Peraton: Some Notes
August 16, 2021
Peraton received another juicy Federal contract. “Peraton Wins Nearly $1B DOD Contract” reports:
Herndon-based Peraton Inc., a national security contractor, won a nearly $1 billion task order to provide the U.S. Department of Defense’s U.S. Central Command (USCENTCOM) and its mission partners with operational planning, implementation and assessment services (OPIAS). USCENTCOM directs military operations with allies in the Middle East.
Peraton is, to some degree, the Harris Corp’s government unit. Backed by Veritas Capital, the contract winner is an example of the shift taking place in cyber intelligence.
The company is active in a number of government centric sectors; for example, digital forensics, cyber crime, and mission operations and analysis.
What work will Peraton perform? I don’t know and it is highly unlikely that the company will follow NSO Group’s method for generating publicity. I mention this Israeli firm’s misstep because it is continuing to send shockwaves through the intelware sector.
Stephen E Arnold, August 16, 2021
Apple and the New Worker Bee Buzz
August 16, 2021
Ah, the good old days. One would post a job, interview candidates, hire a person, and the individual would do what the company said. No more. It seems that the new worker bees want to buzz, clump, explore, and sting when a work task is not congruent with [a] world view, [b] social agenda, [c] perception of truth and justice, or [d] all of the above.
Google still sparkles with the brilliance of its management procedures; example: the Dr. Timnit Gebru method. Amazon has some struggles; example: managing the company’s union activity. Even Microsoft has demonstrated its acumen with the print nightmare thing – three, four times?
I noted “Apple Faces Internal Revolt over Plan to Scan Users’ iPhones.” The write up points out:
A backlash over Apple’s move to scan customer phones and computers for child abuse images has grown to include employees speaking out internally, a notable turn in a company famed for its secretive culture, as well as provoking intensified protests from leading technology policy groups. Apple employees have flooded an Apple internal Slack channel with more than 800 messages on the plan announced a week ago…
I think Apple is playing catch up, but the allegedly accurate information in “Apple Acknowledges Confusion over Child Safety Updates” says:
Apple is ready to acknowledge the controversy over its child safety updates, but it sees this as a matter of poor messaging — not bad policy.
Close but no cigar.
The mild flap (well, maybe a large scale fire storm is more than a “flap”?) illustrates these modern management precepts:
- Operate from the position of god mode. By definition, the words are those of an omniscient, omnipresent, and omnipotent Super Mario who knows everything before it happens most of the time. (Hey, anyone can slip on a banana peel.)
- Convert the so-called employee revolt and confusion with a bad prose passage. Sorry, that doesn’t work for me.
- Illustrate what I call the “Google customer centric approach”; that is, who cares?
Net net: The high school science club management method has been implemented with a style that probably elicits the Sin of Envy from outfits like NSO Group.
Stephen E Arnold, August 16, 2021
Biased? Abso-Fricken-Lutely
August 16, 2021
To be human is to be biased. Call it a DNA thing or blame it on a virus from a pangolin. In the distant past, few people cared about biases. Do you think those homogeneous nation states emerged because some people just wanted to invent the biathlon?
There’s a reasonably good run down of biases in A Handy Guide to Cognitive Biases: Short Cuts. One is able to scan bi8ases by an alphabetical list (a bit of a rarity these days) or by category.
The individual level of biases may give some heartburn; for example, the base rate neglect fallacy. The examples are familiar to some of the people with whom I have worked over the years. These clear thinkers misjudge the probability of an event by ignoring background information. I would use the phrase “ignoring context,” but I defer to the team which aggregated and assembled the online site.
Worth a look. Will most people absorb the info and adjust? Will the mystery of Covid’s origin be resolved in a definitive, verifiable way? Yeah, maybe.
Stephen E Arnold, August 16, 2021
Insider Threat Quantified: Whom Does One Trust?
August 15, 2021
Whom does one trust? Not too many is my answer.
“Workers Increasingly Steal company Data during Turnover Tsunami” contains some interesting data; for example:
there were about 65m attempts made by staff to exfiltrate source code from their corporate network in the three months to the end of June, up from about 20m in each of the previous three quarters.
The paywalled article includes some quotes from experts and underscores the fraying social fabric among workers and employers.
Phishing is a security problem. But the insider threat may be another, possibly more challenging, issue to resolve.
