger, or by manually entering the new size of the partition. in the New Size (MiB) field. These methods are shown in Figure 10 below.
Figure 10: Resizing
When you have finished adjusting the size, click the Resize/Move button. This will close the Resizing window and bring you back to the main window. At this point, no changes have been made. In order to make these changes effective you must first click on the Apply button. Notice, in the example above we are shrinking the existing partition from 4,793 MB to 3,614 MB. When it has completed, this will give us an additional 1,179 MB to use as we see fit.
Figure 11: last chance!
Once you click the Apply button, GParted will start resizing your partition as shown in Figure 12.
Figure 12: GParted doing its thing.
The resize process can take a while depending on how big your drive is and how much the partition's size was changed. So, you may want to go and get a nice cup of tea and relax.
Now that there is some free space on the drive we can either make another partition larger, or we can add a new partition to it.
In this tutorial we are going to take the free space we just created and allocate it towards a new partition.
To do this, right-click on the Unallocated part of the drive and click New as shown in Figure 13.
Figure 13: Creating a New Partition in the Unallocated Space
This will open the Create new Partition window as shown in Figure 14 below.
Figure 14: The New Partition Window
Using the black arrows, or by entering a number in the New Size (MiB) box, you can adjust the size of the new partition. By default, the new partition will use all available contiguous space. Once you are happy with the size of your new partition, you need to select the file system it will use. GParted supports many different file systems, as shown in Figure 15.
Figure 15: Selecting a File System
Unless you have a reason not to, for example if you needed to create a logical volume within an extended partition, you can leave the Partition type alone.
After selecting your file system, click the Add button. As before, nothing is done until you click the Apply button as shown in Figure 16.
Figure 16: Ready to go
Creating the new partition should go much faster than resizing the original one, so no time for tea I'm afraid.
Figure 17: All Done!
You now have two partitions where once was one. Simply click the Exit button to reboot your computer.
Now that you see how easy it is to resize your computer's partitions, you should never have to worry about have not enough space in one partition and too much in another. Using the GParted Live CD allows you to easily resize, create, move, and delete partitions on your computer. If you need help with resizing tutorials, please post your question in the forums.
In the past when you needed to resize a partition in Windows you had to use a 3rd party utility such as Partition Magic, Disk Director, or open source utilities such as Gparted and Ranish Partition Manager. These 3rd party programs, though, are no longer needed when using Windows as it has partition, or volume, resizing functionality built directly into the Windows Disk Management utility.
A filesystem is a way that an operating system organizes files on a disk. These filesystems come in many different flavors depending on your specific needs. For Windows, you have the NTFS, FAT, FAT16, or FAT32 filesystems. For Macintosh, you have the HFS filesystem and for Linux you have more filesystems than we can list in this tutorial. One of the great things about Linux is that you have the ...
When a hard drive is installed in a computer, it must be partitioned before you can format and use it. Partitioning a drive is when you divide the total storage of a drive into different pieces. These pieces are called partitions. Once a partition is created, it can then be formatted so that it can be used on a computer. When partitions are made, you specify the total amount of storage that you ...
Almost everyone uses a computer daily, but many don't know how a computer works or all the different individual pieces that make it up. In fact, many people erroneously look at a computer and call it a CPU or a hard drive, when in fact these are just two parts of a computer. When these individual components are connected together they create a complete and working device with an all ...
I am sure many of you have been told in the past to defrag your hard drives when you have noticed a slow down on your computer. You may have followed the advice and defragged your hard drive, and actually noticed a difference. Have you ever wondered why defragging helps though? This tutorial will discuss what Disk Fragmentation is and how you can optimize your hard drive's partitions by ... | <urn:uuid:54cfb42d-2f46-4d2d-aa30-d1d4ec54d18f> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/tutorials/resizing-adding-partitions-with-gparted-live/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560279379.41/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095119-00526-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.928157 | 2,810 | 2.84375 | 3 |
The article describes an attack on OpenPGP format, which leads to disclosure of the private signature keys of the DSA and RSA algorithms. The OpenPGP format is used in a number of applications including PGP, GNU Privacy Guard and other programs specified on the list of products compatible with OpenPGP. Therefore all these applications must undergo the same revision as the actual program PGP. The success of the attack was practically verified and demonstrated on the PGP program, version 7.0.3 with a combination of AES and DH/DSS algorithms. As the private signature key is the basic information of the whole system which is kept secret, it is encrypted using the strong cipher. However, it shows that this protection is illusory, as the attacker has neither to attack this cipher nor user´s secret passphrase.
Download the paper in PDF format here. | <urn:uuid:5c1f3377-4337-48e4-aa5f-936d4e70088f> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.helpnetsecurity.com/2002/04/04/attack-on-private-signature-keys-of-the-openpgp-format-pgp-programs-and-other-applications-compatible-with-openpgp/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280872.69/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00094-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.927777 | 180 | 2.734375 | 3 |
There is a small difficulty, however. The check for the DisableCMD key is done when CMD.EXE is started, so to be successful, we have to start the program and change the DisableCMD string in memory before the check is made. Sounds impossible? Not really, the CreateProcess function allows you to create a new process with its main thread in a suspended state (this means that the program is not running). This gives you the opportunity to change the string in memory before it is used.
Use the start statement to start a new process in suspended state:
Change the string in memory:
search-and-write module:. unicode:DisableCMD unicode:DisableAMD
The main thread will be resumed after the last statement was executed (search-and-write in our example):
The cmd.exe window in the background was launched from the start menu (showing you that cmd.exe is disabled), while the cmd.exe window in the foreground was launched with the bpmtk (showing you the bypass of the GPO).
And did you notice that this screenshot is taken on a Windows 2008 server?
Next time, I’ll show some tricks to use the bpmtk in a restricted environment, like a Terminal Server. | <urn:uuid:fba03f2a-33a5-4af8-aea4-e87199663ddb> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://blog.didierstevens.com/2008/03/12/bpmtk-disableamd/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280746.40/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00452-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.929165 | 264 | 2.59375 | 3 |
Unionville Area Code 289
The Unionville area code was developed on October 1993 from its separation with area code 416. It is just one of the many area codes that are used in Ontario. Since Ontario is Canada's most populous province, it only follows that it would require a large amount of phone numbers to meet the demands of its residents. This is the reason why Ontario employs a lot of area codes and several area code overlays, which includes the Unionville area code, along with its area code overlay. And the overlaid area code they've agreed upon for the place of Unionville is the 289 area code.
Now, the Canadian Radio-Television Commission (CRTC) is the one responsible for meeting the needs of people and companies based in the Ontario region. And they've imposed several ways to address the problem of number shortage. The first thing they did was to geographically split the area, by dividing them into municipalities. Next was they realigned boundaries that resulted to half of the place getting the new area code while the remaining half dealt with using the original area code. The third way they applied is to utilize overlay area codes. These overlay area codes were to be employed in the same areas where the current area code is being used. Among the three, the overlay code was the solution selected to be used for the dilemma faced by the Unionville area code, and this resulted to the creation of the 289 area code. This proved to be an effective solution for increasing the supply of Unionville local number.
As the 10-digit dialing system of Canada was employed on the province of Ontario, it increased the usage of Unionville area code. The standard 10-digit dialing, which was widely implemented in the area, uses the Unionville area code together with the Unionville local number when making a call. This is unlike the traditional 7-digit dialing system that only required the Unionville local number to be keyed in. Callers to and from Unionville are then enforced to dial 10 digits on their phone otherwise their calls will not be connected. And because Unionville has an overlay area code, there is a possibility that the same area would have different area codes. Local callers would therefore need to enforce 10-digit dialing, which is obviously time consuming and very confusing.
Another disadvantage that this system has is that it provides limited mobility for mobile phones. The area codes restrict the coverage area of mobile phones due to the geographical assignment designated upon these phones. This is a big problem for companies that usually do their business on the road. Their place of business will now be limited in respect to the capabilities of their mobile phones.
If your company is based on areas using the 10-digit dialing system and mobility in your business is a must; then your company would certainly appreciate the aid of RingCentral business phone system. Their auto-attendant feature allows you to receive business calls even if you are not in the vicinity of your office. It gives you the convenience of doing business on the road without worrying about missing any calls. It has call transfer and call forwarding options that would enable you to relay calls, messages and even faxes to your mobile phone. The best thing about this is that it has no restriction on its coverage area. Therefore, you can still receive important information from New York even if your business is located in Unionville. Now that is tangible freedom in communication. | <urn:uuid:6ce85f6c-619d-4df4-a7e1-42955d55d515> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.ringcentral.ca/features/local-numbers/ontario/unionville-289-areacode.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560279923.28/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095119-00480-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.961879 | 690 | 2.90625 | 3 |
Malvertising — or malicious advertising — is getting a bit more attention as of late. In essence, it’s just another method by which criminals attempt to infect user PCs with some form of malware — albeit a very scary form as it can reach so many users so easily.
The important point is that criminals will continue to exploit new methods to infect users with malware. Regardless of the method (e.g., malvertising, spear-phishing, infected websites, drive-by downloads, etc.), the objective remains the same: criminals want to obtain control over online identities.
