South Africa to Hold Mass-Scale HIV Vaccine Trial
February 9th, 2007Oh sure.
Via: AFP:
The first mass trial of an HIV vaccine which has yielded promising results in smaller tests in the United States and elsewhere is to be launched in AIDS-hit South Africa, it was announced.
The South African AIDS Vaccine Initiative said the programme, baptised Phambili or “Going Forward” in the Xhosa language, will be conducted jointly with the HIV Vaccine Trials Network of the US National Institutes of Health.
“Three thousand participants will be recruited from four South African provinces — Gauteng, North West, Western Cape and KwaZulu-Natal,” it said in a statement.
The trial sites include the township of Soweto outside Johannesburg, Cape Town and Durban.
The “test of concept” vaccine, developed by US firm Merck, has been tried on more than 1,800 people across the United States, Canada, Latin America, the Caribbean and Australia.
Strong Angel III
February 8th, 2007I started poking around to see if I could find any indication of the military response to the events of a couple of days ago involving the root DNS nodes. There is, without a doubt, a military response. Of course, who actually did the thing vs. who gets guns pointed at their heads are really two different matters.
While I didn’t find any information on how the military is reacting to this incident, Graham Cluley, senior technology consultant at security firm Sophos, set the appropriate tone when he said, “The criminals are asking for trouble; it’s like trying to steal a salmon from a grizzly bear. I wouldn’t want to be in the bad guys’ shoes right now.”
Anyway, along my meanderings, I ran across something that some of you might find interesting, especially if you like to think in terms of, “This is how the world ends, not with a bang, but with _______ .” <--- Fill in the blank. Remember the "Possible Terrorist Scenario" from my five year old, informal essay on cyberwar?
The folks running the Strong Angel “disaster laboratory” added a pandemic twist to my little nightmare scenario. With the trial balloons already floating out of the UK re: the avian flu nonsense and attacks on the root DNS nodes in mind, spend some time checking out the Strong Angel III exercise.
Via: Strong Angel III:
THE SCENARIO
A Complex Contingency: A lethal and highly-contagious virus gradually begins to spread around the globe. Infection rates are high, deaths are frequent, and no vaccine is available. Cities all over the world fall under quarantine. Emergency services and medical centers are stressed and national government agencies, affected just as severely as the cities themselves, cannot provide assistance. And then the situation goes from bad to worse.
A terrorist cell, having long waited for such an opportunity, launches a wave of successful cyber attacks in a medium size city somewhere in the developed world, bringing down grid power, Internet access, land and cellular telephones. Other, more subtle, attacks follow, and it’s difficult to sort out the mess.
If there were ever a time to work effectively together, this would be it.
Recognizing that a comparable scenario might one day unfold in real life, a diverse group of disaster responders, technologists, and community leaders will assemble in San Diego in August of 2006 for an event designed to simulate a truly complex disaster. Over the course of seven days, on the grounds of the San Diego Fire Training Academy, the campus of San Diego State University, and in the streets of the city, we will explore techniques and technologies for responding effectively when the response itself must adapt to cascading losses. By demonstrating what is possible through public and private-sector partnerships within a community, we intend to develop approaches to cultivating local resilience that may be useful for any city, here or abroad.
Related: Simulated Catastrophe Focuses on Tools to Create Order From Chaos <--- That's actually the title of this article, believe it or not.
Cryptogon Readers Contribute $30 and $50
February 7th, 2007AS, a long time Cryptogon reader and contributor, sent $30. Reader CF also kicked in a generous $50. It’s all going into the small barn / milking shed fund at this stage. Building materials are incredibly expensive here in New Zealand. We have been advised by people who know what they’re doing to go with a kit provided by a company like Versitile Buildings. We’re actually on our way down to check these out today.
Thank you both very much!
SERIOUS ATTACK ON ROOT DNS NODES
February 7th, 2007Two days ago, in a comment on the Zbigniew Brzezinski Before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee story, I wrote the following:
This thing is collapsing for multiple reasons, and all at once… I’ve thought along these lines as well, especially re: a strategic, false flag takedown of the Internet mainly to blame “the terrorists†for economic collapse, and to wipe away evidence of past crimes. Don’t ask me how “the terrorists†would manage to destroy redundant backup and data systems… But “the terrorists†are a crafty lot. Like Satan, et. al. * sigh *
The way to think about it is: What would kill the most birds with the fewest stones? That’s why I thought “the terrorists†will finally focus on the undefended infrastructures that make the Internet possible:
1) End the criticism of the regime.
2) Cut off people like us from real information.
3) Cut off people like us from communicating with each other.
4) People, rendered helpless, jobless, Walmartless, etc, would beg for the government to save them.
5) Anyone who dares speak out against the government would probably be killed by a mob of troglodytes.
6) Oh yeah, the theft of trillions of dollars? What are these trillions of dollars you speak of, Senator? Who? Where?LOOK OUT! THE TERRORISTS ARE COMING BACK TO FINISH US OFF!!!!
