Archive for December, 2007

Have a safe New Years!

HOWTO: Protect chmod 777 folders

Sometimes linux hosting users need to change the permissions on a folder to use upload scripts or other applications that need this permissions. With chmod 777 their folder gain the rights: writing / reading and execute for everyone. Malicious hackers like these kind of folders. How can you protect that folders? You can turn PHP off on that [...]

AOL, Netflix, and the end of open access to research data

Correction: The authors of the Netflix de-anonymization study contacted me to point out that they originally published a draft of their results a mere two weeks after Netflix released its dataset. Netflix has known about their study for over a year. Over the past year, there have been a number of high-profile incidents in which sensitive user [...]

HOWTO: Install Win32 Codecs in Linux

Installing libxine-extracodecs will get you the most wide-spread codecs installed, but not all of them. MPlayer, a movie player program for Linux, has support for a big bunch of video and audio formats. Installing them in Linux ( Ubuntu / Fedora / SUSE ) should be as easy as sudo yum (or aptitude) install w32codecs but for some reason it says [...]

HOWTO: Convert A Friend To Linux

Warning: You should proceed with caution using this Howto, if you do not know what you are doing you could damage your relationship with Friend 2.0 or totally break it. Also, using this Howto extensively with multiple Friend 2.0’s may damage Life 4.5, and end up as a sorrow lonely geek. Prerequisites : Before attempting to convert [...]

WARNING: Do NOT calculate Pi in binary

WARNING: Do NOT calculate Pi in binary. It is conjectured that this number is normal, meaning that it contains ALL finite bit strings. If you compute it, you will be guilty of: 1. Copyright infringement (of all books, all short stories, all newspapers, all magazines, all web sites, all music, all movies, and all software, including the complete [...]

Let’s Take America Back

Great video. This made my day. (more...)

Top 25 Linux 3D Games

Who says Linux sucks for gaming? Here's a great list of 25 3D games for Linux. Feel free to add more games and help another Linux users find those great time wasters you love. Link

To go through the doors of an airport is to enter a strange world where the laws of economics do not apply…

The airline ticket is a curious beast. It’s yours and yours alone, and unlike a ticket for a music or sports event, it can’t be sold or even given away. You hand it to someone else and it turns to dust. You can rebook or get credit for a future flight through the airline, but unless you’ve paid the top fare the exchange costs [...]

Ron Paul and Neil Cavuto on Fox News

This is a brief video with Presidential hopeful, Ron Paul and Fox News Interviewer, Neil Cavuto. Mr. Cavuto thought he had Dr. Paul with a random question about racist campaign donations, but Dr. Paul saved all the momentum and delivered a swift kick in the ass. This made my day. It's funny how logic always makes people not using it look [...]

Firefox = Detention

Tom O’Keefe Vs. American Express

Tom O’Keefe, an art director based in Boston, is suing American Express and Ogilvy & Mather for allegedly using his trademarked concept for the “My Life My Card” campaign. According to the press release issued by O’Keefe’s attorneys, the art director was pitching O&M for work on the campaign. For years, [...]

Bush Sr. vs JFK: You Do The Math

Conspiracy Theory Warning! A fun video to help pass the time during the snowfall. I had no idea how far back the Bush family stretches. Come to your own conclusions. Link

Why REALLY needs your SSN?

The issue is that our SSN was neither designed to be a private number nor something for other organizations to use to identify someone. It's unfortunate how it's now used for that and that basically with it, you can take over almost anyone's accounts. Bruce Schneier talks about using a SSN as ID in his book "Beyond Fear". I don't have it on me [...]

“Look”: The First Major US Film Made Entirely With Surveillance Footage

Look, which has already won major kudos on the film festival circuit and will be in theaters this Friday, is sure to be a thought provoking and controversial film. It purports to be made entirely out of surveillance footage shot without the knowledge the people involved. According to the film's director Adam Rifkin, 37 states say it's legal to [...]

Universal Barring Artists from Posting Full Songs on MySpace

According to an email apparently sent by Universal artist Colbie Caillat to her fans, artists signed to Universal Music Group or one of its subsidiaries may not post full versions of their songs on their MySpace pages. Hey everyone...bad news. Due to circumstances beyond my control I have to swap the songs out on my page for 90 second versions [...]

Myspace for Small Business

One of the reasons people go to Myspace.com is for business reasons. It may be odd for most people since myspace is something really personal. You go to myspace to express yourself and get a hold of your friends and sometimes you drop them a line or two just to make sure they are still there are you remember them. You can personalize your page as [...]

Make Random and Pronouncable Passwords with PWGen

Windows and Linux command-line utility PWGen generates random, meaningless passwords but uses letter and number combinations that can be pronounced and memorized. Simply typing "pwgen" and hitting Enter will shoot back a screen full of passwords to choose from, helping to prevent shoulder-surfing sneaks, but you can easily hone down and customize [...]

Inside the Chinese malware economy

German and Chinese researchers have just released a study that explores the world of Chinese commercial cybercrime. The researchers set up virtual PCs running Internet Explorer, then visited nearly 15,000 Chinese websites, deliberately infecting their virtual systems with whatever crapware happened to be running on the system. Then they carefully [...]

Homebrew camera phone se-cam looks like a bomb

Here's a brilliant rube goldberg security camera made out of a camera phone, some homebrew circuits and solenoid relays. When the phone is called, it activates the relays, which tap out the "take picture/send picture" sequence on the phone-keypad, which then takes the pic and sends it off. Added bonus: this thing actually looks sinister. If I were [...]