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Patch Tuesday

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Windows 7, 8.1, and 10 have updates.

Windows 7
November 13, 2018—KB4467106 (Security-only update)
November 13, 2018—KB4467107 (Monthly Rollup)

Windows 8.1
November 13, 2018—KB4467703 (Security-only update)
November 13, 2018—KB4467697 (Monthly Rollup)

Windows 10
Build 1809 –
November 13, 2018—KB4464455 (OS Build 17763.107)
November 13, 2018—KB4467708 (OS Build 17763.134)
Build 1803 – November 13, 2018—KB4467702 (OS Build 17134.407)
Build 1709 – November 13, 2018—KB4467686 (OS Build 16299.785)
Build 1703 – November 13, 2018—KB4467696 (OS Build 15063.1446)

Additionally Windows 8.1 & 10 have Flash updates.

Win10 “October” Update
Windows 10, version 1809 Re-Released
When you have it offered to you is anyone’s guess.
Media Creation Tool / ISOs available here: Download Windows 10 Disc Image (ISO File)

The Facebook Dilemma

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This topic has been making the rounds for a couple of days. I wanted to watch the entire thing before I passed it along.
The Facebook Dilemma is two, 50+ minute videos of a PBS Frontline special. It is the story of the dangers of Facebook. The first video deals more about the dangers to individuals. The second is about the dangers Facebook presents to society and democracies around the world. It then circles back to the dangers to individuals.
You’ll learn not only about these topics but about the stunning greed, arrogance, tone deafness, and outright deceit on these issues from the highest levels of Facebook.
In the end the only solution is to #DeleteFacebook.

“The promise of Facebook was to create a more open and connected world. But from the company’s failure to protect millions of users’ data, to the proliferation of “fake news” and disinformation, mounting crises have raised the question: Is Facebook more harmful than helpful? On Monday, Oct. 29, and Tuesday, Oct. 30, 2018, FRONTLINE presents The Facebook Dilemma. This major, two-night event investigates a series of warnings to Facebook as the company grew from Mark Zuckerberg’s Harvard dorm room to a global empire. With dozens of original interviews and rare footage, The Facebook Dilemma examines the powerful social media platform’s impact on privacy and democracy in the U.S. and around the world.”

PBS Frontline – The Facebook Dilemma

Patch Tuesday

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Windows Update

Windows 7 and 8.1 get over a dozen security updates.
Windows 7 – October 9, 2018—KB4462923 (Monthly Rollup)
Windows 8.1 – October 9, 2018—KB4462926 (Monthly Rollup)

Windows 10, “This update includes quality improvements. No new operating system features are being introduced in this update.”
Win10 also has over a dozen security updates.
Win10 1809 – October 9, 2018—KB4464330 (OS Build 17763.55)
Win10 1803 – October 9, 2018—KB4462919 (OS Build 17134.345)
Win10 1709 – October 9, 2018—KB4462918 (OS Build 16299.726)
Win10 1703 – October 9, 2018—KB4462937 (OS Build 15063.1387)
Win10 1607 – September 11, 2018—KB4457131 (OS Build 14393.2485)

Cold Boot Attack

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Security flaw in ‘nearly all’ modern PCs and Macs exposes encrypted data
“A firmware bug means existing security measures “aren’t enough to protect data in lost or stolen laptops,” says new security research”
(Thanks Dan!)

Everything you need to know to is in the excellent paper:
F-Secure’s Guide To Evil Maid Attacks

Geeks have always known that once someone has physical access to your PC (or Mac, or phone), given enough time, it will be compromised.
Conduct yourself accordingly, especially on mobile devices. Given that, IMHO it is all about putting hurdles in place to slow an attacker down and frustrate them.
Here is what I tell my friends when they ask about mobile tech device security:
– Use a BIOS/EFI password.
– Use an OS password.
– Use a password manager.
– Encrypt your important docs.
– Cover your webcam. I use these: Laptop Camera Cover Set
– Delete those compromising pics of yourself and/or your significant other (and stop taking them).
– Keep your system up to date. This means both the OS and the firmware.
– Backup, backup, backup

Patch Tuesday

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Sorry I’m a day late with this, yesterday was a long day at work.