That’s one possible scenario, anyway.
I don’t think that it’s possible to know which trick is going to be pulled with any precision. But they’re going to have to try to fit ten pounds of shit into a five pound bag, and soon. The question is how to blame “the terrorists†for the crash without the thing leading to nuclear war. I’m guessing that this Brzezinski thing is like saying, “Don’t do it ‘that’ way. Go back to the drawing board. We don’t want it to play out like ‘that.’†Iraq is clearly out of control. Add Iran to the mix? I don’t see how they maintain any level of control (militarily, politically, economically, take your pick) with an order of magnitude increase in the chaos on the ground. I think this crossed Brzezinski’s mind, and the minds of his handlers.
Today’s operation against the root DNS systems may have been more reconnaissance than attack. I don’t want to discuss this in too much detail (offensive information warfare is a matter that governments take extremely seriously – discussing too many details could result in a visit from the authorities), but the people behind this probably now have a better picture of the countermeasures and backup systems that are in place. This information would help make an attack on undefended physical assets much more devastating.
If my Magic 8 Ball is correct about a strategic, false flag attack on the Internet… well, as usual, I just hope I’m wrong.
Via: AP / Wired:
Hackers briefly overwhelmed at least three of the 13 computers that help manage global computer traffic Tuesday in one of the most significant attacks against the Internet since 2002.
Experts said the unusually powerful attacks lasted as long as 12 hours but passed largely unnoticed by most computer users, a testament to the resiliency of the Internet. Behind the scenes, computer scientists worldwide raced to cope with enormous volumes of data that threatened to saturate some of the Internet’s most vital pipelines.
The Homeland Security Department confirmed it was monitoring what it called “anomalous” Internet traffic.
“There is no credible intelligence to suggest an imminent threat to the homeland or our computing systems at this time,” the department said in a statement.
The motive for the attacks was unclear, said Duane Wessels, a researcher at the Cooperative Association for Internet Data Analysis at the San Diego Supercomputing Center. “Maybe to show off or just be disruptive; it doesn’t seem to be extortion or anything like that,” Wessels said.
Other experts said the hackers appeared to disguise their origin, but vast amounts of rogue data in the attacks were traced to South Korea.
The attacks appeared to target UltraDNS, the company that operates servers managing traffic for Web sites ending in “org” and some other suffixes, experts said. Officials with NeuStar Inc., which owns UltraDNS, confirmed only that it had observed an unusual increase in traffic.
Among the targeted “root” servers that manage global Internet traffic were ones operated by the Defense Department and the Internet’s primary oversight body.
“There was what appears to be some form of attack during the night hours here in California and into the morning,” said John Crain, chief technical officer for the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers. He said the attack was continuing and so was the hunt for its origin.
“I don’t think anybody has the full picture,” Crain said. “We’re looking at the data.”
Crain said Tuesday’s attack was less serious than attacks against the same 13 “root” servers in October 2002 because technology innovations in recent years have increasingly distributed their workloads to other computers around the globe.
Related: U.S. Plans to ‘Fight the Net’
Five Hundred and Seven Mechanical Movements
February 7th, 2007Over five hundred simple mechanical movements from America’s first one hundred years of the Industrial Revolution. For those who share an interest in mechanical things, this book is addictive. Through the use of simplified, concise drawings, here are 507 of the small components which make up complex machinery in areas as diverse as C.R. Otis’s safety stop for the elevator, Pickering’s governor for a steam engine, Arnold’s escapement for watches, compound parallel rules, piston rod guides, the grasshopper beam engine and a self recording level for surveyors. The list goes on and on in fascinating variety, with each movement explained and illustrated.
Amazon Review:
This book is a joy to browse though. It is a little gold mine of ideas for the mechanical designer. Yet, anyone with mechanical aptitude should enjoy it. The many crisp line drawings are presented with a minimum of explanation and no dimensioning. You see, it was assumed back in those days that a person with natural mechanical aptitude could look at a diagram, or a machine, and figure it out. Not only that, but it was assumed that once you had the idea, then you could work out all the details for yourself without having to be told everything down to the last screw size. While there is a descriptive paragraph indexed to every drawing, most of the time you don’t really need it.
This book comes from an age when engineers and designers had to have the talent and the knowledge to use the mechanical principles of levers, linkages, cams, gears, etc. to produce a given motion- and to link together many such elegant little mechanisms to get a bigger job done- reliably. This isn’t done much anymore. Now most machines are huge, cobbled-up, Rube Goldberg devices of pneumatic or hydraulic cylinders, screw actuators, or servo motors- all interconnected by electronic controllers. The whole thing is controlled by software of even more dubious reliability.
Up to the “digital revolution”, this book shows how it was always done- it’s how I learned it. Of course, once upon a time, a mechanical designer actually had to understand machinery, and the basic principles of physics, and not just how to write code….
