ISIS Exploits User-Friendly Encryption Apps to Plan and Recruit
March 21, 2016
The article on Discovery News titled ISIS Taps Dark Web, Encryption Apps to Coordinate discusses the news that ISIS orchestrated the Paris terrorist attacks using encrypted messaging apps. The big social media companies like Google and Facebook enable an encryption method they call “perfect forward secrecy,” which lacks any sort of master key or backdoor. The article explains other systems,
“Extremist groups are even using messaging services found on Play Station 4 gaming consoles, a favorite of young male jihadis who particularly like “Call of Duty,” according to Steven Stalinsky, executive director of the Middle Eastern Media Research Institute, a group that monitors social media by extremist groups…Of particular concern is Telegram, a relatively new instant messaging app designed in Russia that has recently been upgraded to allow more secure communications by groups.”
The article points out that most of these techniques are intuitive, designed for regular people. Their exploitation by ISIS is due to their user-friendliness and the difficulty of interception. Rather than trying to crack the codes, some analysts believe that reverting to good old-fashioned methods like spies and informants may be the best answer to ISIS’s use of Western technology.
Chelsea Kerwin, March 21, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
US Control of Internet Over
March 20, 2016
Short honk: I read “Quietly, Symbolically, US Control of the Internet Was Just Ended.” The write up explains that at a meeting in Morocco, people who run the “Internet’s naming and numbering system” have a plan
to end direct US government oversight control of administering the internet and commit permanently to a slightly mysterious model of global “multi-stakeholderism”.
What’s multi stakeholderism? I noted the reference to Snowden but multi stakeholderism?
Stephen E Arnold, March 20, 2016
Lexmark and Search
March 20, 2016
Short honk. Last year, Forrester, the mid tier consulting firm, released a magic square for enterprise search. I noted this morning that Lexmark was relying on TechRepublic to push this old wine in a somewhat new bottle. You can see the pitch at this link. What’s remarkable about this particular magic square thing is that Lexmark is flagged as a leader in enterprise search. Lexmark as you may know acquired the ISYS Search Software system and Brainware a couple of years ago. ISYS is interesting because its technology was crafted in the 1980s. Lexmark’s financial challenges are similar to those faced by other print centric companies trying to make the transition to the digital ecosystem. But a leader in a sector which has largely embraced open source search technology? Interesting.
Stephen E Arnold, March 20, 2016
Elasticsearch Case Example: Scrunch
March 19, 2016
If you are using or considering the use of Elasticsearch, you will want to read “Lessons Learned From A Year Of Elasticsearch In Production.” The write up contains five excellent tips.
I highlighted this statement as one which Elasticsearch users will want to keep in mind:
If you can afford SSDs, then buy them. Elasticsearch does a lot of reading from disk and fast disks equal fast queries.
Elasticsearch is one reason proprietary search vendors are gasping for air.
Stephen E Arnold, March 19, 2016
The New Google? Instagram
March 19, 2016
I read “Google is Like for Oldies. Instagram Is the New Google” The source of this insight is Alia Bhatt, a person associated with Bollywood. The write up states:
Being in her early 20s, Alia Bhatt though may not be the most intellectual actor on earth, but she is definitely an actress who has earned professional success and fans. Being considered as one of the youth icons, Alia is also extremely fond of social media networking sites and obviously she is a frequenter on Instagram.
The write up adds:
Alia Bhatt, who is a self-confessed Instagram lover, has over 5.3 million followers and her account is filled with pictures from her film’s promotions, magazine covers to dubsmash videos to selfies with friends and lots more on food and her love for pets. As her co-star of Kapoor & Sons Sidharth Malhotra maintains, this generation creates their own new world within their smartphones. “It’s a generational thing. People our age are always on the phone – Instagraming, Tweeting, Whataspping and because we are in this world we have to cater it,” he added.
Google, Instagram is the new you, just without the balloons, the self driving autos, and the solving death stuff. Alert your AI systems, please, to the new lingo like “instagraming.”
Stephen E Arnold, March 19, 2016
Artificial Intelligence Fun: The Amazon Speech Recognition Function
March 18, 2016
I read “Amazon’s Alexa Went Bonkers, Reset User’s Thermostat.” Alexa is an Amazon smart product. The idea is that one talks to it in order to perform certain home automation tasks. Hey, it is tough to punch the button on a stereo system. Folks are really busy these days.
According to the write up:
one of the things Alexa apparently cannot do quite so well is determine who her master is. During a recent NPR broadcast about Alexa and the Echo, listeners at home noticed strange activity on their own Echo devices. Any time the radio reporter gave an example of an Alexa command, several Alexas across the country pricked up their ears and leapt into action — with surprising results.
There you go. A smart device which is unable to figure out which human voice to obey.
Here is one of the examples cited in the write up:
“Listener Roy Hagar wrote in to say our story prompted his Alexa to reset his thermostat to 70 degrees,”wrote NPR on a blog recounting the tale.
Smart devices with intelligence do not—I repeat—run into objects nor do they change thermostat settings. Humans are at fault. When one uses a next generation search system to identify the location of a bad actor, nothing will go wrong.
Stephen E Arnold, March 18, 2016
The Gameification of Enterprise Software
March 18, 2016
Stop the presses! Enterprise software is becoming more like interfaces for consumer software. Some enterprise software systems include game like interfaces.
What makes these startling factoids interesting is that individuals working in enterprises seem to have formed the survey sample.
Navigate to “Survey: How UX Is Transforming Enterprise Software” for an amazing glimpse into the remarkable research conducted, it appears, by an outfit called Tech Pro. The authors of this write up do not include sample demographics, sample size, survey methodology. I found it fairly easy to identify some possible flaws in the survey data because the information presented is not really about user interface or, sorry, UX. I pulled three findings from the article. Ponder these brilliant insights.l
Anyone who has checked out interfaces to enterprise software tuned for mobile devices knows that the much loved green screen is not too popular.
