cyberpervs peeping on schoolgirls

Thomas Floss, a data protection advisor, discovered cases while visiting schools for presentations on data protection and sensible behavior on internet. The Local reported, "on examining one of the computers, Floss discovered a so-called Trojan computer program which was being used to control the equipment, and which had been spread via the chat service ICQ." Hacker traced and when police arrived several live feeds to bedrooms were on individual's computer. Floss adds there is at least one student at each school, after visiting 50-60 schools, who report light doesn't turn off as it should when webcam is off--a possible indication a Trojan program is in control.

virtual eternity

Would you like virtual eternity? A digital simulation of yourself created by sophisticated--and creepy--simulation, gaming and artificial intelligence software. Your digital avatar would interact online and remember conversation and log questions where answers are yet to be added to the database. Intellitar's Virtual Eternity is already in the business. You can interact with co-founder Don Davidson's avatar at the company website. Ms. Smith in a recent blog Digital Cloning: Rise of the Cylons at NETWORKWORLD interviews Don Davidson and asks some of the difficult virtual privacy questions of the co-founder. Intellitar is in the Huntsville, AL area and Davidson's background includes long service at IBM.

starfish prime

Starfish Prime was a series of high altitude nuclear tests in the Pacific Ocean, conducted by military from Johnston Island. On July 9, 1962, a hydrogen bomb lifted 250 miles into space atop a Thor rocket detonated, causing an unprecedented auroral light display. In Honolulu, several hundred miles away, "when the bomb burst, people told of blackouts and strange electrical malfunctions, like garage doors opening and closing on their own ... But the big show was in the sky." James R Fleming, while researching biographical material on James Van Allen, believes the tests began literally the same day Van Allen announced his historic discovery of the radiation belts to the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) in 1958. Fleming discovered documents at the University of Iowa, dated the day of the press conference at NAS, where Van Allen agreed to participate in a military project to set off atomic bombs in the magnetosphere to see if they could disrupt it! Fleming comments in the same article, "In any case, says the science history professor, 'this is the first occasion I've ever discovered where someone discovered something and immediately decided to blow it up.'" There is also a declassified film about the Starfish Prme Event linked in the article.

1859 carrington event

NASA website recaps 1859 Carrington Event the largest known solar flare observed by English astronomer Richard Carrington. "Just before dawn the next day, skies all over planet Earth erupted in red, green, and purple auroras so brilliant that newspapers could be read as easily as in daylight. Indeed, stunning auroras pulsated even at near tropical latitudes over Cuba, the Bahamas, Jamaica, El Salvador, and Hawaii." "Spark discharges shocked telegraph operators and set the telegraph paper on fire. Even when telegraphers disconnected the batteries powering the lines, aurora-induced electric currents in the wires still allowed messages to be transmitted." This entry on NASA website reassures "...statistics suggest that Carrington flares are once in a half-millennium events". Here is a link to an audio version of 1859 Carrington Event.

10/28 defcon: the dark ages & leaking data

one emp burst and the world goes dark*
emp legislation awaits senate action*
communication with 50 nuke missiles dropped in icbm snafu*
feds let google off with warning for wifi–sniffing cars*
google admits street view cars took emails & passwords from computers*
myspace, apps leak user data*
limewire shutters file-sharing services after riaa win*
secret button sequence bypasses iphone security*
netflix admits streaming is the future as system crashes -
netflix now accounts for 20% of downstream bandwidth during peak*
nov30: the day the govt seizes control of the net?*
white house adviser: US must prepare for asteroid*
video: watch fleet of lights at pennsylvania/delaware line*

hundred years starship

NASA's Ames Research Center directer Pete Worden presented plans for space exploration mission to Mars at a recent conference in San Francisco, CA. The mission titled "Hundred Years Starship" will be a one way trip as studies show return trip would be too costly. "The strategy of one-way missions brings this goal within technological and financial feasibility." Worden is in negotiations with Larry Page, Google co-founder, to help fund the multi-billion dollar project. The project is out there as Worden contemplates, "...rather than make an environment on Mars like Earth, why don't we modify life ... including the human genome ... so it's better suited to [Mars]?" Pentagon's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is also involved in turning the mission from science fiction to science fact.

cyberspace operations: air force doctrine document 3-12

cyberwarfare: US seeks to shut down enemy power grids
Air Force Cyberspace operations manual is now available online at the LeMay Center website. Noteworthy reference from manual points to possible offensive use, "...shutting down electrical power to key power grids of enemy..." which seems a familiar tactic? Would this be a Stuxnet-like worm used to attack Siemens industrial software? "Noah Shachtman, a contributing editor to Wired magazine and a fellow at the Brookings Institute think tank, said even the limited mention of offensive operations in the manual surprised him."  Washington Post article believes cyberspace operations manual will be used to clarify cyberspace roles of service branches.