Note: Cryptogon Reader P found a cheaper/smaller version of the book.
$12 Billion Dollars Missing in Iraq
February 7th, 2007Forget the bogus contracts for war toys and crap. Just print the money and deliver it to the thieves in shrink wrapped bundles.
It sounds like a scene out of Miami Vice! But no, this was official U.S. policy. Of course, Bremmer says that the funds were used in the, “best interests of the Iraqi people.”
We can’t even catch our breath from one absurdity to the next.
The war is being used as an ongoing cover for what will eventually become known as the greatest heist in the history of the world.
Via: Bloomberg:
Representative Henry Waxman, kicking off hearings on government contracting, questioned former Ambassador L. Paul Bremer today on what happened to as much as $12 billion in unaccounted-for cash spent when he was in charge of rebuilding Iraq.
A report from Waxman’s House Oversight and Government Reform Committee said the money represented more than half of Bremer’s budget from May 2003 to June 2004. The report described contractors being told to bring big bags to collect shrink- wrapped bundles of money and one episode where a Bremer staff member was allegedly told to spend $6.75 million in a week.
“We have no way of knowing if the cash that was shipped into the green zone ended up in enemy hands,” Waxman, a California Democrat, said at today’s hearing. “We owe it to the American people to do everything we can to find out where the $12 billion went.”
Bottled Water as Black Ops Swindle
February 7th, 2007Spooks lining their pockets with blood money?! Imagine my shock. This case represents just one tiny deal. What about the other $12 billion that went missing in Iraq?
Via: San Francisco Chronicle:
CIA officers operating in northern Iraq bought drinking water from a bottling plant there for years prior to the 2003 invasion that ousted Saddam Hussein.
That changed soon afterward. A CIA officer handling logistics for the Middle East and other regions recommended that an American company provide water and other supplies, according to former government officials.
The U.S. contractor that benefited from the multimillion-dollar deal wasn’t just anyone. The company had personal ties to the officer, Kyle “Dusty” Foggo, who would soon leave his logistics post in Frankfurt, Germany, and move to Washington to become the CIA’s third-ranking official.
In at least one written communication, a Baghdad CIA officer complained about the no-bid contract. According to one official, the officer believed the deal was simply unnecessary because safe water was available commercially but he was ignored.
The water contract, while small on the scale of the billions that flowed into Iraq, raises questions about why U.S. taxpayer dollars went to well-connected businessmen rather than Iraqis who could have benefited from a share of postwar reconstruction business. And the case provides a window into the murky world of covert government business arrangements.
Foggo retired from the CIA last year. He is now at the center of a federal investigation, nearing completion, into whether he improperly steered contracts to companies controlled by his best friend, San Diego defense contractor Brent Wilkes.
Federal prosecutors in San Diego are preparing to seek indictments against Foggo and Wilkes on charges of honest services fraud and conspiracy, two government officials familiar with the investigation told The Associated Press last week.
Bottled Water as Ecocidal Folly
February 7th, 2007Via: Triple Pundit:
Well, I doubt that Fiji has a booming plastics industry so they probably get the bottles from China. I would suspect that they get the bottles in the form of “Blanks” which are then expanded to their final size and shaped by a process called “stretch blow molding.” The total mass of the empty 1 liter bottle is probably around 0.125kg (125g) and it is probably made from PETE or HDPE (Sorry, I’m not running out to the store to check). Plastics of this type typically use around 6kg of oil per kg, 200kg of water per kg, and result in around 3kg of greenhouse gas emissions per kg.
It goes on and on. Of course, the thing most people use routinely, and never even think about, is one of the most insane wastes of resources possible. This doesn’t mention the mountains of garbage…
Steve Jobs Taps the Mat on DRM
February 7th, 2007They lost on this one, and They know it.
Via: Apple:
The third alternative is to abolish DRMs entirely. Imagine a world where every online store sells DRM-free music encoded in open licensable formats. In such a world, any player can play music purchased from any store, and any store can sell music which is playable on all players. This is clearly the best alternative for consumers, and Apple would embrace it in a heartbeat. If the big four music companies would license Apple their music without the requirement that it be protected with a DRM, we would switch to selling only DRM-free music on our iTunes store. Every iPod ever made will play this DRM-free music.
Why would the big four music companies agree to let Apple and others distribute their music without using DRM systems to protect it? The simplest answer is because DRMs haven’t worked, and may never work, to halt music piracy. Though the big four music companies require that all their music sold online be protected with DRMs, these same music companies continue to sell billions of CDs a year which contain completely unprotected music. That’s right! No DRM system was ever developed for the CD, so all the music distributed on CDs can be easily uploaded to the Internet, then (illegally) downloaded and played on any computer or player.
Cryptogon Reader Contributes $35
February 7th, 2007Pookie, Queen of Cryptogon contributions, continues her glorious reign. Thank you.
In Case You Don’t Know: Pookie
