Archive for January, 2004

Maryland Electronic Voting Systems Found Vulnerable

Saturday, January 31st, 2004

Yet more e-voting scandal. This one from SlashDot. Apparently hackers are helping to test voting machines…theres a show on NPR.

From this story and the one on NPR, the state hired a company and set up a test voting precinct and had the group try whatever they could to break into the machines. Most of the attacks would probably be noticed by an even-half-awake poll staff, but some vulnerabilities were exposed. The net seems to be that you could really mess up individual machines, but the grail would be to get to the central collection servers and send a megavote to your favorite candidate. The last paragraph mentions problems that voting machines had in the last election in Virginia; it’s interesting to note that those use wireless networking–my jaw has dropped onto my keyboard and I can’t comment any further.”

Keep matters for a time in suspense

Saturday, January 31st, 2004

Admiration of their novelty heightens the value of your achievements. It is both useless and insipid to play with your cards on the table. If you do not declare yourself immediately, you arouse expectation, especially when the importance of your position makes you the object of general attention. Mix a little mystery with everything, and the very mystery arouses veneration. And when you explain, do not be too explicit, just as you do not expose your inmost thoughts in ordinary conversation. Cautious silence is the sacred sanctuary of worldly wisdom. A resolution declared is never highly thought of—it only leaves room for criticism. And if it happens to fail, you are doubly unfortunate. Besides, you imitate the divine way when you inspire people to wonder and watch.

Fight Music

Saturday, January 31st, 2004

Ask Eminem if he does black music and he will answer you without any hesitation:
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Are the spammers creating bogus weblogs?

Friday, January 30th, 2004

Ok, guys, I’m really p****d off.

This morning I noticed referral spam in my referrals on Webalizer, and on the referrals list on the right side of this page. This referral came after a suspicious email, that I replied to in order the verify authenticity. Here was the original email:

My name is Mark, and I’m the link manager
of http://mywebdreams.blogspot.com/ and http://iraqnewsonline.blogspot.com/.
I am writing to you to request a link exchange between our blogs.
Links to your blog will be placed on all blog’s pages above Archives inscription in the right column.
Our codes:
“”http://mywebdreams.blogspot.com Ilia Dreams Blog“”

“”http://iraqnewsonline.blogspot.com Iraq War Blog“”

Regards,
Mark Chermak mailto:mydiary@greatestphysicists.com

Now, you can tell why I was suspicious. This is not exactly a typical email I would receive asking to be added to my blogroll. So I did reply, asking where this person found me and why they wanted to add me. Maybe I was naieve to do so, but I felt I should verify.

Gavin,

I found your blog in google.com
and I want to link exchange with your blog – it’s very
informative(realy) blog.

Mark.
Both emails now appear to be automated. Though I could be wrong. I looked at the blogs. While they appear to be normal – they come across as somewhat false. I am not sure if they are legitimate, but again I could be wrong.

I became more suspicious when I received a second email, with the same subject line, and the same content, but a different blog.

Hello.
I want to offer an exchange links between your blog and my own blog.
My blog (URL ) : http://trolles.blogspot.com/
If you have agreed to exchange links with my blog, than post my link (HTML code) on your blog
My link (HTML code):
<"http://trolles.blogspot.com/">Troll’s Blog

--
Regards,
Dan mailto:trolles@ua.fm

So what to do? The spam is not chewing up bandwidth like previous spams, its not comment spam, its referral spam but, how does one stop it?

So far I’ve blocked the IP address of the spammer in a .htaccess file, and various subdomains just in case. This does not appear to have worked. Next step is beefing up my robots.txt file.

Has anyone got dodgy emails followed by dodgy referral spam?

Purple Pills

Friday, January 30th, 2004

The ‘ Purple Pills ‘ song from ‘ Devil’s Night ‘ album is all about popping pills and swallowing mushrooms and intentionally made of crazy statements. Different drugs like mescaline, coke, heroin and mushrooms are mentioned in the song.
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Character and Intellect

Thursday, January 29th, 2004

These are the two poles of our capacity; one without the other is but halfway to happiness. Intellect is not enough, character is also needed. On the other hand, it is the fool’s misfortune to fail in obtaining the position, employment, neighbourhood, and circle of friends of his choice.

Kangaroo

Thursday, January 29th, 2004

I’ve been wondering for the last few days why my weblog has been receiving more than the average number of visitors. It appears it’s down to a photograph of a kangaroo in my photos section. Its ranked in the top 100 on Google images – along with my picture of a cheetah.

I am now getting about 550 visitors a day. Feck.