Windows Update
Windows 7 and 8.1 get a few security updates.
Windows 10, “This update includes quality improvements. No new operating system features are being introduced in this update.”
Win10 1803 – September 11, 2018—KB4457128 (OS Build 17134.285)
Win10 1709 – September 11, 2018—KB4457142 (OS Build 16299.665)
Win10 1703 – September 11, 2018—KB4457138 (OS Build 15063.1324)
Win10 1607 – September 11, 2018—KB4457131 (OS Build 14393.2485)

Google Chrome Updated
“The stable channel has been updated to 69.0.3497.92 for Windows, Mac, and Linux…This update includes 2 security fixes.”
Download | Download standalone(full) | Download standalone 64-bit Windows version(full)
Android too:
“Chrome 69 (69.0.3497.91) for Android has been released and will be available on Google Play over the course of the next few weeks. This release contains bug fixes and improvements.”
Download

Win10 Insider
Installed Win10 Insider Preview on my dual-boot Win7/Win10 machine. Here is what it did to my Win7 install:

Thursday Random Stuff…

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Tor Browser and Tails Updated
Download Tor Browser
Download Tails

Paint.net 4.1
“This update converts some effects to use the GPU for rendering, resulting in huge performance gains. Copy/Paste can now be performed on selections, Bicubic resampling is now available for the Move Selected Pixels tool, and there are lots of little quality-of-life improvements and general bug fixes.”
Download

Stuff I bookmarked recently. Some off topic, some not:

Windows 10 support extended again: September releases now get 30 months
The headline is clickbait. Only Windows 10 Enterprise and Education versions will see this. IMHO this only reinforces the notion that home users are thought of as beta testers for businesses.
This Microsoft blog post explains it:
“All currently supported feature updates of Windows 10 Enterprise and Education editions (versions 1607, 1703, 1709, and 1803) will be supported for 30 months from their original release date…All feature releases of Windows 10 Home, Windows 10 Pro, and Office 365 ProPlus will continue to be supported for 18 months (this applies to feature updates targeting both March and September).”

Americans are changing their relationship with Facebook
“Just over half of Facebook users ages 18 and older (54%) say they have adjusted their privacy settings in the past 12 months, according to a new Pew Research Center survey. Around four-in-ten (42%) say they have taken a break from checking the platform for a period of several weeks or more, while around a quarter (26%) say they have deleted the Facebook app from their cellphone. All told, some 74% of Facebook users say they have taken at least one of these three actions in the past year.”

Senate Committee Vents About Hijacking Of Big Tech For Information War
“The leaders of the Senate intelligence committee vented Wednesday morning about what they called the shortcomings of major tech firms, which they argue have led Americans to become vulnerable to foreign disinformation campaigns.
“What is under attack is the idea that business as usual is good enough. The information your platforms disseminate changes minds, hardens opinions, helps people make sense of the world. … That’s how serious this is,” said Chairman Richard Burr, R-N.C.”
Twitter and Facebook CEO’s showed up. Google thinks they are to good to answer when called.

17 countries where teachers can earn the highest starting salary
“While the US is, according to World Bank data, the nation that pays high school teachers the sixth highest, according to the Learning Police Institute they’re actually paying teachers less and less — to the point where the country is experiencing a teacher shortage.
Data gathered from the National Center for Education Statistics actually suggests many states in the US have seen an average of a 4.6% salary reduction since the 2009-10 school year, which could be part of the reason the country is having to outsource teachers from overseas.”
The U.S. is ranked #6, ironically just above Mexico?!

Airport security trays carry more germs than toilets, study reveals
Just another reason I’ve no desire to fly.

