• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

World News Center

Everything you want to know about anything that's meaningful

  • News
  • Reviews
  • About
  • Contact Us
You are here: Home / 2018 / Archives for May 2018

Archives for May 2018

Your Traitorous Home

May 24, 2018 by Bill McCormick

Your stuff hates you and has sold you out.
Once upon a time your home was your safe place. The locale you could count on to allow you to decompress, relax, maybe sucka brewski and catch up on Game of Thrones. It’s the place where you, and your family, can sit, talk, and compare notes on the day gone by. Homes are, by hopeful definition, happy places. I truly hope yours is. But, as time has gone on, people have added more and more gadgets in their homes. To make life easier, more fun, more secure, or some combination thereof. You can talk to your gadget and it will do your bidding. You can monitor your gadget at your office or on the road to see who is knocking on your door in your absence. You can program music, set times on your lights, and all sorts of nifty things that make you feel as though you’re in charge. I’m sorry to inform you you couldn’t be more wrong if you tried.

Your devices, cool though they may be, are basically designed to let in thieves who want to steal your stuff.

No, I’m not kidding.

I’ll give you an example. Garage door openers. They’re cool, aren’t they? Especially when the weather’s shitty. Just push the little button, up goes the door, and you’re inside safe and dry. In the old days that was all that needed to be considered. Now garage door openers are connected to your home security system, have their own app so you can open, or close, the door from any location, and can provide data on the energy usage in the garage so you can adjust temperatures and so on accordingly.

All great features. But each uses wi-fi to communicate. And, unless you have set up a distinct network for each, which no one seems to do because it’s a hassle and requires unique passwords for each device, you’re home is open to anyone with a laptop and some basic software.

All of this has a name. It’s called the Internet of Things or IoT for short.If you click that link you will find an excellent article by Margaret Rouse explaining how to do the stuff you firmly believe you’ll never have to do. I was going to quote it but I’ve learned that fear is a better motivator than calm advice so, instead, I’m going to tell you how a glorified goldfish bowl brought down a heavily guarded casino.

Yes, this is true. And, yes, it can happen to you.

Oscar Williams-Grut, over at Business Insider, has the whole story.

Nicole Eagan, the CEO of Darktrace, told the WSJ CEO Council Conference in London on Thursday: “There’s a lot of internet-of-things devices, everything from thermostats, refrigeration systems, HVAC systems, to people who bring in their Alexa devices into the offices. There’s just a lot of IoT. It expands the attack surface, and most of this isn’t covered by traditional defenses.”

Eagan gave one memorable anecdote about a case Darktrace worked on in which a casino was hacked via a thermometer in an aquarium in the lobby.

“The attackers used that to get a foothold in the network,” she said. “They then found the high-roller database and then pulled that back across the network, out the thermostat, and up to the cloud.”

Robert Hannigan, who ran the British government’s digital-spying agency, Government Communications Headquarters, from 2014 to 2017, appeared alongside Eagan on the panel and agreed that hackers’ targeting of internet-of-things devices was a growing problem for companies.

“With the internet of things producing thousands of new devices shoved onto the internet over the next few years, that’s going to be an increasing problem,” Hannigan said. “I saw a bank that had been hacked through its CCTV cameras, because these devices are bought purely on cost.”

He called for regulation to mandate safety standards.

“It’s probably one area where there’ll likely need to be regulation for minimum security standards, because the market isn’t going to correct itself,” he said. “The problem is these devices still work — the fish tank or the CCTV camera still work.”

See? That’s the thing. If your stuff works you don’t think about it. The garage door opens, the fish are still alive, your central air unit adjusts your personal climate regularly and correctly, and so on. When you ask Alexa to play three hours of polka classics it doesn’t let you down.

But, and this is important, hackers no longer need to render a device useless to steal your stuff. in fact, the longer it stays active the more they can steal.

“But what can they get from me? My garage door doesn’t know any of my personal info.”

I hear that a lot.

And, you’re correct insofar as it goes. But I bet dollars to donuts you also have an app from your bank on your phone. And, if you’re like many people these days, you also have all your contacts, your schedule, and even more personal information.

If they get into your garage door app they have access to all of that. They will have bypassed your incredible password (usually either password or 123456) and have complete access to everything you carry with you. Given a little more time they’ll also have access to everything on your home computers, which hold the main programs, every time you fire up your computer to check the latest updates on Daenerys Targaryen.

