Month: March 2008

Another Security Lapse

This time at Facebook — Security Lapse Exposes Photos:

A security lapse made it possible for unwelcome strangers to peruse personal photos posted on Facebook Inc.’s popular online hangout, circumventing a recent upgrade to the Web site’s privacy controls.

The Associated Press verified the loophole Monday after receiving a tip from a Byron Ng, a Vancouver, Canada computer technician. Ng began looking for security weaknesses last week after Facebook unveiled more ways for 67 million members to restrict access to their personal profiles.

But the added protections weren’t enough to prevent Ng from pulling up the most recent pictures posted by Facebook members and their friends, even if the privacy settings were set to restrict the audience to a select few.

After being alerted Monday afternoon, Facebook spokeswoman Brandee Barker said the Palo Alto-based company fixed the bug within an hour.

So how many millions of lines of code does it take to run Facebook? And how many more bugs might there be, waiting to be discovered?

Here are a few more paragraphs from the above story:

The latest lapse serves as another reminder of the perils of sharing sensitive photos and personal information online, even when Web sites pledge to shield the information from prying eyes.

Before the fix, Ng’s computer-coding trick enabled him to find private pictures of Paris Hilton at the Emmy awards and of her brother Barron Nicholas drinking a beer with friends and photos of many other people who hadn’t granted access to Ng.

[…]

Despite the risks, more people than ever — especially teenagers and young adults — are publishing personal photos and other intimate details about their lives on the Internet.

News Corp.’s MySpace.com, the only online social network larger than Facebook, suffered a security breach that exposed its members’ private photos earlier this year.

And don’t forget about the security breach an Gmail. And plenty of other sites. (I wonder how long till we hear of a breach at Carbonite or some other online storage site.)

My urgent advice: Use the Internet (Web, email, chat, IM, storage, etc) as though it weren’t private and secure.

Attention, Adults!

Over at WorldMagBlog, Andrée Seu writes:

It was not quite 8 a.m. and as I was walking with Spider down streets still devoid of people, a little boy I don’t know called out to me heartily from his front porch: “Today’s my birthday!”

[…]

Remember the days when you didn’t need context to bring up a subject? All thoughts important to you were instantly relevant. Your friends, to their undying credit, didn’t think you weird but were on board without missing a beat, and ready to go with the flow.

Remember the days when you could expect that something that was good news to you would of course be good news to everyone? Even some strange middle-aged lady walking her dog?

Parents, you especially should read the whole piece. It’s not that long.

Grandparents, you should as well.

And teenagers.

And the rest of you.

Well, what are you waiting on?!

Gorbachev a Christian?

Admits, huh?

I wonder if that word choice is supposed to be significant. As in, The Telegraph has suspected it for quite a while and now, finally, Mikhail owns up to the error of his ways. (Or something like that.)

Whatever the case, here are some excerpts from their story:

Mikhail Gorbachev admits he is a Christian

Mikhail Gorbachev, the last Communist leader of the Soviet Union, has acknowledged his Christian faith for the first time, paying a surprise visit to pray at the tomb of St Francis of Assisi.

Accompanied by his daughter Irina, Mr Gorbachev spent half an hour on his knees in silent prayer at the tomb.

[…]

Mr Gorbachev’s surprise visit confirmed decades of rumours that, although he was forced to publicly pronounce himself an atheist, he was in fact a Christian, and casts a meeting with Pope John Paul II in 1989 in a new light.

Mr Gorbachev, 77, was baptised into the Russian Orthodox Church and his parents were Christians.

In addition, the parents of his wife Raisa were deeply religious and were killed during the Second World War for having religious icons in their home.

Oh, is that what he thinks makes him a Christian?!

Here’s a bit more from the story:

Ronald Reagan, the former United States president, allegedly told his close aides on a number of occasions that he felt his opponent during the Cold War was a “closet believer”.

Mr Reagan held deep religious convictions himself. However, until now Mr Gorbachev has allowed himself to express only pantheistic views, saying in one interview “nature is my god”.

Well, that sounds very suspect to me.

Mr. Gorbachev, what makes you a Christian?

Tipping at Restaurants

I learned something yesterday while reading a blog rant. I learned that many (most?) waitresses and waiters are paid around $3 an hour by the restaurant for which they work.

Three dollars an hour!

Well, I didn’t want to believe it just because I read it on someone’s blog. So this morning I researched the matter a bit.

And at the US Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics’ site I found this little gem:

Tipped employees are those who customarily and regularly receive more than $30 a month in tips. The employer may consider tips as part of wages, but the employer must pay at least $2.13 an hour in direct wages.

I had no idea!

Would you take a job with that kind of direct wages?

Especially if you had to rely on tippers like you to make up the difference?

So don’t be stingy!

Especially if you’re a Christian!

When you go into that eating joint that employs servers (aka waitresses and waiters), you are buying the food and hiring the serve staff.

Make sure that server earns a just wage while he’s working for you.

After writing all of the above, I came across the following:

Christian Odyssey: Confessions of a waitress

Unfortunately, the “after-church” Sunday lunch customers are some of the rudest and most demanding people I wait on.

