March 2020 - wlug - list.wlug.org.nz

Hack Turns Apple's iPhone Into An Android
by Peter Reutemann 07 Mar '20

07 Mar '20

'Ten years ago, David Wang pulled off a remarkable trick, installing Android on the first-generation iPhone. Now Wang and his colleagues at cybersecurity startup Corellium are doing it again with the ostentatiously titled Project Sandcastle. From a report: And Forbes got an exclusive hands-on look at their Android for iPhone product ahead of its public release scheduled for later this Wednesday. The timing is sure to have Apple fanboys rubbernecking: Corellium is in the middle of being sued by Apple. As previously reported by Forbes, in August last year, Corellium was taken to court over Apple claims the startup breached copyright laws by creating software versions of the iPhone for security and testing. The case took a surprise turn late last month when Apple subpoenaed Spanish banking giant Santander and the $50 billion U.S. military and intelligence contractor L3Harris. But Corellium has lofty ambitions for Project Sandcastle, saying that it'll actually show how Apple's walled garden, which it has fiercely protected since launching its flagship phone in 2007, can be deconstructed and taken over by others' software. "Project Sandcastle is about having fun building something new from the sand -- from the literal silicon of the hardware," said Corellium CEO Amanda Gorton, in a statement sent to Forbes. "Apple restricts iPhone users to operate inside a sandbox, but users own that hardware, and they should be able to use that hardware the way they want. So where sandboxes create limits and boundaries on the hardware that users own, sandcastles provide an opportunity to create something new and wonderful from the limitless bounds of your imagination."' -- source: https://apple.slashdot.org/story/20/03/06/1954210 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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It’s Not All CUDA At The High End
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 06 Mar '20

06 Mar '20

This item <https://www.nextplatform.com/2020/03/05/software-evolution-on-ornls-summit-…> reports on an interview with Dr Tjerk Straatsma, group lead for scientific computing at ORNL. Seems their supers have made heavy use of NVidia GPUs up to now, but this is set to change: Frontier, the next system for the OLCF, will have AMD CPUs and GPUs. To prepare for this system, software developers may want to make changes to their programming approach, with OpenMP directive-based and HIP native offloading as the most comparable to the OpenACC and CUDA approaches on Summit today. I wonder what happened to OpenCL as the cross-platform architecture for GPU computing?

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Let’s Encrypt changes course on certificate revocation
by Peter Reutemann 06 Mar '20

06 Mar '20

'Earlier this week, Let's Encrypt announced that it would revoke roughly three million—2.6 percent—of its currently active certificates. Last night, however, the organization announced that it would delay the revocation of many of those certificates in the interest of Internet health. The impact of the revocation on system administrators was and is significant due to the very short window of maintenance allowed before the revocation went into effect. Roughly thirty-six hours were available from the initial announcement to the beginning of scheduled certificate revocation. Half an hour prior to the scheduled revocations, more than one million affected certificates had still not been renewed, and Let's Encrypt announced an additional delay to give administrators more time.' -- source: https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2020/03/lets-encrypt-holds-o… Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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Almost Half of Mobile Malware Are Hidden Apps
by Peter Reutemann 06 Mar '20

06 Mar '20

'Certain apps are hiding themselves and stealing resources and data from mobile devices, according to a new report by security firm McAfee. From a report: This is a growing threat comprising almost half of all malicious mobile malware, and a 30% increase from 2018, said Raj Samani, chief scientist and McAfee fellow, who authored the Q1 2020 McAfee Mobile Threat Report. "This shows where the focus from criminals [is] on the mobile platform, which is in stark contrast to non-mobile malware,'' Samani said. A new malware family called LeifAccess or Shopper is taking advantage of the accessibility features in Android to create accounts, download apps, and post reviews, according to the report. LeifAccess, "is a broad campaign [and] is using alternate methods to achieve installation but thereafter trying to achieve legitimacy to the user with fake warnings," Samani said. For example, LeifAccess does not create an icon or shortcut, "so it's not immediately obvious that the app is installed ... but for some of the hidden apps within the report, malicious mobile attacks will even masquerade as a legitimate app," he said.' -- source: https://it.slashdot.org/story/20/03/04/2021233 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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Ampere Altra is the First 80-core ARM-based Server Processor
by Peter Reutemann 06 Mar '20

06 Mar '20

'Ampere has unveiled the industry's first 80-core ARM-based 64-bit server processor today in a bid to outdo Intel and Advanced Micro Devices in datacenter chips. From a report: Ampere announced today that it has begun providing samples of the Ampere Altra processor for modern cloud and edge computing datacenters. The Ampere Altra processor runs on 210 watts and is targeted at such server applications as data analytics, artificial intelligence, database, storage, telco stacks, edge computing, web hosting, and cloud-native applications. Intel dominates about 95.5% of the server chip market with its x86-based processors, and AMD has the rest. But Ampere is targeting power-efficient, high-performance, and high-memory capacity features. Renee James, former president of Intel and CEO of Ampere, said in an interview with VentureBeat that the chip is faster than a 64-core AMD Epyc processor and Intel's 28-core high-end Xeon "Cascade Lake" chip.' -- sources: https://hardware.slashdot.org/story/20/03/04/2027230 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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Intel CSME Bug Worse Than Previously Thought
by Peter Reutemann 06 Mar '20

