Sony's Plan To Tighten Security and Fight Hacktivism 247
mask.of.sanity writes "Sony Entertainment Network is rebuilding its information security posture to defend against hacktivism. It includes a security operations center that serves as a nerve center collating information on everything from staff phone calls, to CCTV, to PlayStation gamers. If it is successful, the counter intelligence-based system will be deployed across the entire company. 'At Sony, we are modifying our programs to deal less with state-sponsored [attacks] and more with socially-motivated hackers. It will be different,' said Chief Security Officer Brett Wahlin."
*clap* *clap* (Score:5, Interesting)
good for them
pity I wont buy another sony product ever again.
Re:*clap* *clap* (Score:5, Informative)
I can't even fully use the products I already have.
The new SEN, replacement for the PSN, has in its user agreementy a clause that says they can and will do anything they like with your user data, including giving it to any third party they feel like. If you have a problem with this you can't use the service.
That's me locked out of network features on the ps3 then.
Re: (Score:2)
What personal data did you actually share with them, other than perhaps credit card information (which for many reasons, they wouldn't be sharing)? I'm not defending Sony, I'm just curious. If they want to share with 3rd parties that it took me about three years to finish Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne, fine. If I was giving them a rich user profile, it'd be a different story.
Re:*clap* *clap* (Score:5, Informative)
Name, address, gaming habits (every game you play, the times you play, how long for), any movies you may have downloaded from them, integrated tv services you've used...
These are just the things I know the box was sending to Sony from my protocol snooping a year or so back.
I'm not sure if the machine sends web history to Sony, or what you've been watching/listening to on the ps3 via UPnP/DLNA, but it wouldn't be beyond their capabilities.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
God, you really have to wonder what's going on in the brains of Sony managers. If they had embraced the hacking/modding community like e.g. Lego did or at least tolerated it silently, they'd have obtained tons of free content, fan pages, free customer service, new customers and new uses for their hardware. Instead, they are constantly yelling "fuck you" at their regular customers and, quite frankly, I doubt that there are any "power" users left who would buy a Sony product.
Re: (Score:3)
But with every power user they also lose 5-10 ordinary customers. Or do you think my girlfriend or any of my friends will buy a Sony product after having asked me for advice?
Re: (Score:2)
While they might not want power users.....
The PS3 remained unhacked for quite a long time compared to all other consoles.
Then they removed the "Other OS" option and they had an influx of people who wanted to do the classic "run linux on it" routine.
Booooooom, their security is broken.
While they might not want to cater for them for direct profit, they DO want to keep them happy in their modding bubble so that they dont spend their considerable skill-set to breaking every security feature of the box. THAT is
Re:*clap* *clap* (Score:5, Insightful)
You have to read between the lines here man.
They're not saying "We were attacked for being a socially irresponsible company, so we're going to do less evil shit." They're saying "We were attacked for doing evil shit, so we're going to keep doing evil shit and make it harder to successfully attack us."
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I would use the term "corporate entitlement" for it. They think the world owes them money because they produce luxury products. Bioware are doing exactly the same thing when their latest title has a bunch of shortcuts and removed (unless you pay extra) content. But in their head space they are entitled to do whatever they want and you are just a source of income who is allowed no opinion or input.
Corporations have figured out the public doesn't listen to the news any more. Their own greed is too high and se
Re:*clap* *clap* (Score:4, Funny)
Corporations have figured out the public doesn't listen to the news any more. Their own greed is too high and self control too low, so Sony can pretty much piss in your face and demand you pay for it and the public will only see a shower and pay the price.
Sure, gold prices are sky hight currently, so what did you expect?
Re:*clap* *clap* (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:*clap* *clap* (Score:5, Insightful)
I think once a business reaches a certain critical mass, evil is inevitable.
Are there any companies in the Fortune 500 (or even Fortune 1000) that aren't complete monsters?