Stephen E Arnold, August 20, 2021
More Ad-Citement: Juicing Video Piracy
August 13, 2021
I read “Pirated-Entertainment Sites Are Making Billions From Ads.” My immediate reaction: “What? Bastions of ad integrity helping out video pirates? Impossible?”
According to the pay walled write up, the flagships of integrity seem to be unfurling the jib to speed toward this type of revenue. I learned something I did not know and which may be semi-accurate:
Websites and apps featuring pirated movies and TV shows make about $1.3 billion from advertising each year, including from major companies like Amazon.com Inc., according to a study.
The write up noted:
The piracy operations are also a key source of malware, and some ads placed on the sites contain links that hackers use to steal personal information or conduct ransomware attacks…
Some of these video services provide links to interesting online gambling sites as well.
This quote, attributed to the founder of White Bullet (an anti piracy outfit) is thought provoking:
Failure to choose tools that assess piracy risk in real-time means advertisers fund criminals – and it’s a billion-dollar problem,” said Peter Szyszko, CEO and Founder of White Bullet, in an email. “At best, this is negligent. At worst, this is deliberate funding of IP crime.
Just one question: Aren’t filters available to block this type of activity in the ad systems of estimable firms?
Apparently that’s just too darned difficult.
Stephen E Arnold, August 13, 2021
Palantir Pushes Beyond What Any Other System Can Do It Seems
August 13, 2021
I believe everything I read online. Don’t you. I spotted this interesting article: “Palantir: Revolutionizing Big Data Analytics.” The write up shows a Covid dashboard and focuses on what’s called “data integration.” Putting information in an index or series of indexes so a user or software can run a query across that which has been placed in said indexes is sometimes called “federation”. Without entering a rabbit hole, let’s accept the “data integration” idea and ignore the buzzwords like “cross function collaborations.”
The Palantir system has a four step “process flow.” These steps include:
- Aggregating data
- Transforming data
- Securing data
- Empowering data.
I track with the first three steps, which have been required by policeware and intelware systems for decades.
The baffler is “empowering” data. I think this means that Palantir data are more valuable, potent, or muscular than data in a system for which I was a consultant many years ago. That was the i2 Analysts Notebook from the late 1990s.
That’s neither here nor there because Palantir did the Silicon Valley thing and found inspiration in that pioneering i2 system, which is now owned by IBM.
But here’s the statement in the write up that left me scratching my head:
Palantir is different from traditional business intelligence solutions like Tableau, Alteryx, or Cloudera, as it’s able to answer questions that a regular model isn’t able to. Questions such as “What steps should be taken if there’s another global pandemic”, or “How to increase margins in the most effective way”.
The companies cited in the passage are not intelware or policeware centric. Second, Palantir seems to be able to process natural language queries, extract on point facts and data from the aggregated and transformed data, and deliver answers.
As far as I know, NLP system do not reliably field ad hoc questions about general business issues or warfighting/intelligence issues. If systems did, there would not be the grousing about training, complexity, and disused intelware due to complexity and instability.
I don’t want to suggest that Palantir cannot deliver NLP which works. I would like to gently suggest that this just may not work in a way which would be useful in certain situations.
I understand the reasons “traditional” intelware fails. Managing data and logic together is tricky and made more challenging and expensive because real time streams can be ingested into some intelware systems. Specialists exist to deal with the real time challenge, and I am not sure Palantir has the robustness of Trendalyze, for example.
The data integrity issue is a big deal. Palantir makes it possible to know who input data. But the integrity issue is larger than than a single person. There are vendors who assemble data sets. Automated data sets work okay too, but when a stream is lost from an authorized intercept, the data set takes a hit. Plus, there is just bad data; for example, variable mechanisms for counting Covid deaths. Has Palantir whipped this garbage in problem? Maybe.
One weakness of Palantir’s competitors is described this way:
The inability to define key business metrics transparently in a common data foundation
This is an ambiguous statement. Most managers don’t know what they need or want. A case in point is a cyber security vendor offering phishing protection to clients. What happens if phishing techniques rely on auto generated emails with smart software crafting the pitch and the inclusion of valid links to the recipient’s company’s Web site. How is an employee to recognize these malformed email? We know phishing systems are not working because of the notable breaches in the US and elsewhere in the last six months of 2021. Senior managers want answers, and hopefully the answers are “good” or at least don’t lead to a diplomatic crisis or a severe business impact. Has Palantir cracked the problem of people who say, “I know what I want when I see it.” In my experience, quite a few CxOs rely on this method. Unfortunately this is not 1690 in Rhode Island where the vigilant are on the look out for irritated Native Americans. Recognizing that eye ball glimmering in a bush is not something intelware systems are able to do in a reliable, economical, speedy way.
