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Defcon X - Live in Las Vegas
Navisto writes: "DEFCON X gathering has begun in Las Vegas already as everyone begins to prepare for the start of Friday's event at the Alexis Park. The hacking convention is in its' 10th year and this is said to be the largest yet. This year there are dozens of speeches happening ranging from wireless, .Net security all the way to Mac OS X AppleScript security issues and hacks. Gathering in Las Vegas brings all the hackers together. This year the official events of Defcon include DC Shoot, Capture the Flag,Hacker Jeopardy, Scavenger Hunt, and this year's first WarDriving Contest. When Live Streams are activated the information will be posted on defcon.org and on the Defcon Forums... PS - E-Mail the Alexis Park letting them know their site isn't cross-browser compatible. Not everyone uses IE and NS ;)"
>> PS - E-Mail the Alexis Park letting them know their site isn't cross-browser compatible. Not ;)"
>> everyone uses IE and NS
There's a deep irony in the home of DefCon not working with Opera.
I think it's somewhere along the lines of the Microsoft website wsorking best with Netscape.
I mod down anyone who uses M$ in their posts. I like to live on the edge.
So how many people will Adobe(TM) arrest this time? I can't help the sarcasim when I feel so sad. From the days of Xmodem and BBS's to fighting DRM, Adobe, MS et. al to let information be free. Sad days indeed, but I look forward with keen eye to what comes out of their.
Anyway, my point is that these DefCon thingies are totally hard-core and you need to be careful.
Defcon used to be an "underground" convention where hacks and stories were openly shared as if everyday conversation. The events, which were fewer, were far more interesting and had fewer Joe Computer User's.
The last time I went to Defcon, 2/3 of the "Hacker's Jeopardy" questions had nothing to do with computing whatsoever (causing a friend's team to lose--they answered the obscure encryption questions correctly but knew nothing of politics and pre-WW1 history history) and almost nobody was able to break into any of the servers in CTF.
There were entirely too many people on LSD and just about everyone was too drunk to speak coherantly. There were some interesting talks and some interesting people, but Defcon is becoming just another computer technology and open source convention. Give a talk about breaking in to a system and the feds, which are 3/4 of the people there, will have a discussion with you.
If any of this has changed, please post.
Note that Defcon is still the absolute best place to get clothing, besides maybe ThinkGeek.
Computer Science is no more about computers than astronomy is about telescopes. --E. W. Dijkstra
PS - E-Mail the Alexis Park letting them know their site isn't cross-browser compatible. Not everyone uses IE and NS ;)"
Oh, I have a sneaking suspicion that one of the Defcon attendees will 'fix' the page for them.
Message to the soon-to-be [h]cracker of the Alexis Park webpage, while you are modifying the Alexis Park webpage, please remember to "demonstrate security bugs" in the Alexis Park employment database and "Flash" the webmaster out of the system.
"Can of worms? The can is open... the worms are everywhere."
Try the Alladin!
;->
yes, it's pricey and they make you walk through their mall... but but their network is 3MBps up AND down (unfortunately NAT'd) and here's the best part:
dirty dirty... WINS traffic everywhere
don't bother using the dumb-terminals they give you... just unplug it from the wall and plug yourself in... then connect with YOUR NIC using IE and try to browse... it will send you to their subscription page and you click 'OK' to be charged $10 for a 24 hour period of net usage
I'd like to see/hear what the Defcon crew does to their network
Yeah I'm right with you there!
Fuck the Enron/WorldCom shareholders, pension holders, investors, creditors. Kenneth Lay should be lauded as a creator of wealth (his wealth).
We should let corporations do what they want after all they know best right?
Oh wait.....
Are you actually advocating zero government involvement with the economy, regulation etc? You haven't seen the news in the last 9 months right?
Alex
SIGGRAPH has nothing to do with computer security. Are you a troll or just stupid?
X is something different in each of your examples. X in the generation is for the "unknown" - i.e., a generation without identity. For Defcon, Jason and the OS, it is simply the number ten. By the time things (like movies, operating systems or conventions) hit ten, they have generally switched to roman numerals. Many conventions and movies start out with roman numerals. For Games, it stands for eXtreme. Goofy, but it's used in several (some fictional) sports like XWF and the XFL. Maybe it's from X as in eXtra Large - XL, XXL. For that matter, the SuperBowl is in the thirties - XXX. No idea about the movie Triple X, never heard of it... does it have to do with porn? And the X Box is probably playing off of the sports X.
Hit the yellow pages and see how many A's Plumbers and AAAA Towing companies there are, how many eMacs, eLamps, eMeters (whups) and other eThings there are - plus iBooks, iLink on Sony equipment, iPhones, etc... At least part of it is to use a single letter to distingush the item from others.
If only my users weren't distinguished with the letter "L". *sigh*.
--
Evan
"$30 for the One True Ring. $10 each additional ring!" -- JRR "Bob" Tolkien
"Blackmail is such an ugly word. I prefer Extortion. The X makes it sound cool."
:)
-- Bender, "Futurama"
Tim
CTF is the sole reason to attend Defcon. If you are a security admin responsible for firewalls, VPNs, and most importantly IDS systems, plugging into the CTF network is a fantastic learning experience. Mostly cause its the most malicious traffic you are ever likely to see in one place. Don't bring your work laptop ;) I like to start up services on my *nix box, start snort, and see who knocks on my door.
Wow - finally, a post actually worthy of a "Troll" moderation.
So much for the server with the page for the DC Shoot...
This started out as being a way kool gathering but now it's like Burning Man. It's "DefCon - The Event"
I believe that the press doesn't like the term "cracker" because the average reader would too easily confuse it with the small bread wafer of the same name. :)
Computer Science is no more about computers than astronomy is about telescopes. --E. W. Dijkstra
I can't explain most of them, but for OS X, one of the reasons for choosing X over 10 is best summed up by Linus (when talking about the name Linux):
"It's unix. The X has to be there. It's like a law."
Check the page source. You can see a link to textonly.htm, which says you can email to sales@alexispark.com. Better yet, try this.
Is she there this time?
Waaait a second, DefCon overlaps ComiCon?
It might overlap Comicon, but definitely not Eroticon.
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
Gawd, wish I had a top floor room with an 802.11b antenna on the balcony facing defcon central - think of the honeypots you could setup to trap these guys, esp during the wardriving contest. A little weak encryption for cover, lots of pseudo-confidential bait, watch the fun.
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
I, for one, am sick of people complaining about those who complain about hackers != crackers.
Best Windows Freeware
I believe that the press doesn't like the term "cracker" because the average reader would too easily confuse it with the small bread wafer of the same name.
Hackers are talented programmers of computers, often of Asian origin.
Crackers are white people.
> "It's unix. The X has to be there. It's like a law."
Ah, that whould explain why {Free|Net|...}BSD are "dead".
It's a silent, unwritten "X". Trust me -- it's a weird Unicode character.
50 bucks says that Superbowl L will be called Superball 50 since the American public is way too stupid to associate the Roman numerial L to 50.
Yeah, knowledge of a pissant numeral scheme indicates intelligence in the 21st century.