Re:*clap* *clap* (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3)
http://www.redhat.com/ [redhat.com]
Re:*clap* *clap* (Score:4, Funny)
Funny how these guys keep growing without being evil:
http://www.redhat.com/ [redhat.com]
But what they don't tell you is the hat is red because... it's dipped in the blood of emacs users! BOOOOOoooooOOOooOoOOOO!
Re:*clap* *clap* (Score:5, Insightful)
Isn't that kinda how these big businesses work in general these days? Microsoft, Apple, Sony, Samsung, Motorola, Oracle, Intel, Dell, etc? I guess I'm just saying if someone has an issue with Sony they probably have an issue with the whole industry & it's practices, not /just/ Sony...
Apple removed DRM from iTunes music. Sony installed Rootkits.
Apple has no DRM on its OS. Sony has aggressively fought against Playstation hacking.
Apple has a Cloud service which mirrors your music to all your devices, regardless of where it came from. Sony?
Apple had a marketing slogan "Rip. Mix. Burn.". Sony created Blu-Ray as an unsuccessful defense against DeCSS.
Apple builds AirPlay into OS X and iOS. Sony creates SACD's DSD format as an (unsuccessful) attempt to stop CD copying (betcha didn't know that one!).
Apple actively and significantly contributes to the F/OSS Community. Sony, OTOH has been caught USING F/OSS code without attribution and in violation of those project's licensing (libarc) in its game, ICO, and parts of LAME (id3lib and more) in an OCX control.
Yep. no way whatsoever to tell those two companies apart by their respective actions.
Re:*clap* *clap* (Score:5, Informative)
Apple has no DRM on its OS
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IOS#Digital_rights_management [wikipedia.org]
Otherwise I agree, Apple is less evil than Sony. Not that that is saying much.
Re:*clap* *clap* (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:*clap* *clap* (Score:5, Informative)
What you have failed to realize is that the "App Store Lock-In", and even the "iOS Development Licensing" are actually there to benefit USERS (by keeping Malware OUT, OUT, OUT).
As well as keeping pornography and political cartoons, software that might compete with Apple, software that might allow people to develop more software in a sandboxed environment, software that might allow people to play old SNES games, etc. OUT OUT OUT. The "this benefits users" argument is nothing more than a cover story; Apple could benefit users without forbidding jailbreaking, without bricking phones that were jailbroken, and without having a policy that forbids lampooning politicians.
Sony's Rootkit and Playstation DRM battles are there to benefit SONY.
So how is that not-locked-down gaming platform working for you? Oh yeah, malware:
https://encrypted.google.com/search?q=windows+malware&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a [google.com]
Apple's iOS DRM serves exactly the same purpose as PS3's DRM: to thwart competition, prevent customers from controlling their computers (which includes phones and gaming systems) and to tap developers' revenue streams.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
LMFAO
Apple created a walled garden which locks you into using their hardware AND their distribution mechanism.
With the release of iMatch, Apple has effectively implemented an new type of DRM, one where their proprietary content can be streamed over to their proprietary devices. Apple didn't remove DRM from music, they just changed the way music and media is distributed to iUsers.
But DRM on music hasn't worked for 20 years, that is why Apple claimed to remove it. How about why can't I play iTunes Movies on m
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
More like "we were attacked so now we will add another layer of bureaucracy in the hopes of making us more secure."
An ops center is worthless if the individual departments aren't installing security updates.
Re: (Score:3)
What they're saying is that their enemy is actually their customers. Well, in Sony's mind that would be consumers, not customers.
For all haters (Score:5, Funny)
Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
You have to remember that ATRAC was the first consumer lossy compression format, way before this newfangled MP3 thing was available.
Re:*clap* *clap* (Score:5, Informative)
And the Vita uses?
Oh that's right, proprietary "vita cards" for games, proprietary "vita memory cards" for storage, and even a non-standard data cable.
Good work!
