Archive for 2011/02/11

“StealthWatch 6.0 is intuitive,” said Mark Pleunes, network manager at Grafisch Lyceum Rotterdam

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Bandwidth Management, Blocking, Education / Awareness, Filtering, Network Security, Privacy / Data Protection

Key capabilities in StealthWatch 6.0 include:

- Application performance monitoring via behavioral analysis and deep packet inspection of flow data to ensure application delivery on time and uninterrupted

- Relational flow mapping to provide real-time, graphical views of network traffic for specific segments of the network

- Grouping of related hosts to analyse the traffic between them and quickly detect anomalies and assess performance

- Advanced reporting capabilities enabling users to retrieve the exact and detailed information they need and simplifying the creation of high-level reports for management

More: http://news.thomasnet.com/fullstory/Network-Software-monitors-security-application-performance-591202

The Smart Services Router can be used to run policy enforcement and deep packet inspection for mobile, video, residential broadband and enterprise networks. It has 16 Tb/s of capacity and scale in all directions to handle increasing subscribers, signaling traffic and new applications

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Bandwidth Management, Blocking, Education / Awareness, Filtering, Network Security, Privacy / Data Protection, Tech Evolution

http://connectedplanetonline.com/3g4g/news/ericsson-converging-ip-and-wireless-portfolios-0210/

The fastest Intelligent Policy Enforcement appliance in the world: The PL8820 handles up to 2 million subscribers and 20 million flows per appliance

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Bandwidth Management, Blocking, Education / Awareness, Filtering, Network Security, Privacy / Data Protection, Tech Evolution

Enforcing precision policies based on Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) has become more relevant than ever as broadband operators fight backhaul congestion while at the same time introducing new service tiers and ensuring profitability in a highly competitive market. It is becoming a real challenge to continue to add more users, devices and applications whilst continuing to maintain a quality service. As mobile operators are increasingly relying on data services as the primary revenue contributor, being able to support subscriber growth and the changing user behavior of an increasingly mobile social networking society is critical

http://www.marketwire.com/press-release/Procera-Introduces-Industry-Leading-30-Gig-PL8820-Appliance-NYSE-Amex-PKT-1394239.htm

Companies need to invest in technology that addresses what the bad guys are doing, or they’ll be disclosing breaches to their customers later on

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Education / Awareness, Network Security, Privacy / Data Protection, Tech Evolution

a next-gen firewall should center on apps, users, and actions, not port/IP

http://www.processor.com/editorial/article.asp?Article=articles/p3303/53p03/53p03.asp

“Trust no one, See everything” – Solera Networks has introduced traffic classification and identification with deep packet inspection, including highly detailed application information and visualized geolocation, to its network analysis platform

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Bandwidth Management, Blocking, Education / Awareness, Enforcement, Filtering, Network Security, Privacy / Data Protection, Tech Evolution

“The goal is to catch an incident before anyone sees a problem, before it impacts a user,” says the security administrator for a large government contractor. “But, if there’s an incident or a machine is acting slowly, you can immediately go back–we’re currently configured to go back a full month–to trace the problem to the point of origin.”

This class of tools is designed to literally see everything that goes on across the network and enable enterprises to spot problems and investigate issues quickly. Solera describes its capabilities as network forensics. Forrester Research has labeled it network analysis and visibility (NAV), maintaining it is essential to enforce a “zero trust” approach to enterprise security (trust no one, see everything).

More: http://www.networkcomputing.com/wan-security/solera-networks-adds-network-traffic-classification-granular-application-awareness.php

Continuous Computing, the global provider of integrated platform solutions that address the mobile broadband capacity challenge, today revealed an enormous roster of ten silicon suppliers with whom the company has pre-integrated its world-famous, award-winning Trillium wireless base station software

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Bandwidth Management, Education / Awareness, Filtering, New Business Models, Tech Evolution

Trillium protocol stack software empowers network equipment providers and device manufacturers to develop reliable, high-performance network elements for wireless and packet processing applications. Trillium protocol stack software features a proven multi-threaded design that minimizes locking and optimizes performance in today’s multi-core processing environments.