Professionals working in enterprises report that 69 percent of the respondent use enterprise software. No word on what type of software the other 31 percent of the respondents use. Perhaps the fact one uses software provided by an enterprise to those working for the enterprise do not use software at all?
Want another stunner? Check this finding:
Databases, storage and human resources were the most popular business functions towards which companies are using or considering enterprise software, however mobility was also cited as a strong category for future deployments.
In 2016 enterprises use databases, storage devices, and “human resources”. I did not know this. I thought that those working in enterprises rode unicorns and communicated by tossing fairy dust in the air to form glittering smoke signal-like utterances.
I loved this finding too:
Difficult [sic] of implementation, problems with/inability to integrate with enterprise applications and poor vendor support/tutorials/training were three most commonly chosen reasons for dissatisfaction with enterprise software.
Difficult I assume is preferable to the word difficulty. I thought that people who did not know how to use software were thrilled with sitting in training classes learning how to perform a link analysis using data pulled from an IBM AS/400 running Ironworks. The slashes are really helpful too.
If the summary entices you, you may, gentle reader, request the entire report. Just follow the link in the source article to the December 2015 study. I elected to admire the excellence of the write up. Too much good stuff in one sitting is bad for my mental digestion.
Stephen E Arnold, March 18, 2016
How Many Types of Big Data Exist?
March 18, 2016
Navigate to “The Five Different Types of Big Data.” If you are a student of classification, you will find the categories set forth in this write up an absolute hoot. The author is an expert, I assume, in energy, transportation, food, and data. Oh, goodie. Food.
I have not thought too much about the types of Big Data. I usually think only when a client pays me to perform that function. An example is my analysis of the concept “real time” information. You can find that write up at this link. Big requires me to understand the concept of relative to what. I find this type of thinking uninteresting, but obviously the editors at Forbes find the idea just another capitalist tool.
When I learned that an expert had chased down the types of Big Data, I was and remain confused. “Big” describes something that is relative. “Data” is the plural of datum and refers to more than two facts or statistics, quantities, characters, symbols, etc.
I am not sure what Big Data is, and like many marketing buzzwords, the phrase has become a catchall for vendors of all manner of computer related products and services.
Here are the five types of Big Data.
- Big data. I like the Kurt Friedrich Gödel touch.
- Fast data. “Relative to what?” I ask.
- Dark data. “Darker than what? Is this secret versus un-secret or some other yardstick?” I wonder.
- Lost data. I pose to myself, “Lost as in unknown, known but unknown, or some other Rumsfeldesque state of understanding?”
- New data. I think, “I really don’t want to think about what ‘new’ means? Is this new as in never before seen or Madison Avenue ‘new’ like an improved Colgate Total toothpaste with whitener.
I like the tag on the article “Recommended by Forbes.” Quite an endorsement from a fine example of capitalistic tool analysis.
Stephen E Arnold, March 18, 2016
Sci Hub May Be Relegated to Dark Web Only
March 18, 2016
Academics are not done with innovating when it comes to the dissemination of free knowledge. Science Alert recently published Researcher illegally shares millions of science papers free online to spread knowledge. The article details Sci-Hub, an online service opened up by a researcher in Russia offers free access to more than 48 million journal articles, which is almost every peer-reviewed paper in existence. Additionally, it describes how Elsevier has sued Sci-Hub. The article summarizes how Sci-Hub works,
“The site works in two stages. First of all when you search for a paper, Sci-Hub tries to immediately download it from fellow pirate database LibGen. If that doesn’t work, Sci-Hub is able to bypass journal paywalls thanks to a range of access keys that have been donated by anonymous academics (thank you, science spies). This means that Sci-Hub can instantly access any paper published by the big guys, including JSTOR, Springer, Sage, and Elsevier, and deliver it to you for free within seconds. The site then automatically sends a copy of that paper to LibGen, to help share the love.”
What is fascinating about this case is that whether Elsevier or Sci-Hub wins, there may still be a means for Sci-Hub to continue offering unlimited journal access. As other articles on this subject have alluded, the founder of Sci-Hub sees its relegation to the Dark Web as its worst-case scenario.
Megan Feil, March 18, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
Google Decides to Be Nice to
March 18, 2016
Google is a renowned company for its technological endeavors, beautiful office campuses, smart employees, and how it is a company full of self-absorbed and competitive people. While Google might have a lot of perks, it also has its dark side. According to Quartz, Google wanted to build a more productive team so they launched Project Aristotle to analyze how and they found, “After Years Of Intensive Analysis, Google Discovers The Key To Good Teamwork Is being Nice.”
Project Aristotle studied hundreds of employees in different departments and analyzed their data. They wanted to find a “magic formula,” but it all beats down to one of the things taught in kindergarten: be nice.
“Google’s data-driven approach ended up highlighting what leaders in the business world have known for a while; the best teams respect one another’s emotions and are mindful that all members should contribute to the conversation equally. It has less to do with who is in a team, and more with how a team’s members interact with one another.”
Team members who understand, respect, and allow each other to contribute to conversation equally. It is a basic human tenant and even one of the better ways to manage a relationship, according to marriage therapists around the world. Another result of the project is dubbed “psychological safety,” where team members create an environment with the established belief they can take risks and share ideas without ridicule.
Will psychological safety be a new buzzword since Google has “discovered” that being nice works so well? The term has been around for a while, at least since 1999.
Google’s research yields a business practice that other companies have adopted: Costco, Trader Joes, Pixar, Sassie, and others to name a few. Yet why is it so hard to be nice?
Whitney Grace, March 18, 2016
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, publisher of the CyberOSINT monograph
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