Re:*clap* *clap* (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:*clap* *clap* (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:*clap* *clap* (Score:5, Insightful)
And guess who designed Blu-ray [wikipedia.org] and shoveled tons of money into the project to push it into the market [wikipedia.org] to destroy to rival HD DVD format [wikipedia.org]: Sony. Learn your history.
Also, comparing two very specific systems which are by definition very closed (gaming consoles) and a music player (which I guess you're going for with that Apple jibe) is hardly an objective comparison in the big picture. If that's all you know about these respective companies, fine, but please stay in your mom's basement.
Re: (Score:3)
I think the only music players that are currently closed are those made by Apple ... the rest are pretty open, or at least use standard connectors and software.
Re: (Score:3)
I think the only music players that are currently closed are those made by Apple ... the rest are pretty open, or at least use standard connectors and software.
Just because Apple has a multifunction connector on the iPod and iPad (which is absolutely a necessity, considering the number of signals it carries), and just because they make it easy to use iTunes to sync those devices, doesn't mean there aren't alternatives. There are several third-party iPod syncing apps, and countless cables and devices that mate with Apple's "dock" connector. So many, that the dock connector is effectively a "standard" connector itself.
Re: (Score:2)
And guess who designed Blu-ray [wikipedia.org]
And guess who made this technology even possible. [wikipedia.org] NOT Sony. Learn your history.
Re:*clap* *clap* (Score:5, Insightful)
Both HD-DVD and Blu-Ray were proprietary, patent- and DRM-laden standards. ... For once, the technically best format (Blu-Ray) won.
I'll just let these two sentences stand next to each other. They're too good. :)
It's not that Sony beat HD DVD which undermines your argument, it's that Blu-ray is a horrible technology, mostly exactly because it's DRM-laden. The blue laser is nice, the DRM and all the crap that goes onto a typical Blu-ray disc is not. What won is simply one of the two evils. Therefore, choosing Blu-ray as an "open" technology to show how good Sony is in using open technologies is just... let's call it a bad example.
Both are very closed, but one is a lot more open than the other (the PS3)
So one sucks less than the other, that doesn't make it a great example for "open".
whereas the post I was responding to was claiming that Sony uses proprietary formats.
Because the PS3 is the only device Sony is selling?
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Of all technologies, you choose to use DRM infested blu-ray as an example of user-friendly products?
Where to all these sock-puppets come from? Can we block them at the door? I guess some simple questions around OS and consumer gadgets should be enough to deter the worst.
Re: (Score:2)
Dear Sony, after all the service I've done for you here on Slashdot, if when I get home I find a gift box full of PS vitas or tablets or cell phones or whatever you might consider appropriate to thank me, I wouldn't get offended.
Re:*clap* *clap* (Score:5, Funny)
And today on our fun game show My Favorite Random Multi-National Conglomerate Sucks Less Than Your Random Multi-National Conglomerate, we introduce our first contestant: peppepz!
Re: (Score:2)
Damn, wish I had some mod points right now. :D
Re: (Score:2)
I avoid Sony like the plague, due mainly to the root kit shenanigans and how I feel they as a company are contemptuous of their customers. However, what I've read of your posts is in fact fair. There's plenty of psychologically damaged people here acting blindly as cheerleaders and apologists for brands, spewing vitriol against their "enemy" brands, but your comments do not belong to the detritus spewed by this pack of psychologically damaged people.
Sony consoles and kit are generally as open/closed as anyt
Re: (Score:2)
The first example you gave countered your own point. Blu-ray is a very proprietary Sony format (that wasn't standard when the PS3 was released). HD-DVD was inferior from a technical point of view but from a licensing standpoint HD-DVD was far far superior to blu-ray.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:*clap* *clap* (Score:5, Informative)
Just because of how Sony handled this? Please, after this fiasco they'll be the safest company to trust your info to. Sony didn't handle the breach well, nor did it inform customers as it should have, but guess what? NO OTHER COMPANY would have done ANYTHING different. I'll bet there are many that would've tried to deny the whole thing.