Continuous Computing is the global source of integrated platform solutions that enable network equipment providers to overcome the mobile broadband capacity challenge quickly and cost effectively. Leveraging more than 20 years of telecom innovation, the company empowers customers to increase return on investment by focusing internal resources on differentiation for 3G, Long Term Evolution (LTE), Femtocell and Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) applications.

More: http://www.sys-con.com/node/1706805

‘Freedom In The Days Of The Internet’ Report Addresses Regulation Of The Internet And Topics Such As Innovation, Privacy And Intellectual Property

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Education / Awareness, Public Policy, Stats / reports

In view of contemporary technological, economic and societal developments, Internet freedom is becoming an issue of intense policy debate. The European Union is facing moral, political and legal dilemmas with this issue.

Moreover, both the pressure to regulate the Internet in more detail, as well as demands for its further liberalization, are growing in intensity – as shown by the electoral success of Sweden’s and Germany’s Pirate Parties in 2009.

The CES study outlines the technological trends and societal changes, looks at the question of regulation of the Internet and addresses topics such as innovation, privacy and intellectual property.

To get the downloadable PDF version of the research paper please click here

http://www.thinkingeurope.eu/content.php?hmID=20&smID=34&ssmID=206

Dr. Alex Karp, the Co-Founder and CEO of Palantir Technologies, one of three data intelligence firms who worked to develop a systematic plan of attack against WikiLeaks and their supporters, has severed all ties with HBGary Federal and issued an apology to reporter Glenn Greenwald

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Education / Awareness

http://www.thetechherald.com/article.php/201106/6804/Firm-targeting-WikiLeaks-cuts-ties-with-HBGary-apologizes-to-reporter

Blast From The Past. Hacking Motives – of MICE and MEECES

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Cybercrime, Education / Awareness

Kilger et al. (2004) summarise the motivations of hackers (in a general sense) using the acronym MEECES, which is a play on the FBI acronym of MICE (money, ideology, compromise and ego) representing the motives for the commission of espionage offences. MEECES stands for money, entertainment, ego, cause, entrance to social groups and status. While this provides an easy to remember outline of the motivations of hackers, the analysis is constrained to fit the acronym.

For example, intellectual curiosity is not given the prominence it should be. Combining the work of Kilger and Grabosky and Smith provides six generic headings that describe the various motivations for hacking. While the motives of money, entertainment, ego, entrance to social groups and justification may be less likely to involve the required specific intent, criminal liability may arise on the basis of recklessness regarding any harm or inconvenience caused. Cause or malice is the final motive in this list and is more inherently criminal. It encompasses the ideas of vengeance, ‘attacking the system’ and terrorism.

Much more: http://www.aic.gov.au/publications/current%20series/htcb/1-20/htcb006.aspx

New emails reveal that HBGary investigated the families and children of the US Chamber’s political opponents. The apparent spearhead of this project was Aaron Barr, an executive at HB Gary. Barr circulated numerous emails and documents detailing information about political opponents’ children, spouses, and personal lives

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Education / Awareness

http://thinkprogress.org/2011/02/10/chamberleaks-target-families/

(Virtually) face to face: how Aaron Barr revealed himself to Anonymous

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Education / Awareness

Our lengthy investigation of that story generated such interest that we wanted to flesh out one compelling facet of the story in even more detail. In a sea of technical jargon, social media analysis, and digital detective work, it stands out as a truly human moment, when Barr revealed himself to Anonymous and dialogued directly with senior leaders and “members” of the group.

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2011/02/virtually-face-to-face-when-aaron-barr-met-anonymous.ars

US Chamber’s Lobbyists Solicited Hackers To Sabotage Unions, Smear Chamber’s Political Opponents

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Education / Awareness

ThinkProgress has learned that a law firm representing the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the big business trade association representing ExxonMobil, AIG, and other major international corporations, is working with set of “private security” companies and lobbying firms to undermine their political opponents, including ThinkProgress, with a surreptitious sabotage campaign.

