Xen Project patches serious virtual machine escape flaws

The Xen Project has fixed four vulnerabilities in its widely used virtualization software, two of which could allow malicious virtual machine administrators to take over host servers.Flaws that break the isolation layer between virtual machines are the most serious kind for a hypervisor like Xen, which allows users to run multiple VMs on the same underlying hardware in a secure manner.The Xen hypervisor is widely used by cloud computing providers and virtual private server hosting companies like Linode, which had to reboot some of its servers over the past few days to apply the new patches.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Xen Project patches serious virtual machine escape flaws

The Xen Project has fixed four vulnerabilities in its widely used virtualization software, two of which could allow malicious virtual machine administrators to take over host servers.Flaws that break the isolation layer between virtual machines are the most serious kind for a hypervisor like Xen, which allows users to run multiple VMs on the same underlying hardware in a secure manner.The Xen hypervisor is widely used by cloud computing providers and virtual private server hosting companies like Linode, which had to reboot some of its servers over the past few days to apply the new patches.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

This USB stick will fry your unsecured computer

A Hong Kong-based technology manufacturer, USBKill.com, has taken data security to the "Mission Impossible" extreme by creating a USB stick that uses an electrical discharge to fry an unauthorized computer into which it's plugged."When the USB Kill stick is plugged in, it rapidly charges its capacitors from the USB power supply, and then discharges -- all in the matter of seconds," the company said in a news release. USBKill.com The USB Kill 2.0 stick.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

This USB stick will fry your unsecured computer

A Hong Kong-based technology manufacturer, USBKill.com, has taken data security to the "Mission Impossible" extreme by creating a USB stick that uses an electrical discharge to fry an unauthorized computer into which it's plugged."When the USB Kill stick is plugged in, it rapidly charges its capacitors from the USB power supply, and then discharges -- all in the matter of seconds," the company said in a news release. USBKill.com The USB Kill 2.0 stick.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

US lawmakers make last-ditch bid to block internet governance transfer

Republican lawmakers are making a last-ditch bid to thwart the proposed transfer by the U.S. of internet governance to a multistakeholder body, by calling on the government to reconsider its plans to put the transition into effect by month end.Raising fears that control of the internet could pass to authoritarian regimes, the legislators wrote in a letter Thursday to Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch and Secretary of Commerce Penny Pritzker that there were unresolved issues, such as the ability to ensure that the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers would in fact follow its own bylaws after the transfer.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

US lawmakers make last-ditch bid to block internet governance transfer

Republican lawmakers are making a last-ditch bid to thwart the proposed transfer by the U.S. of internet governance to a multistakeholder body, by calling on the government to reconsider its plans to put the transition into effect by month end.Raising fears that control of the internet could pass to authoritarian regimes, the legislators wrote in a letter Thursday to Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch and Secretary of Commerce Penny Pritzker that there were unresolved issues, such as the ability to ensure that the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers would in fact follow its own bylaws after the transfer.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

University of California’s outsourcing is wrong, says U.S. lawmaker

A decision by the University of California to lay off IT employees and send their jobs overseas is under fire from U.S. Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif) and the IEEE-USA.The university recently informed about 80 IT workers at its San Francisco campus, including contract employees and vendor contractors, that it hired India-based HCL, under a $50 million contract, to manage infrastructure and networking-related services.The university employees will remain on the job until the end of February, but before then they are expecting to train their foreign replacements. The number of affected employees may expand. The university's IT services agreement with HCL can be leveraged by any institution in the 10-campus system.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Basic IPv6 configuration for Nokia and Juniper routers

This is a quick IPv6 interface configuration tutorial for Nokia 7750 VSR (SROS) and Juniper vMX routers. Routers used in this lab: Nokia VSR ver. 14.0.R4, Juniper vMX 14.1R1.10. Prerequisites The following Nokia routers support IPv6: 7950 XRS systems. 7750 SR chassis systems in chassis mode c or d. 7750 SR-a chassis systems. 7750 SR-e chassis systems. 7450 ESS chassis running in