There Are Whales Alive Today Who Were Born Before Moby Dick Was Written
“Bowheads seem to be recovering from the harvest of Yankee commercial whaling from 1848 to 1915, which wiped out all but 1,000 or so animals. Because the creatures can live longer than 200 years — a fact George discovered when he found an old stone harpoon point in a whale — some of the bowheads alive today may have themselves dodged the barbed steel points of the Yankee whalers.”

Man erects electrified fence to keep bus stop kids off his lawn
“The man — whose name is Bryan — said he was sick of students who cursed, fought, and littered at the bus stop.
“They don’t respect other peoples’ land,” Bryan said. “I pick up trash every day.”
Parents are ticked off. Perhaps they could teach their children to respect others property?

Applebees $2 Samuel Adams OctoberFest For All Of September
That’ll go nice with a Bourbon Street Steak!

Sources: Fox Sports Detroit’s Mario Impemba and Rod Allen involved in physical altercation
I haven’t watched many games this year because the Tigers suck. Not a surprise these 2 don’t like each other and the result shows in the booth. The broadcasting is sub-par. The only bright spot is the former Tiger great Kirk Gibson who is in the booth sparingly as he has Parkinson’s disease.

Burt Reynolds, Screen Legend and Sex Symbol, Dies at 82
One of my favorite actors. RIP brother.
Burt Reynolds Wikipedia
Burt Reynolds IMDB

Wednesday Random Stuff…

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Virtual Machine Host Software Updated
VMware Workstation Player 14.1.3 – 1 bugfix, OpenSSL update, Sprectre/Meltdown patch
VirtualBox 5.2.18 – a few bugfixes
Speaking of VMs. Many of you know I do most of my day-to-day web activity in a Linux VM. In the past I’ve used openSUSE. I have switched to Linux Mint 19 “Tara” Cinnamon. About the only thing I had to add after standard install was Chromium, Tor Browser, and HPLIP (HP printer drivers).

Foreshadow
Great. Just fracking great. Another Spectre type CPU vulnerability.
“Foreshadow is a speculative execution attack on Intel processors which allows an attacker to steal sensitive information stored inside personal computers or third party clouds. Foreshadow has two versions, the original attack designed to extract data from SGX enclaves and a Next-Generation version which affects Virtual Machines (VMs), hypervisors (VMM), operating system (OS) kernel memory, and System Management Mode (SMM) memory.”
Wired has a good breakdown.

The Guardian – How to turn off Google’s location tracking
After Monday’s news, I was gonna write up something on this and saw this article. It is well done.

Stuff I bookmarked recently. Some off topic, some not:

Ajit Pai grilled by lawmakers on why FCC spread “myth” of DDoS attack
“An FCC Inspector General (IG) investigation found that the FCC lied to members of Congress multiple times in letters that answered questions about DDoS attacks that never happened. Pai’s FCC claimed for more than a year that a May 2017 outage in the public comments system was caused by multiple DDoS attacks. In reality, the FCC system crashed because it was unable to handle an influx of comments triggered by comedian John Oliver asking viewers of his program Last Week Tonight to oppose Pai’s net neutrality repeal.”

Mystery Russian satellite’s behaviour raises alarm in US
“Russian intentions with respect to this satellite are unclear and are obviously a very troubling development,” she added, citing recent comments made by the commander of Russia’s Space Forces, who said adopting “new prototypes of weapons” was a key objective for the force.”

Sacramento welfare investigators track drivers to find fraud. Privacy group raises red flags.
“The EFF has a more skeptical view of the data-collection practice and said it’s “disturbing” that millions of people who are not suspected of a crime can be tracked with license plate photos.”