According to e-mails obtained by ThinkProgress, the Chamber hired the lobbying firm Hunton and Williams. Hunton And Williams’ attorney Richard Wyatt, who once represented Food Lion in its infamous lawsuit against ABC News, was hired by the Chamber in October of last year. To assist the Chamber, Wyatt and his associates, John Woods and Bob Quackenboss, solicited a set of private security firms — HB Gary Federal, Palantir, and Berico Technologies (collectively called Team Themis) — to develop tactics for damaging progressive groups and labor unions, in particular ThinkProgress, the labor coalition called Change to Win, the SEIU, US Chamber Watch, and StopTheChamber.com.

More: http://thinkprogress.org/2011/02/10/lobbyists-chamberleaks/

By comparing passwords associated with email addresses registered at both Gawker and rootkit.com, computer scientists at Cambridge have been able to find out whether these users picked the same passwords for both sites

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Education / Awareness, Privacy / Data Protection, Stats / reports

Of the accounts for which passwords were cracked at both sites, 76 per cent used the exact same password. A further 6 per cent used passwords differing by only capitalisation or a small suffix (eg ‘password’ and ‘password1′).”

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/02/10/password_re_use_study/

Leaked HBGary Documents Show Plan To Spread Wikileaks Propaganda For BofA… And ‘Attack’ Glenn Greenwald

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Education / Awareness

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110209/22340513034/leaked-hbgary-documents-show-plan-to-spread-wikileaks-propaganda-bofa-attack-glenn-greenwald.shtml

Oh Western culture, when will you cease to amaze me! First the fact that you can buy a Julian Assange as Che Guevara shirt in the WikiLeaks “mall” and now this …

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Education / Awareness

“Punch Your Friends” lets you take/upload pictures of your friends, enemies or boss and then touch punch them, giving the illusion of bruising. The more you touch punch the more the pictures bruise and yes Kaplan is right, after the initial novelty of getting to see what your friends look like all beat up, the app is kind of crappy. And while the smacking noises are indeed awesome I find the bruises pretty unrealistic (see above).

http://techcrunch.com/2011/02/10/crapp-store/

WikiLeaks and the future of diplomacy

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Education / Awareness

http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2011/02/11/wikileaks-and-future-diplomacy.html

Whistleblower website Wikileaks has launched an online store that offers a range of Wikileaks-themed merchandise: T-shirts with slogans including “Courage is Contagious” and “Viva La Informacíon”, hoodies, iPad sleeves, notebook sleeves, bags, beanies, badges and a mug

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Education / Awareness, New Business Models

http://www.techworld.com.au/article/376370/wikileaks_launches_online_store/

Daniel Domscheit-Berg may not have the ubiquitous media profile of Julian Assange, but for three years he was Assange’s righthand man, the official WikiLeaks press spokesman and widely regarded as the second-in-command at the whistleblowing organisation

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Education / Awareness

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/features/2011/0211/1224289515520.html

Bank of America spokesman Scott Silvestri said neither the bank nor any of its vendors “have engaged HBGary in this matter.” The bank hasn’t engaged in and has no plans to engage in the “practices discussed in recent press reports involving HBGary Federal”

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Education / Awareness

http://www.charlotteobserver.com/2011/02/10/2052350/wikileaks-may-not-pose-threat.html

Jonathan Zittrain, a professor of Law at Harvard and Co-Founder of the Berkman Center for Internet and Society, says the situation is complicated and uncertain. “In the U.S., leakers face the Espionage Act,” he says. “Leak sites could potentially be accused of ‘aiding and abetting,’ though the political costs of pursuing such a prosecution could be high”

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Education / Awareness

http://www.technologyreview.com/web/32279/

“He (Assange) feels obliged to spread his genes. In other words, he thinks he is so good that the world needs more of his kids”