I'm socially motivated to never buy anything from Sony again as well, but it has nothing to do with whatever their latest stupid shananigans are. Sony earned a permaban with their rootkit. Remember that?
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Actually Sony has decades of ill will built up going all the way back to betamax. They have such cool and brilliant engineering counterbalanced by a marketing department that abuses it's customers. Truly I think they hate their customers and wish their was some way to get their money without having to deal with them. The only other corporation that gives me this feeling is AT&T who's motto is "IF you grovel and kiss our feet we might, just might, let you spend your money here."
Re: (Score:3)
Dunno about "safest".
When you make enemies as fast an furiously as Sony, I don't think you can buy enough monkeys to guard the bananas. I picture their security as being based on Wile. E. Coyotes Acme boulder diverting , little pink umbrella working in conjunction with a small sign that says " Oh, No!". If history and weather reporting are any indicator then Sony servers stand about the same chance as whoever hosts RIAA websites.
It sounds like Anonymous isn't the o
Re:*clap* *clap* (Score:4, Insightful)
NO OTHER COMPANY would have done ANYTHING different.
What other company has knowingly and purposely installed malware on paying customers' computers? What other company has shipped a product and then removed some of its functionality after it's already been bought and paid for?
I was a victim of XCP. Don't expect ME to buy anything else from Sony, ever again. If I did to Sony's computers what Sony did to mine when my daughter innocently installed their damned trojan, I'd be in prison.
Sony doesn't deserve to live. I wish averyone who owned Sony stock would sell it, and I wish people would stop buying Sony products. Sony is evil and doesn't deserve your business.
wrong medication (Score:2, Interesting)
This is treating the symptom not the problem.
Re: (Score:2)
What do you propose they do... kill all the would-be attackers?
Re:wrong medication (Score:5, Insightful)
Here's a start:
1. Bring back OtherOS
2. Stop supporting CSS, AACS, HDCP and other forms of DRM
3. Apologise for installing rookits on people's computers without their knowledge
4. Apologise for taking legal action against people who circumvented their digital restrictions
Re:wrong medication (Score:4, Insightful)
That is, stop playing DVD, Blu-Rays, and drop the ability to connect to HDMI and DVI displays?
That's the point, come up with a frickin' format that does not use DRM and distribute movies in said format (Sony is a mayor distributor and user of DRM'd formats).
If you don't like the above mentioned technologies, you can play unprotected media and connect the PS3 via SCART, VGA or component cables anyway.
We know you love your PS3, but why do the rest of us have to put up with crippled discs we want to play elsewhere?
It's not that Sony, like Google, is plotting to insert DRM into the open standard that governs the Web [engadget.com].
No, because they've already inserted their DRM everywhere that matters to them.
Done. Seven years ago. And by the way, did Apple and other phone manufacturers issue any apology for installing CarrierIQ...
Interesting that you'd pick the one company by name that was the least weasel-worded about what it did and didn't use CarrieIQ for.
Re: (Score:2)
Great, when Hollywood will start distributing movies in any DRM-free form you'll be able to play them on the PS3. It supports a lot of DRM-free formats.
I don't care that I can play un-DRM'd content on a PS3. I don't have a PS3. But I do have to live with the restrictions of DRM'd Blu-ray discs, which gained in popularity thanks to such arguments as "well, it plays even on your game console, so what are you complaining about?" And Sony is a huge part of Hollywood. If they wanted to, they could distribute non-DRM'd content. Because Sony is a huge content distributor. And they are exactly the ones that insist on DRM.
Thanks for the ad-hominem attack. It's about the fifth one I've got today for posting a positive comment about a product of Sony.
I don't really have anything against Sony,
Re: (Score:2)
The sad part is that the DRM doesnt matter if it is ever thrown up on a pixel-matrix...
Getting hold of the data will be possible, and as it gets harder and harder, people get MORE motivated to do it for bragging rights... the "Scene" is a nutty place ;)
Only takes one person to make a rip, and all the DRM in the world wont help... (barring 'Trusted Computing' and such..)
