Blogger since 2002, political activist since 2003, geek since birth. Opinions informed by mixed-race, multi-ethnic, cis-female condition, further shaped by kind friends of all persuasions. Sci-tech frenemy, wannabe artist, decent cook, determined author, successful troublemaker. Mother of invention and two excessively smart-assed young adult kids. Attended School of Hard Knocks; Rather Unfortunate Smallish Private Business School in Midwest; Affordable Mid-State Community College w/evening classes. Self-employed at Tiny Consulting Business; previously at Large-ish Chemical Company with HQ in Midwest in multiple marginalizing corporate drone roles, and at Rather Big IT Service Provider as a project manager, preceded by a motley assortment of gigs before the gig economy was a thing. Blogging experience includes a personal blog at the original blogs.salon.com, managing editor for a state-based news site, and a stint at Firedoglake before landing here at emptywheel as technology’s less-virginal-but-still-accursed Cassandra.
The post-holiday season debris field continues to thin out, making its way by the truckful to the landfill. I wonder how much oil the season’s plastic wrappings consumed. Here’s what the trash man left behind this morning. Hackers caused power outage — the first of its kind? Marcy’s already posted about the electrical power disruption […]
Hear that sound? Like so many sighs of resignation? Yup, it’s the first Monday of the new year, and with it, a plethora of shiny resolutions slowly breached and broken like WiFi-enabled toys. One of my 2016 resolutions (which I hope will last more than a week) is a morning update here at emptywheel. Won’t […]
The Internet of Things (IoT) already includes refrigerators, televisions, slow cookers, automobiles, you name it. Most of these items have already experienced security problems, whether personal information leaks, or manipulative hacking. Now the IoT includes toys — and wow, what a surprise! They’re riddled with privacy and security problems, too. Like VTech’s privacy breach, exposing […]
[Note: You can join Professor Stephen Emmott for a @reddit AMA TODAY Friday 04-DEC-2015 at 4:00 pm (UK) / 11:00 am EST.] If we learned a cataclysmic, extinction-level event was hurtling toward our planet, how would we respond? How should we respond if we know we can minimize the threat? This is in essence the […]
Reports this last week that Volkswagen deployed “defeat devices” — software designed to cheat diesel passenger vehicle emissions controls tests — revealed more than an automobile manufacturing group run amok. One might suspect European Union’s emissions governance after looking at a timeline of events. NOTE: This timeline is in progress and is subject to updating as […]
Air travelers along the U.S. east coast experienced flight cancellations and delays this past Saturday, due to initially unspecified “technical issues” attributed to the air traffic control system. Beginning some time late morning, hundreds of flights were affected by the problem. The FAA’s service was restored around 4:00 p.m. EDT, though it would take hours […]
Remember the data breach at JPMorgan Chase, exposing 76 million accounts to “hack-mapping“? Last October, JPMorgan Chase publicly disclosed the intrusion and exposure to investors in an 8-K filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The statement complied with the SEC’s CF Disclosure Guidance: Topic No. 2 – Cybersecurity. Other companies whose customers’ data have been […]
This is a working post for discussion of today’s outages. United Airlines grounded its flights for roughly two hours this morning; the FAA’s advisory indicated an automation-related issue, and subsequent communications from United said it was a “network connectivity” problem. UAL also briefly grounded flights on June 2nd, due to “automation issues.” Now the New […]
The time has come,’ the Walrus said, To talk of many things: Of shoes — and ships — and sealing-wax — Of cabbages — and kings — And why the sea is boiling hot — And whether pigs have wings.’ (Excerpt, Lewis Carroll’s The Walrus and the Carpenter) Here’s an open information security topic worth examining […]
We already knew Sony Pictures Entertainment’s (SPE) hack was bad. We knew that the parent, Sony Group, had been exposed to cyber attacks of all kinds for years across its subsidiaries, and slow to effect real changes to prevent future attacks. And we knew both Sony Group and SPE shot themselves in the feet, literally asking for […]