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Category Archives for "Networking"

China’s ‘Great Cannon’ DDoS tool enforces Internet censorship

China is deploying a tool that can be used to launch huge distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks to enforce censorship. Researchers have dubbed it “the Great Cannon.”The first time the tool was seen in action was during the massive DDoS attacks that hit software development platform GitHub last month. The attack sent large amounts of traffic to the site, targeting Chinese anti-censorship projects hosted there. It was the largest attack the site has endured in its history.That attack was first thought to have been orchestrated using China’s “Great Firewall,” a sophisticated ring of networking equipment and filtering software used by the government to exert strict control over Internet access in the country. The firewall is used to block sites like Facebook and Twitter as well as several media outlets.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

150 years after Lincoln assassination, massive online archive goes live

As the 150th anniversary of President Abraham Lincoln's assassination approaches, a massive online archive has gone live containing 99,525 documents related to the Civil War-era commander-in-chief.The Papers of Abraham Lincoln, a joint digitization project sponsored by The University of Illinois and the Abraham Lincoln Association, is dedicated to identifying, imaging, transcribing, annotating, and publishing all documents written by or to Abraham Lincoln during his lifetime. Lincoln was assassinated in Ford' Theater in Washington, D.C.  on April 14, 1865. Creative Commons Lic. President Lincoln with Gen. George B. McClellan and group of officers at Antietam, Md.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

The Upload: Your tech news briefing for Friday, April 10

Thin crowds greet Apple Watch in stores in AsiaThe arrival of the Apple Watch in stores across Asia on Friday failed to draw the same crowds that greeted the launch of the iPhone 6—a sign, perhaps, that Apple fans are prepared to queue overnight to buy, but not just to try. The watch is now on show at Apple Stores across the U.S. too, but you’ll have to wait until April 24 to buy one. The company is accepting preorders online only.Reviewers like the new MacBook’s looks, but find a lot to criticizeTo read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

The Upload: Your tech news briefing for Friday, April 10

Thin crowds greet Apple Watch in stores in AsiaThe arrival of the Apple Watch in stores across Asia on Friday failed to draw the same crowds that greeted the launch of the iPhone 6—a sign, perhaps, that Apple fans are prepared to queue overnight to buy, but not just to try. The watch is now on show at Apple Stores across the U.S. too, but you’ll have to wait until April 24 to buy one. The company is accepting preorders online only.Reviewers like the new MacBook’s looks, but find a lot to criticizeTo read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Hacked French broadcaster’s passwords revealed in TV broadcast

The hacked French-language TV network TV5Monde might have made it easier for hackers to compromise its systems and social media accounts. One of its employees was interviewed about the hack on TV—in front of a wall of posters that appeared to contain usernames and passwords for the channel’s social media accounts.TV5Monde was hit by a crippling cyberattack on Wednesday when Islamist hackers managed to disrupt broadcasting across its channels and hijacked the station’s website and social media accounts.In the wake of the attack the offices of TV5Monde were visited by reporters of another French TV station, which broadcast an interview with one of TV5Monde’s reporters, David Delos. Behind Delos in the shot however, several printouts stuck to a wall appear to reveal the usernames and passwords for social media accounts including Instagram, Twitter and YouTube.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

ASA Prompt Customisation

I occasionally run into Cisco ASAs that don’t identify their status (active/standby). This is rectified by configuring the “prompt “. These are:


asa-1-pri(config)# prompt ?

configure mode commands/options:
context Display the context in the session prompt (multimode only)
domain Display the domain in the session prompt
hostname Display the hostname in the session prompt
priority Display the priority in the session prompt
state Display the traffic passing state in the session prompt

“state” will tell you if the device is active or standby.