Re: (Score:3)
But media playback is a traditionally DRM- and patent- infested territory
No it is not. They used to have DRM-free satellite broadcasts, and people used to just tune in with giant C-band antennas. Then some bright folks at HBO hired some bright folks at a company now owned by Motorola to develop a DRM system for satellite TV. Video cassettes used to be DRM free also, until some bright folks at Macrovision started attacking AGC circuits in VCRs.
The tradition is for media of all kinds to start out DRM-free, then for DRM to creep in. The removal of DRM from iTunes music was
Re: (Score:3)
I have a strange, maybe backwards, idea, but it just might work: Produce what your customer wants, but, you know, with the actual intent to give him what he wants, not just the bait-and-switch strategy of showing him what he wants, waiting 'til he buys and then yanking it from his grasp to leave him with what YOU want.
It just might make people actually, you know, WANT to buy your products. I have a hunch it might work a lot better than trying to force people to buy your crap.
Re: (Score:2)
That is off topic. The topic is about Sony finally improving their security posture (a good thing).
The GP is suggesting improving their security posture is a worse idea than not pissing people off in the first place. I think that since they need to improve their security either way... it's immaterial whether or not they know how to run the rest of their business properly.
Re: (Score:2)
That's not even treating the symptom. That's just a painkiller so you don't even feel the symptom anymore.
Cheaper strategy (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't be dicks.
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Cheaper strategy (Score:5, Insightful)
He who lies down with dogs gets up with fleas.
You might want to check the species of your bedfellow.
It's not like Sony's sins are minor. They include bait and switch and mass hacking on a scale Anon. can't even aspire to. Because they have money, they have gone un-punished.
So, yeah, gaming elsewhere is probably a good idea.
Re: (Score:2)
That only works to a point. Hackers frequently don't share the morals of normal people. Sony could easily do something completely innocuous, only to find that they've angered a bunch of internet thugs who respond by making Sony and their customers suffer.
It's akin to staying on the mob's good side so that they don't torch your shop. It might be cheaper and easier in the short term, but it's not a sustainable strategy. In the long run, you need to be able to defend yourself.
Re: (Score:2)
Evidence suggests that being at least neutral greatly reduces your chances of being attacked. Sure, they MIGHT get attacked anyway, but they PROBABLY wouldn't be. The attacks have for the most part been well aimed so far.
Re:Cheaper strategy (Score:5, Insightful)
Evidence also suggests that the internet never, ever, ever forgives. Sony is evil in the minds of internet-people, and no amount of "being neutral" will change that any time soon. Are they just supposed to suffer all the beatdowns they get over the next ten years until people start to say, "Hey, that rootkit thing was a long time ago..."?
Re: (Score:3)
Sony is evil in the minds of internet-people, and no amount of "being neutral" will change that any time soon.
No, but a large amount of "being good" would change that. Bringing back OtherOS, donating $25 million to the Mozilla Foundation, or opening a no-kill shelter for kittens would probably take a lot of heat off of them. Even though Google seems to have gotten away with it, "Don't be evil" is a pretty good rule to live by to keep armies of nerds off your ass.
Re: (Score:2)
Well, it doesn't help that after some form of openness (ie otherOS, standardized inputs on the PS3), they immediately clamp shut (proprietary memory designed only for maximizing profit and for screwing gamers over) and that they always follow said process.
Re: (Score:2)
No, but their hacks are much easier to hush up. Because you and them, you BOTH want nobody to know about it.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Because Corporations generally dislike consumers, and Sony is at the top of the pile of disdain.
Oh, they love the consumers' wallets, of course.
Wrong use of word? (Score:3, Insightful)
Hacktivism is to protest political ends. I belive the term is misused here...
Re:Wrong use of word? (Score:4, Funny)
Hacktivism is to protest political ends. I belive the term is misused here...
