What is NFC?

September 30, 2011

Smartphones and Near Field Communications.

Google recently released its Wallet application for mobile payments. Google, Ebay, mobile phone makers and credit card companies are all scrambling to be the ones you use when waving your phone over a register to buy things. Exchanging payment information from your phone to a reader requires NFC enabled smartphones. Near Field Communications is a subset of RFID (radio) with a 20 centimeter range. The short range of the standard, combined with the encryption and authentication capability of modern smartphones suggest that transactions ought to be secure but privacy and security will be major concerns for mobile payment systems. Currently, 67% of users don't even password protect their phones.

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Snippets

September 09, 2011

• Foxconn, the Chinese supplier of Apple’s iPad 2, is expecting to ship 20 million iPad 2s before Christmas.
• Amazon Chairman and internet billionaire Jeff Bezos' private rocketship crashed and burned during test flight. A "flight instability" triggered safeguards which stopped thrust on the Blue Origin's rocket. http://www.blueorigin.com/letter.htm
• A federal judge has tossed out a "grossly excessive" November jury award that would have seen software company SAP pay $1.3 billion to arch-rival Oracle for theft of its intellectual property. A new trial will be required if Oracle rejects the new $272 million dollar settlement.

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College Kids are "Search Stupid"?

September 02, 2011

A study by Illinois academic libraries (ERIAL) discovered that not only do college students use Google over any other resource to find information, but they are not very good at it. Having grown up with the Internet, the college kids were assumed to have some expertise in data retrieval by the librarians and scholars conducting the study, but the students were "utterly clueless" in how to conduct a good search. Information on how to search more effectively is available by searching 'Google Search Tips" and all students should be encouraged to use Google Scholar http://scholar.google.com.

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Cyber-Warfare?

August 26, 2011

While most of us think Cyberwar is the stuff of Hollywood movies and Pentagon budget
padding, there is growing evidence of "State Actors" at work in the hacker's underworld.

• Security firm McAfee released information in August on "Operation Shady Rat", a 5 year long hacking campaign McAfee has uncovered. Government systems in the US, Canada, and South Korea plus corporate networks of defense contractors were apparently penetrated, with some of the intrusions lasting almost 2 years. Signs point to folks behind the Great Wall as probable culprits.
• The Stuxnet Worm reported earlier this year targeted Siemen's controller chips on manufacturing equipment. It just happened to infect and disable equipment necessary for Iran's nuclear program. Such focus suggests a state sponsored attack.
• Recently the Dutch Certificate Authority DigiNotar was found to have been hacked and forged security certificates created for domains like Google, the CIA and Mossad. The fake certificates appear to have been used to gain access to anonymizing Tor networks, Skype phone traffic, and the Gmail accounts of 300,000 Iranians. Once again, this hack appears to be state run or sponsored as part of a domestic spying effort.

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Bookmarks

August 19, 2011

Random links which you might find useful or interesting...

Bomomo - Online Drawing Page
     http://bomomo.com
    
Khan Academy - Over 2400 Educational Videos
     http://khanacademy.org

Shapeways - Personal 3D Printing
     http://www.shapeways.com

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