Protect your Ubuntu

Datamation has a nifty article on Protecting Ubuntu. Touching on a number of topics such as Java exploits and Linux Malware.

Follow it here.

Splash Data's "Worst Passwords of 2012"

Splash Data has released their list of "Worst Passwords of 2012". Splash Data has compiled their list of passwords based on databases of stolen passwords by hackers. Let's take a look at the first 25:


1) password (unchanged)
2) 123456 (unchanged)
3) 12345678 (unchanged)
4) abc123 (up 1)
5) qwerty (down 1)
6) monkey (unchanged)
7) letmein (up 1)
8) dragon (up 2)
9) 111111 (up 3)
10) baseball (up 1)
11) iloveyou (up 2)
12) trustno1 (down 3)
13) 1234567 (down 6)
14) sunshine (up 1)
15) master (down 1)
16) 123123 (up 4)
17) welcome (new)
18) shadow (up 1)
19) ashley (down 3)
20) football (up 5)
21) jesus (new)
22) michael (up 2)
23) ninja (new)
24) mustang (new)
25) password1 (new)

Each year hackers and their programs get more and more complicated, however they tend to stick to easy targets (yea I would too). If your passwords are on this list, I would probably recommend that you change it.... like last week. 

The best types of passwords have a mixture of letters, numbers, special characters, capital letters. I recommend a password of at least 16 characters, is easily memorable, still look like mashing on the keyboard to others, but has meaning, only to you. 

Take this for example, take one of your favorite songs and choose a line or two of it that you have memorized. Then take the first letter of each word and you have a pretty secure password. But lets not stop there. Capitalize those letters at random, maybe change a letter or two with a number/special character (such as s = 5 or s = $), or possibly add at random special characters / numbers to your password. Here is an example:

Journey - "Don't Stop Believin"


Just a small town girl, livin' in a lonely world
She took the midnight train goin' anywhere
Just a city boy, born and raised in south Detroit
He took the midnight train goin' anywhere

40jA$tgliAlwsttmtgA/\jAcbbAri5dhttmtgA?/

Using this method I've created a memorable 40 character password that can have meaning to only me. Not only is this password long, but it also looks like mashing on the keyboard. This makes for a very secure password. Now this isn't the only method of making passwords, you can take this tweak it and make it your own, such as adding something about the website your using it on.

Disclaimer: Do NOT use this password ANYWHERE, because I have created it and posted it on the web it is no longer secure. However this method is tried and true.


Source [MaximumPC]

Motorola announces CLOUDBB Android-Powered desktop with 18.5in touchscreen.

Motorola has announced a rather interesting computer based around Android in China that serves up some entertainment content. The HMC3260 has an 18.6in LED touchscreen that plays TV, movies, games, browses the web and hmmm..... oh yea.... runs Android Apps. Now its Spec time.....

• Freescale iMX53 ARM Cortex at clocked at 1GHz
• 1GB DDR RAM, 4GB NAND Flash Memory
• 18.5in LED [1366x768 @ 60Hz, widescreen] Touchscreen Display
• Android 2.3.4 Gingerbread, with customized Android Launcher
• TV and video client
• Broadband internet via EuroDOCSIS and LAN (DHCP /PPPoE, etc.)

This is not the first android based desktop to hit the web, but its once in a blue moon that we see one form a big name such as Motorola. Speaking of which, coming from Motorola (a Google owned company) one would think to see a least Android 4.0 ICS on a device like this, so I wouldn't expect a lot from a device such as this.

There no word from Moto on availability or pricing, but if you wish to (page is in Chinese) you can find more info at the source link below. I for one, love the idea of Android one day becoming a common place on the desktop, but Android 2.3 Gingerbread isn't it.

Source: [Motorola]

Hey Apple.... that new Nano you got there.... it looks a bit familiar.

As shown in the picture (from BGR) the Apple's new iPod Nano looks a bit like the Nokia Lumia. Hmmmm..... maybe another lawsuit coming soon? 

Read more here at BGR.

  "and it looks as though Apple liked Nokia’s Lumia design even more than we thought." ~ Zach Epstein BGR [iPod Nano]

Safari For Windows is Abandoned By Apple, Leaving Users Vulnerable With No Warning

"The lack of confirmation kept us from writing up a definitive post on this last week, however I think it’s now safe to finally report that Safari for Windows is officially dead. Apple released its newest operating system on July 25th, and along with it came Safari version 6, a full point ahead of the most recent Windows release. Since then Apple has removed any reference to Safari for Windows from its website, and is more or less acting like it never happened."