Right. Unless all those credit card numbers were stolen to support the Club A Baby Seal for Supply-Side Jesus movement, it was just theft, not hactivism.
Wrong way of thinking (Score:5, Insightful)
As part of the society, you should think about how not to become a target of hacking activism. Especially when it's impossible to crush every one of the "hackers".
Better yet, convert them into your loyal customers, and even better, direct their anger to your competitors.
Re:Wrong way of thinking (Score:4, Interesting)
That seems utterly impractical. The barrier to entry for attempting to hack is sufficiently low that any big company will offend people eventually, no matter what it does. Made a game I don't like, use boxes that are too large for shipping? Price a product some jackass feels entitled to at a point more than they can afford. Etc. etc. etc.
Sure, sony has earned a lot of their current hate. But every company has to realize that they will offend someone eventually, if nothing else than the thrill of trying to hack a big company.
From http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune500/2011/index.html
The largets US Companies in 2011
Wal-Mart Stores
Exxon Mobil
Chevron
ConocoPhillips
Fannie Mae
General Electric
Berkshire Hathaway
General Motors
Bank of America
Ford Motor
I challenge you to find anyone on that list that hasn't pissed off a lot of people, intentionally or otherwise, and legitimately or otherwise, but there are still a lot of angry people at them. And you can keep going down the list.
Sony isn't any different, and even if they change their ways, people will still believe them evil a decade from now. But I don't think you do 100 billion dollars a year in business and not make enough people angry to cause all sorts of hacking problems. Even Warren Buffet has made enemies because he thinks he makes too much money and should be taxed more.
Re:Wrong way of thinking (Score:4, Insightful)
I'll grant you that just based on statistics and human nature, any company with a sufficiently-large customer base will invariably really piss off some minority sub-group of their customers. However, there's a difference between pissing off minor subgroups on some matter of debate (e.g. "Wal-mart sells eyeliner that was tested on rabbits! Let's protest these animal-haters!"), and taking flatly evil, anti-consumer actions that affect the entire customer-base in a negative way (e.g. several notable Sony debacles from the past).
It's like the difference between BofA hiking a subset of their customers' credit card interest rates to pad their profits (with due notice, according to the rules), and BofA deciding "Hey, traditional bank fees aren't really working out for us, so we've decided to just start stealing a flat 1.5% of everyone's checking balance every month". They're categorically different, and so is the response from the customer base.
Companies who avoid the really huge, categorically evil, moves tend not to get swamped in hacktivist attacks all the time. I work directly on internet-facing services (including in a security capacity) at a Fortune 1K company that's heavily involved in the tech/consumer world, and we've never had a hacktivist attack to date. We might someday, and we have some plans for that sort of event because it's irresponsible not to. But really our primary defense against this is that when *I* go into a meeting with a product development group, and I hear them suggest something really stupid that would likely cause a public Internet-based backlash, I flat-out tell them it's a stupid and irresponsible thing to do, and they back down.
Sony is getting exactly what they deserve, and it's deplorable that rather than try to turn their *actions* around, they've accepted that they're always going to act evil and modified their security policies to suit a constant condition of "We have a giant target painted on our backs".
Re: (Score:2)
So how many times has Anon attacked GE?
Re: (Score:2)
So how many times has Anon attacked GE?
I'd argue that there is very little data on GE's website for Anon to brag about... And the fact that GE is in a business where you seldom make enemies. I mean, if your lightbulb burns out a little too soon, you don't get all mad at GE. They sell 'dead' products. And most of them are there in a heavily regulated / saturated / mature market. Hard to distinguish them from the competition.
All that makes it a company that is less 'hatable' than SONY that screws with their customers on a weekly basis.
Re: (Score:3)
I guess you underestimate the areas GE has spread into. There's GE Healthcare, GE Transportation, GE Aviation, GE Money Bank, GE Energy, GE Water, GE Real Estate, GE Insurance Solutions... I'd actually be surprised if they really produce anything anymore...
