Numb3rs

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Una altra s�rie collonuda arriba als USA, per� ac� supose que no la veurem en molt de temps (potser mai): Numb3rs (web del club de fans).

Rob Morrow �s l’agent de l’FBI Don Eppes, qui recluta el seu germ� i geni matem�tic, Charli (David Krumholtz), per a ajudar l’FBI a resoldre un ampli ventall de crims inexplicables a Los Angeles. Des de dues perspectives ben diferents, els germans se’n fan c�rrec dels crims m�s estrans, ajudats per la companya de Don, Terry Lake (Sabrina Lloyd) i el nou agent de l’FBI David Sinclair (Alimi Ballard). Son pare, Alan (Judd Hirsch), est� encantat de veure els seus fills treballar junts, per� tem que la seua natura competitiva els porte problemes. El company de Charlie, el f�sic Dr Larry Fleinhardt (Peter MacNicol), li recomana a Charlie que es concentre m�s als seus estudis i menys als afers de l’FBI. Inspirada en fets reals, Numb3rs mostra com la conflu�ncia de treball policial i matem�tiques ens proporciona revelacions inesperades i respostes a les q�estions criminals m�s sorprenents.

Qu� puc dir? He vist el cap�tol 1 i m’ha semblat prou interessant.

A m�s, �s una alegria per als seguidors de Rob Morrow (el metge de Doctor en Alaska) i Peter MacNicol (el "bizcochito" d’Ally McBeal). Els dos ho fan prou b� al seu paper.

Qui no veig b� en el seu paper �s Alimi Ballard. Ho sent, per� cada vegada que apareix l’imagine amb un somriure a la cara, i aix� no quadra amb el paper seri�s que li han posat. En comptes d’Alimi Ballard, havera estat molt millor Victor Garber (Jack Bristow en Alias).

Llic�ncies que expiren

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Cada vegada, m�s empreses ofereixen el software (i fins i tot el hardware) com a servei, no com a producte. Aix� vol dir que paguem una llic�ncia que ens atorga dret a un temps d’�s limitat (per exemple, un any; i despr�s d’eixe any, l’aplicaci� deixa de funcionar)

Sona malament, veritat? Per� sembla que tot val en a�� de la inform�tica i les telecomunicacions (ara en diuen “tecnologies de la informaci�”) i poca gent s’estranya o posa pegues.

Per demostrar com d’estranyes s�n aquestes llic�ncies d’�s per temps limitat, hi ha hi fa objectes del m�n real (una cadira, per exemple) amb llic�ncies d’�s per temps limitat. Revelador.

Will we see RSS spreading virus?

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News aggregators have lately become popular, because they make you more efficient: when a website (usually a weblog) is updated, new articles and/or comments spread like e-mail to arrive into your news aggregator. You save time, so you usually end up doubling the sites you used to read.

My point is, when will we see RSS feeds spreading virus? It’s not as difficult as you may think, and I’m going to ellaborate on this.

Imagine your news aggregator uses the Internet Explorer engine (full of bugs and vulnerabilities), or its own engine (and that engine has bugs). We already have the first stone in the path to become infected: a news aggregator that can be exploited. (If you use an online news aggregator like BlogLines think of a vulnerability in your browser instead).

But for a news aggregator to be exploited, we first need to receive a RSS feed trying to fuck us. Is this impossible? No. I can think of several ways to do it:

  • Domain hijacking A malicious hacker steals your domain and in a maximum of 30 minutes (the time DNS updates need to spread), he can start to send virus, trojans or god-knows-what bogus articles to your subscribers
  • DNS poisoning. Analogue to the previous one.
  • A vulnerability in your web server, weblog software, database, lost password or any other way an attacker could use to publish a bogus article in your RSS feed as if he was you.

Summary: as news aggregators are the applications most ressembling to e-mail clients, I predict we will see in a near future attacks ressembling the ones we suffer in e-mail.

NB: Where "RSS" you can also think of Atom or RDF.

Googling the alphabet

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So, where are we taken if we enter a single letter from the alphabet in Google and hit “I’m feeling lucky”? It depends on which Google you are using.

Google.com:

Google.es (searching only pages in Spanish)