Posts Tagged ‘government’
The Way It Should Be – Episode 16
In this episode of The Way It Should Be, Shawn and Tyler talk about the BP oil spill and how the government is trying to be more transparent and social. We talk about WikiLeaks, a website devoted to uncovering government secrets. Then we wrap up with a few thoughts to ponder. It’s all on this week’s episode of The Way It Should Be.
Direct Download: Episode 16
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The Way It Should Be is a production of Knights Entertainment and Tyler S. Miller Media, Inc.
The Way It Should Be – Episode 11
In this episode of The Way It Should Be, Shawn and Tyler rant on net neutrality. We preview a video from http://broadband.gov/plan and talk about how bad the National Broadband Plan is to the United States. This is an episode you don’t want to miss. Rant filled political packed describes this episode. Also, at the end, we talk about Mark Zuckerburg, the founder and CEO of Facebook. He’s a bad, bad man. That’s all on this week’s edition of The Way It Should Be.
Direct Download: The Way It Should Be – Episode 11
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The Way It Should Be is a production of Knights Entertainment.
United States Treasury Website Serves Malware
In a post from The Register, the US Treasury website has been redirecting users to malware sites for sometime.
Credit: www.noloadfunds.com
The Register reports:
The infection buries an invisible iframe in bep.treas.gov, moneyfactory.gov, and bep.gov that invokes malicious scripts from grepad.com, Roger Thompson, chief research officer of AVG Technologies, told The Register. The code was discovered late Sunday night and was active at time of writing, about 12 hours later. To cover their tracks, the miscreants behind the compromise tailored it so it attacks only IP addresses that haven’t already visited the Treasury websites. That makes it harder for white hat-hackers and law enforcement agents to track the exploit. Indeed, Thompson initially reported that the problem had been fixed until he discovered the sites were merely skipping over laboratory PCs that had already encountered the attack. The attack is most likely related to mass infections that two weeks ago hit hundreds of sites hosted by Network Solutions and GoDaddy, said Dean De Beer, founder and CTO of security consultancy zero(day)solutions.
Great…I’ve said it many times before, and will say it again in rant form. <rant> We see almost every day the defacement or hacking of websites that the government owns. It’s either Sarah Palin, a senator’s website, or some other government run website is hacked. Even though the websites may not contain sensitive information, they still need to be protected to their full extent. That means long, secure passwords. Access to the FTP or backend from single locations, and implementing SSL for what it’s worth. The government is trying to make us go to an all Internet based system of everything. Banking, voting, medical records…yet, the websites for simple government services are not protected. So what makes you think that they can thwart off attacks that are going to be cast upon more secure sectors of the government. Here goes our Social Security Numbers, banking information, credit card info, addresses, names, etc, etc. Protect every aspect of your online identity, or quit altogether. </rant>
The Way It Should Be – Episode 7
This week on The Way It Should Be podcast, we talk about Homeland Security and cellphone sniffers, followed by another Facebook horror story. A 16-year old is suing his mother after an account breach. We finish up with a few book recommendations and be forewarned that this week, we go off on a lot of tangents and mini-rants…all in good fun of course. We hope you join us for The Way It Should Be and send us your feedback: podcast@tylersmiller.com.
Thanks for listening!
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Direct Download: The Way It Should Be – Episode 7
The Way It Should Be is a production of Knights Entertainment.
Flash Drives in the Government
This post is based off of this news story: NextGov.com
Flash drives have become a big problem within the government. I have spoke on this before, and cover it heavily in this weeks episode of The Way It Should Be – Episode 6. I am going to turn that rant into written form.
Credit: comparestoreprices.co.uk
Flash media of any kind should be banned in highly sensitive facilities…like the government. Flash drives are smaller versions of hard drives that can contract a virus and obtain damage from outside sources. Flash drives can just as easily get infected with a virus or malware and then when you plug it into multiple computers, that virus is being spread. Some may argue the Auto Run feature on Windows 7, but there are still ways around it. You still open individual files on the flash drive and you still copy and paste files from computer to drive. There are ways around everything to get infected.
That being said, I thought that it was a great idea for the Pentagon to begin bans on flash media…but now the military want’s to reinstate them. Why? There are numerous threats with allowing this again. Not to mention the fact that you can lose the flash drive. They are getting smaller and smaller and people are losing them more often. What’s to say that unencrypted data is going to get stolen or fall into the wrong hands if the drive is lost? Too many variables to account for.
The fix…the government needs to design their own flash media that is encrypted multiple times and has some kind of tracking device inside that allows it to be tracked if lost. This might not be needed in every device, but sensitive information ones should contain some kind of GPS tracking technology. We know it already exists. Just look at GPS units or the future of microchip implants in newborns. (Not in love with that idea).
Right now, the government needs to continue to block flash drives in the workplace. To me, this is just another way to ensure data security and make sure things do not get into the wrong hands.
Your thoughts?
Feds Prowl on Social Networks
The United States government might be trying to friend you on sites like Facebook and MySpace in hopes to uncover information about you including photos, messages and get information on your family.
A 33 page document available shows that local law enforcement, Secret Service and the FBI have been logging into social network sites to uncover information about people. They add the suspect as a friend and can then see otherwise restricted content, such as photos and contact information.
The government officials logging into the systems also state that they use status updates and tweets as alibis. Finding when and where people are and who they are with and using otherwise private information to convict people.
According to Wired Threat Level:
The document says evidence from social networking sites can:
Read More http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/#ixzz0iXjAlUKG
The deputy chief of the Justice Departments Computer Division gave a PowerPoint presentation to officers stating that they should start to use social networks to uncover private information about suspects and how this can help them in cases.
The cops can also map social relationships and networks, among other things. The document does not include guidance or cautionary notes on how to conduct an investigation responsibly using these services, though it acknowledges the problematic nature of using an assumed identity to open an account with a social networking site.
“Can failure to follow [terms of service] render access unauthorized?” the document asks. “If agents violate terms of service, is that ‘otherwise illegal activity’?”
In short…do not add anyone on Facebook or MySpace unless you know who they actually are. The random person you choose to add next time might just be with the FBI or Secret Service.
The Way It Should Be – Episode 6
In this episode of The Way It Should Be, we talk about Census and the cloud, moving patient medical records onto the Internet and allowing the Justice and Homeland Security Departments access to said data, then we discuss the use of flash drives within the military…bad idea? We think so.
Join us this week on The Way It Should Be as we cover technology and political news in one show. Have comments? Comment on the post or email us: podcast@tylersmiller.com We appreciate your feedback and look forward to reading your comments on the show.
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Direct Download: The Way It Should Be – Episode 6
Thanks for listening!
The Way It Should Be is a production of Knights Entertainment.