If any corporation has the potential to piss off a lot of people, it's probably GE. There aren't too many cookie jars they don't have a finger in.
Re: (Score:2)
So you want your personal data to be at the mercy of a bunch of self-righteous hackers? While it's not a substitute for a more consumer-friendly policy, securing their systems is something they should have done long ago.
After the horse left the barn (Score:2)
Can they turn on your Playstation Eye remotely? (Score:2)
All they have to do is push a download that turns on the Playstation Eye of people they don't like.
Hacktivism? Really? (Score:3)
So shutting off PSN access for millions of gamers is now considered hacktivism? Going after Sony's game division, which has almost nothing to do with Sony's corporate division, is now hacktivism?
I know that the Slashdot crowd is extremely anti-Sony but I fail to see how denying paying consumers the ability to play games is hacktivism. Or preventing dozens of new games from getting released on the PSN store, and allowing those companies and artists to sell their titles, is hacktivism.
Everybody needs an Anti-Cyber-Threat-Center! (Score:5, Funny)
NATO just dropped a few billion for one! Now SONY will have one! Where's yours!?!?!
I smell Y2k sized contract money now!
I am now a Anti-Cyber-Threat-Security-Response-Operations-Analysis-Coordination-Center Specialist!
In the train:
Passenger: "What line of work are you in?"
Me: "Cyber Security!"
Passenger: "Do I need that?"
Me: "Does your wife know about the email to your girlfriend on your laptop that I am reading right now?"
Passenger: "Ok, I'll buy some."
Passenger: "But do I need to wear that tinfoil hat . . . ?"
Re: (Score:3)
Oh yea, it's dot-com all over again! And I'm in the right line of business again, just in time, cyber security technology expert... no, wait, sounds too cheesy. Information security ... too formal. Snakeoil peddler... no, too honest...
I'll just go by the simple, humble title of IT security consultant. It should be good enough for a 300/hour rate, and that's good enough, I don't want to be greedy...
Hacktivists (Score:2)
Oh i hate the term. Hackers dont hack the phone calls of the staff or hack into cctv to do harm.
Political activists use legitimate methods to increase their influence.
If you hack into phone calls for purposes different from demonstrating a problem then you are not a hacker. if you use force (like the Anonymous asshats) you are not an activist.
Now they discredit political activists and hackers at the same time by calling them hacktivists, joining two very different things. in order discredit both and connect
Who decides what methods are legitimate? (Score:5, Insightful)
And who, pray tell, decides what is legitimate?
Answering that question is what politics is all about. The point of engaging in politics is to determine legitimacy. Look at any political movement and you will see this struggle to define legitimacy. Legitimacy is not the starting point: it is the outcome. You are begging the question.
Which is, of course, because you are trying to propagate your definition of what is legitimate. You are not describing politics: you are engaged in it. You are not a disinterested obsever: you are a participant.
Re: (Score:2)
Political activists use legitimate methods to increase their influence.
Yeah, like gerrymandering, suppressing voter turnout, diddling voting machines, and "losing" the ballots from precincts likely to vote the wrong way.
Re: (Score:2)
Legal is what the ruling party declares legal. Hey, I don't make the laws, I only get to twist them!
Re:Hacktivists (Score:4, Insightful)
Political activists use legitimate methods to increase their influence.
So Rosa Parks wasn't an activist when she sat on the whites-only seat on the bus? Her entire point was that what should have been legitimate wasn't. Activism isn't about increasing your influence (that's more NGO territory - lobbying for a good cause), it's about bringing public attention to your cause. Very often the most effective way of doing that is publicly defying the rules to make a point.
Sony rootkit (Score:4, Informative)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_rootkit [wikipedia.org]
Never forget, never forgive.
Re:Sony rootkit (Score:4, Insightful)
Why is this insightful? It is the same mentality that makes the MidEast a battleground for 6000 years.