So, what do you do to help protect against malvertising? As an end-user? As an organization seeking to protect employee information and identities? As a service protecting online customers?
Unfortunately, regardless of how careful we are as end-users, enterprises, customers or governments, the malware will get through. Again, even if we:
- Avoid certain websites
- Adhere to strict online practices
- Protect corporate networks with firewalls and intrusion detection
- Secure access to online customer accounts
The malware will infiltrate the perimeter — and it’s best to assume this has already taken place. And, the more sensitive the transaction or information at risk, the more sophisticated the attack.
Here are some best practices to help protect against malvertising and any other online threat.
End-Users & Online Customers
- Be safe. Practice safe browsing and always keep all your software up to date. Be educated and share good practices with others.
- Use suspicion. Don’t assume SMS, email and social networking messages are necessarily from legitimate acquaintances or businesses. Be suspicious and never reveal account or personally identifiable information.
- Switch it up. Where passwords are your only choice, use a passphrase technique such as taking the first letter of an easy-to-remember phrase AND use different ones for different sites.
- Take advantage. Always take advantage of advanced security controls offered by online providers. So many online thefts can avoided.
- Go mobile. To access online services, consider downloading and using mobile applications from legitimate app stores (i.e., no jailbreaking) versus traditional PC browsers.
Employers & Service Providers
- Secure in layers. Implement layered security controls for networks, employees and online customers. Perimeter security is just step No. 1.
- Protect identities. Ensure identities are well protected with controls beyond username and passwords with some form of two-factor authentication that is dynamic in nature.
- Go OOB. For higher-risk transactions, make sure they are confirmed on an out-of-band (OOB) channel to defeat malware that has initiated or modified transactions.
- Be smart. Consider both security and usability when introducing controls — the technology exists. | <urn:uuid:271b90e5-93dc-45ee-b7ae-e0ff462f6262> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.entrust.com/malvertising-and-other-online-mischief/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560281424.85/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095121-00112-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.90017 | 568 | 2.515625 | 3 |
Process Management is a holistic management practice that models an enterprise's human and machine tasks and the interactions between them as processes with the view of improving agility and performance. It is a structured approach employing methods, policies, metrics, management practices and software tools to manage and continuously optimise an organisation's activities and processes.
The Bloor definition for Process is any activity in an organisation or between organisations that takes an input and then performs some action on the input to produce an output, where the activity provides value to the parties taking part. A process consists of a number of tasks in sequence and or in parallel. Some of processes differentiate the organisation from its competitors, while others provide support for regulations and governance, and others are necessary to run the organisation, but provide no differentiation. The activity must have both Worth and Saliency to the organisation(s) involved. In essence, processes describe how tasks are structured, who performs them, their sequencing, how long they take and what information is required to complete them. | <urn:uuid:ff670b9d-85aa-45dc-b389-22acde4bfb24> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.bloorresearch.com/research/market-update/business-process-management-p1/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560281069.89/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095121-00049-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.947912 | 201 | 2.953125 | 3 |
When designing and deploying security solutions, a thorough understanding of what you have to protect is important. Just as important is understanding the vulnerabilities within and around your assets and infrastructure. A threat analysis considers the range of currently known threats and the potential and likelihood that an attack will be attempted against your organization. Do you know what’s coming at you?
Threat management is the mitigation of recognized risk in an attempt to lower that risk to an acceptable level. These efforts require the use of auditing and analysis to confirm your efforts. Humans can be your weakest link. Ensure that they have received adequate training to stay a step or two ahead of potential attackers through:
- Audit & Analysis
- Risk Assessment and Mitigation
- Social Engineering
- Threat Assessment
- Vulnerability Assessment
Audit & Analysis
Audit and analysis are techniques to measure, record, and understand the threats facing an organization. Audit trails, log files, monitoring data, and other collected data points are used to construct a historical perspective of the infrastructure. Some auditing tools are native to any OS, application, or network service. ISO 27002 lists common controls an organization can use to defend infrastructures. ISACA’s COBIT framework provides ways to test these controls when auditing. Standards and frameworks must be understood to prove corporate governance is compliant with applicable government regulations, such as: Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX), Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), and Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS).
Making a record of events occurring on the network and within a system, as caused by a process or user account, is only the first part. Recorded event details need to be assessed and evaluated in context of all other events, both digital and physical. Such analysis can reveal what actually occurred and whether or not such occurrences are compliant and in adherence with required/expected work tasks. Internal auditing and analysis helps show a company is taking due care of their environment and can lead to resolving employee issues, tracking down criminals, and providing continuous improvement to the organization’s security profile.
Risk Assessment and Mitigation
Risk assessment is the initial and ongoing evaluation of an organization’s security stance in light of their assets, threats, and risks. Generally, risk assessment is performed as a multi-step process. This process starts with an inventory of assets. Each asset is assigned a composite value based on both tangible and intangible considerations. Threats that could negatively affect each specific asset are listed. Each of these threats is then evaluated in terms of the potential exposure factor (i.e. amount of potential loss), likelihood of occurrence (i.e. probability of becoming real), and annualized rate of occurrence (i.e. how often in a given year is threat realization possible). These calculations are analyzed to determine the threat/asset combination that is expected to cause the most harm the most often, and thus represents the largest risk to the organization.
Once risks are determined and prioritized based on severity and/or occurrence rate, countermeasures are selected to address top priority threats. Mitigation strategies include risk avoidance (i.e. removing elements of the environment or adjusting work tasks to remove that risk), risk reduction (e.g. installing security products or reconfiguring existing products), risk transference (e.g. assigning risk to others via outsourcing or insurance purchase), and risk acceptance (i.e. choosing to let a risk exist as is due to poor countermeasure options, lack of budget, small loss potential, or infrequency of occurrence). Overall, risk assessment and mitigation aims at taking an organization’s original total risk and reducing it to a manageable and acceptable level. All risk is never eliminated (every new control carries new risks), and risk is not all bad; the ability to analyze risk concisely requires training and exercise.
Social engineering is any attack focusing on the humans of an organization. Since humans are the weakest link in any security solution, it is important to address this growing concern. Social engineering attacks can occur through any means of communication, both real world and digital, whether real-time or not. Social engineering attacks often prey on new or undertrained employees but just as often focus attacks on high value targets such as administrators or C-level executives. Confidence games played by hackers can range from seemingly innocent conversations asking for general information, (e.g. a name, e-mail address, phone number), to specifically targeted ploys to trick a victim into revealing secret information or performing a risk task (e.g. opening an e-mail attachment, typing in commands, or visiting a URL).
Due to the nature of social engineering, there are no specific technology defenses that address it. Some filters for SPAM or phishing in e-mail and Web browsers can help, but the best countermeasure is employee education and awareness. Employees need to know they are targets. They need to be more suspicious of contacts they don’t automatically recognize or that fail to provide a provable identity. Information classification policy should identify how data is to be classified and labeled. Each strata of classification should clearly identify what content can be shared with whom. When necessary, procedures should dictate the means by which identities can be verified, before revealing information or performing tasks. A thorough understanding of the means of social engineering and the common tactics employed by criminals will assist organizations in designing a training program that equips their personnel with the tools needed to avoid the common traps.
A threat assessment is part of a comprehensive risk assessment and risk mitigation process. It is the profiling and evaluation of threats that loom over an organization and its assets. Only when you know the potential harm that could occur is it possible to design and deploy an appropriate and sufficient security response. Threats include Internet attacks, internal personnel, nature’s physical elements, unplanned downtime, hardware failures, over allocation of resources and capacity, oversights, mistakes, and more. All of these must all be considered when designing an organization’s security solution. Understanding threats (i.e., what they are, how they manifest, how situations are used by criminals, etc.) involves learning how criminal hackers work, the process and costs of incident response and forensic investigations, as well as a thorough understanding the underpinnings of IT infrastructure, including hardware, firmware, operating systems, applications, file storage, network resources, databases, networking protocols, etc.
When crafting and maintaining a secure infrastructure there are three primary phases or elements: risk assessment/analysis, vulnerability assessment/analysis, and penetration testing. Security starts with a risk assessment to establish a foundational security policy. Risk assessments are repeated on a regular basis to incrementally improve upon a security solution. Generally, risk assessments are more paper based methods of security assessment an analysis.
Vulnerability assessment is then possible once an initial security policy has been implemented into the deployed infrastructure. Vulnerability assessment seeks to confirm that all necessary patches and upgrades are installed, that reasonable configuration settings are in place, and that known flaws and vulnerabilities are addressed. This assessment is usually performing using mostly automated analysis tools which include an updatable database of checks, tests, and threat probes. Most vulnerability assessment tools can be run by a well-rounded network or security administrator. These assessment tools are generally safe to use and do not pose a serious risk to the infrastructure.
