WINDING DOWN
An idiosyncratic look at, and comment on, the week’s net, technology and science news
by Alan Lenton
A few bits and pieces to whet your appetite this week: cloning credit cards, cloud data downers, 9-11 and the Federal Reserve Bank, new web technology, Sphere Vision, NASA sounds, X-37B (ssshhh...), the Xerox Alto, CP/M, and a Sherlock Holmes exhibition. If that’s not enough for you, URLs in the Scanner section point to hacking, HP’s malware cert, death by PowerPoint, punishing retailers, computer education, and encryption.
Phew! That should keep you going...
Shorts:
Bad news from the Antipodes. An Australia researcher has written an Android app that allows you to clone Mastercard and Visa contactless credit cards. Except mine – I have no use for contactless stuff and it interfered with the workings of my transport pass, so I had them give me a replacement that didn’t have a chip.
Anyway, as a proof that it was more than just concept; the researcher, Peter Fillmore, cloned his own cards and was able to shop in the Woolworths chain and in a pub. Take a look at the article and have a long think about how you plan to stop people cloning your credit cards...
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/10/07/aussie_builds_card_cloner_app_goes_shopping_at_woolies
The dangers of using the cloud to store your data are starting to become more apparent. The latest problem is for users of the cloud storage site Firedrive. Or, perhaps, I should say former users, for it stopped functioning a fortnight ago, and, as far as I can tell from searching the web, it’s still down. The web site is still there, and has been all along, but you can’t access its cloud storage. That’s pretty grim for people who rely on it for storage, since they can’t access their storage material even to move it elsewhere.
No one knows what the problem is, how long it will last, or whether it will ever come back, there is no communication from the owners of the site. Unfortunately, this is only the latest in what is becoming a little known but growing problem. It’s a bit analogous to the problem we had a few years ago, when AboveNet, who hosted our Federation 2 game, went to the wall owing a lot of rent on the building the data center was in. The landlord was, understandably, refusing to allow any equipment to be moved out. Fortunately, through the good offices of an employee, we were permitted to remove our equipment, and set up with a new provider (downtime – less than four hours – 3.5 hours to physically move it, 20 minutes set up).
We were lucky, very lucky. But somehow I have the feeling that the customers of failed cloud services aren’t going to be quite so lucky, so always make sure you have an accessible back up of anything residing on someone else’s hard drives!
http://www.cloudwedge.com/4891-firedrive-has-been-offline-for-nearly-a-week/
http://torrentfreak.com/firedrive-mystery-deepens-ios-and-android-apps-disappear-141006/
http://news.techworld.com/security/3575397/firedrive-mystery-deepens--is-this-cloud-storage-site-coming-back/
Homework:
I’d like to draw your attention to one of the most amazing stories I’ve come across in a long time. It’s all about how the staff of the Federal Reserve Bank kept the financial system working during the 9-11 attack. It’s a fascinating story, based in post-attack New York, Chicago and Washington, and of the way the Federal reserve staff kept money moving so that the financial system didn’t go into meltdown as a result of the losses of 9-11. I really recommend you take some time to read it!
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/09/10/1328813/-The-Astonishing-Story-of-the-Federal-Reserve-on-9-11#
The web is moving on. It’s never completed, as computers – whether PC or ‘device’, such as smart phones – get more powerful, it’s possible to do more things with your browser. If you’ve got a modern browser – Chrome, Firefox, or later versions of Internet Explorer, for instance – you can take a look at what’s in store for you in your browser in the not too distant future.
Using a mixture of video and the latest HTML5/WebGL technologies ‘Rome’ have put together an amazing experience called “3 Dreams of Black”, there is also a piece about the technology involved.