Read more here.

Justin Kerr [Maximum PC]

Left 4 Dead 2 Linux Port Runs Better on Linux.

"On a high-end test system with an Intel Core i7 3930k processor, 32GB of RAM and an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680 graphics card, Valve managed to run the Linux port of L4D2 at 315 FPS."

Read More Here.

[H-Online]

Woah.... I see what you did there, Microsoft........

It appears that M$ may be snooping in to your text messages and possibly video calls on Skype. But thats not all, read more here: http://goo.gl/nSdLE

Anonymous declare's war on pedophiles

‘Anonymous’ hacker group declares war on pedophiles [video]

Anonymous a few days ago declares war on the pedophiles if the internet. The op dubed Operation PedoChat aims to eradicate them from the internet.

Minecraft Server Script

So I've created a Minecraft server in which will go live in about a week or two, and for easy management just by logging on to my server via ssh I have created a script to help out. It is far from a 1.0 release but the current beta is stable.

Here is the pasetbin link: http://pastebin.com/dCysXi94

The Hacker Manifesto

With all the stuff happening on the net today from Anonymous, and Lulzsec, to PIPA and SOPA. I figured it was a good a time as any to reiterate the great, famous, and immortal words from our "Mentor".

The Hacker Manifesto

by

+++ The Mentor+++

Written January 8, 1986

Another one got caught today, it's all over the papers. "Teenager Arrested in Computer

Crime Scandal", "Hacker Arrested after bank Tampering"...

Damn kids. They're all alike.

Bud did you, in your three-piece psychology and 1950's techobrain, ever take a look

behind the eyes of a hacker? Did you ever wonder what made him tick, what forces

shaped him, what may have molded him?

I am a hacker, enter my world...

Mine is one that begins with school... I'm smarter than most other kids, this

crap they teach us bores me...

Damn underachiever. They're all alike.

I'm in junior high or high school. I've listened to teachers explain for the fifteenth time

how to reduce a fraction. I understand it. "No, Ms. Smith, I didn't show my work. I did it

in my head..."

Damn kid. Probably copied it. They're all alike.

I made a discovery today. I found a computer. Wait a second, this is cool. It does that I

want it to. If it makes a mistake, it's because I screwed up. Not because it doesn't like

me... or it feels threatened by me... or thinks I'm a smart ass... or doesn't like teaching

and shouldn't be here...

Damn kid. All he does is play games. They're all alike.

And then it happened... a door opened to a world... rushing though the phone line

like heroin though an addict's veins, an electronic pulse it sent out, a refuge from

the day-to-day incompetencies is sought... a board is found. "This is it... this is where I belong..."

I know everyone here... even if I've never met them, never talked to them, may never hear from

them again... I know you all...

Damn kid. Tying up the phone line again. They're all alike.

You bet your ass we're all alike... we've been spoon-fed baby food at school when we

hungered for steak... the bits of meat that you did slip though were pre-chewed and

tasteless. We've been dominated by sadists, or ignored by the apathetic. The few that

had something to teach found us willing pupils, but those few are like drops of water

in the desert.

This is our world now... the world of the electron and the switch, the beauty of the baud.

We make use of a service already existing without paying for what could be dirt-cheap if

it wasn't run by profiteering gluttons, and you call us criminals. We explore... and you call

us criminals. We seek after knowledge... and you call us criminals. We exist without skin

color, without nationality, without religious bias... and you call us criminals. You build

atomic bombs, you wage wars, you murder, cheat, and lie to us and try to make us

believe it's for our own good, yet we're the criminals.

Yes, I am a criminal. My crime is that of curiosity. My crime is that of judging people by

what they say and think, not by what they look like. My crime is that of outsmarting you,

something that you will never forgive me for.

I am a hacker, and this is my manifesto. You may stop this individual, but you can't stop

us all... after all, we're all alike.

via [http://www.mithral.com/~beberg/manifesto.html]

[mentor] your words will stand the test of time, they have become immortal. As we move on... new, young inspiring hackers will find and read these words, adopt, and live by them. We are legion.