Once the administrative staff has responded to all issues uncovered by risk assessment and vulnerability assessment, the third phase of security assessment can be performed – namely penetration testing (a.k.a. ethical hacking). Penetration testing is when a highly skilled team of security experts use the tools and techniques of criminal hackers to test the resiliency of the deployed security infrastructure, the methods of detection, and human response. The goal of such testing is to reveal vulnerabilities and other issues that automated tools overlook and which skilled and focused criminal hackers may be able to uncover. If you are able to find these concerns before they are abused, defenses can be implemented to prevent those esoteric breaches which may have been unknown prior to the penetration test. | <urn:uuid:39681b49-5b2a-4b9c-88f2-82702b9f307b> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://blog.globalknowledge.com/2012/05/07/threat-management-whats-coming-at-you/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280128.70/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00169-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.943923 | 1,652 | 2.546875 | 3 |
What exactly is the difference between a run-of-the-mill cyber incident and a “significant” cyber incident? Your organization may or may not have had to ponder this question in the past, but the federal government certainly has — and it’s an important question to boot.
The distinction among severity levels will weigh heavily in the government’s response to cyber threats, and it will determine what is expected from organizations when they respond to a breach.
Classifying cyber threats based on their severity is a central concern featured in a policy directive President Barack Obama published this July. Building off of this classification system, the policy outlines the necessary actions for the federal government to take in response to cyber security incidents. It covers five key principles to guide the government’s response efforts. Here’s a closer look at these principles and what each of them aims to accomplish:
- Sharing responsibility: According to the directive, protection against cyber attacks is a responsibility that is shared among individuals, private-sector businesses and the government.
- Response according to risk: The government’s response to an incident will be based on severity, and incidents will be triaged to determine the severity level.
- Respecting affected organizations: When a private business is affected by a cyber attack, the government will protect the details of the affected organization to the extent allowed by law.
- Unifying the government’s efforts: Government agencies need to work collaboratively to effectively combat a security incident. The first agency to respond to an incident should notify others.
- Supporting rapid recovery: In responding to an incident, the government’s aim must be to help the affected party “return to normal operations” as quickly as possible.
Any organization that conducts business with the federal government must keep in mind the policy directive and the five principles the government will follow in responding to threats. Partnering with the government to share risk information and resolve incidents can benefit both the private and public sectors, but organizations must maintain adherence to these principles in their security efforts.
As an industry leader with a long history of experience with federal government security, Lunarline can help your organization ensure adherence to federal standards, whether that means full FedRAMP compliance, incident response improvements or enhancements in any other area of cyber security. | <urn:uuid:5d963e91-f43e-4a50-ace0-7dd3d1b5664a> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://lunarline.com/blog/2016/08/new-cyber-incident-policy-directive/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280221.47/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00013-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.952669 | 470 | 2.75 | 3 |
National Cyber Security Awareness Month in the US was created to focus on the need for improved online safety and security for all Americans. It is important to note that with the internet, however, there are no international boundaries. Cyber threats affect everyone, everywhere, anytime and anyplace. No one is safe.
When you physically travel it is obvious when you enter a different country. It is also well known that each country has its own set of laws and regulations. The internet is a different story. Consider email, for example, where the fastest distance between two points is not always a straight line. An email sent from someone in Texas can easily move through London, Russia or even China before it reaches its recipient. Meanwhile, both the sender and recipient assume their email communication took a direct route.
Another issue to consider is the insider threat. Regardless of the industry or location, nearly all organizations have one thing in common – they all have employees. With employees comes the possibility of insider threats. When people think of insider threats, they typically assume it is the deliberate, malicious insider; someone actively trying to steal from a company or cause harm. Today, very often the overlooked problem is the accidental insider. '
The accidental insider unknowingly exposes an organization to risk. A common example is clicking on a link or opening an attachment that was sent in disguise from an attacker. Although some threats are obvious (you won $100,000, visit this link or open this attachment to learn how to claim your prize), others are not.
Our adversaries are getting smarter, and more dangerous. They are targeting employees with emails that appear to come from a manager or co-worker; for example, with details related to a current project or issue. While an employee thinks they are doing a good thing opening the attachment or clicking the link, they unknowingly expose their organization to an attacker. This type of scenario is becoming more common because the adversaries we deal with today are not just con artists, but seasoned criminals who have done extensive reconnaissance.
So, what can you do to counter these attackers? Start by acknowledging that the types of threats we face have changed. Therefore, what worked in the past is not enough to keep organizations safe today. Organizations place too much emphasis on technology. They believe the more software they purchase, the safer they will be. These companies spend millions of dollars on security technology, yet they are still being compromised. They are doing good things, but they are not doing the right things.
Implementing technology lays a solid foundation to protect against cyber attacks, but it is no longer enough. Without focusing on the most vulnerable part of an organization – your employees – breaches will continue to occur.
Attackers are targeting individuals; therefore, processes must be put in place to safeguard employees. Start with education. An educated employee is less likely to fall victim to an attacker. A security awareness and training program should be required for absolutely everyone in your organization who touches data. Because threats change, training programs should be re-evaluated and updated at least once a year to ensure employees remain current on the latest threats.
Run your web browser and email client in separate virtual machines on the local client – this can be transparent to the user. If users become infected, then they will only be infected for a few hours versus a few days or months. Applying this to the desktop can decrease damage and increase security. It’s a twist on traditional virtualization that is more commonly used at the server level. By virtualizing the desktop environment, it’s possible to operate the browser and email client in contained areas where users can click away on websites and freely open email attachments. If there is an infection, it can be contained and the damage to the wider network is controlled.
Two additional methods that attackers use to cause harm are HTML and macros. Most employees do not use them in their regular functions. Employees have too many features turned on that they don’t need. Turning them off makes it more difficult for attackers to wreak havoc.
Organizations must wake up and realize the importance of the human element. Otherwise, breaches will continue to happen. If you work to change a person’s habits through heightened awareness, then you will minimize risks.
Dr. Eric Cole is an industry-recognized security expert with over 20 years of hands-on experience. He is a SANS faculty fellow and course author, and founder of Secure Anchor Consulting, where he provides state-of-the-art security services and expert witness work. To view upcoming courses taught by Cole, visit http://www.sans.org/info/113507. | <urn:uuid:d21edd20-1f6d-4275-b29c-6a9da1932eae> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/magazine-features/comprehensive-cybersecurity-securing-the-human/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560281162.88/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095121-00315-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958742 | 944 | 2.953125 | 3 |
As large swaths of the country are hit by snowstorm after snowstorm and western states battle a decade’s long dry spell with California declaring a drought emergency, weather is on nearly everyone’s mind. For many years now, the populace has relied on powerful supercomputers to forecast the weather, so it may be surprising to learn the practice is still fraught with uncertainty.
In the words of Nashua Telegraph reporter David Brooks, supercomputers are almost as uncertain about the weather as we are. That be overstating things a bit, but the atmosphere is a chaotic system and that chaos can only be tamed so much.
In professional circles, there’s a debate about how to best predict atmospheric conditions and events. It centers on the degree of accuracy and uncertainty associated with the world’s most prominent large-scale weather models.
Weather models all employ the same basic techniques. They collect data from satellites, weather balloons and other sites and plug them into physics equations, for computers to calculate the answers. The process is repeated many times to illustrate, for example, the most likely track a storm will take. This all has to happen very quickly. Forecast accuracy depends on the quality and number of input data, the available computing power and the code design.
“Some models seem to do a better job forecasting certain things out two, three, four days, but when you get closer to the actual event, another model might do a better job of something like snowfall amounts,” notes Mary Stampone, an assistant professor of geography at the University of New Hampshire in Durham and also the official state climatologist. “It takes the expertise of trained meteorologists to sort through all this computer data to see which (model) is more reasonable.”
The issue even extends to the Olympics, where weather concerns have highlighted the performance discrepancy between America’s Global Forecast System, used by the National Weather Service, and the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF). The consensus among meteorologists is that the ECMWF provides the more accurate global forecasting model. With two systems on the current TOP500 list at number 51 and 52 – the European model has significantly more computing power than the US model.
The limitations of the US model came to the light when the ECMWF warned that Hurricane Sandy would hit the East Coast days ahead of the American hurricane model, which showed the storm heading off-shore away from land.
“The state of operational U.S. numerical weather prediction is an embarrassment to the nation and it does not have to be this way,” wrote Cliff Maas, a professor of atmospheric sciences at the University of Washington on his weather blog last year. “Taiwan, Germany, England, the European Center, Canada, and other nations have more computer power for their weather prediction services. Our nation has had inferior numerical weather prediction for too long. New computers are an obvious and relatively easy first step, because they make everything possible.”
The two main forecasting supercomputers used by the National Weather Service are underpowered, with only one-tenth the computing power of the European center, according to Maas. The good news is that the systems are currently undergoing a $25 million upgrade as part of the Hurricane Sandy supplemental bill.
“If the U.S. did invest more money and people into making the model better, then the forecast would be better,” said Jeff Masters, meteorology director at the online forecasting service Weather Underground. “The money we spend on weather forecasts and improving them pays for itself.”
Meteorologists agree that leadership-class supercomputers are required to improve forecasts for this computationally-intensive application. That means spending money on petascale supercomputers and preparing for the exascale era, something the ECMWF has already started doing. Working with the Cray-formed CRESTA project, the European center has been refining its Integrated Forecast System (IFS) model, which provides medium-range weather forecasts to its 34 European member states.
