Category: Technology

  • Exploding the Review

    In the early 90’s, when I was moving in the world of computer bulletin board systems (BBS), it ultimately ended in my interest in phreaking. It started out reading t-files, moved into wardialing, and a few years later would result in PBX, voice mail, and switch hacking. While I got a late start in the…

  • T-Mobile’s Poor Implementation Works Against Amber Alerts

    Just over a month ago, I received a pop-up alert on my Samsung Galaxy 3 (via T-Mobile) with a standard, and persistent, emergency broadcast noise… Emergency alert Longmont, CO AMBER Alert: LIC/245FLJ (CO) 2001 Blue Ford F350 Pickup truck Type: AMBER Alert The noise stopped briefly, then picked back up again until I tapped “OK”.…

  • T-Mobile SMS Disclosure

    Yesterday while waiting for a friend to arrive for a movie, I got a curious text from an unknown number with a 337 area code, saying that I had the wrong number. Since I had not called or texted that number, I replied as such. A few texts later, the stranger sent a screenshot of…

  • Welcome to the Internet…

    No matter how many articles, news segments, books, web sites, infgraphics, or rumors that warn people about the perils of the Internet, people still flock to this magical Mecca thinking it will bring great entertainment, answers, or whatever else (porn). While I have been in InfoSec for most of the last 20 years, this post…

  • Improving Foursquare

    FourSquare is a social media application, allowing you to use GPS enabled phones to ‘check in’ to venues, earn badges, etc. As with most social media platforms, 4sq lacks several features and would benefit from additional work. Some of my ideas, after using the site for a month. “Things done” is a poor choice of…

  • So far, yet so short…

    two days into my smart phone experience, i am simultaneously amazed and disgusted by the state of technology surrounding these devices and ‘cloud’ applications. back in the day, i had a ‘hacker’ mindset. i found flaws in systems that let me circumvent security or gain privileges not intended for users (or remote people not intended…

  • windows is beyond a joke (or, why we’ll all be using macs soon)

    Mom has been limping along on a 7 year old computer that tries to run XP. Unfortunately, Dad loaded MS One LiveCare on it and didn’t realize that they could do the internetz w/o the MSN software from the ISP. This comp is a dog, so miserably slow I would literally throw it in the…

  • Microsoft LifeCam – sucks the life out of me

    It wasn’t my choice, but I was handed a Microsoft “LifeCam” today, as the original recipient didn’t want it. Figured I’d try to use it to make a Guinea Pig cam after seeing a nice setup and live streaming a few nights ago. The software it comes with makes me want to vomit. Insert the…

  • Opera upgrade woes

    I use the Opera web browser for doing work on OSVDB. It started when I used 6.02 and it was a screaming fast browser and lasted for years. At some point the site became more feature rich and the ancient version didn’t cut it. I bit the bullet and upgraded to Opera 9 which had…

  • Over Reliance on Social Network Friends in Zynga Games

    Re-thinking Game Design for Character Advancement Abstract:Zynga is a commercial company that produces free games that are played via the Facebook social network. Per Zynga’s mission, they seek to “connect people through games”. This is readily apparent in their eagerness for you to play games with your friends through a number of game designs and…