House committee approves bill to end NSA phone records program

A U.S. Congress committee has overwhelmingly approved legislation designed to stop the bulk collection of U.S. phone records by the National Security Agency.The 25-2 vote in the House of Representatives Judiciary Committee sends the USA Freedom Act to the House floor for a vote. The two votes against the bill came from lawmakers who had argued for stronger protections for civil liberties.The legislation is a stronger version of a similar bill that passed the House last May but stalled in the Senate, sponsors said. However, several efforts to further strengthen privacy protections by amending the bill failed in committee. Opponents said changes would upend a carefully crafted compromise with House Republican leaders who have threatened to kill an amended bill.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Wireless engineers now have a new online hotspot for geeking out

There are plenty of places online to bounce ideas off of other network and IT pros, but Kevin Franzen felt there was a need for at least one more, and he calls it the WirelessGeek.net forums.“I am trying to provide an open forum for engineer types to discuss wireless networks,” says Franzen, a certifiably smart wireless network guy (CWNE #136 and CCNP-Wireless) who works in Austin as principal network engineer for a large telco that is not affiliated with the forums.  “Currently folks try to use Twitter for this but it is not effective. The other wireless forums are related to vendors or a training company.”To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Appeal goes out to UN, Africa Union over Burundi social media shutdown

Access, a global human rights group, has appealed to the United Nations and the African Union to intervene in the Burundian government’s decision to block mobile social media amid protests aimed at stopping President Pierre Nkurunziza’s third-term bid.The government of Burundi on Monday ordered the shutdown of social media applications including Twitter, Facebook, Whatsapp, and Viber on the mobile Web, according to various media reports. The country’s telecom sector regulator ordered telecom operators to block the apps, according to reports.“Although fixed-line internet does not appear to be impacted, the majority of internet users in Burundi rely upon mobile internet for connectivity,” Access noted in a letter to the UN and the African Union.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

FAA: 2 million lines of code process new air traffic system

The Federal Aviation Administration this week said it had completed the momentous replacement of 40-year old main computer systems that control air traffic in the US.Known as En Route Automation Modernization (ERAM), the system is expected to increase air traffic flow, improve automated navigation and strengthen aircraft conflict detection services, with the end result being increased safety and less flight congestion.+More on Network World: Graphene is hot, hot, hot+The FAA said the first of 20 installations of the ERAM system went online at Salt Lake City Center in March 2012 and the final installation was completed last month at New York Center.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

UNESCO, Chinese school tech fund helps Liberia recover from Ebola

A school technology project funded by UNESCO and the Chinese government will help Liberia’s educational system recover from the Ebola virus outbreak, which has led to more than 10,000 deaths in West Africa.The US$700,000 “Harnessing Technology for Quality Teacher Training” project is part of a US$8 million funding agreement signed in March 2012 between UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) and the Chinese government that was established to support teacher education and development. The funding agreement is intended to help African nations achieve the U.N.’s Millennium Development Goals.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Microsoft relents a little after Windows 10 phone design backlash

Microsoft is making some changes to its Windows 10 smartphone apps after provoking outrage with its initial designs.Specifically, Outlook’s Mail and Calendar apps will put common commands at the bottom of the screen, where users can easily reach them with one hand. In a blog post, Microsoft has shared some mockups of a future design, showing a bottom bar for actions such as compose, delete, search, next message, and calendar views.An earlier Windows 10 preview for smartphones had these commands closer to the top of the screen, well out of one-handed range. “Without a doubt, the highest volume of dissatisfaction we’ve heard about Outlook Mail and Calendar for phones” came from people upset with this change, wrote Albert Shum, head of the design team in Microsoft’s Operating Systems Group.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Apple, IBM to bring iPads to 5 million Japanese seniors

An initiative between Apple, IBM and Japan Post Holdings could put iPads in the hands of up to 5 million members of Japan’s elderly population.The iPads will run custom apps from IBM tailored to the needs of Japan’s elderly, who make up about a quarter of the country’s population, IBM said. The programs will remind people to take medication, offer diet and exercise information and connect them to services like grocery delivery, among other tasks. The tablets will also come with standard Apple software like FaceTime for communication, iTunes for organizing music and Photos for managing pictures.Japan Post will manage the devices and its 400,000 employees will receive training from IBM on how to use them. Japan Post, a government-owned holding company that offers banking and insurance services in addition to handling postal operations, will begin testing the iPads in the second half of the year. Details on the size of the trial weren’t provided.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Writer rescues Verizon customer in distress

A Virginia woman writes to Christopher Elliott, an author, journalist and consumer advocate who gets results: Help! Verizon lost the cable boxes and remotes I returned to it via UPS after I moved out of my apartment. Now it’s trying to stick me with a $2,000 bill, even though UPS tracking showed it had been delivered, and even though the Verizon representative I spoke to agreed and updated my account to show that they had received the equipment.Here’s the problem: I discarded the UPS tracking information after speaking with the Verizon rep in early December, never dreaming that it would come back to haunt me on my January bill.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

Kill An SSH Connection

Check what’s connected to the switch first:

#show ssh
%No SSHv1 server connections running.
Connection Version Mode Encryption Hmac State Username
0 2.0 IN aes128-cbc hmac-md5 Session started user1
0 2.0 OUT aes128-cbc hmac-md5 Session started user1
1 2.0 IN aes128-cbc hmac-md5 Session started user1
1 2.0 OUT aes128-cbc hmac-md5 Session started user1

Kill session using “disconnect” command:

