Doug update. Status: lost. That was fast.
Just arrived in vegas. Doug st…
Just arrived in vegas. Doug status: still with me. #Defcon
Recent actions have made Brock…
Recent actions have made Brock Lesnar more likeable than @KingJames. Shit’s all upside down right now. That was harsh LeBron. Seriously.
Cyberwar?
Today I came across a couple of conflicting posts about the word “Cyberwar” and whether they accurately describe the state of things. First was Bruce Schneier’s opinion that “The Threat of Cyberwar Has Been Grossly Exaggerated.” He concedes that he lost a debate on this very subject, but points out that the debate, and ongoing discussion has more to do with a disagreement on the definition than a disagreement on the current threats in cyberspace. Sometime later in the day, I was promised by Matt Olney Yes, Virginia, There is Cyberwar.
I agree with Schneier on this one. It’s not that I don’t see potential for something like a “Cyberwar” but to suggest that the attacks happening now constitute a war really stretches the concept of war.
Olney states: “It exists as certainly as espionage, defacing and cybercrime exist, and you know that they abound and are a threat.”
I absolutely agree that espionage, defacing and cybercrime exist, but I don’t agree that their existence is anywhere near sufficient to constitute a war. The non cyber equivalents of those things do not indicate war, so why should they in cyberspace? The United States and other nations have spies in other countries. Espionage is a concern for the security of every nation, but that doesn’t mean everyone is at war. Valuable property is stolen in the real world, kids have defaced almost any hard physical surface you can think of with spray paint, markers, or carvings and yet that has never been classed as a war.
“But we know that networks can be penetrated, servers can be compromised and we even know that generators can be destroyed simply by instructions from control servers. We also know that there are those who would seek to harm us. So yes, Virginia, there is cyberwar.”
We know that houses and offices can be burglarized, sensitive documents and property can be stolen and we even know that power lines can be taken down by a drunk driving his car into a pole. We know there are mean people out there, so we’re at war? Nah. I’m not buying it.
Certainly security is an issue. There are definitely threats from many different sources that need to be addressed. If you want to say “Cyberwar” like we talk about the “War on Drugs”, “War on Obesity” or “Battle of the Sexes” then fine, but when you degrade the language into Newspeak, then we’ll all be worse off.
The Last Emperor is Dethroned
I was unable to watch the Strikeforce event live last night, but I was delighted to see the results. Fedor Emelianenko, one of the most over hyped fighters of all time finally lost a fight. Fabricio Werdum caught him with a combination of a triangle choke and an arm bar. As a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu fan I always like to see BJJ used successfully.
The important thing though is that Fedor, the unbeatable Russian fighting robot, lost to a guy who was dropped by the UFC. Fedor had only one loss on his record, which everyone discounted because it was stopped due to a cut and it was also avenged in the rematch. On the other hand, most of his wins did not come against top level fighters. It was thought for some time that the guys fighting for the PRIDE organization in Japan were far superior to the heavyweights in the UFC. For a time, that may have been true, but the new crop of heavyweights in the UFC have shown that the PRIDE fighters are not on top anymore. Fedor’s most notable wins in PRIDE were against Mirko Cro Cop and Antonio Rodrigo “Minotauro” Nogueira. Cro Cop was expected to come in and clean up the UFC heavyweight division, but has instead been mostly an embarrassment. He’s lost multiple fights and even his wins were unimpressive. Nogueira has faired better, but was stopped by Frank Mir and Cain Valasquez despite having never been never lost by TKO in PRIDE. While Fedor’s old resume highlights were getting tarnished in the UFC, he stayed outside fighting UFC rejects.