Finally, the Palantir competitors “lack flexibility due to rigid data assets.” I remember the sales pitch of MarkLogic, a vendor of slicing-and-dicing content systems. The idea is that XML was almost magical. Input parameters and one gets output like a book made up of relevant content from the objects in the database. XML is a useful tool, but based on my experience with intelware systems, most of them use structured files, open source software, and the same popular algorithms taught in CompSci 401 around the world. The flexibility issue is a big one because now intelware must make sense of audio, video, pictures, gifs, database files, proprietary files from legacy systems, consumer file types like Word, and numeric streams. The phrase “rigid data assets” does quite capture the nuances of the data chaos facing most organizations.
Net net: This is an interesting write up, but I think it needs evidence, and substantive information. Palantir certainly has magnetism, but I still ask myself:
Why is Palantir funding SPACs and allegedly requiring these firms to agree to license the Palantir system?
This is a mystery to me. Because if Palantir whipped NLP, for instance, or the data chaos problem, the company would the hottest thing since i2 Analysts Notebook.
Stephen E Arnold, August 13, 2021
NSO Group: Let Loose the Legal Eagles
August 13, 2021
I was dismayed to read “More Journalists File Legal Complaints after Being Targeted by Pegasus Surveillance Software.” Outrage and finger pointing are obviously not enough. According to the article:
The list of legal challenges against NSO Group continues to mount after 17 additional journalists from seven countries have filed complaints with prosecutors in Paris, France. To date, international media freedom organization Reporters Without Borders (RSF) and two French/Moroccan journalists have filed cases in court over serious concerns that their governments were spying on them due to their work as journalists, carrying out vital public interest investigations. The latest journalists to file complaints include Sevinc Abassova from Azerbaijan, Szabolcs Panyi and Andras Szabo from Hungary, and others from India, Togo, and Mexico. Among the other complainants are Shubhranshu Choudhary, an RSF correspondent in India, and two RSF Award Winners, Hicham Mansouri from Morocco and Swati Chaturvedi from India.
I am not an attorney. I have enough challenges just being a retired, chubby consultant. Several points seem salient to me:
- NSO Group is essentially the intelware equivalent of the protagonist in Nat Hawthorne’s zippy thriller, The Scarlet Letter.
- The legal process is tough to manage when it involves a single matter in a single jurisdiction. A pride of filings exponentiates the complexities and the likelihood of some intriguing decisions. Say “hello” to high risk litigating.
- The ripple effect of the intelware disclosures is going to intersect with an unrelated security action taken by Apple Computer. The NSO Group matter will raise the stakes for the trillion dollar company everyone once associated with user privacy.
Net net: Excitement ahead. Buckle up.
Stephen E Arnold, August 13, 2021
Milvus and Mishards: Search Marches and Marches
August 13, 2021
I read “How We Used Semantic Search to Make Our Search 10x Smarter.” I am fully supportive of better search. Smarter? Maybe.
The write up comes from Zilliz which describes itself this way: The developer of Milvus “the world’s most advanced vector database, to accelerate the development of next generation data fabric.”
The system has a search component which is Elasticsearch. The secret sauce which makes the 10x claim is a group of value adding features; for instance, similarity and clustering.
The idea is that a user enters a word or phrase and the system gets related information without entering a string of synonyms or a particularly precise term. I was immediately reminded of Endeca without the MBAs doing manual fiddling and the computational burden the Endeca system and method imposed on constrained data sets. (Anyone remember the demo about wine?)
This particular write up includes some diagrams which reveal how the system operates. The diagrams like the one shown below are clear, but I
the world’s most advanced vector database, to accelerate the development of next generation data fabric.
The idea is “similarity search.” If you want to know more, navigate to https://zilliz.com. Ten times smarter. Maybe.
Stephen E Arnold, August 13, 2021
Traditional Sports Media: Sucking Dust and Breathing Fumes?
