Noel's Muses

PRISM - The US Govt Caught Out, Yet Again

nospam@example.com (NoelB) — Sat, 08 Jun 2013 11:47:00 +1000

The Prism program allows the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA), the world's largest surveillance organisation, to obtain targeted communications without having to request them from the service providers and without having to obtain individual court orders.

With this program, the NSA (a military defined organisation) is able to reach directly into the servers of the participating companies and obtain both stored communications as well as perform real-time collection on users.

We have recently been hearing reports from American politicians, Embassy staff (Yes, looking at you Jeff Bleich), and U.S. cloud service providers, and security experts all claiming the worlds fear of U.S. Laws, like the Patriot Act when it comes to hosting data in the U.S., is just FUD, even as recent as two days ago I read a report from a U.S. cloud expert in Europe trying to show the world it is safe to host data in the U.S., claiming there is oversight, court orders are in fact needed (something that we have known for along time is utter rubbish), and this expose about PRISM proves it.

Prominent world renowned media organisation, The Guardian, has blown the lid after obtaining highly classified documents

The United States National Security Agency has obtained direct access to the systems of Google, Facebook, Apple and other US internet giants (like Microsoft), according to a top secret document obtained by the Guardian.

The NSA access is part of a previously undisclosed program called Prism, which allows officials to collect material including search history, the content of emails, file transfers and live chats, the document says
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Why Windows XP users need to dump Internet Explorer - NOW!

nospam@example.com (NoelB) — Sun, 03 Mar 2013 14:19:00 +1000

Here we are in the year 2013, and Microsoft's incompetence (or is it arrogance?) still continues to astound me. We are now (and have been for nearly twelve months) at a stage where the normal age-old Internet Address ranges are depleted, yes, they have now pretty much run out of IP addresses all around the world, most regions will no longer issue any more IPv4 addresses to existing organisations, and new organisations are severely restricted in how many they can obtain - because there are little to none to give out. The problem of IPv4 address depletion has been solved for some time by the new IP address scheme, called IPv6, however, at present less than 1% of the world is using IPv6, many service providers, businesses and governments are moving that way, albeit very slowly, and there is going to be serious problems in the near future.

I'm not going to go off on a tangent like many of the IPv6 fanboi's do, and lets face it, they have been crying wolf since late nineties about running out of addresses within two years, when that was never the case and time has proved that, so they have no-one else to blame but themselves for the slow take-up of IPv6 today but now it is essential that all service providers, businesses, and governments stop delaying, and start configuring their entire networks for IPv6 - especially the service providers with end users, where here in Australia,

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The NBN and what they don't advertise

nospam@example.com (NoelB) — Mon, 28 Jan 2013 10:46:00 +1000

So, the National Broadband Network (NBN) in Australia is supposed to be the next generation super communications method, but what most people forget is the NBN is not just about high speed data, it is also going to be your new telecommunications method as well, that's right, no more copper network, means the NBN will be the only form of landline telephone communications you'll ever have.

What's wrong with that you ask? Well, at present when the power goes out we all take for granted the battery powered systems provided by the Telco's in their copper network exchanges, with the NBN, you will not have any power pumped up the line to make or receive calls. Living on the bottom end of the Sunshine Coast, I myself have lost power no less then 5 times since last night alone, at time of this writing, with reports of over 100K homes in Brisbane City alone without power, this tweet just popped up from Energex

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Essential Android Apps

nospam@example.com (NoelB) — Wed, 02 Jan 2013 10:53:00 +1000

I occasionally get asked what are some of the gotta have Android Apps, well, this of course will vary from person to person, it depends on your uses and interests, so this post is probably going to be rather boring for most of you, especially if your one of those poor souls with restricted freedoms using windows phone or an iphone For me, I have an interest in Linux Systems Administration (none of this windows crap), I also have a need to be entertained (what is it they say small things small minds... blah), and being aware of what's going on around me or my town, so that means networky related apps, communications apps, and multimedia apps, Twitter is a must have, and facebook is a privacy invading cesspool so who cares

Lets start with the basics, data protection, about the best app for backing up is Backup Pro, there is a free trial version that I recommend you try, the Pro upgrade is at present less than a once-off AU$5.00, it's well worth it, you can backup photos, apps, music, videos and so on, you can even backup on-line with their remote dropbox, this is however limited with only 100MB space, you might be able to purchase more storage, though you can also (my preferred method) backup to SDcard, the only negative is you can not backup to a choice driven remote location which would be better than needing a separate program for that action, which brings me to my next most essential app, yep, you guessed it - Rsync for android, you do need to satisfy some pre requisites for ssh, initial setup should handle this for you, a word of caution, rsync does not work with passwords, it uses keys, but is one of those life saver apps, since rsync servers are easy to setup on any Slackware, OpenSuse, or Red Hat box.