The global grid size for simulations is currently based on a 16 km resolution, but researchers are working to get that down to 2.5 km global weather forecast model by 2030. To be exascale-ready, IFS needs to run efficiently on a thousand times more cores. Advances achieved by CRESTA so far have enabled IFS to harness 200,000 CPU cores on Titan, the fastest supercomputer in the United States. This is the most cores ever harnessed by a weather model and it marks the first use of the 5 km resolution model that will be needed in medium range forecasts in 2023.
Even with the best data and the ultimate computing machine, weather forecasting will never be perfect. Weather systems are a stochastic problem, which means they are sufficiently complex that a future state cannot be determined with absolute certainty, only with a certain probability.
Yet, there’s no question that sophisticated weather models and storm tracking tools help protect the country from the effects of severe weather events. Considering that devastating weather events, like tornadoes, hurricanes and floods, can cost the country billions of dollars a year, the boost in computing power and enhancements to other weather-related services are a wise investment. | <urn:uuid:d007cb18-3680-48a9-9275-d0b1681a949c> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.hpcwire.com/2014/02/12/accurate-forecasts-tied-supercomputer-spending/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560279379.41/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095119-00527-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.940378 | 1,090 | 3.25 | 3 |
According to a new study 90% of Americans do not feel safe online.
The report released by McAfee and the National Cyber Security Alliance (NCSA) revealed that 59% of Americans say that their job is dependent on a safe and secure internet.
However, 90% do not feel completely safe from hackers, viruses and malware while online.
"The threat to the safety of Americans online is growing every day and as the survey shows the fear of Americans has also grown to 90 percent," said Gary Davis, vice president of global consumer marketing at McAfee. "It is our responsibility to make sure that consumers are aware of these growing threats so they can be best prepared to defend themselves against these hidden criminals."
Last year 26% of Americans were notified by a business or online service provider that their personal information had been lost or compromised due to a data breach.
The survey of 1,000 adult Internet users found a disparity between online safety perceptions and actual practices involving smartphone security and password protection.
"The Internet is a shared resource for so many of our daily activities which is why protecting it is a shared responsibility," said Michael Kaiser, executive director of the NCSA. "Everyone should take security measures, understand the consequences of their actions and behaviours and enjoy the benefits of the Internet."
A recent study by McAfee revealed that nearly 20% of Americans browse the internet unprotected while another 12% have zero protection security and 7% have their security software installed but disabled.
"The need for consumers to stay educated is necessary now more than ever with nine in ten Americans using their computers for banking, stock trading or reviewing personal information," said McAfee in a blog post.
Please follow this author on Twitter @Tineka_S or comment below. | <urn:uuid:8936cd30-c8b1-4798-9389-aa976b89b4ae> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.cbronline.com/news/one-in-four-americans-suffered-security-breaches-last-year-021012 | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280239.54/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00435-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.960239 | 356 | 2.8125 | 3 |
Driven by the deployment of FTTH, it is really popular for many new houses to be connected to a network that can provide data, telephone and TV services all over Ethernet, which is also called triple play network. It combines mainly three types of telecommunication technologies, which are Ethernet, VoIP (a technology transmitting voice calls using a broadband Internet) and CATV (a technology delivering television programming to via coaxial cables or fiber optic cables).
Some might say as we can also enjoy voice call and television programs services over other transmission media, why should we connected to a triple play network. The biggest benefit is cost. For example, for a traditional home network, three different types of cable should be connected to the houses separately for Ethernet, telephone and television, which will cost more than that of a triple play network. Transmitting television programs via fiber optic cable is also a better solution for the 4K television. In addition, this triple play network can better fit the deployment request of the popular smart home network.
Actually, the benefit of this triple play network is also reflected on the network infrastructure. To build a triple play network. The first step is to understand its network infrastructure. Triple play network is largely based on FTTH network. And FTTH network is generally based on PON, especially EPON (Ethernet Passive Optical Network). Thus, triple play network is suggested to be built over EPON.
To brought these services to the different individual users in the existing fiber optic network, some change must be made. The following picture illustrates the mentioned advantages of triple play network by contrast. Another two commonly used network infrastructures are also displayed— EPON + LAN and EPON+ DOCSIS (Data Over Cable Service Interface Specification) EOC (Ethernet Over Copper).
EPON + LAN
In a network which combines EPON and LAN together, the services of Internet and VoIP are offered by EPON ONU which is deployed at the optical nodes and the LAN access for interactive order and broadband access. Ethernet cable should be connected the user’s house. For the Cable TV, the signals from the cable TV operator are firstly received by an optical receiver and then reach users via the traditional coaxial cable. Although, the existing network has not been changed, but two different types of cables should be connected to the end user’s house, which is not as cost-effective as triple play network.
EPON + DOCSIS EOC
EPON + DOCSIS EOC seems a more cost-effective solution than EPON + LAN Solution, as the biggest character of this solution is making full use of the existing cables. CATV system and ONU via EPON system will transmit the data, voice, and TV services to the user’s house, by using the existing EPON OLT (Optical Line Terminal) equipment to enable these services on two way over the cable at cost points competitive with EOC solution. However, the end user’s number of this solution is limited comparing with triple play network. And the deployment cost is still higher than that of a triple play network.
EPON Triple Play Network
The above picture is a simple figure of a triple play network. In a triple play network, the Cable TV signal will be transmitted in to optical signals, as the signal should travel a long distance, EDFA should be deploy in this link to ensure the signal quality. The signal will then reach a WDM network. On the other hand, the IP network which offers Data and VoIP services will be combined through EPON OLT and then transmitted to the same WDM network. Then the three services are all combined over a fiber optic network. To support more users on the same network, the fiber optic splitter will be used. The signals reach individual user’s house via EPON ONU which is installed at user end.
Using EPON for triple play network not only allows a cable operator to virtually provide a dedicated IP Ethernet connection to each customer in a more efficient and direct way, but also allows operators an FTTP operators to be in the same market place for headend, hub and user premises equipment in a economical manner. Connecting only one type of cable to the user’s house, data, VoIP and Cable TV are all available via a ONU.
The following table listed the above mentioned most basic components that are required in a triple play network for your reference. Kindly contact firstname.lastname@example.org for more details about FS.COM triple play network solution.
|EPON OLT||Optical line terminal for Ethernet passive optical network|
|EDFA||Erbium-doped fiber amplifiers|
|DWDM MUX/DEMUX||DWDM multiplexer/demultiplexer|
|CWDM MUX/DEMUX||CWDM multiplexer/demultiplexer|
|PON Splitter||Splitting or combining signals in optical fibers.|
|EPON ONU||Optical network unit for Ethernt passive optical network| | <urn:uuid:0e916fd6-0a01-4925-a7f5-4124dac4181a> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.fs.com/blog/what-you-need-to-build-triple-play-network-data-voip-tv.html | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560281226.52/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095121-00159-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.928306 | 1,049 | 2.734375 | 3 |
Organizations often hire contractors. In most cases, negotiating and signing a contract should precede the beginning of work. In some cases, however, the assignment is too small to warrant a full contract. And, in other cases, although a contract is essential, the work is too urgent to delay until the negotiation and approval of a full-scale contract. In these types of circumstances, turn to a Letter of Agreement (LoA) instead.
The Letter of Agreement
What is a Letter of Agreement (LoA)? Also known as a letter of understanding, memorandum of understanding, or a scope of work agreement, an LoA is a brief document that summarizes basic items of agreement between you and a contractor so that work can commence. At a minimum, an LoA will contain information on the nature of the work to be done, due dates, and payment terms. In comparison with a contract, an LoA is much briefer, making it faster and easier to draft, and easier to get approved by both parties. | <urn:uuid:b3e8cd80-1b11-43bc-a465-df3eea6bfdf9> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.infotech.com/research/letters-of-agreement-jump-start-contracts | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560281746.82/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095121-00067-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.959457 | 206 | 2.65625 | 3 |
Worms, once responsible for some of the worst virus epidemics in history, are now on the decline and are gradually fading into the background as hackers are looking to make money instead.
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Figures compiled by web security outfit PandaLabs reveal that worms have been outnumbered by more threatening malicious code such as adware or Trojans, which currently make up a combined 49% of all detected infections.
In its latest malware audit for October, PandaLabs says worms scored only 8.31%, having gradually weakened from 18.14% in November 2006 and 12.11% in January 2007.
Adware and Trojans have kept their high corruption rate and now make up an infection score of 25.97% and 23.37% respectively.
Although worms have advanced in terms of their sophistication, their prime focus remains the same. They continue to create havoc and panic but are usually motivated by nothing more than pure hate, said PandaLabs.
Dominic Hoskins, Panda Security UK, said, "Having computers brought to a standstill turns into significant financial losses, but in fact this type of activity is no longer considered attractive and hugely beneficial by malware creators."
Notoriety has now been completely played down by financial gain, he said. "In effect, the sole purpose of creating new malware is now financially led through the theft of sensitive and confidential information," said Hoskins.
