WORLDWIDE RETALIATION

I had a moment of introspection tonight not seen too often around these parts. I was reading the story about a software engineer who is suing his former company for firing him illegally and I thought I might write more about that and what I think about a company that is so blatantly and disgracefully racist and sexist and then I thought about what I would lose if that company behaves in the disgraceful and contemptible manor I have come to expect from social justice wrecked institutions like twitter and face book and SFWA and I decided that I would wait until I have stored my online email offline and perhaps backed up one or two other things that could vanish in a twinkling were some SJW loser to take umbrage at being called a spade just because he is used to dig latrines in which to bury his fellow man after the ritual pummelling and social torture meted out to those who dare to dream that America could be great again.

I shall say more anon.

THE SHINY ONES

The NID announced that they pulled their undercover operatives out of China after the OPM hack raided the State Department's files and China found itself in the position of now knowing for certain who was an actual state department employee and who was just pretending to work for Uncle Sam's foreign affairs personnel meat grinder.

This is what NID had to say on the matter as relayed from Ars Technica.

Director of National Intelligence James Clapper told the committee that while "we don't know in terms of specifics" what was taken in the OPM breach, it had "potentially very serious implications, first among them close to home [for me] in terms of the Intelligence Community and identifying people who may be under public status... This is a gift that's going to keep on giving for years." Still, he said, as "egregious" as the OPM breach was, it didn't amount to an attack on national infrastructure. "Rather, it would be a form of theft or espionage. We, too, practice cyber espionage. We're not bad at it."

I think we are going to have to take Clapper's word that we are not bad at cyber espionage but the only case I can think of was what we learned about the NID from Snowden so I'm not sure that's a credibility gap filler for me. But they sure do spy on everybody, don't they?

You remember valerie plame who launched the vandal that sank Scooter Libby because she claimed that 'he' outed her as an undercover CIA agent? Yeah, me neither but isn't it odd that that was a crime deserving the appointment of a special prosecutor who only ended up tripping up Scooter because he misremembered under oath and didn't know enough to just claim he could not recall. Funny too how it was actually a State Department loser who actually outed plame to the press and he got off scot free. Where is the special prosecutor in this case? Who has been fired or jailed at OPM?

WHAT CHINESE HACKERS KNOW ABOUT ALL OF US

It looks like the major media are lightly stepping over the recent revelation that Chinese hackers have been rooting around in the Office of Personnel Management's files for over a year. For those that don't know what the Office of Personnel Management is, here is a brief summary:

OPM controls thousands of agents who go forth and investigate the background information provided by all employees of the United States who require a National Security Clearance in order to work for the U.S. Government. That includes all military officers and most enlisted personnel. It includes most State Department employees and Foreign Service Officers and it includes almost all of the bureaucrats working in every other job. For instance, CIA, NSA, DIA, Secret Service personnel require security clearances and background investigations as do all FBI agents and all the other agents one can think of.

OPM's databases are online and include completed copies of this form.  Go ahead and look. You know you want to see how bad it is knowing that these are not only compromised but almost certainly include the OPM agent's report of investigation and notes which are used to limit or deny clearances and deny access.

I won't be surprised to learn that all of those who completed the paperwork for Special Background Investigations are clearly denoted and their access described in fuller detail. You know, the people who require Q clearances or access to Restricted or Formerly Restricted Data. It probably even has clues for who was investigated or reinvestigated as access requirements ballooned and moved beyond Top Secret.

The terrible thing about OPM is that they were quick off the ball a decade ago and required all submissions of form SF 86 to be made electronically. ie, all of us squirted our personal information directly into OPM's computers because they refused to accept paper submission of SF 86's after 2005.

I think every single person involved in this fiasco at OPM must be fired and horsewhipped and then deported to Iran. Where was their Information Vulnerability Assessment? Where was their cyber security? Why wasn't the data encrypted given how insanely valuable it could be to an up and coming superpower? This catastrophe ranks up there with Hanssen, Ames and Walker for the damage it has caused and will cause going downstream.

This won't be solved by firing the #1 bureaucrat. This requires the wholesale demotion and firing of every person involved in safeguarding the information they acquired and retained in the leaky sieve laughingly known as the security database.

SOMETHING FOR BUCK

I have one here that I ran across on the road this week. It is right down Buck's alley. From the good author at Everything is Broken:

It covers the ugly and bitter truth about computer and information security in a humorous and disarming way. You should spend a couple of minutes reading through the link.

Meet my "Trigger Alert". In it's stunning debut it will warn readers that Everything is Broken is a disarming cynic and people who read the site might get depressed about information security.

NOW THEY TELL ME

The latest news flashed before my eyes so quickly I had to stop in my internet tracks, back up, reacquire the target and move to the kill.