Next, there's the physical protection of your phone, if some bugger nicks it, you want to
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Open Letter to the Governments of the world and the ITU

nospam@example.com (NoelB) — Fri, 16 Nov 2012 13:04:00 +1000

In a few short weeks, from December 3 to 14, the ITU will meet to decide the Internet's as we know it today, future. They want to take over full control, deciding on regulating it, what we can see or can't see, how companies must stop supplying access in some cases (PIPA, SOPA etc anyone?) and more importantly, introducing government access fees for carriers, which will drive up the cost of Internet access for everyone, those are just some of the ideas, with censorship being the huge one of course, and dictated by communist countries, so how do people in say for example Australia, the United States, United Kingdom, and Germany like being told the type of content they can or can not access by the likes of Iran and China... The words I have for that are legally unprintable!

ITU participants (representatives of each of our own countries governments) need to hear from as many Internet users as possible to voice their opinion in stopping more madness Internet control madness.

Sign the petition here

You can watch this short video to understand more about why this is a bad thing...

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Have ICANN Lost The Plot

nospam@example.com (NoelB) — Fri, 21 Sep 2012 06:31:00 +1000

ICANN are considering the introduction of Dotless Domains, basically, this means, instead of, for example entering in http://blog.ausics.net, I could buy ausics and you only enter in http://blog.ausics or http://ausics

Now, some of you might think that's a cool idea, but NO, it's not! What about host names on LAN, I have a box called fox (no pun intended, well, ok, maybe ) so, if I http://fox, I want my local fox, not someones domain, http://fox the use of hostname in local lookups (search lists) in place of FQDN, has been used for near eternity on PC's.

It could not be one of the more crazy and stupidest moves by the hierarchy yet, for reasons I explained in my submission (below)

I really recommend those in a system or network administrative position to have a read of ICANNS RFC, and submit their opinion on it, one of the more vocal voices against this, is more or less Mr DNS himself, Paul Vixie who wrote about it last year.

Regrettably, you have only a couple of days, submissions close Sept 24 2012....

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How redundant is your network, really?

nospam@example.com (NoelB) — Wed, 12 Sep 2012 21:14:00 +1000

The well publicised GoDaddy outage on Sept 11 this year should be a huge wakeup for everyone to find out, just how good their network is designed.

So, you have multiple data links to multiple carriers, redundancy, failover, the works, even a wireless/microwave link in case someone digs up the entire block including your fibre. You've also got dual power supplies in your routers, switches, and servers, even redundant routers and switches, they are all protected by dual channel mains supplies, each with their own dedicated UPS and battery bank, both connecting into the power company by two separate diverse paths, backed up by two mega powerful diesel generators.

You can go to bed tonight and sleep easy can't you... Or, can you?

A bored shitless teenager, after getting banned from some gaming server on your network, has decided to seek revenge, so initiates a more, real life battle, he attacks the name servers that host the game server network since they may be slightly easier to take down, than the actual server.

Most kids don't care about collateral damage, then again, maybe they are smarter than many give them credit for, attacking the game server, only peeves off the gamers, attacking and taking out DNS peeves off the network admins for affecting the entire network, that would be a quick way to having the ISP kick off the game server, and with word of mouth, that game network soon becomes known as a high risk target, and may find it very hard to get another network to stick their gear in.

OK, back to our story, so, your primary DNS server 10.1.1.1 is massively DDoS'd, but wait, your secondary slave server should respond and save the day, so no problems, right?

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Ethernet Cabling - It's Easy

nospam@example.com (NoelB) — Mon, 30 Jul 2012 21:37:00 +1000

What is contained within, may, in part, In Australia, be illegal - No, I'm not talking about bomb making, I'm talking about, ethernet cable making.... So, you're wondering, eh??? partially illegal? That's answered in my earlier blog posting here, about our nanny state cabling laws... You'll soon see how ludicrous is it to be an offence if you're using the Internet, but not an offence if your using an intranet with air gap to the internet, and no, a wireless bridge doesn't count as an air gap

This is a quick how-to kinda thingy for the handyman/hobbyists amongst us, if you are not feeling confident, you should go out and buy the cables from your local PC store, or get some cabler in to do it for you, but ensure you have a bulging wallet before calling them in, it wont be cheap, and we are talking hundreds...