IDG Contributor Network: Massive solar storm will ‘kill’ the internet, says space expert

Not enough is being done to protect networks from solar storms that could wipe out electric power grids and destroy satellites. The end game in a catastrophic solar storm would be the internet’s time synchronization not working anymore. That would stop the internet altogether.“An impending calamitous solar storm” is how Joseph N. Pelton, the former dean of the International Space University (ISU) in Strasbourg, describes the perceived event in his press release.Pelton, who is also a current executive board member of the International Association of Space Safety (IAASS), has published an article in Room: The Space Journal (subscription) on the subject.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

IDG Contributor Network: Massive solar storm will ‘kill’ the internet, says space expert

Not enough is being done to protect networks from solar storms that could wipe out electric power grids and destroy satellites. The end game in a catastrophic solar storm would be the internet’s time synchronization not working anymore. That would stop the internet altogether.“An impending calamitous solar storm” is how Joseph N. Pelton, the former dean of the International Space University (ISU) in Strasbourg, describes the perceived event in his press release.Pelton, who is also a current executive board member of the International Association of Space Safety (IAASS), has published an article in Room: The Space Journal (subscription) on the subject.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Deploying F5 BIG-IP LTM VE within GNS3 (part-1)

One of the advantages of deploying VMware (or VirtualBox) machines inside GNS3, is the available rich networking infrastructure environment. No need to hassle yourself about interface types, vmnet or private? Shared or ad-hoc? In GNS3 it is as simple and intuitive as choosing  a node interface and connect it to whatever other node interface. In this lab, […]

FAA advises against using or charging Galaxy Note 7 phones on planes

The Federal Aviation Administration has advised passengers not to turn on or charge their Galaxy Note 7 smartphones on board aircraft, following reports of exploding batteries in the device made by Samsung Electronics.The U.S. aviation regulator said Thursday in a statement that in the light of the incidents and concerns raised by Samsung about the devices, it also advises passengers not to stow the phones away in any checked baggage.Samsung last week offered to replace the phones for its customers in the wake of 35 cases reported worldwide as of Sept. 1 that suggested a battery cell issue in some of the devices. The company said it was conducting an inspection with suppliers to identify possible affected batteries in the market. The company stopped meanwhile sales of the Galaxy Note 7.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Technology Short Take #71

Welcome to Technology Short Take #71! As always, I have a list of links related to various data center technologies found below; hopefully something here proves useful.

Networking

Servers/Hardware

Security

Yes, U.S. did hack Elysée Palace in 2012, French ex-spy says

Bernard Barbier, a former head of the French signals intelligence service, shared a few stories with students of CentraleSupélec, the elite engineering school from which he graduated in 1976, at a symposium this summer.There was that time he caught the U.S. National Security Agency delving into computers at the Elysée Palace, residence of the French president, for example. And flew to Washington to tell them they'd been found out. Or when the Canadians said they -- and the Iranians, the Spaniards, the Algerians and a few others -- had all been hacked by a Frenchman, and they were totally right, although the French government denied it.These little confessions to the members of a student association at his old school, though, have reached a somewhat larger audience than he may have planned on.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Yes, U.S. did hack Elysée Palace in 2012, French ex-spy says

Bernard Barbier, a former head of the French signals intelligence service, shared a few stories with students of CentraleSupélec, the elite engineering school from which he graduated in 1976, at a symposium this summer.There was that time he caught the U.S. National Security Agency delving into computers at the Elysée Palace, residence of the French president, for example. And flew to Washington to tell them they'd been found out. Or when the Canadians said they -- and the Iranians, the Spaniards, the Algerians and a few others -- had all been hacked by a Frenchman, and they were totally right, although the French government denied it.These little confessions to the members of a student association at his old school, though, have reached a somewhat larger audience than he may have planned on.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here