Month: April 2013

  • Fun Times, InfoSec, and No Wind in Chicago

    I just returned from a brief trip to Chicago, where I attended and presented at Thotcon, as well as attended BSides Chicago. Thursday: After a two hour delay due to “mechanical” issues, I arrived in Chicago. I am a bit surprised, as the flight crew in Denver did not give us a lot of confidence.…

  • Fine Dining, A Learning Experience

    I have had my share of good meals, and truly enjoy them. I tend to go out of my way to eat a nice meal every so often. Locally, it generally means a meal at one of the three Richard Sandoval restaurants he has in town. In Vegas, it may mean one of Gordon Ramsay’s…

  • Brief Glimmer of Hope for the Human Race

    Brief Glimmer of Hope for the Human Race

    The amount of suffering inflicted upon animals these days is utterly depressing. Every so often I read an article where humans go the extra mile to give an animal a second chance. Of course, the imbalance of one animal receiving life-changing help doesn’t begin to approach the number that are abused and mistreated. However, it…

  • America; Not a Country, a Business

    I watched “Killing Them Softly” a week or two ago. The movie got bad reviews, and I see why. All the right intentions, good cast, just fell short in many ways. The best part of the movie, comes in the last few lines delivered by Brad Pitt, after killing three people the previous 24 hours…

  • The Madness after the Boston Madness

    The last few days have once again shown how utterly ridiculous parts of our society are. In the wake of the Boston Marathon bombings, we saw news outlets fumble over themselves, eager to announce the next terror, while feigning disgust. Another device found! A controlled detonation! No, a fire! CNN led the way in pathetic…

  • “Threat Intelligence”, not always that intelligent.

    I’ve been in the security arena for some time now, like many of my friends and colleagues. For over a decade, we have been presented with several vendors that deliver yearly reports summarizing various attributes of the industry: vulnerabilities, hack attacks, spam, malware, breaches, and more. They are typically delivered in summaries that can be…

  • Your Favorite ‘News’ Site is Likely Just A Shitty Blog

    Ten years ago, your favorite tech-centric site was an online news portal. Meaning, it was run by, edited by, and written by news professionals. Old school journalists and editors, brought up through the system we all know and expect. At some point, that changed for the (much) worse, and very few realize it. If you…

  • When information aggregation scares and baffles me…

    I’ve been around the block. I am familiar with most of the ways companies and web sites track data. I am familiar with aggregation techniques, know the real value of the most ‘harmless’ things (e.g. clicking ‘Like’ on Facebook), and know the power of modern databases. In my mind it is a simple fact that…