#disconnect ssh ?
The number of the active SSH connection
vty Virtual terminal

#disconnect ssh 0


Rand Paul’s bill would overturn US net neutrality rules

U.S. Senator Rand Paul, a Republican presidential candidate, has introduced legislation that would overturn the Federal Communications Commission’s recent net neutrality rules.Paul on Wednesday introduced a resolution of disapproval, a move that allows Congress to review new federal regulations from government agencies, using an expedited legislative process.Paul, of Kentucky, joins House of Representatives Republicans, who introduced their own resolution of disapproval earlier in April. Both bills are largely symbolic. While resolutions of disapproval cannot be filibustered, or blocked, by minority Democrats in the Senate, President Barack Obama would almost certainly veto the efforts.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

IT/IT: Observations on Ownership

We are clearly moving to a software focused world — this conclusion is almost as inevitable and natural as taking your next breath (or eating that next Little Bits burger — but don’t get the big one unless you’re really hungry).

But, as with all things, there is a flip side to the world going to software. It could actually turn out that the IT world is on the path to becoming our own worst enemies. This, by the way, is what caught my eye this week, and what causes me to rant a little.

The cost and hassle of repairing modern tractors has soured a lot of farmers on computerized systems altogether. In a September issue of Farm Journal, farm auction expert Greg Peterson noted that demand for newer tractors was falling. Tellingly, the price of and demand for older tractors (without all the digital bells and whistles) has picked up. “As for the simplicity, you’ve all heard the chatter,” Machinery Pete wrote. “There’s an increasing number of farmers placing greater value on acquiring older simpler machines that don’t require a computer to fix.”

The issue at stake, at least in the United States, is the Digital Continue reading

iOS 8 now on 4 out of 5 Apple mobile devices

Apple says that iOS 8, released to the public in September, can now be found on 81% of iPhones, iPads and iPod touch devices accessing the Apple Store. That's up from 77% from Apple's March report and up from 68% in January.The iOS 7 edition of Apple's software for iPhones and iPads now accounts for just 17% of devices, with 2% on even older versions, according to Apple on its developer page. Some have balked at moving to iOS 8 because of the space required to download it, while others have been spooked by buggy releases. Apple But iOS 8 has a lot going for it, including that it's compatible with devices as far back as iPhone 4S and iPad 2, from 2011. What's more, people are buying the new iPhone 6 and 6S in droves, with Apple selling 61.2 million units during the the first three months of 2015, way more than the 44 million iPhones it shipped during the same quarter last year.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

iOS 8 now on 4 out of 5 Apple mobile devices

Apple says that iOS 8, released to the public in September, can now be found on 81% of iPhones, iPads and iPod touch devices accessing the Apple Store. That's up from 77% from Apple's March report and up from 68% in January.The iOS 7 edition of Apple's software for iPhones and iPads now accounts for just 17% of devices, with 2% on even older versions, according to Apple on its developer page. Some have balked at moving to iOS 8 because of the space required to download it, while others have been spooked by buggy releases. Apple But iOS 8 has a lot going for it, including that it's compatible with devices as far back as iPhone 4S and iPad 2, from 2011. What's more, people are buying the new iPhone 6 and 6S in droves, with Apple selling 61.2 million units during the the first three months of 2015, way more than the 44 million iPhones it shipped during the same quarter last year.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

WordPress e-commerce plug-in puts over 5,000 websites at risk

TheCartPress, an e-commerce plug-in used on thousands of WordPress-based websites, has several high-risk vulnerabilities.There are currently no fixes available for the flaws and, according to its developer, support for the plug-in will be discontinued on June 1st.The vulnerabilities could allow attackers to “execute arbitrary PHP code, disclose sensitive data, and perform Cross-Site Scripting [XSS] attacks against users of WordPress installations with the vulnerable plug-in,” researchers from security firm High-Tech Bridge said in an advisory Wednesday.There are factors that limit the exploitation of some of the flaws, but they still pose a significant risk.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here

An introduction to JavaScript-based DDoS

An introduction to JavaScript-based DDoS

An introduction to JavaScript-based DDoS CloudFlare protects millions of websites from online threats. One of the oldest and most pervasive attacks launched against websites is the Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack. In a typical DDoS attack, an attacker causes a large number of computers to send data to a server, overwhelming its capacity and preventing legitimate users from accessing it.

In recent years, DDoS techniques have become more diversified: attackers are tricking unsuspecting computers into participating in attacks in new and interesting ways. Last year, we saw what was likely the largest attack in history (>400Gbps) performed using NTP reflection. In this attack, the unsuspecting participants were misconfigured NTP servers worldwide. This year, we’re seeing a disturbing new trend: attackers are using malicious JavaScript to trick unsuspecting web users into participating in DDoS attacks.

The total damage that can be caused by a NTP or DNS reflection attack is limited by the number of vulnerable servers. Over time, this number decreases as networks patch their servers, and the maximum size of the attack is capped at the outbound capacity of all the vulnerable servers. For JavaScript-based DDoS, any computer with a browser can be enrolled in the attack, making the potential attack volume nearly Continue reading

PF_RING Deep Dive with Luca Deri on Software Gone Wild

Whenever software switching nerds get together and start discussing the challenges of high-speed x86-based switching, someone inevitably mentions PF_RING, an open-source library that gives you blazingly fast packet processing performance on a Linux server.

I started recording a podcast with Luca Deri, the author of PF_RING, but we diverted into discussing ntopng, Luca’s network monitoring software. We quickly fixed that and recorded another podcast – this time, it’s all about PF_RING, and we discussed these topics:

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