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Posts published in “Internet”

Google Drive Download Blues

By Ken Starks on February 27, 2014 |

Internet

Google Drive Download BluesStalled Google Drive

Those who keep up with my posts on Google Plus might know about my month-long struggle with Google Drive. For those who do not, here’s the deal. I split a 200 gig account with my organization Reglue. Half of it I pay for so I have a place to backup my important stuff. The other half is dedicated to files and other documents for Reglue.

I learned a hard lesson in 2011: you can’t back your stuff up too often. Every record we had literally disappeared in a flash during a once-in-a-century lightning storm. Drives on three local computers were fried on the spot.

Stalled Google DriveOur computers were only a portion of the casualty list. The storm also took out two televisions, my entire AC unit and a microwave. The thunder was so close and so powerful it broke out our front bay window and the window glass in two of my trucks. Even top-of-the-line Belkin surge protectors couldn’t stave off these strikes.

Continue readingGoogle Drive Download Blues
Russia’s Olympic Spying, Comcast Weds Time Warner & More…Boris and Natasha

Russia’s Olympic Spying, Comcast Weds Time Warner & More…

By FOSS Force on February 15, 2014 |

Business, Internet, News, Politics and Security

FOSS Week in Review

The day we fought back

Tuesday, February 11th, The Day We Fight Back, has come and gone. Whether the event was a success, failure or fell somewhere in between depends on whom you read.

Surprisingly, the biggest naysayer was probably the New York Times, which started an article. “The Day the Internet Didn’t Fight Back,” with the line, “So much for mass protest.” It appears as if the Times’ metric for this judgement was the lack of participation by some sites which took part in the online SOPA protest a couple of years back.

Continue readingRussia’s Olympic Spying, Comcast Weds Time Warner & More…

Brute Force Attacks on WordPress Sites Underway

By Christine Hall on February 10, 2014 |

Internet, News and Security

At about 1 p.m. this afternoon the security company behind the WordFence plugin for WordPress issued a security advisory via email informing users of their plugin that WordPress sites are currently under a brute force attack.

“As of 11am eastern time this morning we are monitoring the largest distributed brute force attack on WordPress installations that we’ve seen to date. The real-time attack map on www.wordfence.com became so busy that we’ve had to throttle the amount of traffic we show down to 4% of actual traffic.

“A brute force attack is when an attacker tries many times to guess your username password combination by repeatedly sending login attempts. A distributed brute force attack is when an attacker uses a large number of machines spread around the internet to do this in order to circumvent any blocking mechanisms you have in place.”

Christine Hall

Christine Hall has been a journalist since 1971. In 2001, she began writing a weekly consumer computer column and started covering Linux and FOSS in 2002 after making the switch to GNU/Linux. Follow her on Twitter: @BrideOfLinux

FOSSForce.com
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The People Vs the NSAThe Day We Fight Back banner

The People Vs the NSA

By Christine Hall on February 10, 2014 |

Internet, Politics and Security

There is a tablet in my house that blinks whenever my roommate has a message. I know this because for some reason it’s my job to keep it charged for her. It has front and back cameras. The built-in microphone and speakers are capable of holding a conversation in English–probably other languages as well. With what we know now, I must assume that the NSA has the ability to activate the cameras and microphone to run silently in the background, bypassing the light that indicates when the camera is in use.

The same is true of the other computers in my home, but to a lesser degree.

The Day We Fight Back banner
The Day We Fight Back banner.

The desktop I’m using to write this article doesn’t have a camera or a microphone. Nor does the old Dell laptop that gets used occasionally around the house. My other laptop, a newer Gateway, is equipped with a built-in camera and microphone, but I’ve never managed to get the microphone to work under Bodhi Linux. Not that I’ve tried very hard. I don’t Skype or anything, so a microphone is of very little use to me.

This is probably a good thing as it means the NSA can’t watch or listen to me as I use my desktop or Dell and they can’t eavesdrop when I’m on the Gateway. They can only steal my bank passwords, learn where I store data online and what social networking accounts are connected with me.

Christine Hall

Christine Hall has been a journalist since 1971. In 2001, she began writing a weekly consumer computer column and started covering Linux and FOSS in 2002 after making the switch to GNU/Linux. Follow her on Twitter: @BrideOfLinux

FOSSForce.com
Continue readingThe People Vs the NSA
Torvald’s Thumbs Up, Gates’ Computer Skills & More…Wozniak

Torvald’s Thumbs Up, Gates’ Computer Skills & More…

By FOSS Force on February 8, 2014 |

Hardware, Internet, Mobile, News, Politics and Security

FOSS Week in Review

Canadians spy at airports

The more we see of the Snowden revelations the more we wonder, when did the English speaking world become a police state?

