ranting-and-blogging

Collateral Murder

Fri, 13 Jan 2012 02:08:45 +0100

No one has been held accountable for the war crimes in this video except for the alleged leaker. Time to remind Hillary and the others who have expressed their disgust in relation to the horrible act of urinating on deceased people, that she has done NOTHING to investigate the incident in Iraq shown in the video. In one part of it one can see how they drive over the bodies in their tanks. Listen carefully in the uncut version here at 18:30 min into the video what they say when they realize they have driven over a dead body:

That body was of the Reuters photographer their fellow soldier had gunned down earlier.

Why Occupy? Part 2

Mon, 31 Oct 2011 09:22:25 +0100

Hmm, I am unable to edit, so I will just clarify something here; Just by living in Australia, I am essentially in the “1%”, although whomever came up with these figures for this movement is bad at mathematics, which is irrelevant to my point – unless my point is that the poor have less access to education! The current system is now based in debt, not wealth creation. Over the last decade, ALL of our western governments have spent far more on wars than it would have taken to FIX this problem! Wars based on LIES! Millions of innocent civilians killed. I am happy to pay my taxes to support a system that works, but not a system that is broken. This does not mean that I will stop paying my taxes, because then I’d just be another hippy. So I demand a system that works. I remember having to get passports to go to New Zealand as a small child, and that it didn’t make sense. I asked my parents why everyone couldn’t just go anywhere they wanted to go. They explained that “others” would take what was “ours” because they didn’t have it. I asked why we (Australia) didn’t share what we had with those who didn’t have it – I was always told to share with my brothers, and I was also told that all humans were related to those who first walked out of Africa (although we now know we were in Asia first, but that is irrelevant to my point) which means that all humans are my brothers – and sisters – so we should share, yes? My parents smiled and said that they hoped I never lost that perspective, and I haven’t. I do not care about 99% this and 1% that; the Occupy Movement is giving a voice to solutions that many scholars have had for awhile, but who were not being heard until now. I do not resent the wealthy. I was brought up to work my guts out and reap that which I sew, but the current system does not provide that equation. None are free until we are all free, regardless of whether we are talking about starving Ethiopian children (one of whom I’ve sponsored via World Vision since 2003) or the homeless war veterans on the streets of the USA. I am very fortunate, so that means that it is my responsibility as a global citizen to be an advocate for those who can not stand up for themselves right now. If enough people do it then it will be enough. It comes back to being the change you wish to see in the world. If some people feel compelled to do more, then that’s great! But if they “just” set up automatic payments to sponsor children and alike, then that’s great too (and a tax deduction remember). If they do nothing at all, then as long as they stay out of the way of those who are doing something, that’s ok too. But if they do nothing, and then they try and stand in the way of those who feel compelled to do something, THEN I get PO’d! By the same token, I despise anyone who thinks that they are entitled to a handout – I promote the hand-UP, but not out.

Why Occupy? An Australian Perspective

Fri, 28 Oct 2011 08:12:44 +0100

This post was inspired by a conversation I had recently with an Australian Information Technology study-buddy of mine.

I was, as you can imagine, posting links to the Occupy Movement all over my social networking arena, including one for where people are occupying in Australia.

My friend commented on my Facebook wall:
Doesn't it kind of not make a whole lot of sense in Australia? Our banks are well regulated, so they didn't get involved in the greedy repackaging of high-risk loans or shorting of the market. We're currently in a boom at a time when the rest of the developed world has stalled or is in decline. We're not suffering under austerity measures like much of Europe, where gutless politicans plundered the treasury to fund election promises. We don't have the same problems as the US with runaway capitalism causing an ever increasing divide between the wealthy elites and the middle/lower classes.
Yes our current crop of politicians are probably the worst we've had in recent times, but the closeness in polling ensures neither of the two major parties can achieve anything too unpopular and have been relegated into a stable paralysis. While I support the actions of the "Occupy Wall Street" crowd (although I think they got the address wrong - occupy midtown may be more appropriate), I don't think the same grievances apply in Australia.

He caused me to pause; Why WAS I so quick to jump on this bandwagon? "Why do we do what we do?" is a question that we should all ask ourselves regularly to ensure that we are fulfilling a purpose and not wasting time.

