[Link] Reverse Connection ICMP Shell

(Friday, 15 April 2011)

<Reverse connection: ICMP shell>

[Link] How to find 0-day in browsers

abazhanyuk.com (August 7, 2011)

<How to find 0-day in browsers>

Microsoft Extends Windows 7 Beta Download Availability

  Microsoft Extends Windows 7 Beta download availability until February 10th. If you start your download on the 10th, then you have until the 12th to finish downloading.

<Windows 7 Team Blog - General availability for the Windows 7 Beta to end>

<Download Windows 7 Beta>

Unlimited Microsoft Windows 7 Beta Downloads

“Windows 7” by <xkcd>

  You've probably heard that <Microsoft> was allowing 2.5 million downloads of the Windows 7 Beta, which already started on January 9th and only lasts until January 24th, 2009. You may also have heard of the problems Microsoft's site had providing downloads to the massive surge of people interested in the beta.

  Because of the previous download issues, <Microsoft is removing the 2.5 million download limit.> So, if you think you may want to give Windows 7 a try sometime before the beta test period runs out on August 1, 2009, then you better go <download Windows 7 Beta> before January 24th.

  There is a 32 and 64 bit beta download, with 5 and 4 different languages to choose from respectively. Apparently Hindi speakers aren't expected to be running 64 bit machines. In general, the Windows 7 Beta requires a 1 GHz processor, 1GB of ram, 16 GB of available disk space, to be burnt to a DVD for installation, and 128 MB DirectX 9 graphics to enable the Aero theme.

  You should remember that the Windows 7 Beta will stop working on August 1, 2009. It's also been mentioned that the Beta version being released is an upgrade version, that can only be installed on top of Vista. (EDIT: reported incorrect) Although, there's not a single mention of that on the download page and its tabs, unless it's hidden very well.

<Download Windows 7 Beta>

Virtual Desktops in Windows with VirtuaWin

VirtuaWin

  The lack of virtual desktops in Window XP and Vista has slowed my work on Windows boxes for too long. I recently revisited a free Virtual window manager for Windows (Vista, XP, and older) named VirtuaWin.

  <VirtuaWin> is a small, light weight, and minimal virtual window manager. VirtuaWin is found free and open source at our favorite, <SourceForge.net>. The application consists of a system tray icon in your task bar:

(the green box)

  Out of the box you get 4 desktops, although the limit is 20. These are switchable in several customizable ways. The configurable hotkeys and mouse edge bumping seem to do well for me. Virtual desktops and multiple monitors make things even better!

  You can then refine this tool with the <great collection of add-on modules>. Modules provide a desktop pager, auto switching, visual and audio desktop change notifications, and more. The system tray icons can be easily customized by dropping in icon sets. VirtuaWin has quite a <collection of icon sets> you can browse.

[Link] Windows 7 is , You Guessed it, Vista Rebranded

Kernel process profiling shows it looks like a Vista; performance testing shows is walks like a Vista; claims of being a high performing Linux-laptop-killer falling flat on it's face, make it sound like a just another disappointing Vista.

InfoWorld 5 pages (Nov 10, 2008)

<InfoWorld - Test Center benchmarks: Windows 7 unmasked>

[Link] Windows 3.x Still Dying

Microsoft ended support for Windows 3.x at the end of 2001, but 3.x continued on as an embedded operating system. Windows 3.x continued to power cash registers, ticket systems, and even in-flight entertainment systems.

"On 1 November Microsoft stopped issuing
licences [for Windows3.x]"(Ward)


BBC News (Mark Ward) (Nov 5, 2008)

<BBC News - The end of an era - Windows 3.x>

[Link] Introducing Windows 7 (the official name)

Windows Vista Blog (Oct 13, 2008)

<Introducing Windows 7>

New True Crypt Release Features Hidden, Encrypted, OS Partitions

   We know True Crypt as the free-open source application for Windows/Mac/Linux that creates on-the-fly-encrypted drive volumes. You create a file or volume with the combination of several heavy, industry standard, encryption algorithms. With the password, that file or volume can be mounted as a drive letter (in Windows).

   True Crypt has been around a while; it's based on E4M (Encryption for the Masses) and released it's first version at the beginning of 2004. It's popularity exploded when it was the featured topic of a <GRC's Security Now> audio podcast. This was near the popular beginning of the series, which then featured informative, weekly, encryption and network protocol discussions.

   Since it's start, True Crypt has acquired additional innovative features. It can encrypt entire partitions, like an entire hard drive, as well as devices such as USB flash drives. It later featured the ability to create <hidden volumes> through <steganography>(wiki) techniques (hiding the encrypted volume inside a larger one filled with cryptographically random free space).

   The new True Crypt version 6 can not only encrypt your hard drive/partition containing your operating system, prompting you for your password at boot up, but can also make that a hidden volume. This creates an innovative situation of <plausible deniability>.