Worms infection rate:
October 2007: 8.31%
September 2007: 8.39%
August 2007: 8.23%
July 2007: 8.30%
June 2007: 8.71%
May 2007: 9.46%
April 2007: 8%
March 2007: 6%
February 2007: 6%
January 2007: 12.11%
December 2006: 16.16 %
November 2006: 18.14% | <urn:uuid:3ebead3e-c303-45b7-ad1c-f48e45fb262b> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240083855/Worms-in-decline-report-says | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280718.7/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00187-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.960121 | 409 | 2.53125 | 3 |
We may not understand the full impact that wearable computers—fitness trackers like the Fitbit, and augmented-reality devices like Google Glass, for example—have on our privacy. In fact, one of the first computer scientists to work on wearable tech says we should be more wary.
Alex “Sandy” Pentland, director of the MIT Human Dynamics Lab, is an expert on the intersection of society and big data. Thanks to the revelations last year by Edward Snowden, many people now realize that their metadata (e.g., not the contents of your email, but the time and place you sent it from) is often up for grabs, regardless of how many privacy barriers they’ve put in place. But Pentland doesn’t think we’re scared enough.
"The thing is, I can read most of your life from your metadata,” Pentland told The Verge. “And what’s worse, I can read your metadata from the people you interact with. I don’t have to see you at all. People are upset about privacy, but in one sense they are insufficiently upset because they don’t really understand what’s at risk. They are only looking at the short term.” The possible scenarios, he said, are “downright scary."
Indeed, data on where you are at specific times can be quite telling. A recent study led by Stanford University Ph.D candidate Jonathan Mayer found that even phone call metadata could establish that people were most likely buying guns, growing marijuana, suffering from certain health problems, or terminating pregnancies. It’s not difficult to imagine that real-time location data could do so as well. | <urn:uuid:6879a936-1ee0-4540-be52-d06a498493ea> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.nextgov.com/big-data/2014/05/father-wearable-computers-thinks-their-data-should-frighten-you/83875/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560280888.62/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095120-00517-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.958238 | 354 | 2.53125 | 3 |
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Mission San Louis
Florida’s Apalachee-Spanish Living History Museum
Historical Site Project. AMH 2010
15 October 2016
The places I included in my presentation are all circled in Red. I enjoyed this landmark more than I’d ever imagined I would and hope to return soon. Enjoy the PowerPoint!
Mission San Luis
This sign was the first to be displayed outside at the Mission San Luis on the way to the Council House. San Luis was the Spaniards' westernmost military, religious, and administrative headquarters between the 1560s and 1690s. Apalachee Indians and Spaniards occupied the area.
All residents of San Luis were Christians. Church bells would signal that it was time for different activities of the day. There were Saturday evening prayers, 11 a.m. Mass on Sundays, services on religious holidays, choir practices, baptisms, marriages, and funeral rites in the church. The cemetery was located beneath the floor of the church. The Indians requested friars after tragedy caused their traditional values to waver. So they activities were attended by Spaniards and Indians.
The room shown to the left is where the Friar wrote letters to important leaders, the governor, and the king.
The garden outback is where herbs were grown to make homemade remedies for illnesses. Rosemary was the most commonly used.
The above picture shows the Friar’s establishment/home, connected to his kitchen by an archway. The top left image is the stove his chef cooks. She then carries the food through the archway to the house.
The Friar was responsible for teaching the children things, such as music and how to pray. The palm painted on the wall shown to the right was a teaching method used to help the children memorize music scales with the use of their left hand.
The Typical Apalachee Home
The picture on the right shows the size of the average Apalachee Home. The homes were simple; reserved for sleeping and storage. There was a narrow doorway and no windows. Smudge pits were used to smoke out insects; there was a small opening in the roof for ventilation. The materials used to build the homes came from the forest and palmetto fronds. This along with the simple structure made them easy to build and repair.
This picture shows just how large the council house is. I stood in front of it for scale and you can hardly even see me. Once inside we were briefed on some of the contents of this Apalachee Civics Center by a crafter. Many things like praying, Sunday mass, dances, and games occurred here.
The Apalachee Civic Center
Once inside the Civic Center, the group was greeted with a crafter. He was wildling away at a piece of wood with flint (used for a wide variety of things around Mission San Luis). The Bottom left image shows the very popular Cassina leaves. These leaves were used to make a very highly caffeinated Black tea that the crafter talking to us, didn’t seem to like. He claims that it is to strong for him. The top right image shows me wearing a mask and holding instruments that were used for evening dances and festivities.
Agriculture and Gender Roles
A big part of the Apalachee diet was corn. The next stop on the trail was a Spaniard that lived in the nearby fort, he was checking on the corn crops. He explained to the tour group that he did not regularly tend to the field, the blacksmith’s wife did. Men regularly cleared the fields and hunted while women tended to the fields and did other household jobs. The Spaniard then introduced us to the Blacksmith and made his way back towards the fort.
The Blacksmiths were the toolmakers. They’d make tools for everything from farming, too the household, to warfare. When we were visiting, the Blacksmith was working on hammering strips of metal into hooks to hang things in his workshop.
PLAY ME FOR THE INSIDE SCOOP ON WHAT FEULS THAT FIRE!
Above are the images of the kitchen and spices of the middle class Spaniards living in Mission San Louis. The spices were put into that gourd (above) and hung to dry (top right) so they’d last longer.
Daily Life for Spaniards
Once we entered the house, the Spaniard living there gave us a full tour of the two roomed home. He said that a lot of Spaniards commonly lived in a home the size of only his kitchen with a family of eight to ten. More workers meant more money which made the lack of space bearable.
These beds all occupy one bedroom. Rosemary is hung from the bed posts in an attempt to make the close quarters smell better.
The last stop on our tour was casa fuerte. The Fort, also known as the blockhouse, was occupied by unwed Spaniards. That’s why the number of Spaniards (12-45) was so small, because the rest of the Spaniards were married. They lived upstairs with dining downstairs. Though the blockhouse was occupied by Spaniards, the Apalachee militias prvided the bulk of the province’s military power. Before the fort could be taken, the Spaniards and Apalachee burned it down and evacuated.
Downstairs was the dining hall where the Spaniards kept a series of maps, games, and other things to keep them occupied. Some of the more popular games included cards and dice.
The image on the left is the messenger posing with the cannon Isabella. There are the slots positioned in each corner of the fort’s fence for cannons. There was a cannon for each corner. The messenger gave us a tour outside and inside the blockouse.
“Long Live Spain!”
"Apalachee Before European Contact." Apalachee Before European Contact. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Oct. 2016.
Mission San Luis Pamphlet on the lives of the Apalachee
Direct facts from the museum of Mission San Luis
Revolvy, LLC. ""Apalachee" on Revolvy.com." Apalachee. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Oct. 2016.
to help the children memorize music scales with the use of their left hand.
Above are the images of the kitchen and spices of the middle class Spaniards living in Mission San Louis. The spices were put into that gourd (above) and hung to d | <urn:uuid:adce85c9-4dff-49c7-8eb1-1c43da8ebe6b> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://docs.com/hannah-frady/1464/mission-san-louis-powerpoint | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560281419.3/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095121-00269-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.968629 | 1,452 | 2.984375 | 3 |
How does the East Coast quake stack up?
- By Kevin McCaney
- Aug 23, 2011
This story has been updated to correct the name of and fix the link to Michigan Technological University.
The 5.9-magintude earthquake that struck near Mineral, Va., on Aug. 23 and rocked much of the East Coast was a rare occurrence — most lifelong Easterners have probably never felt anything like it.
But how rare was it?
It was the strongest earthquake to hit Virginia since at least 1897 (for which earthquake magnitudes are estimated) and apparently the strongest quake to hit east of the Mississippi River since a 5.9 quake struck in Indiana in 1983, according to a site hosted by Michigan Technological University.
The strongest earthquake recorded on the East Coast hit Charlestown, S.C., in 1886 with an estimated magnitude of 6.8, resulting in more than 60 deaths and extensive damage.
In California, Alaska and other points around the globe, a quake of such intensity is practically business as usual, but on the East Coast, it’s about as likely as a solar eclipse.
Although reports of damage were minimal by earthquake standards, it did have an impact around metropolitan areas.
In Washington, the White House, Pentagon, the Capitol and other federal buildings were evacuated temporarily, and some agencies and commercial operations sent employees home early. Commuter trains and the Washington Metro train service were shut down or slowed by post-earthquake inspections. And the National Cathedral in Washington suffered some damage to its central tower, according to several reports.
Both reactors at Dominion Virginia Power's North Anna nuclear power plant, located within 20 miles of the quake’s epicenter, shut down during the quake, CNN reported.
In some areas, cell phone service was temporarily disrupted because of the volume of calls. A spokesman from Verizon Wireless said there were no reports of damage to the company's wireless network, but that congestion from a significant spike in cellular traffic interfered with some calls for about 20 minutes after the quake, although conditions returned to normal shortly after that.
Likewise, a spokesperson for Sprint Nextel in Virginia said there was no damage to the system from the quake, but that callers had trouble getting connections because of volume in the hours following the seismic event. The company encourages the use of text messaging at such times because the messages require considerably less bandwidth than a voice call. But at the height of the congestion some customers were not able to send or receive texts, either.
