Getting caught up on some newsfeeds, some good stories from Slashdot.

North Korea training hackers - what a scary headline. It's strange to have thought, read, talked and even preached about the concept of information warfare for many years. And suddenly it's happening. Not that we didn't think it was, but now the press reports it...

Third cybersecurity chief resigns. I feel old - this is the 3rd time I've blogged the resignation of the government's cybersecurity chief. First Howard, then Richard, now Amit.

Museum security. A change of pace, but a short read on physically securing priceless works of art.

posted by mt at 13:09

Some new colors - hopefully matching the new site - coming soon.

posted by mt at 10:49

Joi Ito makes some good points on the complexities of where your data "lives". Is there such a thing as a data haven, or is that just a pipe dream given todays geopolitical climate?

This implies that some non-US entity had the FBI force an action in the UK under MLAT. This means that Indymedia is being suspected of engaging in international terrorism, kidnapping or money laundering.

posted by mt at 10:20

Not sure if this is accurate, but it comes from a reliable source.

"Six or seven thousand organizations are paying online extortion demands," Alan Paller said at the SANS Institute's Top 20 Vulnerabilities conference in London. "The epidemic of cybercrime is growing. You don't hear much about it because it's extortion, and people feel embarrassed to talk about it."

"Every online gambling site is paying extortion," Paller asserted. "Hackers use DDoS (distributed denial-of-service) attacks, using botnets to do it. Then they say, 'Pay us $40,000, or we'll do it again.'"

We've commented on the problems facing these online sites before. Most of the gambling sites are located offshore and have limited network options. Therefore it's easy to target these sites. I'd think some of the Canadian/UK ventures would be much more successful in fending off such attacks. It was a major problem for online sports books last year, haven't heard quite as much this year - perhaps they're either paying or have DDoS boxes in place?

posted by mt at 13:07