You can check what’s currently on the ASA with:

asa-1-pri# show run prompt
prompt hostname context


UK government’s spying practices challenged at European human rights court

The U.K. government’s mass surveillance practices will be challenged at the European Court of Human Rights.Human rights and civil liberties organizations Amnesty International, Liberty and Privacy International have filed a joint application with the court, they announced on Friday.The groups assert that U.K domestic law governing the U.K. intelligence agencies’ interception of communications and its intelligence sharing with the U.S., are in breach of fundamental human rights to privacy, freedom of expression and non-discrimination guaranteed under the European Convention on Human Rights. The challenge is based on documents disclosed by NSA leaker Edward Snowden revealing mass surveillance practices by intelligence agencies.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Transforming robot probes Fukushima reactor vessel

Tokyo Electric Power on Friday sent a robot where no machine has gone before—inside the highly radioactive heart of a reactor at the crippled Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear power plant.The robot, developed by Hitachi-GE Nuclear Energy and the International Research Institute for Nuclear Decommissioning (IRID), was inserted into the primary containment vessel (PCV) of reactor No. 1 at the plant, which was heavily damaged by the 2011 earthquake and subsequent tsunami that devastated northern Japan.Tokyo Electric is taking the unprecedented step to better determine the state of melted-down fuel in the reactor as part of plans to dismantle the plant, a spokesman said. The No. 2 and No. 3 reactors also suffered meltdowns.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Next Generation Multicast – NG-MVPN

Introduction

Multicast is a great technology that although it provides great benefits, is seldomly deployed. It’s a lot like IPv6 in that regard. Service providers or enterprises that run MPLS and want to provide multicast services have not been able to use MPLS to provide multicast  Multicast has then typically been delivered by using Draft Rosen which is a mGRE technology to provide multicast. This post starts with a brief overview of Draft Rosen.

Draft Rosen

Draft Rosen uses GRE as an overlay protocol. That means that all multicast packets will be encapsulated inside GRE. A virtual LAN is emulated by having all PE routers in the VPN join a multicast group. This is known as the default Multicast Distribution Tree (MDT). The default MDT is used for PIM hello’s and other PIM signaling but also for data traffic. If the source sends a lot of traffic it is inefficient to use the default MDT and a data MDT can be created. The data MDT will only include PE’s that have receivers for the group in use.

Rosen1

Draft Rosen is fairly simple to deploy and works well but it has a few drawbacks. Let’s take a look at these:

ICANN seeks opinion on legality of ‘.sucks’ registration process

The body that manages the Internet domain name system has asked regulators in the U.S. and Canada to comment on the legality of the high prices and procedures used by Vox Populi Registry for registrations of ‘.sucks’ domain names by trademark owners.The move Thursday by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) follows a recent letter from its Intellectual Property Constituency, which asked that the rollout of the new .sucks gTLD (generic top-level domain) should be halted.The IPC, which represents the holders of trademarks and related intellectual property, described the registration scheme for the domain as predatory and designed to exploit trademark owners. It said Vox Populi had announced it would charge trademark owners US$2,499 and above to register domain names during the early ‘sunrise’ period.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

US blocks Intel from selling Xeon chips to Chinese supercomputer projects

U.S. government agencies have stopped Intel from selling microprocessors for China’s supercomputers, apparently reflecting concern about their use in nuclear tests.In February, four supercomputing institutions in China were placed on a U.S. government list that effectively bans them from receiving certain U.S. exports.The four institutions, which include China’s National University of Defense Technology, have been involved in building Tianhe-2, the world’s fastest supercomputer, and Tianhe-1A.The two supercomputers have been allegedly used for ”nuclear explosive activities,” according to a notice posted by the U.S. Department of Commerce.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

White Lodging Services confirms second payment card breach

A large hotel management company has confirmed a second payment card breach in less than 14 months, underscoring the difficulties businesses are having with data thieves.White Lodging Services said the second breach was detected on Jan. 27 after unusual payment card activity was discovered on credit cards used at four Marriott-branded hotels. The compromised data includes customer names, card numbers, security codes and expiration dates, it said in a statement.The Merrillville, Indiana-based company manages hotels under agreements with hotels owners and is a separate entity from the specific hotel brands it operates.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Show 232 – Big Switch Networks on the State of Open Networking – Sponsored

Rob Sherwood, CTO, Big Switch Networks, discusses the state of open networking with Ethan and Greg. We cover trends in hyper scale networking, the state of SDN's evolution, hardware/software disaggregation, and integrating SDN underlays & overlays. For example, we discuss how Big Cloud Fabric ties into VMware.

