Archive for August 2019

https://www.forbes.com/sites/douglasbell/2019/08/13/60-years-of-seatbelts-volvos-great-gift-to-the-world/ Volvo proudly exclaim that: “few people have saved as many lives as Nils Bohlin”. 2019 is the 60th anniversary of Bohlin’s breakthrough idea used by billions of people: The 3-point safety belt has saved hundreds-of-thousands of lives and prevented or reduced the severity of injuries for millions of people. Nils Bohlin is the little-known →

Device Orchestra is back with another track, this time taking on Darude’s Sandstorm. Listen to the 2000 dance hit played on a pair of electric toothbrushes, an electric typewriter, and some credit card terminals: bit.ly/2KJjQNv →

Almost all connected device makers claim to care about security in their sales pitch, but the reality seems that the security of most device firmware is terrible. According to recent research the firmware security has not improved in any measurable way over the last 15 years, even as attacks on connected devices like home routers →

https://spectrum.ieee.org/energywise/semiconductors/optoelectronics/acpowered-leds-could-cut-the-cost-of-lighting “Engineers at Pennsylvania State University have demonstrated a practical way to integrate gallium nitride LEDs and their power supply circuits onto the same chip using industry-standard manufacturing processes.” The results promise a cheap lighting chip that runs directly from the AC electricity supplied by a wall outlet (110-120V AC). Researchers say that this makes →

NanoVNA is a small handheld Vector Network Analyzer (VNA). It is equippedwith lcd display, portable device with battery(battery not included). This project aim to provide an RF gadget but useful instrument for enthusiast. The device hardware offers 50k-300MHz frequency range that can be expended up to 900 MHz (with somewhat less dynamics on higher frequencies). →

In search for some cheap and useful RF test hardware, I came by Geekcreit® Spectrum Analyzer USB LTDZ_35-4400M_Spectrum Signal Source with Tracking Source Module RF Frequency Domain Analysis Tool at sale price of aroundy $30/EURO30. It looked to have quite promising specifications: Attribute: RF frequency domain analysis tool Interface: usb Power supply: usb Standby current: →

https://www.smbc-comics.com/comic/a-guide-to-science-writing →

Here is some telephone history from Tekniikan museo museum located at Helsinki Finland. Here is once possibly the most common phone model used in Finland (Ericsson Dialog from 1964). Ans one very old telephone   Here is the first automatic telephone center in Finland from 1922.       Those pictures were taken few months →

I had some problem with breakers tripping. Then the source of the problem turned to be this extension cord made by Bachmann. Sparking and blackening outside and also inside It seems that child protection mechanism failed and part of it was stuck between contact bars. This then caused sparking on contacts, which caused blackening. End →

This posting is here to collect cyber security news in August 2019. I post links to security vulnerability news to comments of this article. If you are interested in cyber security trends, read my Cyber security trends 2019 posting. You are also free to post related links.   →