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Education / Awareness

Embattled WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, fighting an extradition case over sexual misconduct, has at least “four love children” with mistresses across the world, according to leaked excerpts of a tell-all book by a WikiLeaks defector

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/europe/Julian-Assange-has-four-love-children-Book/articleshow/7474727.cms

Disgruntled programmer sabotaged WikiLeaks submission system

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Education / Awareness

Reuters reports that a source familiar with the contents of Domscheit-Berg’s upcoming book, “Inside WikiLeaks: My Time With Julian Assange at the World’s Most Dangerous Website,” said the former No. 2 person at WikiLeaks claims to have taken a “backlog of leaks” when he left the organization late last year after a falling out with founder Assange.

More: http://www.itworld.com/legal/136614/disgruntled-programmer-sabotaged-wikileaks-submission-system

Assange had become “exactly the kind of person he used to hate and wanted to expose”

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Education / Awareness

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/feb/10/julian-assange-wikileaks-book-claims

“Julian’s main criterion for a woman was simple. She had to be young. Preferably younger than 22. And it went without saying that she couldn’t question him. ‘She has to be aware of her role as a woman’, he used to say,” Mr Domscheit-Berg said

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Education / Awareness

More: http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/breaking-news/assange-fathered-kids-across-globe/story-e6frf7jx-1226004143042

Sweden’s justice minister says WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange should turn himself in for questioning in a Swedish rape investigation and has no reason to worry about getting a fair trial

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Education / Awareness, Enforcement

http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2011/02/10/general-eu-sweden-wikileaks-assange_8301842.html

Wikileaks’ lawyer in Germany, Johannes Eisenberg, has demanded Daniel Domscheit-Berg hand back all the data he took away, or else!

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Education / Awareness
Domscheit-Berg is also accused of defensive maneuvering on his part by stating Wikileaks can’t keep the data safe, secure, shielded and under lock and key, or, simply put, stowed away from the prying eyes of third parties who would like to take a peek.

More: http://www.techeye.net/internet/julian-assanges-german-lawyer-wants-wikileaks-data-back

US not out to get Assange, ambassador says

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Education / Awareness, Public Policy

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2011/02/11/3135975.htm

WikiLeaks said it is taking “legal action” over a tell-all book to be released Friday by a former staffer that is critical of its founder, Julian Assange, and says the Web site was disabled by a spate of defections last year

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Education / Awareness

In “Inside WikiLeaks: My Time with Julian Assange at the World’s Most Dangerous Website,” the former staffer, Daniel Domscheit-Berg, a German computer scientist who was WikiLeaks’ second-in-command before falling out with Mr. Assange last summer, writes of tensions between WikiLeaks’ core members and Mr. Assange. They disagreed, he writes, over Mr. Assange’s leadership style, his paranoia — he asserts that Mr. Assange began to travel with bodyguards in late 2010 — and the way he managed WikiLeaks’ finances

More: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/11/world/europe/11wikileaks.html

An ABC Four Corners episode on Monday, February 14, will explore the role of US Army Private Bradley Manning in Wikileaks’ publishing of classified US government documents and videos

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Education / Awareness

http://www.goodgearguide.com.au/article/376238/four_corners_air_wikileaks_investigation/

I never understood why Julian was so obsessed with the idea he was being followed. It was almost as though he could only be convinced of the significance of his own opposition to the status quo if people thought of him as public enemy number one

Posted: 2011/02/11 in Education / Awareness

In Iceland, he once bought a Solzhenitsyn book titled First Circle. He found the volume in an antique bookshop, and discovering it put a broad smile on his face. Solzhenitsyn is a must-read author for the leftist, anarchistic scene, but for Julian, the Russian author had a special significance. Julian identified with the dissident writer, who was imprisoned for many years in a Soviet gulag and was later exiled to the wilderness of Kazakhstan.

Julian saw a number of similarities between his own biog­raphy and that of the trained mathematician and philosopher.

More: http://www.gizmodo.com.au/2011/02/julian-assange-chief-marketing-officer-of-wikileaks/