Archive for the 'Infrastructure' Category
MonsterMind: NSA’s Cyberwar Bot
August 13th, 2014Via: Wired: Edward Snowden has made us painfully aware of the government’s sweeping surveillance programs over the last year. But a new program, currently being developed at the NSA, suggests that surveillance may fuel the government’s cyber defense capabilities, too. The NSA whistleblower says the agency is developing a cyber defense system that would instantly […]
Banks Dreading Computer Hacks Call for Cyber War Council
July 13th, 2014Via: Bloomberg: Wall Street’s biggest trade group has proposed a government-industry cyber war council to stave off terrorist attacks that could trigger financial panic by temporarily wiping out account balances, according to an internal document. The proposal by the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association, known as Sifma, calls for a committee of executives and […]
Google: Better Than 50% Chance That Loon Becomes a Reality
June 30th, 2014They also have drones: Google Buys Drone Maker Titan Aerospace. Via: Wired: Cassidy has always contended that by providing the Internet to unserved areas, his project could help make those dreams achievable. A year after the project’s public launch, he’s confident that Internet service enabled by high-altitude balloons is more than a possibility. “We’ve definitely […]
FCC Approves Plan to Consider Paid Priority on Internet
May 15th, 2014Via: Washington Post: The Federal Communications Commission on Thursday voted in favor of advancing a proposal that could dramatically reshape the way consumers experience the Internet, opening the possibility of Internet service providers charging Web sites for higher-quality delivery of their content to American consumers. The plan, approved in a three-to-two vote along party lines, […]
Hackers Can Mess With Traffic Lights to Jam Roads and Reroute Cars
April 30th, 2014Via: Wired: The hacker in the Italian Job did it spectacularly. So did the fire sale team in Live Free or Die Hard. But can hackers really hijack traffic lights to cause gridlock and redirect cars? According to one researcher, parts of the vehicle traffic control system installed at major arteries in U.S. cities and […]
RUSSIAN FORCES SEIZE GAS FACILITY INSIDE UKRAINE
March 15th, 2014Via: Telegraph: Ukraine’s military mobilised to thwart an apparent Russian advance for the first time on Saturday night as Kiev sent paratroops to defend a gas facility near Crimea with tensions high in the hours leading up to Sunday’s independence referendum. The foreign ministry in Kiev denounced an “invasion” by Russia’s forces into its mainland, […]
Dismantling Fukushima Will Require Robotic Technology That Has Not Been Invented Yet
March 2nd, 2014Via: IEEE: “At Fukushima you have wrecked infrastructure, three melted cores, and you have some core on the floor, ex-vessel,” Barrett says. Nothing like Fukushima, he declares, has ever happened before.
NDR Interview with Edward Snowden
February 8th, 2014Via: NDR: One of the major programmes that faces abuse in the National Security Agency is what’s called “XKeyscore”. It’s a front end search engine that allows them to look through all of the records they collect worldwide every day. What could you do if you would sit so to speak in their place with […]
Snipers Attacked A Silicon Valley Power Station Last Year And Nobody Told Us
February 6th, 2014See Fiber Optic Cables Cut in California (2009) for commentary that applies here as well. They called that one vandalism. Oh sure. That one happened in April too. Hmm. Via: sfist: Around 1 a.m. on April 16th last year, a team of attackers cut phone likes and took out 17 power transformers at a PG&E […]
Decade After Decade: Security on SCADA Systems Is Crap
January 13th, 2014Via: IT News: Over 60,000 exposed control systems found online. Researchers have found vulnerabilities in industrial control systems that they say grant full control of systems running energy, chemical and transportation systems. The vulnerabilities were discovered by Russian researchers who over the last year probed popular and high-end ICS and supervisory control and data acquisition […]