Suns Out, Guns Out
Remember our hero JJ Watt? Dude is ripped. I’m sure he will be destroying people. Don’t know how much NFL I will be watching this year but that is a topic for another day.
The Internet Reacts To JJ Watt’s Freakishly Large Arms In Latest Instagram Post

Patch Tuesday

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All supported Windows and Office versions have patches.
Windows 10 update history (not updated as of this writing)
Windows 7 and 8 have a few bugfixes and more Spectre/Meldown fixes.
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/4343900/windows-7-update-kb4343900
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/4343898/windows-81-update-kb4343898
See below for full breakdown.

Adobe Reader Updated
Download (EN-US)
All Downloads
APSB18-29 Security updates available for Adobe Acrobat and Reader

Stuff I bookmarked recently. Some off topic, some not:

In post-massacre Vegas, security policies clash with privacy values
&
Caesars Palace not-so-Praetorian guards intimidate DEF CON goers with searches [Updated]
“For safety and security, hotel team members will enter rooms and perform a standard wellness check, even if you have opted out of housekeeping services, posted a sign on your door, or otherwise refused team member entry. You may be asked to leave the hotel, if you do not comply with this company policy,”
Blog Post from Marc Rogers “who leads DEF CON’s security team”.
“I do not support or endorse these room searches or how they are executed. I sympathize with the challenge these hotels are facing but believe they need to take a harder look at the efficiency, impact and long term cost of this strategy.
We MUST NOT let our hotels become like our airports. If we do, then the terrorists win.”
Everything you do outside your room is filmed in Vegas, I get that. But inside your room should be another story. I had money stolen out of my hotel room by the maid 20 plus years ago. I haven’t allowed housekeeping in my room since. You come in my room unannounced and we are going at it.

Blue light from phone screens accelerates blindness, study finds
“Scientists say they have found how blue light from smartphones, laptops and other digital devices damages vision and can speed up blindness. Research by the University of Toledo in the US has revealed that prolonged exposure to blue light triggers poisonous molecules to be generated in the eye’s light-sensitive cells that can cause macular degeneration – an incurable condition that affects the middle part of vision.”
My S7 has a blue light filter and I am experimenting with it. Apple calls their blue light filter Night Shift.

2019 Chevrolet Silverado 1500 Driven: Longer, Lighter, More Fuel Efficient, and Extremely Refined
Base price, I repeat BASE PRICE is $30,000, for a fracking Work Truck.
“The crew cab Silverados I drove — a $50,995 LT Trail Boss and top of the line $62,535 High Country”

Back on the shelves: Samuel Adams OctoberFest
My favorite American Oktoberfest.

[Read more…] about Patch Tuesday

Weekend Random Stuff…

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Stuff I bookmarked recently. Some off topic, some not:

Intel Launches 9th Gen Core 8 Core and 6 Core CPUs on 1st October
No word on if Spectre and Meltdown are still an issue with these.

Here’s why you’re being kept in the dark about how your data is used
“In the wake of the Facebook/Cambridge Analytica scandal, people are more aware than ever of the tenuous nature of data collection, and more concerned about how securely tech and financial institutions catalog this data.And with good reason: according to the Identity Theft Resource Center, there were 1,579 data breaches in 2017, an alarming 44.7 percent uptick from the year before.”

Hydroelectric Dam Threatens to Wipe Out World’s Rarest Ape
“The world’s rarest great ape, discovered only in 2017, will not survive the building of a $1.6 billion hydroelectric power plant and dam in the middle of its remaining habitat in Sumatra, Indonesia, wildlife experts warn” The project ” is being financed and built by state-controlled Chinese companies under China’s Belt and Road.”
No cool.

Professors allow students to pick their own grade
Crap like this is one of the many reasons I’ve little respect for colleges or college degrees.

The ‘American Pickers’ Find the Aerosmith Van that Started It All
Kinda neat but they paid $25K for it?!

Woman killed by neighborhood dogs
Can you guess what breed of dog???

Chris Pine and Chris Hemsworth ‘Star Trek 4’ Future In Doubt as Talks Fall Through
Looks like Paramount tried to renege on previous deals.

There is a Tiger on the prowl in St. Louis. I’m gonna go see how that ends…