You could easily wake up one morning and find your bank account drained, your friends getting wonderful updates from you telling them about the joys of Viagra, and your family signed up for a variety of expensive things you neither want nor need.

The latter will be items or tickets they will try to get refunded to a clean credit card. It’s easier to do than you might think.

Now you’re broke, turgid, and heartbroken.

And here’s the really shitty part. Unless you have state-of-the-art insurance there’s almost nothing you can do about it. You can stop the bleeding, of course, but getting anything back is nigh on impossible. By the time you discover it your money, and all your info, is in a different country.

And that’s the least of it. They now have your identity, financial history, and personal references. There will be a new you living it up in Moscow by nightfall.

As of this writing over 60% of businesses have no IoT protection. Worse, once in your system they can use it as a starting point to infiltrate your neighbors and anyone else they can cadge a signal from. One such attack shut down electric grids in Europe and America to the tune of $110 MIL.

All that from your garage door opener.


Listen to Bill McCormick on WBIG (FOX! Sports) every Friday around 9:10 AM.
contact Bill McCormick
Your Ad Can Be Here Now!

Filed Under: News Tagged With: garage door, home, internet of things, iot, opener, security

Them Versus Them

May 3, 2018 by Bill McCormick

None you know, all you should – image by John Jones (ICC)
It’s hard to believe that once, not that long ago, movies about superheroes were so few and far between that any attempt to do the genre justice, no matter how lame, was heralded by fans as the best thing to happen to things in the history of things. And, as I noted before, those movies got co-opted by major studios, watered down, and turned into the movie franchises we know and love today. So far so good. I guess. At least the groundwork was laid for superhero movies to start tackling some real world issues. Wonder Woman managed to address, and then move past, the genocide of Native Americans in a single scene, but Black Panther hit the issues of racism and human trafficking head on and never flinched. To be fair to Wonder Woman it had a lot on its plate before the first scene was shot. Many were quick to dismiss a film directed by a woman, starring a woman, about a woman who is famously bisexual. That last part the film dealt with tastefully and with humor.

But now, thanks to the internet and proliferation of choices, an ugly subset of humans have reared their heads and seem determined to force issues that don’t exist. Mostly they want people to choose between Marvel and DC.

The theme runs like this; Marvel makes great movies for the whole family that tend to preserve traditional family values. You can also note that Marvel was the main bastion of white male heroes as an underlying theme there. DC, on the other hand, is a dark place filled with death and sexuality that should be forever shunned. DC’s whiteness is ignored in these cases for reasons I can’t fathom. It isn’t like Batman or Superman are minorities unless you want to stretch the illegal alien motif to its breaking point.

And this silliness isn’t happening in a vacuum. It’s out in the open on Rotten Tomatoes website and many others that allow fan interaction. Most have, to some degree or another, downplayed fan input to keep it from spilling over on their main pages. RT, for example, has no fan scores on its front page. You have to click the movie title to see those rankings.

Now, like all cliches, there is some truth there. Marvel espouses a lighter tone than DC. Marvel also uses the exact same color palette for every film. DC does not. Marvel marketed their films better than any other company, even before they tied up with Disney. And their marketing is consistent from film to film. Except for Black Panther, which caught a bunch of middle aged white guys with their knickers twisted. But they turned that to their advantage, so good for them.

However, there is one major difference between Marvel and DC that does not get addressed since doing so would add some much needed perspective.

Marvel released almost a dozen movies to introduce its universe. DC has, for all intents and purposes, released its universe and will now backfill in with character driven movies. Batman V Superman and Justice League were essentially one long movie to get all your favorites on screen. Marvel has done nothing with their villains but DC released Suicide Squad. While not an amazing movie by any measure, it did get the backstories and introductions out of the way for a slate of characters who will populate smaller films for years to come.

And, this must be noted, fans of DC have bought into this. You wouldn’t know it by the message boards but it’s true. The last five DC releases have earned well over two billion dollars. No matter how you cut that pie there’s plenty for everyone.

Marvel has earned more but, after Infinity War finishes, they only have two or three more possible tent pole films; Black Panther Two (assuming he survives Infinity War), Spiderman II (same caveat as Black Panther) and Captain Marvel. Antman & Wasp is not a major film, although I bet it’ll be a lot of fun. There’s nothing seriously planned for X-Men or Fantastic Four, Deadpool is slated to conclude its run after this movie, and Venom is going to be a hard “R” celebration of violence porn, which I will also enjoy. DC, on the other hand, has numerous films coming out that could each stand as a tent pole; Aquaman, Wonder Woman 2, Shazam, Batman, Cyborg, The Flash, Black Adam with Duane Johnson, the all female crime film featuring Harley Quinn, and, at least, four or five more.