CTIA, the organization that represents the wireless telecommunications industry, also recommended using text service. “The industry’s infrastructure appears to be intact, but because many wireless consumers are using the networks, we are experiencing higher than normal traffic," CTIA said in a statement. "In these high volume instances, there can be delays. We encourage people to send text messages and e-mails to contact their loved ones until volume returns to normal.”
As news rocketed around the social media universe and the U.S. Geological Survey's Earthquake Hazards Program website, even Twitter experienced an overload, briefly posting a message that it was over-capacity before returning to normal operations.
Although earthquakes on the East Coast are rare, they happen all the time around the world. According to the USGS' Latest Earthquakes in the World site, the quake that struck in Virginia at 1:51 (and 4 seconds) p.m. Aug. 23 was the 24th earthquake of a 2.5 magnitude or greater around the world on that day.
It was also the strongest of the day, at least to that point, which is another thing that made it such a rare occurrence.
The Federal Emergency Mangement Agency's Earthquake Hazard Map, which rates earthquake hazards in U.S. regions on a seven-step scale from white (very small probability of damage) to red (potentially serious damage) shows Mineral in the second, or gray, area, where people “could experience shaking of moderate intensity” during an earthquake.
The likely outcome of a quake in that area, the site says, is: “Moderate shaking — Felt by all, many frightened. Some heavy furniture moved; a few instances of fallen plaster. Damage slight.”
So, although the earthquake was rare, and much stronger than normally felt on the East Coast, it pretty much held to form. At the time of this writing, there were no injuries and little damage reported.
And if anyone is worried that a big East Coast quake is a sign of the Apocalypse, USGS points out on its earthquake FAQ page that, worldwide, serious earthquakes of 7.0 or higher magnitudes have been holding steady, or even decreasing slightly, in recent years.
But if you’re worried and want to find the place with the fewest earthquakes, USGS has that answer, too. You just have to move to Antarctica.
William Jackson contributed to this report.
Kevin McCaney is a former editor of Defense Systems and GCN. | <urn:uuid:fb19e458-9ff3-4a9b-a23e-72b203e0772d> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://gcn.com/articles/2011/08/23/east-coast-earthquakes-a-rarity.aspx | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560281419.3/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095121-00269-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.967517 | 1,033 | 2.921875 | 3 |
Cell Phones and Nature
09.01.2011 by Andrew M. Seybold
What happened during the earthquake was that everyone reached for their phones at once. The networks worked perfectly during the aftermath of the quake but they were simply overloaded on both the voice and the data side. Calls could not be made or received, calls were dropped, video taken of damage could not be sent, and SMS messages did not get through.
The East Coast has suffered a double whammy as we all know. First was the 5.8 earthquake followed by Hurricane Irene, which was not as bad as was feared but still bad enough that the damage will take a long time to repair. Both of these events caused problems for the commercial wireless networks but in very different ways, pointing out the major differences between network overload and cell site failures.
In both of these cases there were network issues. During the earthquake the problem was simple: The networks stayed up but they were overloaded and could not process all of the requests for service. This is the same scenario that has been experienced with landline phones for years. Remember how difficult it used to be to get a dial tone on Mother’s Day? Perhaps you remember when after an earthquake in California or during the wildland fires you could not get a call through to your relatives using the wired network?
While the cause of wired and wireless phone system overloads are different, the results are the same. The network is up and running but the number of people trying to make calls simply overwhelms the network. In the case of wired phones, the reason is that after your dedicated line reaches the nearest central office your call is joined with all of the other calls on a cable or microwave link. This link transfers the requests and the calls overloaded the link since all of these systems are built on the premise that not all phone users will want to make a phone call at exactly the same time. Therefore, the wired phone systems were designed to handle a normal, expected traffic load with extra capacity for peak call periods, but they were not designed for times when demand is unusually high. The lines and switches were jammed and people could not get dial tone and had to wait until the demand subsided.
The difference between wired and wireless network overloading is that in the wireless network the overloading happens when too many people are trying to use the network in a small area. Each cell site is typically made up of three sectors, each covering a 120-degree portion of the surrounding area (see diagram below).
This diagram depicts three cell sites with each site divided into three sectors. Each of the sectors has the same capacity as the others.
Each sector can handle a maximum loading within it. For the sake of simplicity, let’s assume that within each sector the maximum number of voice calls that can be handled is 100. A sector’s normal traffic load might be thirty calls at the same time, peaking at sixty calls in a single cell sector during busy periods. Good cellular design dictates that reserve capacity be built into each cell sector so that others entering that sector from another have capacity on the new sector and are not disconnected as they move from sector to sector.
The sector becomes overloaded when demand for service exceeds the maximum number of calls that can be processed in that sector, in this case 100, so if there are 120 people within the sector some will not have network access. The way you gain access to the network is that your device (or the network in the case of an incoming call) sends a request on what is typically called the signally channel. This channel is not only used to request a call but also for the network to track the location of the device so it can be found during an inbound call as well as to facilitate the hand-off to the next sector when the phone is moving. In some networks this signaling channel is also used for SMS traffic, which uses some of the capacity of the signaling channel.
If there are too many devices trying to access the network within a cell sector, the signaling channel becomes overloaded and some customers’ requests will not even reach the network (this is one reason priority access for public safety is not a viable option). So there are two issues, the total number of calls a sector is capable of handling, and the amount of traffic on the signaling channel. Even if more spectrum is allocated to a cell sector, while the number of calls that can be handled by that sector increases, there is still a finite number the sector is capable of processing and completing.
On the data side, even fewer data sessions per sector are normally supported. In normal usage, data bursts to and from the device will permit more customers to make use of the broadband data side of the system. However, if a number of customers are streaming video up or down, the total number of broadband data users is diminished greatly. Even in normal times we have seen the results of cell site sector overloading. AT&T had this type of problem as the iPhone took off a few years ago and many of its customers started using a lot of data services. It is possible that one sector or multiple cell sites are completely overloaded due to demand but calls can still be made and received a few miles away where the demand is less.
What happened during the earthquake was that everyone reached for their phones at once. The networks worked perfectly during the aftermath of the quake but they were simply overloaded on both the voice and the data side. Calls could not be made or received, calls were dropped, video taken of damage could not be sent, and SMS messages did not get through. No matter how much spectrum we have or how robust the commercial operators build these networks, we will have network overloading during major events.
This is not a new problem. You might recall that during the Oklahoma bombing the radio and TV stations were telling people within the affected areas not to use their phones so the commercial systems could be used to augment the public safety channels. During the earthquake, I am not aware of a single cell site failure so the bottom line is that in this instance, the problems experienced were network overloading and this will never be solved no matter how much spectrum we throw at it and no matter how many more cell sites are built. It is not possible for anyone to build a commercial wired or wireless network that will not reach saturation at some point, due to some type of major incident. The same is true, by the way, with the Internet for all of you who plan to rely on it and store all of your data in the cloud.
One advantage to the commercial wireless networks is that the network operators can do some on-the-fly network management. Especially the newer 3G and 4G networks have tools built in that enable pro-active traffic management by changing antenna patterns to shrink the radius of a cell site, to overlap cell sectors in a given area, and to try to balance the load. However, even with all of this new technology there comes a point where a cell sector, and possibly many cell sectors, will be overloaded and this will happen over and over again. It is more severe during an event such as an earthquake because once the event is over, everyone reaches for their phones at once. During a longer incident, say a hurricane, the traffic does not usually peak as quickly and therefore the networks are generally able to handle the additional traffic.
The other advantage to a natural disaster such as a hurricane is that there is advanced warning. In the case of Irene, you can review all of the press releases from the network operators and see that they were all preparing for the worst. They moved equipment around, made sure batteries and generators were operating and had their maximum capacity, and pre-dispatched people and spare parts to areas where the predictions were for the major damage from the storm.
From all of the reports I have seen, the commercial networks, for the most part, withstood what the hurricane threw at them. There were, according to the FCC’s records, a number of outages but they were not network-wide and were limited to cell sites that were damaged or flooded, or where the connection between the site and the network was destroyed. The result was that most of the East Coast was able to use the commercial wireless networks. I have not heard of any network overloads simply because the storm was both predicted and lasted so long in most areas.
The sites that went down went down because of wind damage or flooding, or as mentioned, because the link between the cell site and the network was broken. Today, many cell sites, but not all, have battery back-up and many have both batteries and generators. The number of sites with generators depends in large part on the network. Some networks won’t build a major site without a generator, others build out the network with key sites having both batteries and generators, but some sites only have battery back-up. Some sites are equipped with battery back-up and provisioned so that a portable generator can be driven to the site and connected. Some of the smaller picocell sites don’t have any back-up power at all and if you have a femtocell in your house or office and you lose power, you will probably lose the picocell as well.