06 Mar '20

'Security researchers say that a bug in one of Intel's CPU technologies that was patched last year is actually much worse than previously thought. From a report: "Most Intel chipsets released in the last five years contain the vulnerability in question," said Positive Technologies in a report published today. Attacks are impossible to detect, and a firmware patch only partially fixes the problem. To protect devices that handle sensitive operations, researchers recommend replacing CPUs with versions that are not impacted by this bug. Only the latest Intel 10th generation chips are not vulnerable, researchers said. The actual vulnerability is tracked as CVE-2019-0090, and it impacts the Intel Converged Security and Management Engine (CSME), formerly called the Intel Management Engine BIOS Extension (Intel MEBx). ' -- source: https://it.slashdot.org/story/20/03/05/149222 Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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GCHQ’s Advice For Securing Smart-Home Gadgets
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 05 Mar '20

05 Mar '20

For those who can’t be bothered trying to understand the ins and outs of security concerns with “Internet-Of-Things” devices <https://www.theregister.co.uk/2020/03/03/ncsc_smart_gadget_security_tips/> such as cameras and baby monitors, GCHQ advises: * If your camera comes with a default password, change it to a secure one – connecting three random words which you'll remember is a good way to do this. You can usually change your password using the app you use to manage the device. * Keep your camera secure by regularly updating security software. Not only does this keep your devices secure, but often adds new features and other improvements. * If you do not use the feature that lets you remotely access the camera from the internet, it is recommended you disable it.

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Let’s Encrypt discovers CAA bug, must revoke customer certificates
by Peter Reutemann 05 Mar '20

05 Mar '20

'On Leap Day, Let's Encrypt announced that it had discovered a bug in its CAA (Certification Authority Authorization) code. The bug opens up a window of time in which a certificate might be issued even if a CAA record in that domain's DNS should prohibit it. As a result, Let's Encrypt is erring on the side of security and safety rather than convenience and revoking any currently issued certificates it can't be certain are legitimate, saying: Unfortunately, this means we need to revoke the certificates that were affected by this bug, which includes one or more of your certificates. To avoid disruption, you'll need to renew and replace your affected certificate(s) by Wednesday, March 4, 2020. We sincerely apologize for the issue. If you're not able to renew your certificate by March 4, the date we are required to revoke these certificates, visitors to your site will see security warnings until you do renew the certificate.' -- source: https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2020/03/lets-encrypt-revokin… Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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Microsoft Retiring MCSA/MCSD/MCSE Certifications
by Lawrence D'Oliveiro 04 Mar '20

04 Mar '20

Came across this Microsoft article <https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/learning/community-blog-post.aspx?BlogId=8&…> (linked from this YouTube video <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=laaGuJItNCM>) explaining that Microsoft is “retiring” its more broad-based MCSA, MCSD and MCSE certifications in favour of a range of narrower, “role-based” ones. You’ll notice in the diagram on that page that everything starts with the cloud now: Azure, Dynamics 365 and Microsoft 365. And as we know, Microsoft has previously admitted that Azure is more about Linux instances rather than Windows ones. Myself, I never understood the emphasis on vendor-specific certifications. They have a short shelf-life, requiring continual “refreshing” or “updating” to new product versions--basically another revenue stream for the vendor.

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Cisco: Avoid Coronavirus, Stay Home, Use Webex
by Peter Reutemann 04 Mar '20

04 Mar '20

'Ars Technica: Networking giant Cisco is getting into the coronavirus monitoring and mitigation game with its Webex remote meeting property. The company notes that in the wake of mandates issued to employees to halt travel plans and/or work from home, traffic across its Webex backbone has increased significantly. Webex meeting traffic connecting Chinese users to global workplaces has increased by a factor of 22 since the outbreak began; traffic in other Asian countries is up by 400 percent or more, and free signup rates in impacted countries have increased 700 percent or more. In response, Cisco is offering temporarily unlimited usage (with no time restrictions) in all countries where the service is available (full list here), not just the ones worst hit by coronavirus. The company is also offering free 90-day licenses to businesses that are not currently Webex customers and offering free upgrades to customers whose current plan is insufficient to accommodate increased traffic due to the outbreak. In the worst affected countries, telepresence and remote work software like Webex is currently the only alternative to a complete shutdown of activities. In its press release, Cisco highlights the Nesbitt Center, an organization working with disabled young adults in Hong Kong. All Hong Kong schools, including the Nesbitt Center, have been required to suspend day programs during the outbreak. Webex videoconferencing has allowed the Nesbitt Center to continue delivering educational sessions despite the lockdown. Ars Technica also recommends Jitsi, a "free and open source software, offering video call and screen sharing capabilities." There's also Jitsi Meet for people "who just need to get something done on-the-fly with no setup at all." Do you have a favorite remote work software?' -- source: https://tech.slashdot.org/story/20/03/03/2013226/cisco-avoid-coronavirus-st… Cheers, Peter -- Peter Reutemann Dept. of Computer Science University of Waikato, NZ +64 (7) 858-5174 http://www.cms.waikato.ac.nz/~fracpete/ http://www.data-mining.co.nz/

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