Group items tagged

I'm just going to resubmit the bookmark directly to this page so I'll be sure it ends up publicly in the group. This wasn't mentioned in Singh chapter 2, but it was created around the time period discussed in the chapter. (Plus, it's one of my favorite articles I've read in Wired so I really wanted to use it as a bookmark.) The article discusses the strategies used to break this cipher, some of which, such as frequency analysis, we have talked about in class. It's also just fascinating to read about the Oculists and their history.

Interesting article on how public-key encryption is used to keep information safe during financial transactions online. The article discusses weakness in basic public-key encryption schemes and how some of these schemes have been improved.

This video talks about a hack done by a group of Russian hackers that gained access to 1.2 billion records, and discusses the idea that perhaps passwords are no longer the best way to protect our information. It's a quick video, but what was interesting to me was that I hadn't even considered that something other than the current password system could protect our information.

I found this article interesting because it actually mentions the "firesheep" add-on we discussed during class as well as the encryption of our data.

Good find. It's important to note that this piece is from 2011, shortly after the Firesheep controversy. As far as I can tell, HTTPS use is now mandatory, at least on Facebook.com. I don't know about the Facebook app, however. That might be something to look into.

Gives you tools to make sure your information is safe.

One word of caution: This piece is from 2012, before we learned what the NSA was up to. It's quite possible that some of these mechanisms are now known to be insecure.

My short list of people to follow on Twitter who tweet about cryptography, security, and privacy.

What a tangled web we weave, indeed. About 40 percent of the world's population uses the Web for news, entertainment, communication and myriad other purposes [source: Internet World Stats]. Yet even as more and more people log on, they are actually finding less of the data that's stored online.

6. Use Strong Passwords We like to beat this dead horse about making sure to utilize uncrackable passwords, but it's never more important than when banking and shopping online. Our tips for creating a unique password can come in handy during a time of year when shopping around probably means creating new accounts on all sorts of e-commerce sites.

A pre-WWII NSA document on advanced military cryptography which was declassified in 2014. This leads to the question of what impact disclosing these military secrets has on encryption and decryption of messages in future wars, and also why were these documents released in the first place.

This article provides information for how to make your personal information more private through Google. While Google does have access to a large amount of your information, this allows you to better control what is shared online.

Ransomware shuts down a hospital for more than a week. This time, there's a $3 million demand.

More on the technicalities of the FBI's request to Apple.

This piece captures some of the complexity of the surveillance / privacy debate as it applies to Snowden and the Paris attacks.

Seriously, folks, you need better passwords.

Fairly easy to read argument from a crypto expert (Columbia University computer scientist Steven Bellovin) on the dangers of "back doors" in computer systems.

Gives information on several uses of crypto in life; provides some information on multiple uses

A round up of current conversations about surveillance and privacy in light of the Paris attacks.

An article debating security/surveillance vs. privacy post-Snowden leaks, written fall 2014 for Stanford Lawyer Magazine

Some pre-Internet history of ransomware.