<www.TrueCrypt.org>
<True Crypt Downloads>

Open Source Lojack System For Laptops (beta)

   <Adeona> is the first Open Source system for tracking the location of your lost or stolen laptop that does not rely on a proprietary, central service. Adeona instead uses the open source <OpenDHT> distributed storage service to store location updates.
   Protect your laptop, for free, without giving away your privacy to a proprietary central server (and any organizations who could persuade them to share your location information).

(Windows/Mac/Linux)

"We are exploring the possibility of Adeona for mobile devices, like the iPhone or Windows Mobile."

Beta notes:
   The current version of Adeona is 0.2.1. This is a beta version. Being the first public distribution for deployment, Adeona has been made easy to uninstall. It also shows readily in your system process list. No mention of GPS support. Location information includes: internal IP address, external IP address, nearby routers, access point, photos (Macs only via <isightcapture>).

DNS Design Flaw Allows Spoofing

DNS
(July 8, 2008) United States Computer Emergency Readiness Team (US-CERT) Vulnerability notice <#800113> regarding a DNS Cache Poisoning Issue.

"It is a fundamental issue affecting the design. Because the system is behaving exactly like it is supposed to behave, the same bug will show up in vendor after vendor after vendor.", says Dan Kaminsky, director of penetration testing, at the <IOActive> security firm. Kaminsky found this flaw more than six months ago while doing non-security related research of the DNS system.

A number of software vendors released patches Tuesday, July 8th. A patch <was released>(July 8, 2008) by Microsoft, being it's scheduled update day, and a patch <was also released> (July 8, 2008) for the Berkeley Internet Name Domain (BIND) server. The <Security Focus article> (July 8, 2008) claims both Cisco and Juniper also acknowledged flawed systems (but haven't released patches).

Programming Salaries Compared

I came across a great post from <The Unix Geek - Blogspot>. He had grabbed average pay for different programming languages, operating systems, and API's from <Indeed> and listed them in order. I've used his findings and the same method to expand on them.

Programming Languages

$82,000 - Objective-C
$80,000 - C++
$80,000 - TCL
$79,000 - C#
$79,000 - Java
$78,000 - Python
$77,000 - Perl
$74,000 - Ruby
$72,000 - JavaScript
$64,000 - Delphi
$64,000 - PHP
$64,000 - Visual Basic
$60,000 - C
$54,000 - Smalltalk

Operating Systems (generic average)

$86,000 - GNU/Linux
$55,000 - Microsoft Windows
$51,000 - Mac OS X

API's

$86,000 - Win32
$81,000 - Tcl/Tk
$76,000 - Qt
$75,000 - GTK+
$71,000 - .NET ($75,000 for "Visual Studio")
$43,000 - Cocoa ($60,000 for "Mac Programming")

Embedded (Various)

$71,000 - AVR
$70,000 - RFID
$67,000 - PIC

TCP Reset Injection Detection Utility

  An interesting source, <NNSquad> (Network Neutrality Squad), has released an open source tool (licensed under <LGPL>) to detect TCP reset (RST) packets that may have been injected into a TCP connection by a party other than the endpoints.
  The <NNSquad Network Measurement Agent (NNMA)> tool's available downloads are beta and include a Windows 2000/XP/Vista installer binary and <VC++ 6.0> Windows source code.
  TCP reset injection has been discovered being controversially used by internet service providers, such as <Comcast>, to disrupt torrent and P2P file sharing.

Hotmail CAPTCHA Massacre

<Recent reports> of streamlined Windows Live CAPTCHA bot attacks are slamming Hotmail. <New reports> show this process in action with success rates purported one in 8 to 10 attempts being successful (10 - 15%). One bot can <reportedly> create at least 1,440 accounts a day. These accounts are then used for mass mail spamming.

Internet Explorer 8 beta availible for download

Microsoft has made the IE8 betas available for download.
<Internet Explorer 8 beta Download>

To help developers with compatibility testing, Microsoft has made <Virtual PC> images preloaded with XP-SP2 or Vista available with IE6, IE7, or IE8 beta. Microsoft claims they will expire on July 3, 2008.
<VPC Image Dowloads>

Hacking Through Firewire Connection

Apparently someone just noticed that unrestricted direct write access to RAM is a feature of Firewire (according to the article). This allows one to compromise password protection code, and probably most anything else one can imagine. This is described as being done with a physical connection to the target system through a firewire port, using another system. Windows and OS X are said to be vulnerable to this.

<Engadget: Windows passwords easily bypassed over Firewire>

[rumor] Vista SP1 to be released Monday

<This site> is claiming that they 'received word' (without mentioning from where) that Windows Vista Service Pack 1 will be released on Monday, February 4, 2008. This report is being echoed by many other Vista fan-boy sites as being accurate.

It's been let on by Microsoft for a couple years now, and later confirmed, that they planned to ship SP1 alongside Windows Server 2008, which is now due in February 2008.

<For quick info check out this knowledgeable SP1 FAQ>