You might also like to look at some pure 360 degree video, made by the company I work for, Sphere Vision, so I’ve included an URL for some demos. You can drag your mouse around to point the camera in the direction you want. The Thorpe Park roller coaster is a good example in which you can either watch where you are going, or you can drag the camera around to watch the screaming passengers!
http://www.ro.me/ (2 Dreams of Black)
http://www.ro.me/tech/?PageSpeed=noscript (How it was made)
http://www.spherevision.com/360-video-in-action/360-presentations/ (Sphere Vision Demos)
For Geeks:
NASA has just produced an album. Sort of NASA sound bites. The best part is the ‘Solar System & Beyond’ which features both man made sounds, for instance beeps from Sputnik, and more ethereal stuff in the form of radio emissions from Jupiter and Saturn. There’s also Rocket launch sounds and clips from Kennedy’s vow to put a man on the moon and get him back to earth, as well as communications between spacecraft and the ground station. The latter includes the famous ‘The Eagle has landed’ and ‘One small step...’ The sounds are also available as MP3s and other formats suitable for use as ring tones, and, of course, since they were funded by the US government, they are all in the public domain!
https://soundcloud.com/nasa
http://xkcd.com/1438/ (This ‘soundbite’ isn’t on the album – don’t forget to check out the tooltip!)
I see that the US Air Force’s, super, top secret, eat before reading, X-37B, now you know too much, I’ll have to kill you, space plane has returned to Earth after two years in orbit.
So how come I know about this, if it’s so hush, hush? Easy, after years of denying it even existed, the Air Force told me – and the rest of the world – about it. Apparently it was doing experiments.
Of course it’s not very secret any longer.... Gizmag even has a picture of it – ten of them to be exact.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/10/18/supersecret_x37b_mini_shuttle_returns_to_earth_after_
nearly_two_years_aloft/
http://www.gizmag.com/otv-3-x-37b-landing/34312/
And here’s something special for programming geeks – the source code for the Xerox Alto computer has been released by the Computer History Museum. The Alto is the legendary first computer to have a graphical user interface. The code released has a whole bunch of other firsts as well GUI word processors, drawing programs, and the first ethernet drivers. It also includes the code for Smalltalk and BCPL. BCPL was one of the precursors of the ‘C’ language. More importantly, from my point of view, it was the language in which the first multi-player player game – MUD – was written in, all those years ago by Richard Bartle and Roy Trubshaw, at Essex University!
Also available at the Museum is the source code for the CP/M operating system. I wrote my first commercial code to run on a CP/M microcomputer!
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/10/22/chm_releases_parc_alto_source_code/
London:
Planning on coming to London between now and 12th April 2015? I know it’s the rainy season, but then it always rains in England. However, if you were to visit these green and soggy isles, there’s a treat for the Sherlock Holmes fans amongst you. The Museum of London has an exhibition of Sherlock Holmes and his London that, from all accounts is well worth visiting. Of particular interest are the original sketches by Sidney Padget, who illustrated the stories as they first appeared in Strand Magazine.
Worth a visit if you happen to be in the London area.
http://londonist.com/2014/10/sherlock-holmes-at-the-museum-of-london.php
Scanner:
‘A motivated, funded, skilled hacker will always get in’ – Schneier
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/10/09/your_security_defences_are_going_to_fall_get_over_it_schneier/
HP accidentally signed malware, will revoke certificate
http://arstechnica.com/security/2014/10/hp-accidentally-signed-malware-will-revoke-certificate/
Death by PowerPoint: Microsoft warns of zero-day attack hidden in slides
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/10/22/powerpoint_attacks_exploit_ms_0day/
Nearly half of consumers will punish breached retailers during holidays
http://www.darkreading.com/nearly-half-of-consumers-will-punish-breached-retailers-during-holidays/d/d-id/1316786
The ‘fun-nification’ of computer education – good idea?
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/10/20/the_funnification_of_it_good_or_bad/
FBI director urges new encryption legislation
http://www.darkreading.com/fbi-director-urges-new-encryption-legislation/d/d-id/1316711
Acknowledgements
Thanks to readers Barb and Fi for drawing my attention to material for Winding Down.
Please send suggestions for stories to alan@ibgames.com and include the words Winding Down in the subject line, unless you want your deathless prose gobbled up by my voracious Thunderbird spam filter...
Alan Lenton
alan@ibgames.com
26 October 2014
Alan Lenton is an on-line games designer, programmer and sociologist, the order of which depends on what he is currently working on! His web site is at http://www.ibgames.net/alan/index.html.
Past issues of Winding Down can be found at http://www.ibgames.net/alan/winding/index.html.