Author information

Ethan Banks

Co-host at Packet Pushers

Ethan Banks, CCIE #20655, has been managing networks for higher ed, government, financials and high tech since 1995. Ethan co-hosts the Packet Pushers Podcast, which has seen over 3M downloads and reaches over 10K listeners. With whatever time is left, Ethan writes for fun & profit, studies for certifications, and enjoys science fiction. @ecbanks
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The post Show 232 – Big Switch Networks on the State of Open Networking – Sponsored appeared first on Packet Pushers Podcast and was written by Ethan Banks.

IBM, Fujifilm show tape storage still has a long future

IBM and Fujifilm have figured out how to fit 220TB of data on a standard-size tape that fits in your hand, flexing the technology’s strengths as a long-term storage medium.The prototype Fujifilm tape and accompanying drive technology from IBM labs packs 88 times as much data onto a tape as industry-standard LTO-6 (Linear Tape-Open) systems using the same size cartridge, IBM says. LTO6 tape can hold 2.5TB, uncompressed, on a cartridge about 10 by 10 centimeters (4 by 4 inches) across and 2 centimeters thick.The new technologies won’t come out in products for several years and may not be quite as extreme when they do, but the advances show tape can keep getting more dense into the future, said Mark Lantz, manager of IBM’s Advanced Tape Technologies Group.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

IBM, Fujifilm show tape storage still has a long future

IBM and Fujifilm have figured out how to fit 220TB of data on a standard-size tape that fits in your hand, flexing the technology’s strengths as a long-term storage medium.The prototype Fujifilm tape and accompanying drive technology from IBM labs packs 88 times as much data onto a tape as industry-standard LTO-6 (Linear Tape-Open) systems using the same size cartridge, IBM says. LTO6 tape can hold 2.5TB, uncompressed, on a cartridge about 10 by 10 centimeters (4 by 4 inches) across and 2 centimeters thick.MORE: What's behind Microsoft's not-so-crazy startup spending spreeTo read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Jawbone’s UP3 will ship April 20 — just don’t take it swimming

Jawbone’s latest activity tracker, the UP3, will finally ship April 20 after being delayed for months, though without a core feature the company had hoped for.Water resistance issues led to delays in the product’s launch, Jawbone said Thursday. The company was hoping for a product that could be submerged up to 10 meters underwater, but Jawbone couldn’t achieve that. The shipping product will withstand everyday splashing and showers, like other trackers, but will be unsuitable for swimming or submerged use, Jawbone said in a blog post.Customers who want to cancel their pre-order can do so with no charge, the company said. Jawbone had originally planned on launching the UP3 late last year.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Jawbone’s UP3 will ship April 20 — just don’t take it swimming

Jawbone’s latest activity tracker, the UP3, will finally ship April 20 after being delayed for months, though without a core feature the company had hoped for.Water resistance issues led to delays in the product’s launch, Jawbone said Thursday. The company was hoping for a product that could be submerged up to 10 meters underwater, but Jawbone couldn’t achieve that. The shipping product will withstand everyday splashing and showers, like other trackers, but will be unsuitable for swimming or submerged use, Jawbone said in a blog post.Customers who want to cancel their pre-order can do so with no charge, the company said. Jawbone had originally planned on launching the UP3 late last year.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Apple trying to discourage Apple Watch lines at launch

In many ways, new Apple product launches have become ritualistic affairs. The night before a new product goes on sale, enthusiastic consumers line up outside of Apple retail stores in lines that sometimes stretch out for blocks on end.With the Apple Watch slated to launch in a few weeks, that ritual may finally be coming to an end. According to an internal Apple memo obtained by Business Insider, Apple retail head Angela Ahrendts wants to put the days of waiting in line in the past, all in the interest of enhancing the customer shopping experience. To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

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