Robby Pedrica's Tech Blog

Category: Computer Tech

  • DEP in Windows hacked

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    Robby Pedrica
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    I’m really sorry about the continuous Windows security reports but they just keep on coming so what else can I do… Data Execution Prevention is a security tool that Microsoft added to all versions of Windows since XP SP2. It’s meant to address buffer overflows by working with the CPU to mark all memory locations…

  • The Microsoft Tax

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    The headline phrase typically refers to the buying of computers with Windows pre-installed by the OEM vendor when you don’t need or want it. I.e. you’ve paid more for the machine ( because it includes Windows ) when you aren’t going to use it. Unfortunately this time it refers to you, a citizen, paying extra…

  • Slackware current issues

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    I’ve been running Slackware-current ( the development version of Slackware ) for probably close to 5 years now. For the most part, it’s a pretty uneventful stream of upgrades however, every once in a while things get interesting. The March 1 update is massive, has taken a month to release and includes around 465 updated…

  • Remember that 17-year old bug in Windows …

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    … I spoke about in late January? Well Microsoft has finally come out and acknowledged it. Over a month later. Well actually 9 months later. The hole, which originated with the release of Windows NT back in 1993 and is present in every 32-bit version of Windows since, including Windows 7, was discovered by Tavis…

  • Another IE hole

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    Another flaw has been found in versions 7 and 8 of Internet Explorer running on Windows XP. There’s an unpatched bug in VBScript that hackers can use to drop malware on 32-bit Windows XP machines. Microsoft says an exploit “was posted publicly that could allow an attacker to host a maliciously crafted web page and…

  • Another Windows hole

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    A new critical flaw has been found in all versions of Windows since Windows 2000 and affects even current releases like Windows 7 and Server 2008 R2. The vulnerability was found by 2X Software which says that the flaw can be used to create a DoS attack against any Windows systems from the last 10…

  • Privacy and freedom: World Gone Mad Part 2

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    Robby Pedrica
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    The US Copyright Lobby has indicated that using FOSS equates to the undermining of intellectual property rights. Yes you read that correctly. They want the US Trade Representative to place countries like Brazil, India, and Indonesia on the Special 301 list, which is a list of countries that do not, according to mostly the Pharmaceutical…

  • Privacy and freedom: World Gone Mad Part 1

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    Last week, a story broke in the US concerning invasion of privacy and has become a huge talking point globally. The Lower Merion School District provided Apple Mac laptops to students ( no private machines were allowed ) and installed remote control software on these, allowing the school to remotely activate web-cams in an apparent…

  • 2009 most hacked app – Acrobat Reader

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    Malicious Acrobat Reader documents made up almost 80% of all exploits for 2009 according to security research company ScanSafe. Vulnerabilities have doubled year on year in Adobe’s PDF reader and they seem to be having a problem in keeping things under any sort of control. To keep yourself safe ( well sort of ) disable…

  • New Windows 7 update phones home

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    Robby Pedrica
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    Apologies for the late notice on this but I only just learned of it myself: Microsoft will be releasing “Update for Microsoft Windows (KB971033)” today. This however is not an ordinary update.  This one will change the current activation and anti-piracy behaviour of Windows 7 by phoning home every 90 days ( for now ).…

  • New research paints grim picture for AntiVirus software

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    While I’ve never assumed AV software will protect you from all ills on the Internet, new research from SurfRight shows just how bad things are. A sample of just under 110k users ( a very good sample I think ) shows that 32% ( yes 1/3rd ) of all machines running AV software were infected…

  • XStore Services downtime

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    XStore services will be down this evening at 6pm for scheduled maintenance for about 15 minutes. Services affected include: hosted Nagios monitoring hosted email/web

  • Patch Tuesday

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    This coming Tuesday, Microsoft is releasing a slew of patch fixes, 5 of which are rated critical, 7 important and 1 moderate. All of the critical flaws result in remote code execution and 10 of these patches require a system restart. The list of operating systems affected includes everything from Win2k through to Win2k8 R2.…

  • Virtualisation part 3: VMware backup scenarios

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    Backups in a virtualisation environment take on a whole new meaning, typically complex ( as opposed to the simple outlook that the vm vendors would like to portray )  because now you are dealing with shared SAN storage, vm images instead of files, very specific requirements around backup hardware and setup, 3rd party backup agents…

  • New Microsoft IE flaw

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    Robby Pedrica
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    Microsoft has issued a new security advisory ( 980099 ) to address a publicly disclosed vulnerability in Internet Explorer that may allow information disclosure for Windows XP users or for users who have disabled Internet Explorer Protected Mode. The advisory explains that content can be forced to render incorrectly from local files in such a…