August 12, 2021
The TikTok video format is becoming a norm core channel. I want to mention that Amazon Twitch is having a new media moment as well. I read “Lionel Messi’s Twitch App Interview Shows How Social Media Is Conquering Sports.” Note that this link is generated by DailyHunt and the story itself is output by smart software; thus, the link may be dead, and there’s not much I can do to rectify the situation.
The story contained this statement, which may be spot or or just wild and crazy Internet digital baloney:
Spanish influencer Ibai Llanos chatted with Lionel Messi on Amazon.com Inc.’s streaming platform Twitch after the world’s best-paid athlete signed with French soccer club Paris Saint Germain from Barcelona.
Here’s the kicker (yep, Messi-esque I know):
More than 3,17,000 people watched the exclusive interview, the kind of prestigious content that would often be sold to the highest bidder for TV broadcast in different territories. Llanos was introduced to Messi by Sergio Aguero, a fellow Barcelona player and video-game enthusiast who is friendly with the social media celebrity. Sports viewing is shifting steadily onto streaming platforms, and even overtaking traditional broadcast TV in the Asia Pacific region, according to GlobalWebIndex.
What? Twitch? Who is the star? Messi? The write up states:
Soccer clubs are eager to tap this new revenue source after they were hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic, especially as they need to win over younger audiences who enjoy video gaming just as much as traditional sports. Llanos has drawn 7 million Twitch followers since he started out commenting on esports tournaments from his home. He’s brought a humorous commenting style to everything from toy-car races to chess games. He’s now becoming a sports entrepreneur in his own right, collaborating with Barcelona’s Gerard Pique to broadcast the Copa America soccer competition in Spain. Llanos streamed a top-tier Spanish game for the first time in April under a deal between the Spanish league and TV rights owner Mediapro.
Observations I jotted down as I worked through this “smart software” output:
- Amazon Twitch plays a part in this shift to an influencer, streaming platform, and rights holder model
- The pivot point Llanos has direct access and channel options
- Eyeballs clump around the “force” of the stream, the personalities, and those who want to monetize this semi-new thing.
Big deal? Well, not for me, but for those with greyhounds in the race, yep. Important if true.
Stephen E Arnold, August 12, 2021
Microsoft: Maybe ESET-Type Companies Are a Problem?
August 12, 2021
Microsoft security may have a problem other than bad actors compromising systems. The news cycle has moved forward, but I still chuckle at the SolarWinds’ misstep. How many super duper cyber solutions failed to detect the months long compromise of core Windows processes? I don’t know, and my hunch is that whoever knows does not want to talk about the timeline. That’s understandable.
I read “IISpy: A Complex Server?Side Backdoor with Anti?Forensic Features.” The source appears to be We Live Security which is reporting about an ESET research finding. (I find it interesting that cyber security researchers report interesting things that other cyber security vendors appear not to report or possibly know about. Interesting or a signal that cyber security systems are not particularly effective when new methods poke through a secured system, saying, “Surprise!)
The write up states:
According to ESET telemetry, this backdoor has been active since at least July 2020, and has been used with Juicy Potato (detected as Win64/HackTool.JuicyPotato by ESET security solutions), which is a privilege escalation tool. We suspect the attackers first obtain initial access to the IIS server via some vulnerability, and then use Juicy Potato to obtain the administrative privileges that are required to install IISpy as a native IIS extension. According to our telemetry, IISpy affects a small number of IIS servers located in Canada, the USA and the Netherlands – but this is likely not the full picture, as it is still common for administrators to not use any security software on servers, and thus our visibility into IIS servers is limited.
If the affected server is the exact one the bad actor wants, numbers may not be germane. Also, does the phrase “not the full picture” indicate that the cyber researchers are not exactly what’s going on?
Interesting questions from my point of view.
If I step back, what’s my observation:
Perhaps cyber security is in a quite pitiful state. If this is accurate, why would the US government offer Amazon AWS another $10 billion deal? Microsoft will contest this important award. You can read the Microsoft News story “Microsoft Challenges the Government’s Decision to Award Amazon a NSA Cloud-Computing Contract, Which Could Be Worth $10 Billion” to get a sense about the disconnect between selling and addressing what may be fundamental security issues.
Would that money, time, and effort be better invested in addressing what seems to be another troubling security issue?
The answer to this question would be in my opinion a true juicy potato.
Stephen E Arnold, August 12, 2021
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