"I don't think the report is true, but these crises work for those who want to make fights between people." Kulam Dastagir, 28, a bird seller in Afghanistan
Detection of an RFID device by an RF reader... - Google Patents
Topic: Computer Security
2:59 pm EST, Feb 27, 2007
A method is provided for operating an RF transponder system to detect the presence of an RFID device in the proximal space of an RF reader unit having an excitation signal generator circuit and an RFID device detection circuit.
Here is a HID patent! By blogging this patent I am teaching you about technology that is patented by HID. By hosting this patent Google is also teaching you about technology that is patented by HID. Hey, HID, why don't you sue me?
HID has claimed that teaching others about the information violates two of the company's patents, IOActive's CEO Josh Pennell told reporters in a conference call on Tuesday. On the advice of lawyers, Pennell would not describe other details about the claims.
Teaching others cannot violate a patent!
"If I say anything, HID will sue us," he said. "Large companies have lots of resources, and small companies, such as IOActive, don't."
Battle brewing over RFID chip-hacking demo | InfoWorld | News | 2007-02-26 | By Paul F. Roberts
Topic: Computer Security
1:53 pm EST, Feb 27, 2007
Secure card maker HID Corp. is objecting to a demonstration of a hacking tool at this week's Black Hat Federal security conference in Washington, D.C. that could make it easy to clone a wide range of so-called "proximity" door access cards.
HID has sent a letter to IOActive, a security consulting firm, accusing Chris Paget, IOActive's director of research and development, of possible patent infringement over a planned presentation, "RFID for beginners," on Wednesday, a move that could lead to legal action should the talk go forward, according to Jeff Moss, founder and director of Black Hat.
Intellectual Property laws are again being abused to silence security research. Patents do not cover presentations of technical information. They are a matter of public record. You can look them up online. Patents cover products. This claim is totally frivolous and the company fronting it is, I presume, betting yet again that the victim doesn't have the economic resources to defend himself. The worst part is that they have the audacity to accuse the researcher of being irresponsible. These issues are well understood. What is irresponsible is the willful malpractice of law in the pursuit of a loophole around the first amendment.
I'm happy to announce that the expungement order was signed effective 1 Feb 2007. That is, as of this date, if someone asks me "have you ever been convicted of a crime?", my fully legal answer to any and all concerned is a resounding, "no".
Randal Schwartz has had his record expunged. I'm happy to hear that he is now able to put this injustice behind him.
Which Videos Are Protected? Lawmakers Get a Lesson - New York Times
Topic: Intellectual Property
6:48 pm EST, Feb 26, 2007
C-Span did contact the speaker’s office to have it take down a clip from her blog — one shot by C-Span’s cameras at a House Science and Technology Committee hearing on global warming where Ms. Pelosi testified.
C-Span, a private nonprofit company financed by the cable and satellite affiliates that carry its programming, says that over more than 25 years of operating it has consistently asserted its copyright to any material it shoots with its own cameras.
You don't own the videos of government testimony. Carl Malamud has been working on changing that. He has started posting hearings into the public domain. Download them. Quote them in your podcast. Sample them in your music. Use this or it will go away.
In keeping with my plan to regularly post music videos, in hopes that others join, here is an interesting one for Autechre that really makes you wish Youtube had higher resoltuions available. There are some better screen caps here.
Why do people succeed? Richard St. John compacts seven years of research into an unmissable 3-minute slideshow on the real secrets of success (Hint: Passion, persistence, and pushy mothers help)
The Department of Homeland Security is paying Rutgers $3 million to oversee development of computing methods that could monitor suspicious social networks and opinions found in news stories, Web blogs and other Web information to identify indicators of potential terrorist activity.
The software and algorithms could rapidly detect social networks among groups by identifying who is talking to whom on public blogs and message boards, researchers said. Computers could ideally pick out entities trying to conceal themselves under different aliases.
It would also be able to sift through massive amounts of text and decipher opinions - such as anti-American sentiment - that would otherwise be difficult to do manually.
Nicholas Belkin, a University professor who studied in the field of Information Retrieval Systems, said "It could be used to identify members of groups who want to form a demonstration or oppose a particular event or government policy."
We want our ideas to spread like wildfire, or to have impact that lasts, but we often forget that different ideas spread differently. A quick look at Digg demonstrates that the easiest way to get Dugg is to have a trivial idea.
This is an excellent general principal. Easy ideas spread faster.
How to crash an in-flight entertainment system | CSO Blogs
Topic: Computer Security
3:52 am EST, Feb 25, 2007
My next test case was the number "8"; no luck there either, the number didn't change at all. I then tried the number 5: success! '5' is an interesting test case, it's a "boundary value" just beyond the maximum allowed value of the field which was '4'. A classic programming mistake is to be off by 1 when coding constraints.