Somehow people still saw his nearly perfect record and decided he was unbeatable. This is a ridiculous leap to make, both because of his habit of ducking top competition and because there are too many facets or as some say “too many ways to lose” in MMA. Fedor actually seems like a nice guy and he is a good fighter, but I’m inclined to root against anyone labeled as “invincible.” Guys who can’t lose have lost too many times in MMA. Other fans and “experts” will scoff at the idea of certain fighters losing, and anyone who suggests a vulnerability is derided as not understanding the sport. B.J. Penn has been hailed as one of the top pound for pound fighters in the world. People (including B.J. himself) seemed to think that there were no lightweights who could really compete with him. It didn’t take that long before Frankie Edgar came in and boxed his way to B.J.’s belt. Lyoto Machida was untouchable and had never lost around. He was supposed to hold the light heavyweight belt for years. Almost immediately Shogun took it from him. GSP has already been clobbered by Matt Serra.
I hope that with the fall of “The Last Emperor” we can see him as “the last unbeatable fighter.” Nobody is unbeatable and to call anyone unbeatable is stupid. Anderson Silva looks pretty tough now, but it isn’t hard to imagine someone beating him with wrestling and taking his belt. If he continues to fight he will lose. GSP will lose. Brock Lesnar will lose.
–Blarg!
#1 Fraud
I’ve been wanting to write something Information Security related since that’s what I do all day and that’s currently a major interest of mine. I can’t talk about what I find at work and I don’t have much to say on more general topics, but the Gregory Evans debacle is cracking me up. Articles have been coming up frequently in the security related news feeds that I read. This article from The Register gathered the best quotes.
Basically, the guy is a convicted felon who is going around posing as a software security expert (I mean, “The World’s #1 Hacker”). He claims that everyone calling him out on his bullshit is due to racism, but his charade is pretty obvious to anyone who pays any attention. Ben Rothke’s analysis on the plagiarism in Evans’ book is enough to devalue Evans as a credible expert. In an attempt to boost his hacker cred, he also made up some stuff about his relationship with famous hacker (and felon) Kevin Mitnick.
He went to prison for fraud. He is still a con artist. Legal problems are likely to resurface in his life, but before they put him away again, let’s all spend some time laughing at him.
First, tell us about Ligatt Security, Greg.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wy9LELlwbZs
Oh dear.
Hey Greg, you know how I know you’re full of shit? You’re on FOX & Friends:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QpOuACC3g4o&NR=1
China is our biggest threat. India is our biggest threat. Got it. It’s funny when the anchor tells him “you do your homework” and sounds impressed. He managed to poorly articulate some things he’s read on the internet. Impressive Greg!
As an investor, I’m concerned Ligatt stock is only worth 0.0002 cents per share. Can you make me feel better?
http://www.youtube.com/watch#!v=uPsB9756HIA
What could he be doing better? Nothing! He’s already perfection! He doesn’t sound like a hustler at all!
Some uplifting quotes to take away when you’re having a bad day:
“I got the news this morning on my way to work, got here late because I caused an accident when I was reading my email and I saw it and I started screaming and I swerved and then this tractor trailer fell over and hit this bus full nuns and it was just a mess, but I took off real quick because I got a fast car. They didn’t know it was me, so I’m here doing this video blog.”
“You could have bought Google’s years ago. Just imagine if you bought Google’s at a penny or less than a penny how trillionaire you’d be today. I’m trying to give you that same vision.”
Incipiat Turba readers, your asses are spoiled. I’m done bustin’ my butt for now.
– Blarg!
The Lakers winning is a regula…
The Lakers winning is a regular occurrence. Los Angeles, get a grip.
Pac-11
So apparently the Pac 10 is adding Colorado and that’s it. I guess that’s less extreme than turning into the Pac 16. I do think it’s funny that the Big Ten (11) now has 12 teams and the Big 12 now has 10 teams. Do they trade names? Do they keep the same old names for maximum confusion? Are they working on new names? Should the old Big Ten maintain tradition by changing their name to the Big Eleven and find a way to work a ’12′ into the logo? I’m not confident that the conference apocalypse is shelved for good, so maybe they’ll just all pile into two super conferences, the Nike Conference and the Adidas Conference or something like that.
– Blarg!