If you were to google or youtube for how to make ethernet patch leads or wiring, you might be confused by the different colour code pinouts used in examples, because most, but not all examples, are from Americans, who use a different wiring pinout standard than pretty much the rest of the world does like here in Australia, the U.K., Germany, Sweden, and so on.

Although both methods are technically valid, the standards type Americans and a couple of

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IRC - The online hangout before, during, and after, facebook

nospam@example.com (NoelB) — Tue, 01 May 2012 19:46:00 +1000

Internet Relay Chat, or IRC as it is commonly known as, was the first and original open access public multi-user chat (excluding unix "talk"), yes kiddies, the Internet's old hands were publicly multi chatting long before ICQ, MSN, and well before privacy invading predatory sites like facebook were even dreamt of, in fact, back as early as 1988, and it's still a very active social outlet today, yet, rather unjustly, doesn't get the attention it deserves, perhaps this is a good thing, it's not like IRC is just for elitists these days, it hasn't been that way since the nineties, but it has its loyal fanbase, and contrary to popular belief, not everyone thinks facebook is the "in thing", nor will it ever be to many, if you want to make public comments, set up a blog, or share pictures for anyone to see that's archived for life, there's always your blog, or twitter.

Sure, there is a difference, facebook and the like record what you say and show it and your shared pictures to almost everyone at any time and kept indefinately, refusing to actually delete anything, only hiding it, override your rights by claiming copyright ownership on everything you post, let people know when your away so criminals can break in and clean you out, let the world know all about you, so you can become a high risk target of identity theft - well there ya go, facebook does have its purposes afterall . IRC on the other hand, is a real time multi user chat service, you need to be there, there and then to see what's being said, your private messages go nowhere but to the recipient, your public messages for all in the channel, but not logged by the servers, and one other thing I really love about it, is there is no in your face constant server sponsored or paid spamming of advertisements occupying three quarters of your bandwith.

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Copyright Enforcement (Updated)

nospam@example.com (NoelB) — Fri, 20 Apr 2012 11:49:00 +1000

UPDATE April 20 2012

The High Court of Australia has today dismissed AFACTS appeal with costs.

Today, the HCA declared that ISP iiNet did not authorise infringing users on its network. It re-enforces the decision by the Full bench of the Federal Court, and the decision of original Federal Court hearing with Justice Cowdroy.

Other important notes to come out is the recognition that terminating users wont stop them moving to another ISP and carrying on with their file sharing infringing actions.

As I've said before, MPAA et al need to change their ways by making the content available at same time as overseas, and digitally online and at reasonable prices.

TV Networks need to stop making us wait 4 to 8 months (or longer) for a series return, or a new hit series - after it has already aired in the U.S. and U.K. If they fixed this, TV pirating would be pointless, we know they can do it. FFS we have how many digital channels now? How about thrashing all these constant repeats and non popular shows and the like on one of the secondary digital channels. We should be able to watch the current airings of hit series at same time as U.S. and U.K. and by same time, I appreciate contracts declare it must air first in say, the U.S., but given the time differences, 24 hours would be acceptable, even 48 hours, but 4 to 8 plus months? Completely unacceptable, so the networks only have themselves to blame for this, no one else.

If these organisations changed their ways, there would be little to no need for piracy , ya know... EVERYONE, then wins!

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Security and The Net

nospam@example.com (NoelB) — Thu, 01 Mar 2012 20:48:00 +1000

In an era where people are dependant on Computers, Mobiles and Tablets, one needs to stop being complacent about access to it, and I'm not talking about physical access. Far too many people assume things are safe by default, or are of the mindset that It'll never happen to them, well, wake up and smell the coffee, because things are not always as well as you would want to believe, and often because of the simplest reasons, opening an email from a friend who has had their PC infected and sending out malware, getting a strange MMS or SMS ringtone, downloading torrents, using a trojaned program, phone or tablet app, forgetting to change a devices default password, or not applying security on that brand new, or just reset WiFi device, as you see, most of these are user faults, and yes, it gets worse for the user faults.

Then there are times I think there should be a licence to use The Internet, especially when you repeatedly here of the same horror stories of people constantly being scammed, really, you've won millions from a lotto in another country you never entered? Overnight millionare from some long lost relative being told by plain email yet they want you to supply your details? really? The groups committing these crimes have been doing this for over ten years, they are masters of the art, most are highly intelligent, discreet, well organised, and highly resourced, their capabilities may be the envy of many a spook.

It's not however, only scams where you send them money, all some of these scam artists want is as much information as possible about you, that all leads to an ever increasing identity theft database for the fraudsters, who don't have to be international crime gangs, they can be someone in your local area, mostly where free public access WiFi is available.

