I just discovered the BugMeNot service today.

It offers a database of logins shared by the community to login to free websites that require free registration.

This is usually annoying to subscribe to such a website just to download a freeware or read an article, and it often makes people choose unsecured or random logins.

They even provide an extension for Firefox. Thanks to this great website, you are probably going to save a lot of time.

JC :: Mar.08.2010 :: Web :: No Comments »

I added a new link to Packetlife.net, which is a really amazing website about networking, with focus on Cisco stuff.

The work that the author made is truly impressive : blog, cheat sheets, gentle forum and even a lab (I haven’t test because I don’t need it, but if you are a student, it is great for students and so far I have never seen any other website offering it), all integrated with a quality level that is rare to find even on professional website.

This is one the best website I have never seen in all categories and certainly the best about Cisco networking. If you are interested in this topic, visit there right now.

JC :: Feb.20.2010 :: Cisco, Network :: No Comments »

This video, while “amusing”, is quite interesting :

Though not many details are given, I am quite skeptical about the possibility of such a massive attack.

However, it shows well that security is not just a technical matter. It has many implications in law, politics, economics, and a whole information system must be prepared to that, starting with our leaders.

That would be a HUGE effort for our politicians here in France – if they ever care…

JC :: Feb.18.2010 :: Defense, Hacking, Security :: No Comments »

Netios 0.73 fixes some bugs and

Complete changelog :

2010-02-10  (0.73) Jean-Christophe Baptiste <jc@phocean.net>

* remove useless options
* fix various bugs

Check there (tools page) for more details and a download link.

JC :: Feb.10.2010 :: Cisco, Defense, Network, Python, Scripts, Programs, Security :: No Comments »

I continue to publish some my coding.

Hostcheck is a simple Perl script that can be useful to quickly check if a list of host is up.
It just read a host file and check if the host are available doing a ping test or trying to open a socket.

Nothing great, but it may help to quickly check that most of things are right after a network change, for instance.
Because we want to test many hosts, and not to scan, the pace is fast so it may not be 100% reliable. The idea is to see roughly is the connectivity is correct or if your whole LAN is down.
It uses colors and is easy to read, so it might be good to show to your manager !

I hope it will be useful. More info and download link are there.

JC :: Jan.15.2010 :: Network, Perl, Scripts, Programs :: No Comments »

Netios 0.72 fixes some bugs with the show_run mode and large config files. I also found some issues concerning the prompt detection, so it should be fixed now.

Complete changelog :

2010-01-14  (0.72) Jean-Christophe Baptiste <jc@phocean.net>

* ciscoclass.py : forgot to remove a debug print
* ciscoclass.py : finish and fix a bunch of bugs in the show run function, format the config file properly
* ciscoclass.py : fix the prompt regex

Check there (tools page) for more details and a download link.

JC :: Jan.15.2010 :: Cisco, Defense, Network, Python, Scripts, Programs, Security :: No Comments »

And Google is making so much noise about that ?

If what is said is true, it nothing else but a trojan. A good one, but nothing new otherwise.

I would also say that the most targeted company was Microsoft. After all, it was an Internet Explorer 0-days breach that was exploited. Once the computer was infected, I bet that the trojan was doing much more than just targeting Gmail. To maximise the chance of an attack to succeed, a good trojan comes with a bunch of functionalities and harvest as many things as possible on the computer. Thus I doubt the target was only Google.

As Steve Ballmer said (hey, I didn’t think I would ever quote him here ! ), it happens every day. And it must not be something new in a country like China. And suddenly, Google cares ? Whereas they quietly applied censorship in China until then ? I always become suspicious when a multinational company claims it cares about human rights to the detriment of its business.

Maybe Google is just really wanting to get out of China for some reason (not so popular there with the competition of Baidu?) and is looking for an excuse. More details will certainly be coming so time will tell…

JC :: Jan.15.2010 :: Security, Web, openSUSE :: 2 Comments »

That is exactly why I have never used – and will never use – Facebook or anything like that.

JC :: Jan.11.2010 :: Desktop, Security, Web, openSUSE :: No Comments »