It would not matter if every cell site in the United States had massive generators on them. First of all, generators do not operate underwater (one of the big problems during Katrina). Secondly, even if the generator continues to keep the site up, if the link between the site and the network is down then the site, while on and operating, is not functioning and might as well be off. The network operators do the best they can and are very responsive to restoring sites that go down, but sometimes they have to wait for the wired phone company, the fiber company, or even the power company to restore the link to the site before they can bring it back online. As you know, there are still some people without power in various parts of the East Coast and the power companies are working overtime to restore power.
Two different acts of nature caused incidents resulting in two different types of commercial network issues. During the earthquake, the networks stayed up but were overcrowded, a situation that will be repeated regardless of what we do, and the hurricane saw more spot outages due to power and communications links problems. In both cases these types of problems cannot be fixed by an FCC inquiry or a change in the rules, they will continue to happen. There is no such thing as a network that can withstand overcrowding or wind and flooding.
We have all come to rely on our wireless devices, and these incidents underscore our reliance on them. We have to learn to live with the fact that such disruptions will continue to occur. Mother Nature is to blame, not the network operators. In the meantime, what we can learn from this is to not rely 100% on a single form of communications. For my part, I keep four family radio handhelds with good batteries in them for local conditions within my family, and I have been a licensed amateur radio operator since my teens and our local organization provides emergency communications during disasters. We train and we prepare. Our slogan is that “When all else fails there is Amateur radio.” It worked during Katrina, in Haiti, and during the recent tornadoes; I will guarantee you that there were amateur radio operators on the air right after the earthquake and again during the hurricane.
Infrastructure-based communications systems will become overloaded or damaged, that is a fact of life. It is also one reason that the public safety community relies on what is known a simplex, or off-network communications (or peer-to-peer for IT types). If their infrastructure is down they are still able to communicate unit-to-unit no matter where they are, over distances of several miles in most cases. Their networks are designed to support this mode of operation and it is one of the reasons commercial cellular networks are not able to provide the type of communications needed by public safety. They simply cannot afford to be without the ability to communicate so they can continue to be effective during any type of emergency
We rely on our wireless devices but incidents such as these should make us more aware that we might not always be able to communicate with them. It is no one’s fault, it is a fact of life we have to learn to live with—part of smart disaster planning should include at least one other form of communications for times such as these.
Andrew M. Seybold | <urn:uuid:eab77cb6-ed24-4a40-a66f-a8899a19bc32> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://andrewseybold.com/2617-cell-phones-and-nature | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560279923.28/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095119-00481-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.978321 | 2,558 | 2.84375 | 3 |
Computer networks today have become increasingly open, with greater reliance on IP. More and more staff are accessing a greater number of applications and databases, while remote access has grown hugely. Staff are accessing applications not just from within the office, but from various locations outside the office. These teleworkers and day extenders are significantly increasing remote access, as are mobile workers, including those using wireless hotspots. Company networks are also being remotely accessed by suppliers and third parties.
Our use of email has mushroomed to the point where it pretty much inconceivable to run many businesses without it. The number and size of attachments has also grown very significantly. This openness and our enthusiasm for email, while it can make life easier and improves productivity, has many disadvantages. One of the main ones is the greater difficulty we have in protecting the confidentiality of information. The opportunities for unauthorised viewing of data, data theft and data leakage have increased tremendously and organisations are now having to look urgently at managing this problem.
What data is at risk?
The increased standardisation on IP can mean that all confidential data which is held on a network is at risk and needs to be protected from unauthorised access, both inside and outside an organisation. Internally, there are risks from employees and skilled IT staff. It may be non-malicious, with people wanting to find out other people’s salaries. Or it may be staff accessing confidential company data, including personnel files, company plans and financial information. It could also be malicious, such as viewing and stealing customer information or company confidential information (e.g. research) to pass on to others. It may be employees who feel the need, for whatever reason, to leak company or government information.
Employees can also inadvertently expose confidential data to the outside world through the use of unprotected wireless, unprotected remote access or careless laptop use. Valuable sales information, for example, could be seen by competitors. Confidential information about customers or the public could be leaked. The large number of high profile cases of data leakage highlights this problem. Interestingly as mobile and remote workers increasingly store highly confidential personal information, such as passwords and bank details on company equipment, they are also at significant personal risk.
Another high risk area is the use of USBs and mobile devices such as PDAs and Blackberrys for the storage of confidential information. The very mobility of these devices renders them vulnerable to accidental loss or theft. Additionally, failure to manage these devices means that they are often the conduit for data theft and leakage from organisations. Data is also at risk of exposure from people outside an organisation. Industrial espionage is well known and “spies’ might be after valuable R&D information or other information which will give them a competitive edge, such as contract tendering details.
Externally, companies are at risk from hackers or others who might want to find something detrimental on an organisation which they can publicise. Criminals, wanting to use information (particularly financial) to carry out crimes, are also a significantly increasing threat. The large sums available from these types of crimes, the low risks of detection and punishment, and the ease of carrying them out has made this much more attractive than many other areas of crime. It will continue to grow at an increasing pace over the next few years.
Data leakage is a very important issue, not least because companies have a legal requirement, under The Data Protection Act, alongside other statutory requirements, to secure information on their employees and on their customers. Even if information held on a system has come from a third party such as a supplier, companies are still liable to protect that information from being seen by unauthorised people. The impact of negligent data loss on their reputation is also now moving organisations to focus on an area that has traditionally been ignored.
According to the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) Information Security Breaches Survey 2006, only one company in seven actually encrypts data on hard disks. Recently, a laptop containing salary details, addresses, dates of birth, national insurance and phone numbers of some 26,000 employees went missing from a printing firm, which was writing to M&S workers about pension changes. Identity theft is the possible result of such losses.
You only have to use email on the Internet, and receive “phishing’ emails, to be aware of the many criminals out there today who want to get access to your personal data so they can steal from you. If your company is the repository for sensitive personal data, then it is more important today than ever to protect it. If you carry out credit card transactions and hold information on company networks, then you have to comply with the latest PCI (Payment Card Industry) data security standard by next year, or you may be financially penalised.
Is current protection adequate?
We have used various methods up until now to protect company data, but they are no longer enough in themselves, because of the increased risks we face. Firewalls and access control are commonly used and networks may be protected by multiple layers of firewalls. However, computers being used by staff at home to communicate with the office and access information may not have firewall protection. Even if they do, the user may not have enabled the firewall or may not have updated it. And, of course, if access control is inadequate, firewalls will not stop data being read.
Currently, access control may be a simple password, which is generally recognised as an inadequate security mechanism, which may put data at risk. According to the DTI Information Security Survey 2006, the vast majority of companies still rely on weak, static passwords. Companies may also use more sophisticated means, such as strong two-factor authentication. This involves a password in conjunction with another method of authentication, for logging in. The other method could be a token, but could also include biometrics, smart cards or virtual tokens.
Traditionally, larger companies have relied on the security of mainframe systems to protect key data. However with this company confidential data now routinely accessible from and downloadable onto the network, this protection has significantly diminished. Regularly reviewing access control lists is another key component in data security, as is managing emails and instant messaging, because unencrypted emails are vulnerable to interception.
These methods are all components in safeguarding data. However, the computing scenario has now changed so much that, on their own, they are unable to cope with the current state of threat. One strong area of risk is allowing unauthorised (or departed) members of staff to have unmanaged access rights to data, for which they have no valid need. This is a major cause of data leakage. A common failure in larger companies is to terminate the departing user’s rights at the last place he/she was located, but neglecting to terminate access rights at previous divisions or locations.
Companies now need to review how the risks to their organisations have changed, with regard to data confidentiality, and assess what the current dangers are. A risk assessment can be carried out and positive action drawn up to protect against the relevant threats. A key part of any programme will be to regularly communicate to staff that data protection is the responsibility of everyone in an organisation, and not just the IT team. It should also be re-iterated that any unauthorised access to or misuse of data by staff, whether it is non-malicious but done without authorisation, or whether it is done with criminal intent, is not acceptable.
High risk areas
Email is a key area of risk for many organisations. The route for email over the Internet is via servers. Sending unencrypted emails is the equivalent of sending postcards by ordinary mail. They are easy to intercept and read, without the sender or intended recipient being any the wiser. There are actually companies whose business it is to use key word searching to find (to order) information for interested businesses.
The solution is to use email encryption which enables you to secure the communication and restrict read access to the named recipient only. There are a number of ways of carrying out email encryption which don’t impact the business. For example, encryption specialist Utimaco has a system that enables you to send email as encrypted PDFs, readable by the recipient using a password. Other systems operate around PKI and the use of public and private keys. The common thread is that confidential information can be freely sent over the Internet, with the data secured by encryption.
If you’re emailing remotely, then VPNs can also have an important role to play. This is because VPN encryption will protect the confidentiality of your emails. This applies to both SSL and IPSec VPNs. So companies can require the use of VPNs by employees picking up email remotely. Similarly, VPNs use can be enforced for wireless users. If you don’t want to encrypt all emails, you can just make sure you encrypt confidential emails. Encryption is also a good idea for confidential internal emails. As discussed earlier, the curiosity of some employees can get the better of them. Most administrators have access to email. Or access to internal systems may be gained by outsiders if access control is not secure enough.
