The end of Internet (as we know it)

Featured as an Easter Egg in Google Reader, this link will bring you to the end of the Internet. A leaf node of sort indeed. 🙂

That will stop those “evil hackers”

Can you see what’s wrong?

Source: http://www.timmins.net/~paul/

Russian Arithmatic Problem: What is Solaris + Vodka?

Answer: Solaris + Vodka = Solarka. Only in Russia.

EDIT: For some reason the image in the original post was corrupted. So I took the chance to change the post a bit and reposted it.

A quick look at Google Browser Sync Firefox Extension

Google has released a new Firefox extension called Google Browser Sync. What is interesting about Google Browser Sync is that it helps to synchronize a selected collection of Firefox setting across all the Firefox installations you have Google Browser Sync installed. The settings available for synchronization are:

• Cookies
• Saved Passwords
• Bookmarks
• History
• Tabs and Windows

While you may not worry so much about people looking at your bookmarks (unless you have some rather unusual habits you would rather not share with anyone), the other synchronization options do worry me a little bit. What should be noted, however, is that "Cookies" and "Saved Passwords" are encrypted by default, and cannot be left unencrypted by the extension.

Windows Vista Beta 2 Now Available for Public Review

The latest installment of Windows, Windows Vista, has entered its beta 2 phase. The download is about 3.5GB for 32-bit x86 machines and about 4.4GB for 64-bit x86 machines. The hardware requirement is here, the beta 2 release notes here, and above all, the download can be found here, with a list of mirrors based on geographical location available.

Windows Vista features some very interesting security features that has been available to OpenBSD and various distributions of Linux for a few years now. These features are, according to some source, enabled by default in Beta 2. I will post about these features in the next few days.

For the mean time, those of us who have a fat pipe can head over to the download address above and play around with Vista. Enjoy!

Update 1: Distrowatch has a humorous "review" of Windows Vista.
Update 2: Microsoft also has a Get Ready page that has all the links above pus a few other useful information.

The IT Crowd

I have found just the medicine for the boredom associated with exam studies: The IT Crowd! A short production by the British Channel 4 TV station. Very typical British humor, and may I say bloody well done! You can legally download the whole series, along with episode guides, over [Geeks are Sexy] technology news blog.

Thanks to KonstableKonst for bringing this to my attention.

Security is for the paranoid and crazy?

"There wont be too many people in honours altogether, let alone wishing to be paranoid and crazy."

A friend's comment on the software security paper offered at my university at post-graduate level.

Cryptographical Prodigy: A Budding Cryptographer

Annotation: I kind of feel sorry for her, but the smile on her face tells me that "it's okay".

Source: http://mademelaugh.com/funnypix/p0020.html

Why I failed in Math

Slow updates in June, plans for security articles, and a new security blog

My finals will be coming up, and that could only mean one thing: It's time to get my head out of the sand and get some studying done. I am a bit behind schedule in assignments, so I won't have much time to make regular posts to this blog.

It seems like my post A Day in a Security-conscious Professor's Life has attracted a lot of traffic searching for information about SSL certificates. It was modified from a long answer my Information/Software Security Professor wrote as the model answer to one of our assignment regarding SSL. Beyond the cheap attempt at trying to get some laugh out of an interesting assignment, I didn't expect so many people reading my blog because of it. In light of this and my new found interest in information security, I will be writing a few introductory articles on SSL, how it works, what it means, how to use it wisely, and a few other security related things — after the finals.

I have also grabbed a new blog from WP.com (Thanks to Podz from the WP.com team for sorting out the multiple blog issue) that I plan to use to write information/software security related issues. This blog, as beloved as it is, is getting quite clogged up with all sorts of things and lack in coherence. So I figured that starting up a new topic-specific blog is due.

Expect to see some new and exciting articles on SSL and a few other things.

Watch this space.