We had a brief exchange where talked about problems specific to Australia, such as our banks talking people into mortgages that they really could not afford when they were employed, and now that so many are unemployed, they are selling these homes for far less than their true value. We discussed Australia's trading arrangement with China. We discussed our Prime Ministers' new $3000 chair, and the fact that anyone giving birth is given $5500, which has encouraged breeding amongst teenagers and increased the sales of extremely large television sets here. The "Carbon-tax" that is being implemented here next year did not come up then, but it is yet another issue to contend with.

However, since that exchange I have had time to reflect, and I have realised that it is more than that. The reason why I support the Occupy Movement from the comfort of a country where we have access to healthcare and education, and where homelessness is really not an issue, is because occupying within Australia shows the 1% of the world that the 99% are coming together - you have the figures, but we have the numbers. The current system does not work for everyone, ergo, IT DOES NOT WORK. A herd is only as strong as its weakest member, so our species is in grave danger. Now we ARE being heard.

It is the same reason that I walked out of class when I was fourteen years old in protest of the genocide in Rwanda - we tried to arrange a walk-out and a sit-in on the oval at my high-school, but the teachers got wind of it beforehand and called an assembly to say that walking out of class and defying them would not solve anything, so it was just myself and a 17-year-old chick whose name I never caught sitting out on the oval that afternoon. They did not understand that we weren't walking-out on THEM, we were walking out FOR our brothers and sisters in Rwanda. (We didn't even get detention; I think they felt sorry for us). But that day did not waiver my resolve - if it had, I would not be here today with you.

I also support Occupy Australia because lately I have found that my government does not "have my back". Not only have they not supported Julian Assange (I don't think I need to reiterate that saga here; If you are reading this then you already know that which I am referring to) but they have also said in writing that they will not be investigating the allegations of torture upon Australian citizen and former prisoner at Guantanamo Bay, David Hicks.
TORTURE IS ILLEGAL. End of story. Julian Assange said in an interview recently "The only job that the Australian Government has is to protect Australian citizens. That's it."

So, I stand with my brothers and sisters today. as I stood with them in 1994, from my admittedly comfortable perspective, and I implore you to do the same. The problem is not "over there", it is everywhere. We are the 99%. We are getting organised. We are hacking the system - ethically. We WILL change the world together - YES WE WILL! ;)

NOKIA & STAR WARS & TEXAS, oh my!

Wed, 07 Sep 2011 13:16:44 +0100

Nokia Smartphones currently use the Symbian operating system, but are changing over to the Windows Phone 7 system right now. As this has all been being developed for launch, the personal information of the development team at Nokia was leaked by hackers who were able to breach Nokia's security this week. It seems that the hackers responsible were from Antisec. At this point there isn't any evidence to suggest that their data has been abused in any way, ie in identity theft, so it seems to be more of a prank than sabotage. The information that was stolen was just that which the developers gave to the site themselves, and for a lot of them that was just an email address. However, some developers gave more personal data willingly when signing into the system.

As someone in the IT industry, I can't fathom why anyone, especially IT people, would supply more data than is mandatory to in order to enter a site. If all that was required was an email address, then why would one give anything else? That was the case here, yet several developers filled in all of the "blanks". Having your email address stolen may just result in some extra spam, thereby being a nuisance, but not a threat. By the same token, why would Nokia have non-mandatory fields for the developers to supply their data to? Therefore, the responsibility of that data safety lies with Nokia to protect the data they've requested, including that which was not compulsory, and it lies with the developers for supplying more personal data than they had to. I saw a comic within the last month or so - but could not find it in order to post a link to it unfortunately - that was about internet security. On one side was the heading "Private" and on the other side it said "Not Private". Under "Private" it said "not on the internet" and under "Not Private" it said "on the internet". Regardless of the motive and the outcome, Nokia now has a blemish on their public face.