In other words, the playing field is changing.

Okay, that’s a brief look at the business involved, let’s look at the franchises. It is entirely possible to like both of them. I do. My girlfriend, who is late to the superhero game as she never read comics, loves them all. Despite what you see online more people fall into this category than not.

Simply put, there’s no need to hate. The plan for each franchise is wildly different, and the execution of each, while occasionally flawed (I’m looking at you Iron Man III & Man of Two Million Killed), have given fans something they’ve been hoping for all along. a chance to see their heroes come to life.

Both franchises need to do more, much more, to embrace diversity and representation. And fans need to hold them to that. The good news is that fans are. They are doing so the only way Hollywood understands. With their pocketbooks. Little girls, and people of color of all ages, didn’t walk out of Wonder Woman and Black Panther, respectively, crying and hugging each other because there was a funny smell in the ventilation system. Those movies touched them, moved them, and promised more to come.

Hopefully much more.

And there’s another part of this that gets overlooked. DC has been building its television universe to the point that it’s now overflowing off of the CW and developing its own channel. Marvel’s attempts at television have yielded Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and the Defenders universe on Netflix. All great shows, but they need the cinematic universe to survive, at least by reference. The DC shows work as stand-alone properties. They even have their own Superman and no one blinked. Essentially they have a firmer foundation to build from. Thus they can bring Teen Titans to the screen, currently entitled Titans, and still have those characters appear in films with different actors.

DC, it should be noted, also has the best superhero cartoons out there. Marvel doesn’t even try anymore instead limiting its animation licenses to stuff for Disney’s kids’ channel. Fortunately there is no plan for Spider Babies or anything like that, but the shows do skew young and are brightly colored.

Whoo, that’s a lot of shit to parse. So what does it mean for fans?

Well, for one, it means there will be a hell of lot of superhero stuff they can enjoy if they can get off their high hobby horses and quit sniping. A boy can dream, can’t he? As for me, it means I’m going to be buying a lot of popcorn, continuing to ignore the trolls, and parking my fat ass in a comfy seat right next to my girlfriend to cheer on the capes and cowls as they appear.

The rest of you should try it too. It’s far less stressful and a lot more fun.

But you have to do it without my girlfriend. Get your own.


Listen to Bill McCormick on WBIG (FOX! Sports) every Friday around 9:10 AM.
contact Bill McCormick
Your Ad Can Be Here Now!

Filed Under: News, Reviews Tagged With: dc, diversity, future, marvel, superheroes

Primary Sidebar

Archives

  • March 2023
  • October 2022
  • May 2022
  • April 2022
  • March 2022
  • December 2021
  • October 2021
  • July 2021
  • June 2021
  • April 2021
  • November 2020
  • July 2020
  • June 2020
  • May 2020
  • March 2020
  • February 2020
  • January 2020
  • December 2019
  • November 2019
  • October 2019
  • September 2019
  • August 2019
  • July 2019
  • June 2019
  • May 2019
  • April 2019
  • March 2019
  • February 2019
  • January 2019
  • December 2018
  • November 2018
  • September 2018
  • July 2018
  • June 2018
  • May 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • February 2018
  • January 2018
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • February 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015
  • November 2015
  • October 2015
  • September 2015
  • August 2015
  • July 2015
  • June 2015
  • May 2015
  • April 2015
  • March 2015
  • February 2015
  • January 2015
  • December 2014
  • November 2014
  • October 2014
  • September 2014
  • August 2014
  • July 2014
  • June 2014
  • May 2014
  • April 2014
  • March 2014
  • February 2014
  • January 2014
  • December 2013
  • November 2013
  • October 2013
  • September 2013
  • August 2013
  • July 2013
  • June 2013
  • May 2013
  • April 2013
  • March 2013
  • February 2013
  • January 2013
  • December 2012
  • November 2012
  • October 2012
  • September 2012
  • August 2012
  • July 2012
  • June 2012
  • May 2012
  • April 2012
  • March 2012
  • February 2012
  • January 2012
  • December 2011
  • November 2011
  • October 2011
  • September 2011
  • August 2011
  • July 2011
  • June 2011
  • May 2011
  • April 2011
  • March 2011
  • February 2011
  • January 2011
  • December 2010
  • November 2010
  • October 2010
  • September 2010

Copyright © 2023 · Metro Pro on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in