Antivirus "is dead," says Brian Dye, Symantec's senior vice president for information security. "We don't think of antivirus as a moneymaker in any way."

Well if only they could get my fine Windows XP laptop to accept this reality and finally move on. Every time I boot the machine it goes through a forced loop to perform a virus scan and, after notifying me that I'm a delinquent who doesn't care a whit about computer security, wants to reach out to the Symantec Mothership and download the latest and greatest version of their virus scan for a mere bazillion dollars.

The thing is, I figured out about 7 years ago that it's over. I doubt the speed of hack has increased but the penetration is nearly 100% in spite of all the aftermarket attempts to limit the damage. Yes, I view populating this realm on par with the old European style of battle. We're going to march into the gunfire people until we get taken down. We're going to regret it when it happens, shift to our computer backup, reboot, and we're going to march on. We're going to close up the files and move on over the wreckage of the previous ranks.

Still and all, it never happened to me. Maybe I'll be a cyber general someday.

XP MUST DIE THIS DAY

You know it really is a hoot to listen to all the 'technologists' bleat about the vulnerabilities that we're sure to fall heir to because we and 25% of all other computer users, continue to operate computers with Windows XP. Sure it's 12 years old but what does it tell a reasonable person when you say your 12 year old computer, running a 12 year old operating system, runs JUST FINE DAMMIT!

I'll tell you what it tells a 'technologist' and a computer/software vendor, "you screwed up and actually sold your customer a working product that didn't need you to come back in 2 years and sell them something that actually worked." You can bet the technologists and Microsoft won't make that mistake again. Look at all the crap Microsoft has spawned since 2001 that is lost to history now while XP lives on.

In regard to the alleged security problems that will bury us XP users, please. Last month we upgraded our Apple stuff for urgent security concerns having to do with SSL and this week we get the news that many of the internet's servers are vulnerable to easy exploitation of their SSL. In short, those operating the latest equipment and newest operating systems using the highest tech, are just as vulnerable to data theft and penetration as people running XP.

Dell, Microsoft, sincerely, thanks for colluding to sell me a wonderful computer and operating system that work just fine 12 years after I bought them. I can honestly say, I didn't think you had it in you.

TRON DIES HORRIBLY ON THE WIRE IN CYBERWAR

Iranian muslims were surfing the Navy Marine Corps Internet for over 4 months that we know about. They made their way into the unclassified network in the usual way of hackers and other cyber ne'er-do-wells and had a fine time examining all the content they could suck through their cyber hookahs. The ugly little secret is that once you're in to the NMCI network you can pretty much roam at will through the largest intra-net in the world. Once you're in and attach the data vacuum all you have to do is suck, a lot. The code breakers and other hackers will get you into the password protected sites and files and you can read them at your leisure.

Nothing happens without a reason. I hope the Iranians enjoyed reading the public mail. Sometimes one has to remember that the Soviets didn't suddenly come to the realization that they were competing so far out of their league it wasn't even a contest. Somebody had to help them to see for themselves just how disparate was the correlation of forces. There's enough on the unclassified networks to make it pretty clear that the US could do a complete take down of the Iranian forces and impose a regime change in less than a week. If it wanted to. It doesn't hurt anybody to let them know that before they make it necessary.

MAVERICKS

I just upgraded the Operating System tonight and it seems to have taken hold just fine. The computer runs a little bit slower for now and I had to reverse the polarity of the mouse and Skype has dropped synch, but other than that, good to go. The next step will be to see how it works with the hardware lying around here that drove me to the extraordinary step of upgrading from a perfectly good but obsolete OS X version to the latest one.

It feels a little odd, to be truthful, to update the newer operating system while leaving Windows XP Pro running on the other laptop. If only I had a smidgeon of the trust I have in Apple for the folks that run Microsoft... Never going to happen. It was interesting though, talking to the family guru on computers tonight and learning that he'd shifted all 7 of the family Macbooks over to OS X 10.9.1 last month. It is nice when something so fiendishly complex works properly after it's installed. It would  have been nice if the idiots running the government's bizarre schemes had the good sense to turn to a crew that actually knows how to do that without using its customers as beta testers.

NO HAPPY COWS

I just ran across this today. Drat.

I didn't hold on like grim death to XP Pro because I hated everything that came after it, I hung on to it because it worked so damned well.

Where I worked for so many years above rocket scientists, mostly Lockheed, I listened to all the engineers and scientists whine about the dismal lack of performance and stability that came with Vista and 7 and 8. I was delighted to plug along on my crisp clean sailing machines of computers running XP that never collapsed under the strain of innovation. Admittedly, our needs were small and we weren't trying to set speed or load records. What we had worked well enough. Still does.

Plus I also had OSX running on a MacBookPro so there was that.

But the cruelest cut from Microsoft today was: