security

Although Randy Bias’s article, titled “Avoiding a Geopolitical Open Source Apocalypse”, is a bit dated — it was published in October 2024 — it remains relevant. The piece appears on thenewstack.io and provides useful food for thought about cooperation between East and West for a shared, secure open-source ecosystem. Some think that open source software is generally more secure, but is it? Open source software mainly made in the West has well-documented security issues of its own, due in part to its heavy reliance on overworked and volunteer maintainers. Securing open source software requires time, energy and diligence. Unfortunately, many projects are very thinly resourced and lack the expertise required to look for security risks diligently. ...

The W3C (World Wide Web Consortium) is an international organization committed to ensuring that the web works for everyone—not just today, but in the future as well—through clear standards and guidelines that safeguard growth and interoperability. In their statement »Ethical Web Principles« they really put it succinctly: the web should be for everyone. The web should be a platform that helps people and provides a positive social benefit. As we continue to evolve the web platform, we must therefore consider the consequences of our work. The following document sets out ethical principles that will drive W3C’s continuing work in this direction. ...

Motherboard berichtet reported on a box capable of cracking an iPhone’s PIN. The GrayKey itself is a small, 4×4 inches box with two lightning cables for connecting iPhones, according to photographs published by cybersecurity firm Malwarebytes. The device comes in two versions: a $15,000 one which requires online connectivity and allows 300 unlocks (or $50 per phone), and an offline, $30,000 version which can crack as many iPhones as the customer wants. Marketing material seen by Forbes says GrayKey can unlock devices running iterations of Apple’s latest mobile operating system iOS 11, including on the iPhone X, Apple’s most recent phone. ...

Hacking the Samsung Galaxy S8 Irisscanner → Mobile vendors have established fingerprints as a biometric feature to unlock smartphones. Now they turn to iris recognition, as do hackers. This video demonstrates how to circumvent the iris recognition of the Samsung Galaxy S8 flagship phone only using basic tools. The linked video clearly shows that you don’t need expensive hardware to bypass the iris scanner. The text was automatically translated from German into English. The German quotations were also translated in sense. ...

I finally managed to read the book 1984 from George Orwell. I’m almost ashamed I only read it now, because it’s really good and still so relevant. It’s impressive how prophetic George Orwell already was in 1948. In many respects his theories are still applicable to today’s fear of constant surveillance. A really great story that everyone should read. “The old civilizations claimed to be founded on love or justice. Ours is founded on hatred.” — “1984” by George Orwell ...