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The Internet and Legal Jurisdictions

nospam@example.com (NoelB) — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 18:47:00 +1000

I'm sure you know where this is coming from, yes, the U.S. Governments targeting of Megaupload. But it's not just about Megaupload really is it, not when you think about it, it's about all data services within the U.S. and its Governments believed extended reach, be it Megaupload, Amazon, any Web Hosting company, Google Services including Apps and Gmail, or even Twitter and facebook.

Before I go any further, let me make it very clear from the outset that I have no, never had any, nor ever could see myself having any, data, dealings, association or interest in, or with, Megaupload or any of its associated companies. My interest is in the future of a free, neutral, uncensored, and UN-Govt-molested Internet.

We all know the Megaupload folks knew their services were used for allegedly illegal purposes, although registered in Hong Kong, and staff based in non U.S. countries, the U.S. Govt is claiming jurisdiction because the equipment used in providing that service was in full or in part, located on U.S. soil, this is in my opinion a fair call. However, some legal talk over this seems to suggest the U.S. Government thinks it can claim jurisdiction on anyone who uses, for example, Paypal (being located in the U.S.), or simply because they may have a .com or .net domain name, the latter being highly questionable and is really clutching at straws and reeks of pure desperation, one I'm sure any civilised and rational nation would refuse to extradite over, extradition treaties are very specific in nature as to what offences are allowed in order to meet the criteria. I have faith that the courts in my country for example, would quash based on the latter.

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I'm on Strike! Stop SOPA/PIPA/ACTA/TPP

nospam@example.com (NoelB) — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 10:02:44 +1000

Today, the 18th January UTC, my various web sites, including the surprisingly popular ITS site, joined thousands around the globe and went on strike, now, some of you may be wondering why, since I'm not in the U.S., and we only have two hosts, hosted there, the answer is rather simple.

True SOPA/PIPA will not directly affect anyone outside of the United States of America, however, when you take into account the likes of Youtube, Twitter, Wikipedia, Yahoo, Hotmail, Google and even that hopeless site that has total disregard and utter contempt for everyone's privacy - yes, facebook, are all registered entities in the U.S. and are mostly located in the U.S., therefor, SOPA/PIPA will indirectly affect all non Americans, at least in the interim, because if this does become law in the U.S. it likely wont take too long before the U.S. is bypassed for most things Internet based, remember how quickly Youtube and Google took off? It wont take long before they are replaced, so the only harm will be to themselves in the long run.

The EU has made its opinion on Internet censorship and filtering very clear in that it should never happen.

The European Court of Justice gave a preliminary opinion that will have far-reaching implications in the fight against overaggressive copyright monopoly abusers. It is not a final verdict, but the Advocate General’s position; the Court generally follows this. The Advocate General says that no ISP can be required to filter the Internet, and particularly not to enforce the copyright monopoly.

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Why One Should Avoid The Cloud Hype

nospam@example.com (NoelB) — Sun, 11 Dec 2011 16:02:00 +1000

This entry has been updated (Jan 10 2013)

Cloud computing is a marketing term for technologies that provide computation, software, data access, and storage services that do not require end-user knowledge of the physical location and configuration of the system that delivers the services. (Source - Wikipedia)

Cloud computing is nothing new, it has been around for decades. Email or Web Hosting anyone? The term Cloud is used as a metaphor for the Internet, based on the cloud drawing used in the past to represent the telephone network, and later to depict the Internet in computer network diagrams as an abstraction of the underlying infrastructure it represents, but in recent times, some marketing hero decided to come up with a new hype, and like all techno weenies, the media picks up on it, these stormy cloud times are rather funny, but sad.

Richard Stallman of the Open Source Software Foundation summed it up nicely in an interview with The Guardian “It’s a trap… It’s worse than stupidity, it’s a marketing-hype campaign.”

Here at home in Australia, organisations investing in off-shore cloud services could find themselves on the pointy end of legal action should the privacy of Australians be breached as a result, Victoria's acting Privacy Commissioner has warned

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Ethernet Cabling in Australia - The not so free and lucky country

nospam@example.com (NoelB) — Wed, 31 Aug 2011 17:24:00 +1000

It might surprise you to know that making your own ethernet patch leads, cabling up ethernet sockets, in-wall or not, if, any part of it is, or can be, used on a telecommunications network, including accessing the Internet via any means at all, is, in our wonderfully over-regulated nanny-state country, illegal.

This was however once legal, until changes were pushed (likely by industry), and the Cabling Provider Rules were introduced, previous to the CPR, there existed the Digital Data Exemption, which amongst many things made it legal for anyone to carry out such activities, paid, or hobbyist, and had been in place since 1989.

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