Buried Internetworking Infrastructure: Risky Business →
A deeply (no pun intended) problematic physical security & connectivity planning scenario - specifically the lifespan of in-situ buried internetwork cabling (on, or near land) coupled with a paucity of outcome planning (in the Anthropocene Epoch...) is detailed by highly respected researcher - Paul Barford, Ph.D., a UW-Madison Professor of Computer Science resident at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Along with Carol Barford, Director of the University of Wisconsin-Madison UW-Madison Center for Sustainability and the Global Environment and Ramakrishnan Durairajan, Assistant Professor, CIS at the University of Oregon) have produced a study detailing failure risks (essentially a call to action, as the buried cable timeline has shriveled from a one hundred year life-span to somewhere less-than-fifty years) of buried internetworked cabling. Superb work. And, here's Rebecca Hersher's reporting for NPR on both the study, and the issues. Enjoy.
'"Most of the damage that's going to be done in the next 100 years will be done sooner than later," says Barford, an authority on the "physical internet" -- the buried fiber optic cables, data centers, traffic exchanges and termination points that are the nerve centers, arteries and hubs of the vast global information network. "That surprised us. The expectation was that we'd have 50 years to plan for it. We don't have 50 years."1 - Paul Barford, Ph.D. in an press-release published at EurekaAlert! (a service of AAAS).
The End of Humanity, AI Style: Or How I Learned to Admire RAND →
Edward Geist, Andrew J. Lohn, writing at the RAND Corporation, have crafted a fascinating report targeting the potential for Artifical Intelligence to increase the already signifcant possibily of thermonuclear warfare (otherwise known as into-the-frying-pan-with-no-oil)... Today's Toasty MustRead!
AWS Data Centers, Digital Tour →
Quick, entertaining and yet commendable 'digital tour' of a Amazon Web Services Data Center illustrating the security, thereof. Displaying the Datacenters security fundamentals, Security Controls inherent in their designs and People involved with securing and auditing the data assets of the company's customers. Recommended for executives and managers, and certainly light on the tech...
Sonic Weapon, The Deployment →
Superbly crafted piece - by Emily Waltz, writing at the IEEE's Spectrum Magazine - on the alleged sonic weapon deployed and implemented in Cuba, targeting lawful United States of America Department of State diplomats (and other countries career diplomats, as well) while in-country. We are certain the State Department's Bureau of Diplomatic Security and the United States Marine Corps' Marine Security Guard Embassy Security Group are actively working these incidents befalling ours and other nations diplomats. Today's Must Read.
CMU/SEI, Tracy Cassidy's 'Technical Detection of Intended Violence: Workplace Violence as an Insider Threat' →
Superbly researched deep dive within the Insider Threat realm, this time by Tracy Cassidy (Insider Threat Researcher at the CERT National Insider Threat Center. A Good and Necessary Read.