Eminem vs Canibus

Thursday, January 29th, 2004

Among all the persons who were opposed to Eminem, Canibus can be considered more than a rap battle rival than a real enemy. There is much more lyrical rivalry between both men than real bad feelings against each others.
Where did the rivalry between Eminem and Canibus start ?
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Sept. 11 tape: courage amid chaos, Betty Ann Ong

Wednesday, January 28th, 2004

I am still amazed by stories such as this, its been over 2 years since that day, and yet my interest, it seems, will never go away.

Perhaps its having lots of relatives working in airlines, and having quite a bit of knowledge about aircraft and airlines that fascinates me. Or maybe its just Ms. Ong, with her Purser (most senior cabin crew after the Captain and FO) stabbed and apparently dead, along with an FG1 (first class cabin crew), Ong got on the phone and told people calmly what was going on.

I never knew that a gas, perhaps mace, was used to subdue people on the aircraft.

Stirring stuff.

I missed a good night

Wednesday, January 28th, 2004

Sounds like everyone had a good time at the debate on blogging in the House of Commons last night. I wish I could have made it. I did attend the last event in the Grand Committee room, and have met everyone that was there, besides a couple of bloggers with whom I have recently become acquainted online.

The best commentary comes from one of those I have yet to meet, Jackie D. My old mate Tom was apparently falling asleep, fellow debate regular James Crabtree was also there, along with blogger-in-training Clive.

I would hope to meet Jackie, Norman and Paul at a future event, once I get myself back in London.

Everything is at its peak of perfection

Wednesday, January 28th, 2004

This is especially true of the art of making one’s way in the world. There is a more required nowadays to make a single wise person than formerly to make the Seven Sages of ancient Greece, and more is needed nowadays to deal with a single person than was required with a whole people in former times.

No WMD in Iraq

Wednesday, January 28th, 2004

David Kay: “Turns out, we were all wrong”.

I never really believed that there were WMD. On balance I ended up agreeing with the Iraqis when they said they didn’t have any – and they were right.

Kim’s criminal records

Wednesday, January 28th, 2004

Kim Mathers is no friend of Court. Between 2000 and 2004, she’s been charged several times under different circumstances.

In April 2000, Kim drove with a revoked driving licence and she received a second drunken conviction.

Then in June 2000, Kim got in trouble again at Hot Rocks Cafe. As a consequence of the incident with John Guerra, she was charged for disturbing the peace.

Marshall filed for divorce on June the 22nd 2000 and Kim attempted suicide on July the 7th. But she soon got into trouble again : on the 4th of August 2000, Kim had a severe argument with her twin sister Dawn.. She hit her and was accused of assaulting her.

In October 2000, she pleaded guilty in Court to her disorderly conduct charge. It is known that Marshall accepted to pay $15,000 for her legal fees. Kim had to go to an Alcoholic Anonymous meeting every week. Apparently, it didn’t help a lot.

In July 2001, Kim was caught travelling with an unauthorized substance (less than 25 g cocain) in her car in Harrisson Township. She was walking down with a friend when the police controlled her vehicle and found the white powedered substance in her car. Kim was charged with possession of cocaine. Kim risked up to four years jail sentence if she was convicted, but the lawsuit was dismissed five months later, according to the Michigan Court legal documents.

On June the 17th 2002, Judith and Douglas Schlabach filed a lawsuit against Kim. She had her truck stolen in June 2001 and the person who was driving it, Adam Erik Jenkins caused damages greater than $25 000. Jenkins had taken Kim’s truck without permission and caused an accident on 32 Mile Road.

As long as we don’t learn our lesson, we are condemned to repeat the same mistakes again and again.

In June 2003, during Eminem’s European Anger Management Tour, Kim was arrested in Saint Clair Shores by the police who found some cocaine again in her car. This event caused a lot of disagrement to Marshall who took a private jet during his tour to file a request for Hailie’s full custody. He was worried about the fact Kim could face some possible jail charges.

In September 2003, Kim appeared before a judge, but she missed two Court dates and was under electronic house arrest. But Kim really worried her whole entourage when she suddenly disappeared in November 2003 without anybody knowing where she was. She was found by the police about three weeks later. Kim was judged recently and faces two years of probation. She will have to stay drug and alcohol free during this time.

Atlantic: January 2004

Tuesday, January 27th, 2004

The Atlantic continues to outstrip itself, this months magazine has a plethora of great in depth analysis. Ill blog some of the non-net stuff later.

Meanwhile: Europeans are not cowards: Fletcher Crossman

Tuesday, January 27th, 2004

This is a rather interesting piece of writing. I think is the best article I’ve read in a while. I think I’ll put it all in, in case the IHT decide to take it down later.
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