The latest news was reported January 30th by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), from which we learned that all the electronics eavesdropping hasn’t been being conducted solely by the U.S. and the Brits. The Canadians have had their hand in it too.

It seems that Communications Security Establishment Canada (CSEC), a Canadian spy agency, has been using the free Wi-Fi at “a major Canadian airport” to track wireless devices, which presumably would include laptops as well as phones and tablets. The surveillance would continue for days after visitors passed through the airport.

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Google Beats Troll, Ellison’s Oracle ‘Unbreakable’ & More…Michael Copps

Google Beats Troll, Ellison’s Oracle ‘Unbreakable’ & More…

By FOSS Force on February 1, 2014 |

Business, Internet, Mobile, News, Patents and Politics

FOSS Week in Review

NSA involved in industrial espionage

Another big non-surprise this week in the continuing saga of the NSA. It appears that our beloved spy agency has been using their secret powers for the purpose of uncovering industrial secrets from foreign companies. So much for the separation of business and state. Reuters reported that in a television interview with a German TV network, Edward Snowden said the agency doesn’t confine its intelligence gathering to items of national security.

“‘If there’s information at Siemens that’s beneficial to U.S. national interests – even if it doesn’t have anything to do with national security – then they’ll take that information nevertheless,’ Snowden said…”

Even the Republicans are jumping on the stop-the-NSA bandwagon, which is rather surprising.

Continue readingGoogle Beats Troll, Ellison’s Oracle ‘Unbreakable’ & More…

Chrome Eavesdropping, Balkanized Internet & More…

By FOSS Force on January 25, 2014 |

Browsers, Business, Hardware, Internet, News, Politics and Security

FOSS Week in Review

Sixteen-year-old wrote the code for Target breach

TargetMiamiThe press calls him a “nearly seventeen-year-old” and he’s reported to be one of the people behind the malware used to compromise credit card data at Target and other locations. By our way of counting, “nearly seventeen” means he is sixteen or, like the show tune says, “sixteen going on seventeen.” He lives in Russia and is said to be the author of the BlackPOS malware that was used against Target and might have been used against Neiman Marcus.

This info comes from Los Angeles based cyber-intelligence firm IntelCrawler, which says it’s also traced six additional breaches to BlackPOS. As noted on MarketWatch, despite authoring the malware, the kid is just a small fry in this affair.

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You Say GIMP Was Right

By FOSS Force on January 22, 2014 |

Internet and Polls

GIMP logoBack in November, the popular open source image editing program GIMP ended their association with SourceForge and dropped the site as its host. Since that time, downloads of GIMP have no longer been available on the site but have been moved to the GIMP’s website.

The split was the result of GIMP’s concern over policies at SourceForge, primarily SourceForge’s use of DevShare, an installer for Windows that bundles third party software offers with FOSS downloads. In addition, the GIMP folks had reservations about potentially deceptive “download here” buttons on ads being served by the likes of Google’s AdSense.

There were two sides to this story, of course.

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Troll Sues FTC, Net Neutrality Dead & More…Supreme Court

Troll Sues FTC, Net Neutrality Dead & More…

By FOSS Force on January 18, 2014 |

Business, Internet, News, Patents, Politics and Security

FOSS Week in Review

NSA spying not as effective as claimed

Claims from the Obama White House and the NSA about the effectiveness of the NSA’s dirty tricks evidently aren’t true, according to a report from the New America Foundation. Since the Snowden revelations began, we’ve heard that something like 50 terrorist attacks have been averted as a result of the NSA monitoring Americans’ phone records and such.

However, Mashable tells us that according to this report, the effects of the NSA’s cyber spying has been minimal.

“‘Our review of the government’s claims about the role that NSA “bulk” surveillance of phone and email communications records has had in keeping the United States safe from terrorism shows that these claims are overblown and even misleading,’ said the research team, led by Peter Bergen, a reporter specialized in national security who also interviewed Osama Bin Laden in 1997.

“‘Traditional investigative methods, such as the use of informants, tips from local communities, and targeted intelligence operations, provided the initial impetus for investigations in the majority of cases, while the contribution of NSA’s bulk surveillance programs to these cases was minimal,’ they added.

The report goes on to claim that the spy agencies wholesale collection of phone data only had an impact in 1.8% of cases. The figures for PRISM’s impact is 4.4%.

Continue readingTroll Sues FTC, Net Neutrality Dead & More…