[…]

But here’s a tip for you—free of charge: If you go out to eat, remember to leave your server a 20 percent tip. If they made you laugh, smile, or gave exceptional service (even if things didn’t go exactly as planned otherwise), leave them a little extra. Remember the things that are out of their control, and remember that they are still doing their best to serve you in spite of those things.

Jesus’ example of servanthood couldn’t be truer than in a restaurant. Yes, wait-staff are there to serve you. But by treating your wait-staff with dignity and empathy, you’re showing them the respect they deserve. They have feelings, and they are simply trying to earn a living—sometimes two.

Your generosity and politeness is a service to them. Somehow I think if Jesus were a customer at a restaurant, he’d be gracious, polite and generous.

“And, The labourer is worthy of his reward” (1 Timothy 5:18).

“Masters, give unto your servants that which is just and equal; knowing that ye also have a Master in heaven” (Colossians 4:1).

Expensive Free Wireless

As one who has used public wireless in airports, coffee houses, libraries, and elsewhere, I found this article particularly interesting.

Public Wireless, or its Evil Twin?

The next time you’re in an airport, train station, bus station, coffee house, or other public place and decide to “jack in” to the Internet, you might well be exposing yourself to identity thieves — or worse.

Here’s how it works: the girl across from you in the airport coffee shop has a laptop in her briefcase that’s set as an ‘access point’, or a ‘WiFi hotspot’. She’s even given the access point a legitimate-sounding ID, say, something like “Free Airport WiFi”. You power up your own laptop, quickly browse for available networks, see “Free Airport WiFi”, note that it’s unsecured but ignoring that, you connect.

On connecting, her computer promptly proxies your access to the web and begins feeding your laptop with look-a-like pages for your banks, email access portals, or other sites. She’s recording everything that passes through her access point. She’s an “evil twin”.

I don’t understand how it can be done. But that doesn’t change that reality, does it?

If you use public wireless, you’d be well served to click the link to read the full article. It includes some safety tips and precautions.

Cellphone Radiation and Your Cells

So you’re thinking, “Not another anti-cellphone scare piece!”

Well, click the link and read the full article anyway. 🙂

How Cellphone Radiation Affects Your Cells

Radiation from cell phones is too weak to heat biological tissue or break chemical bonds in cells, but the radio waves they emit may still change cell behavior.

Scientists exposed 10 female volunteers to radiation at 900 megahertz from GSM phones to simulate an hour-long phone call.

[…]

This study shows that even without heating, molecular level changes take place in response to exposure to cell phone frequency electromagnetic radiation.

[…]

We believe the biological damage comes both from the modulated signals that are carried ON the carrier microwave and the carrier wave itself. However, they do their damage by two entirely different mechanisms. These modulated information-carrying radio waves resonate in biological frequencies of a few to a few hundred cycles per second, and can stimulate your cellular receptors causing a whole cascade of pathological consequences that can culminate in fatigue, anxiety and ultimately cancers.

[…]

Do you suffer from any of these common illnesses and ailments, which have all been scientifically linked to cell phone information-carrying radio waves?

  • Alzheimer’s, senility and dementia
  • Parkinson’s
  • Autism
  • Fatigue
  • Headaches
  • Sleep disruptions
  • Altered memory function, poor concentration and spatial awareness

[…]

To date, there are few alternatives to ensure complete safety, but there are some common sense recommendations:

  • Limit the amount of time you spend on the phone.
  • Limit your exposure to WiFi routers. Find out where they are located in your work environment and stay away from them.
  • If you have any land-based (non-cellular) portable phones, do NOT use anything other than the 900 MHz phones as the Gigahertz phones stay on continuously, blasting you with information-carrying radio waves 24/7.
  • Use the speakerphone instead of putting the phone to your ear; this is probably one of the single most important steps you can take other than not using your cell phone.
  • Use a wired headset to limit your exposure to the cell phone — ideally, an air-tube headset that conducts sound but prevents any radiation from traveling up the wire to your brain. Also make sure the wire is SHIELDED, which prevents the wire from acting as an antenna that could attract more information-carrying radio waves directly to your brain.
  • Limit calls inside buildings.
  • Use the phone in open spaces as often as possible.
  • Limit use by children and preadolescents.

That’s my public service announcement for today.

Disclaimer: I tend not to like cellphones, though I’ve owned one for years. (And we have three in our household-of-five.)

And now in the Thousand Words Department:

If a rat used a cellphone....

Note to SPCA and PETA: Regarding the above abused rat, I’m only the messenger. Thanks.

(I think SPCA stands for Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. I suppose they’re good pals with PETA — People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.)

March 17

On this day twenty-seven years ago, my wife celebrated her first birthday as Mrs. Roth.

1845 — rubber band patented

1942 — first Jews from the Lviv Ghetto (western Ukraine) gassed at the Belzec death camp (eastern Poland)

1966 — off the coast of Spain in the Mediterranean, the Alvin submarine found a missing American hydrogen bomb

Oh, and today is Evacuation Day in part of Massachusetts.

Private
Above all, love God!