A Star Wars Galaxy fan site was hacked this week by ObSec, a subsidiary of LulzSec, and over 23 000 usernames and passwords, and more than 21 000 email addresses, were stolen. The site hasn't been properly maintained since 2009, so the security was easy to breach. Again the responsibility lies with the site itself for not maintaining it properly and yet leaving it active and therefore an open invitation to hackers, and it also lies with the 23 000 users of this site; Although they may not have been active on this site, if they have used the same usernames and password combinations elsewhere, then those sites are now at risk also. This is why we MUST all be diligent about using different username and password combinations everywhere, and updating/changing them on a regular basis. There are plenty of password managers out there, and the ones that we have to pay for are inexpensive. Remember, just because you have forgotten all about your data being stored somewhere because you aren't currently using it, doesn't mean that it has forgotten about you!

Anonymous have also been busy this week, hacking Texas Police computers in retaliation to some of their "members" being arrested. Approximately 3GB of sensitive data was stolen and published online, including: 647 social security numbers, 174 passwords, 83 drivers license numbers, 6 182 dates of birth, 42 credit card and bank account numbers, 10 175 personal postal addresses, 325,596 email addresses, & 78,869 phone numbers (via PC Mag).

This puts a LOT of police officers at risk, and they'll be busy moving house and changing their identification in order to protect themselves and their families, which means less time to protect those whom they serve. However, the "point" that Anonymous is trying to make is that the police in Texas aren't doing their job anyway. Fighting fire with fire seems like it's just going to build a bigger fire though, rather than causing policy change. We'll continue to follow this story as it unfolds, right here. Bookmark this blog!!

Who Was Hacked This Week?

Thu, 25 Aug 2011 01:50:57 +0100

In the 21st century, it is impossible to NOT have a bank account. Not that long ago, one could keep their money under ones' mattress, but not anymore. So, since we are all forced to rely on our banks, we have the right to expect them to keep our money safe. And, if their security is breached, surely they are obliged to tell us, right?

Apparently not. Some Belgium banks were infiltrated over the last couple of weeks, allowing up to 90% of a "handful" of victims' accounts to be stolen via a Trojan Horse. They have tried to place the blame back upon their customers, "warning" them to close pop-up windows and alike when internet banking with these banks. Personally, two of my internet banking service providers require me to log in via a pop-up window, and they always have, so I, too, would view this as a regular screen and enter my login data accordingly - wouldn't you?

Yes, we must take responsibility for ourselves, but this is really something that's out of our hands, and we NEED our banks to protect our money, because we don't have a choice but to use them. We can choose between the different banks of course, but really, aren't they all the same?

Sadly, the above hacking incident was not the first instance where these banks in this part of the world have been hacked; It also occurred in 2009, this time via an SQL injection. "Banks are notoriously known for keeping details about data breaches secret, and while this is somewhat understandable from a security perspective, people have a right to know that many times these are the result of basic programming errors, such as the ones reported in this article."

What I don't understand, as someone who is in the cyber security profession, is why these banks wait until they are breached in order to upgrade their system. It's more economical to upgrade to the latest and greatest security system available as soon as possible, than to lose money to a hacker. Citigroupin the USA were also hacked, quite severely, in June of this year...now that I think of it, they are one of the banks with whom one logs in via a pop-up keypad...hmm...Earlier this month approximately US $20 million was stolen by some Ukrainian hackers, again from private accounts.

Whilst a lot of your personal banking security is completely out of your hands, there ARE some things that you can do in order to avoid breaches to your personal bank accounts when internet banking. For starters, NEVER internet bank over wi-fi unless it is your personal wi-fi network that is password protected. If even your pacemaker and insulin pump can be hacked over wi-fi (see previous articles from this column) then you can bet your bottom dollar that your bank account can be too...and if you internet bank over unsecured wi-fi, you WILL be betting your bottom dollar!

You can also keep your password private and safe - only share it with the people with whom you would share a toothbrush (hopefully, that is NO ONE!). There are password managers and encryption options available, so that you can keep all of your passwords complicated enough to avoid them from being guessed, and make them unique to each site, so that if one is hacked, then they aren't all compromised.

Before loading any "free" software, read the fine print and find out what it "requires access to" in order to operate. Just today, a couple of "free" applications in the Google Chrome Web Store wanted to access ALL of my browsing history and future history, and my data from those sites - I think not!!! The other day a friend invited me to video chat on Facebook, but the terms and conditions listed EVERYTHING from my Facebook account as being the required data it would need to operate; I declined that invitation, and let my friend know why, and they immediately removed the application from their profile too and thanked me for the "heads up".