Remote and laptop use
The DTI Survey 2006 found that 60% of companies that allow remote access do not encrypt their transmissions and that businesses that allow remote access are more likely to have their networks penetrated. Security is a particular risk when people are working away from the office either at home or while travelling. All remote access to head office applications should be done over encrypted VPNs (either IPsec or SSL) which as already mentioned, will protect data confidentiality.
Laptops are particularly at risk of theft or loss, disappearing from employees’ homes, cars, hotels, etc., etc. The cases of laptop theft quoted earlier, which exposed personal data, would not have been a problem if the companies concerned had encrypted the laptop hard disk. Thieves would have been unable to decipher the information on the laptops.
Wireless computing is a particularly risky area, whether used in or away from the office. Without proper protection, using wireless is like broadcasting in open air for anyone to see. The original wireless security standard, WEP, is flawed and unreliable. The world record for cracking WEP, set in April 2007, currently stands at 3 seconds. WEP’s vulnerability was demonstrated by recent problems at TJX, the parent company of TK Maxx, where the biggest loss of credit card data in history took place. Hackers stole 45 million customer records from the TK Maxx parent company, by breaking into the company’s wireless LAN. WEP had been used to secure the wireless network but WEP is one of the weakest ways of securing wireless and it didn’t stand up to the attack. If the customer records had been securely encrypted, the customer data would have been safeguarded.
Wireless hotspots and Internet cafés can be risky places to use a computer. Someone could easily pick up your password and details. If you’re sending confidential emails using a wireless computer then, not only do you need to use an encrypted SSL VPN or IPSec VPN connection, but you should also consider whether to encrypt the email itself. Don’t send it in open text. It is far too risky. Similarly, if your organisation is using unencrypted wireless in the office, all the information held on your network can be at risk. This is one reason it is wise to encrypt all relevant confidential files, data, internal emails and network attached storage (NAS). The DTI Survey 2006 revealed that 20% of wireless networks are completely unprotected, while a further 20% are not encrypted. 40% of companies that allow staff to connect via public wireless hotspots do not encrypt the transmissions.3
Securing data across the organisation with UEM
The easiest and most effective way of stopping sensitive data being read by unauthorised personnel or outsiders is to encrypt it. Access to the data should only be given to those individuals and teams that need it and are authorised to use it. How widely should you use encryption and where is it especially needed? It should be evaluated for use throughout an organisation, with a particular focus on email, business-critical stored data, remote access and wireless use, although you don’t have to encrypt everything, just data which is confidential.
While encryption is an obvious solution, it is one that has historically only been implemented by a minority, largely due to the high cost and the difficulty of using older-style encryption solutions, which traditionally also had high processor overheads. Another previous limiting factor was the historic difficulty of centrally managing encryption across all elements of the enterprise. Major improvements in technology, increased awareness of the threats coupled with reductions in pricing have now radically changed the landscape for encryption. There have been significant increases in encryption speed and a huge growth in processor speeds.
Another major advance in encryption technology has been the ability to easily manage encryption across all data risk areas including desktops, laptops, PDAs, USB sticks and other removable media, greatly improving overall security. This comprehensive approach is known as unified encryption management (UEM) and it is revolutionising encryption. If you can’t start afresh in implementing a UEM strategy, you can proceed bit-by-bit, gradually migrating to a structured, organisation-wide encryption environment. Perhaps a key factor in people’s changing attitude to encryption is a reduction in the costs of deployment. All these developments have contributed to an increased use of encryption solutions.
Improved centralised management capabilities, which support UEM, are part of solutions from companies such as Utimaco and Pointsec. Utimaco, for example, offers a management centre which manages and co-ordinates encryption across the whole network, whether it be for laptops, mobile devices, wireless devices, for your LAN, USB sticks, or network attached storage.
How do encryption solutions work? If we take one of the traditionally weakest points, the laptop, a typical solution would encrypt the hard disk and encrypt or decrypt information as the user accesses it. No unauthorised user would be able to read the data stored on it. The data on the laptop will be securely protected, even if the hard disk is removed. Complete encryption of the hard disk and a secure user authentication procedure, which runs before the operating system boots, will provide secure protection for the laptop. Office or home desktop PCs can also use similar encryption software.
Products such as Utimaco’s SafeGuard Easy encryption solution can operate transparently in the background, so end users don’t need any training, nor do they have to change the way they work. However, encryption is only one component in an access control programme, which should also include authentication and, in turn, be part of wider company wide security policies. Key elements of such policies are actually identifying data that is confidential, analysing the risk of loss, and determining how to secure it. While this would appear to be self-evident, in practice many organisations do not carry out these tasks.
With increased network access to an ever-growing number of applications, from an ever-growing number of locations, data resident on computers, laptops and other removable media is more at risk than ever of being seen by unauthorised personnel or outsiders. The growth of organised criminal activity seeking personal and financial details will continue to be a problem, particularly considering the large profits to be made here. This means that data leakage is moving from corporate embarrassment to significant commercial threat.
Encryption has now become a vital part of the security equation if companies are to protect confidential data, both to safeguard their company, and also to fulfil legal and moral obligations to employees, customers and others on whom they hold data. Encryption solutions from suppliers such as Utimaco and Pointsec are increasingly cost-effective and easy-to-use, so there is now little excuse for organisations not to secure themselves, particularly as the cost of any rectification will almost certainly involve the purchase and hurried deployment of an encryption solution!
If you’ve read this far, you probably don’t have encryption widely deployed. A question to consider is: “Would your company deploy (or be forced to deploy) encryption, if you experienced a high profile data breach?” If the answer is yes, then perhaps it is better to install encryption first before that happens, so the installation can take place in a controlled and cost effective manner. The growth of encryption is moving towards centralised unified encryption management, in preference to single point encryption solutions. This trend is expected to continue. Alongside this development, there is an increasing awareness of the threat of data loss, together with an increased implementation of risk assessment and protection around the issue of data leakage. | <urn:uuid:176c5206-b1e9-4039-8f48-831592baa812> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | https://www.helpnetsecurity.com/2007/10/29/block-data-leakage-at-the-source/ | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560281424.85/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095121-00113-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.955737 | 3,423 | 2.703125 | 3 |
public and private sector.
Optical Still Popular
Although touchscreen technology received the most attention during November's elections, optical scanning -- a hybrid of paper ballots and computer technology -- remains in wide use. In more than 1,200 counties, which represent 27 percent of the U.S. population, voters marked paper ballots by filling a box beside the candidate's name. Voters then fed the ballots into optical scanners that read and counted the marks. By comparison, approximately 510 counties -- less than 10 percent of the population -- used touchscreen voting machines, according to Election Data Services. Despite the growing use of e-voting technology, punch cards remained the most common method for casting ballots, being used by 32 percent of the population.
A study by The Boston Globe compared Boston's infamous lever machines with optical scanners, which are widely used in the rest of the state. State election records showed cities and towns that used lever machines had 60 percent more untabulated votes than the statewide average. When those communities shifted to optical scanners, the number of uncounted votes dropped significantly.
But voting technology firms say state and local governments won't see real advantages until they eliminate paper ballots. "In Arkansas and Minnesota, they ran out of ballots," Adler said. "That doesn't happen with e-voting." Computerized voting also can easily accommodate ballots in different languages and "read" ballots to blind voters with a text-to-speech feature. Georgia used that option on its touchscreen machines, and for the first time allowed blind citizens to vote without assistance.
It looks almost inevitable that lever machines and paper ballots will go the way of the buggy whip, due in part to legislation signed by President Bush in October 2002 that will update the nation's old-fashioned election procedures. The bill authorizes $3.9 billion in the next three years to help states purchase new voting equipment, train poll workers and establish statewide, computerized lists of registered voters.
Although some states see this as a chance to upgrade to the technology used in Georgia and parts of Florida, others see the legislation as an opportunity to open the door wider and set standards that will enable various new methods of voting, online being the most notable.
"It's a tremendous opportunity to set standards and do some innovative projects that prove the technology can work," Adler said. One possibility is to use computer technology to allow remote voting, a concept readily accepted in western states such as California, Washington and Oregon, where many citizens vote early or by mail. As long as the bar for standards is set high enough to ensure voter privacy, ballot security and verifiability, casting ballots via computers or wireless devices should be viable, he said.
In Swindon, England, Votehere's technology was tested in a local election where 11 percent of voters used the Internet and 5 percent voted by phone. Overall, the voting experiment boosted turnout by 3.5 percent compared with figures from two years ago.
Adler and others are convinced that voting via the Internet, phone and other electronic means will cross the ocean and eventually be accepted in the United States. "Voting is one of the core foundations of democracy," Adler said. "We must move forward responsibly to improve the process of elections." | <urn:uuid:f843c669-fad6-42c6-822f-fc9cd307a5b7> | CC-MAIN-2017-04 | http://www.govtech.com/e-government/Putting-the-E-in-Elections.html?page=2 | null | s3://commoncrawl/crawl-data/CC-MAIN-2017-04/segments/1484560281426.63/warc/CC-MAIN-20170116095121-00536-ip-10-171-10-70.ec2.internal.warc.gz | en | 0.955547 | 658 | 2.546875 | 3 |
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