Slashback: OSX Security, DoD Filtering, Anonymous Posting

Slashdot tonight brings some corrections, clarifications, and updates to previous Slashdot stories, including some favorable results from the University of Wisconsin's Mac OS X Challenge, skeptics investigate cold fusion claims, more on DoD web filtering, AT&T cuts 10,000 jobs after BellSouth merger, more child-proofing efforts for MySpace, Why Windows Vista Will Suck: a rebuttal, Harvard Professor punished for reporting bugs, Assemblyman Biondi backpedals on NJ anonymous posting bill, and a followup on Chinese TLDs -- Read on for details.

University of Wisconsin's Mac OS X Challenge. HABITcky writes "The University of Wisconsin Security Challenge has ended after 38 hours, intermittent DoS attacks, 4000 ssh login attempts, a bandwidth spike of 30 Mbps, and 6 million logged ipfw events. During this time there were 'no successful access attempts, nor any claims of a successful attempt.' You may remember this challenge was proposed in response to the 'woefully misleading' ZDnet article, Mac OS X hacked under 30 minutes, which was previously discussed here on Slashdot."

Skeptics investigate cold fusion.smooth wombat writes "As a follow-up to a previous Slashdot posting, Purdue University is investigating the claims of Rusi Taleyarkhan who claimed in 2004 to have created nuclear fusion at room temperature. The investigation came about from complaints from colleagues who suspect something is amiss. Taleyarkhan, who used to work at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, has, since working at Perdue, removed the equipment the co-workers were using to try and replicate the results, claimed results for experimental runs were positive for fusion despite the co-workers never seeing the raw data and opposed the publication of results which contradicted his findings."

More on DoD web filtering. timetrap writes "I work in a mobile combat communications unit, while I'm not in the sandbox right now, I can attest to the DoD policy on blocking web access. First of all when you are down range don't expect to even get DSL speeds from a satellite, we usually roll with about 256kbs for the data side of our trunk. So blocking sites is very important, otherwise 4 or 5 people could start streaming audio and pretty much knock down any legitimate use of the network. We filter websites with smartfilter and yes the military system admins in the IPO office will unblock any web site that isn't blocked by local policy (no pr0n, no streaming audio, no civilian web mail: both the hot and the g varieties, and no chat programs; although irc is used by the DoD) This is no Orwellian conspiracy, but quick and easy system administration; apply smartfilter: check! If you want to check the current smartfilter blocked sites goto: securecomputing and submit some sites to check." Slashdot's own Jamie took a look at Smartfilter back in '99 as a part of the Censorware project and it still remains a mysterious black box to this day. While some would advocate full disclosure using censorware still appears to be merely passing the buck.

AT&T cuts 10,000 jobs after BellSouth merger. mytrip writes to tell us that immediately following their $67 billion acquisition of BellSouth, AT&T plans on cutting about 10,000 jobs.

More child-proofing efforts for MySpace. conq writes "BusinessWeek has an interview with Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthalin in which he describes measures MySpace and other similar sites should take to protect children. From the article: 'We're going to be suggesting some very specific measures that MySpace can take based on our conversations with MySpace as well as with other law enforcement authorities at the state and local levels. We've received hundreds of complaints from parents who are concerned about these issues, and we want to be sure that the measures we propose are technologically feasible and financially viable.'"

Why Windows Vista will Suck: a rebuttal. shrapnull writes "Hot on the heels of Extreme Tech's 'Why Windows Vista Won't Suck', Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols has an alternate position posted on DesktopLinux, and sent to subscribers of Novell's 'Suse Linux Cool Solutions' newsletter."

Harvard researcher punished for reporting bugs. Guillermito writes "A story previously discussed came to a sad conclusion two weeks ago. The bottom line is this means that it is forbidden to use reverse engineering tools to find bugs in a software. You also have to prove that you own a valid license for each version of the tested software. To publish a proof of concept that contains a few dozens of copyrighted bytes is also forbidden. It's a nice precedent for any company selling a defective product."

Assemblyman Biondi backpedals on NJ anonymous posting bill. Quadraginta writes "Earlier, denizens of Slashdot reacted to a story about a bill to be introduced to the New Jersey legislature that would require hosts of forums, bulletin boards and the like to keep track of the real identity of anonymous posters. Seems like there was a strong reaction all over. Assemblyman Biondi now appears to be backpedalling furiously. From a letter quoted after the link: 'I am getting inundated with responses which I will review and use to better educate myself on the implications of this bill. If, after reviewing all of the correspondence and the opinion of OLS, it turns out that the bill is, in fact, unworkable, I will certainly reconsider and withdraw it.'"

A followup on Chinese TLDs. nqz writes "In this story on ComputerWorld, ICANN and the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC) both dispute a previous story discussing China's new top-level domains containing Chinese characters."

Comments

It was, but...

[jd]

...nobody broke into the box to read the statement.

DoD filtering

[hotspotbloc]

no pr0n, no streaming audio, no civilian web mail: both the hot and the g varieties, and no chat programs

And that's why when it says on your military ID "Property of the U.S. Government" they're not just talking about the ID card ... =)

Solution to security research problem

[jmorris42]

There is a fairly simple solution to the problem of vendors forbidding security reaseachers from examining their products. At the next big security confab float and get a lot of signatures on a resolution something like this:

"Some companies object to our legitimate research, even though we report our findings responsibly. So be it. We resolve to continue to locate defects in these irresponsible vendor's products. However since they now make it a crime to do the right thing, we resolve to anonymously publish our results for these products to the most vile and wicked cracking gangs we can contact as ready to use fully weaponized exploits. We further assert that we do not fear any legal reprecussions on the grounds that if any Fed can tag us we aren't worthy to continue in this line of research."

Let the business press cogitate on that announcement a day or two and see how fast vendors start backpeddling.

Why Windows Vista Will Suck

[heatdeath]

For those who don't want to read the entire article, here is the cliffsnote version.

I understand operating systems and am very smart and I have 20 computers and a dog named spot.

linux power.

Vista will suck because it won't be free.

linux power.

The graphics will suck because it takes an expensive computer to run Aeroglass.

linux power.

Memory management will suck because linux has had good memory management for years.

linux power.

Superfetch will suck because GCC has had it for years, and your dog can run off with your USB card. (Never mind that it's just a *cache*, and it won't do anything but slow your computer down again after your dog starts chewing on it)

linux power.

TCP/IP improvements will suck because it's been in other OS's for years.

linux power.

Security will be bad because they found a bug in vista.

linux power.

Re:Oops!

[Biff Stu]

In that case, it's a damn shame it wasn't hacked. It seems that he would have welcomed an escallation of permissions.

Re: Mac Challenge

[Lars T.]

Well, if you want to take down a machine, you can also submit a story linking to it on Slashdot - doesn't make you a 1337 h4x0r even if it works.

Oh yes, and: "The challenge is as follows: simply alter the web page on this machine, test.doit.wisc.edu (128.104.16.150)." Not DOS it or other machines around it.