Next time you are on the telephone to your bank with a human, or are visiting a branch, ask them about the security they provide for you whilst internet banking, ie when did they last upgrade their system. They work for you, they are your employees, therefore you have a right to know how they are protecting your money. Until next time, be safe and sensible.

Who Was Hacked This Week?

Mon, 15 Aug 2011 10:13:55 +0100

In short - you were. Here's the story; Charles Blair Hill, a 45 year old civilian was shot and killed in July 2011 by transit police in the San Francisco subway system (BART - Bay Area Rapid Transit) during a "confrontation" where Charles was intoxicated and carrying a knife. People who felt that this was use of excessive force by the transit police arranged a protest via social networking sites, on the transit system where the incident occurred. This alerted authorities, who shut down access to social networking sites at the time and place where the protest was to take place, thus stopping it from taking place. It was scheduled for the busiest time of day, so no commuters were inconvenienced - this time.

At the same time this was taking place, David Cameron, the British Prime Minister began negotiations with Facebook, Twitter and Blackberry in order to obtain user data to track and stop future protests in light of the current riots in the UK. This is after having condemned the same actions by those in power in the Middle East recently - and we know how that has turned out. We also know where Twitter stands on these issues, since the United States Government tried to obtain the user data of people associated with or suspected of being associated with Wikileaks in January 2011. Facebook and Blackberry have yet to make a public announcement about their stance on this issue.

Those who are not shy about stating their stance about anything, even if they are shy about showing their faces, are the "hacktivist" group Anonymous. To protest the protest of the protest, they initiated a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack on the lesser-used BART site mybart.org (I just visited it and it says "This site is currently under renovation") which wasn't bothersome to begin with because the site that is mainly used is bart.gov, and the latter site was left unscathed. Unfortunately it was later revealed that Anonymous hadn't just protested, but that they had taken data from the site about the users of the site and stored the data on pastebin.com. Why they decided to do that, I can't tell you, and it's not as if we can just call them up and ask them. These stunts make it difficult to get behind this group, even when they do execute peaceful protests via hacking (see previous post regarding the Syrian Ministry of Defense). They have tweeted that they are just getting warmed up, so if Britain persists with this line of censorship, we can be sure that Anonymous will orchestrate similar attacks there soon.

Where do you stand on this? Do any of these ends justify the means?

Who was hacked this week?

Mon, 08 Aug 2011 08:55:40 +0100

THE SYRIAN MINISTRY OF DEFENSE was hacked by way of a peaceful protest, by the group known as Anonymous. As it's not physically possible for those who oppose what is occurring there to arrange a picket line or a sit-in, the hacking of their website is the next logical step.

We neither condone nor condemn the actions of Anonymous in general; this report has only to do with this one display of solidarity.

So what is happening in Syria to make them a target of hacking? The people of Syria want that which most of us want - democracy! According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, over 2000 demonstrators have died since the uprising began in March 2011. After more than 30 years of being ruled by the same family who fail time and again to meet the needs of the people, the people are speaking up.

Where is the United Nations whilst all of this is taking place? Syria is allied with China and Russia, and they hold too many cards at the UN table - for now.

The only way the rest of the world are aware of what exactly is taking place in Syria at the moment is via the videos our brothers and sisters are loading to YouTube. In 2011, the internet is the voice of the people - in Syria and everywhere else. Awareness is the key. Stunts such as the temporary replacement of the Syrian Ministry of Defense website with a call for peace raises awareness for all, surely shortening the life of the corruption taking place and taking lives there.

That's the revolutionary hacking news this week - now for the personal hacking news that potentially effects hundreds of millions of people: New insulin pumps are susceptible to hacking over wi-fi, making it easy to overdose a diabetic who has one. Pacemakers have been vulnerable to wi-fi hacks for a few years already, and now insulin pumps are now too. Again, this is not new either - the reason we must turn our cell phones off in hospitals is because their frequency can alter the dose given on all medicine administering machines, including chemotherapy and pain relief.

Rather than be afraid, I find it liberating to know where our vulnerabilities lie as a society, so that we can rectify them before damage is done. These stories may appear unrelated, but essentially, hacking is hacking, so self-education can save our own lives, and the lives of entire countries.