Sony's CSO has invented time travel! (Score:4, Interesting)
TFA claims that Sony's new CSO, Brett Wahlin, "served as a counter-intelligence officer in the US Military for eight years during the Cold War." The final year of the cold war is generally agreed to be 1991, when the Soviet Union dissolved. This suggests he started working as a C-I officer no later than 1984. Yet the photo in his recent bio [sfisaca.org] suggests he's in his early 40s now. So either 1) he's a prodigy and worked for the US military during high school, or 2) he can travel in time. Either way, the hacktivists might have met their match! Well played, Sony.
Re: (Score:2)
or ... 3) Once again, Sony is lying.
Uh (Score:4, Insightful)
Why not orient your company and your policies so as not to actively piss off people who like tinkering with their own electronics and people who don't like DRM and spyware-riddled merchandise?
Cheapskates! (Score:2)
There are cushier jobs than leading Sony Entertainment Network’s burgeoning security shop, but Brett Wahlin was never one to shy from a challenge. So when the entertainment giant looked to revamp its security in the wake of the devastating hacking attacks against its PlayStation Network last year, the former McAfee Chief Security Officer answered the call.
McAfee, seriously? What, they couldnt shell out a few more bucks to get a guy from Norton? :)
Karma'a a bitch (Score:3)
Anti-Social (Score:5, Insightful)
Evidently Sony learned nothing from the cause/effect relationship of their brutal approach to both security and their users. Sony set the stage by deploying rootkits and other security attacks on their own customers. Then they retroactively deleted the Linux (OtherOS) option from PS3s, many of which they'd sold to hackers for the very purpose of "hacking Sony". Though OtherOS had been crippled from the beginning, there was little effort by PS3 hackers to crack the lockout from the hardware, until Sony tried shutting all OtherOS users down. Then hacking the PS3 became necessary for every PS3 Linux user.
It was a case of "when guns (OtherOSes) are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns (OtherOSes)". Why stop at just keeping what you paid for, when you had actually paid for more than you'd originally gotten? Sony had destroyed any ethical relationship, and the community was organized.
Now, I'm not pinning all or even most of the attacks on Sony beyond keeping Linux on the small PS3 Linux community - maybe not even any of them. But that episode showed the world Sony was a legitimate target. Then after some success in keeping what they paid for resulted in arresting the hacker, Sony was now a legit target for both legitimate hacking and just plain "bash the bad guy". Combine that with Sony's copyright overreaches, its region-encoding scams, its DVD backup denials (also broken and showing Sony both greedy and vulnerable) - Sony fanned the flames of backlash.
Now Sony is just escalating the conflict. It would be a lot cheaper to give hackers back Linux, this time with some support, to give them more of a common interest with Sony. Instead Sony is further defining itself as an enemy instead of a partner. Sony's awareness of social networks seems to be purely as either enemy or marketing victim. This will not end well. In fact it will not end, and many will suffer.
Firewall (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Another reason to hate Sony: the Dreamcast's fair shot was ruined by their lies. They released absurd specs that made everyone think the PS2 was much more powerful than it actually was.
Re: (Score:2)
Well yeah, she was dressed like a slut.
Re: (Score:2)
Yup. And here's where PR sets in. Instead of saying "Whoopsie, I guess we made a mistake, let's roll that back and rehire the security staff", they say "We now go forwards with a bold statement, displaying our dedication for the security of the data our valued customers entrust to us".
It's all in the delivery.
Re: (Score:3)
... didn't you make security staff cuts weeks before PSN got hacked?
Interesting that, isn't it?
i) They got seriously hacked. So, what were the security staff actually doing when they were employed?
ii) I wonder if some disgruntled ex-security staff member showed up on 4chan and spilled the beans?
The security staff (by all accounts) deserved to be sacked. Since Sony hasn't been able to tie it back to first causes (ie., disgruntled ex-security staff), instead they simply admit their security sucked and they're now falling for blowing wads of cash on security snakeoil sale