NSA Google Search Tips

May 11th, 2013

There is so much data available on the Internet that even government cyberspies need a little help now and then to sift through it all. Wired article Use These Secret NSA Google Search Tips to Become Your Own Spy Agency tells that the National Security Agency produced a 643-page book Untangling the Web: A Guide to Internet Research to help its spies uncover intelligence hiding on the web. That Untangling the Web: A Guide to Internet Research book is no longer NSA secret, it was just released to public by the NSA following a FOIA request.

Untangling the web book from NSA

Untangling the web book from NSA

The most interesting is the chapter titled “Google Hacking.” It has few tips like this:

Be careful what you publish on the web and how you do it.

Friday Fun: Lego NXT Xbox 360 Disc Changer “The Carousel”

May 10th, 2013

Finnish boy built this Lego NXT Xbox 360 Disc Changer “The Carousel”

Loudness control in broadcasts

May 9th, 2013

I was an interesting article (written in Finnish) on AV-Visio 2/2013 on-line magazine about EBU – Recommendation R 128. In Finland the public broadcasting company YLE and biggest TV companies start to use that new practice this year on their channels. Similar standards on subjective audio volume control is in use USA and Canada.

EBU R128 tells how broadcasters can measure and normalise audio using Loudness meters instead of Peak Meters (PPMs) only, as has been common practice. Basically EBU R128 recommends to normalize audio at -23 LUFS +/- 1 LU, measured with a relative gate at -10 LU. The metering approach can be used with virtually all material.

Loudness On the way to nirvana — audio levelling with EBU R 128 article is an introduction to R128 in English. For more details check also links at EBU GROUP on LOUDNESS (PLOUD) web page and Loudness and the EBU R128 Broadcast Standard videos.

FreeLCS (Free Loudness Correction Server) is a free software that lets users easily have their audio files loudness corrected according to the EBU R128 loudness recommendation. FreeLCS uses other open source programs to get the job done (Linux, libebur128, gnuplot, FFmpeg, sox, mediainfo).

The age of the password is over?

May 8th, 2013

You have a secret that can ruin your life. It’s not usually a well-kept secret. Kill the Password: Why a String of Characters Can’t Protect Us Anymore article tells that just a simple string of characters—maybe six of them if you’re careless, 16 if you’re cautious—that can reveal everything about you: Your email. Your bank account. Your address and credit card number. Photos of your kids. The precise location where you’re sitting right now.

No matter how complex, no matter how unique, your passwords can no longer protect you. And the way we daisy-chain accounts (our email address doubling as a universal username) creates a single point of failure that can be exploited with devastating results.

Access to our data can no longer hinge on secret word. The age of the password is over. Look around. Leaks and dumps are now regular occurrences. Everyone is a few clicks away from knowing everything.

We just haven’t realized it yet. And no one has figured out what will take its place.

There have been several options on trial but none of them have become enough widely used and easy to use. For example smart cards for authentication fall short on lack of smart card readers on all computers (and problems related to reader software). For SSH connections I have tried to use SSH keys and certificates instead of passwords where I can, but that is not practical everywhere. And in many web services there is no possibility to use other authentication than old fashioned username and password.

In the short time I expect that you see more and more two or multi factor authentication schemes to be used where password is one factor and then there are other factors to add the security. Combining two or more factors increases security considerably (none of the factors need not to be 100% secure for this to work well).

Unix box in pocket

May 7th, 2013

Addressable markets for high-end phones article has some interesting statistics: There were about 5.2bn adults on earth at the end of 2012 and roughly 1.1bn of them had ’smartphones’ at the end of 2012. Around 900m of smartphones ran either the iOS or Android. Both iOS and Android are based on Unix technology (iOS is based on Darwin BSD and Android is based on Linux).

It is pretty striking that almost a fifth of the earth’s adult population has a Unix box in their pocket.

Tour of the Arduino Manufacturing Facility

May 6th, 2013

Have you ever wondered where all those magical Arduinos come from? Tour of the Arduino Manufacturing Facility article tells that they come from Torino, Italy, and how they are built. The video below will walk you through the PCB manufacuring and assembly process.

For more details check also the large set of pictures from Tour of the Arduino Manufacturing Facility article.

Another article related to Arduino making is The Making of Arduino published in IEEE Spectrum. The Making of Arduino article tells how five friends engineered a small circuit board that’s taking the DIY world by storm.

Freeduino

May 5th, 2013

Freeduino is a collaborative open-source project to replicate and publish Arduino-compatible hardware files. The Freeduino Eagle SCH, BRD and Gerber production files allow users to create boards that are 100% functionally, electrically and physically compatible with Arduino hardware.

A Boy And His Atom

May 3rd, 2013

What can you make out of few atoms? This Stop Motion Movie Is Animated Using Individual Atoms article tells that researchers at IBM take a break from exploring the limits of data storage at the molecular level—and instead make stop motion films, animated entirely with individual atoms. This is the result: A Boy And His Atom: The World’s Smallest Movie

The video was created using a custom, IBM-manufactured microscope which operates at -268°C, IBM claims this is the “world’s smallest movie.” IBM researchers used a scanning tunneling microscope to move thousands of carbon monoxide molecules (two atoms stacked on top of each other), all in pursuit of making a movie so small it can be seen only when you magnify it 100 million times. It holds the Guinness World Records™ record for the World’s Smallest Stop-Motion Film. I can see this as continuation to “IBM” atoms done is 1990.

See how it was made in Moving Atoms: Making The World’s Smallest Movie video. Meet the scientists, see how they made a movie with atoms, and find out more about their research in the field of atomic memory and data storage.

Friday Fun: Car key Hack

May 3rd, 2013

Your daily commuting can become mundane and boring. Hilarious Car Key Hack Lets You Drive It Like You Stole It article shows how you can easily spice things up with this clever hack that makes it feel like you’ve just jacked someone’s ride. All you need is an old screwdriver—the more worn it is the more convincing the effect will be—and a car key you’re willing to hack to bits. Drive It Like You Stole It page has all the building instructions.

I think this is funny and all, but it could get annoying in shorter time than it took to make the hack. And this hack would work only on old cars with mechanical locks. Majority of the cars in use nowdays have microchipped keys, so this hack does not work for them (unless you get a clever idea where to hide that microchip and surrounding electronics, some ideas for that can be found at Drive It Like You Stole It page discussion).

The World Wide Web is 20-years old

May 2nd, 2013

Image of the Day: The World Wide Web celebrates its 20-year anniversary article tells that April 30, 2013 marks the 20 year anniversary of the World Wide Web. World Wide Web was put into the public domain on April 30, 1993. The World Wide Web was created few years earlier (1989) by British physicist, Tim Berners-Lee at The European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN).

To honor 20-year anniversary of World Wide Web CERN started a project to restore the very first website.

I personally started using World Wide Web at 1994. Pretty soon I started making my first web pages, some of which lead to creating this ePanorama.net web site (one of the first pages was my own web link list so I have my favorite links easily accessible from all different locations I accessed the web).


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