31 Years of the Digest ... founded August 21, 1981
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The Telecom Digest for September 15, 2012
Volume 31 : Issue 218 : "text" Format
====== 31 years of TELECOM Digest -- Founded August 21, 1981 ======
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Telecom and VOIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) Digest for the
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Date: Fri, 14 Sep 2012 09:01:16 -0400
From: ajbcommconsulting@frontier.com (Jim Bennett)
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: Smartphone? Presto! 2-Way Radio
Message-ID: <50532A9C.5020202@frontier.com>
As seen last week in the NY Times:
>
> They work on iPhones, iPads, iPod Touches, Android phones and Windows
> phones. You open the app, tap someone's name, hold down the big Talk
> button and speak. A second after you start talking - yes, even before
> you're finished - your voice bursts to life, extremely clearly, on
> your friend's phone, wherever it may be in the world.
>
> Your buddy can respond to you by pressing his own Talk button, and
> the conversation is under way.
> <snip>
Astounding. Yet another amazing new digital technology. Who would have
ever even thought it possible? A box that magically transmits your
voice using radio waves, and then, through a system of networked
repeaters, it can be heard on another box at a distant location. This
is absolutely the most amazing new thing I have seen in decades.
We owe a debt of gratitude to the news media, which does an excellent
job of keeping us informed about all this new technology.
Just think how hard the previous generations had it. For example, prior
to 1972 there were no Bic lighters. I am old enough to remember those
times - sitting around freezing in the dark, eating uncooked food. We
really have come a long way.
Jim Bennett
==================================================
Speaking from a secure undisclosed location.
Date: Fri, 14 Sep 2012 17:51:20 -0600
From: Bill Horne <bill@horneQRM.net>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: Major outage in West Glacier, Montana
Message-ID: <k30ftn$bjn$1@dont-email.me>
On 9/12/2012 8:48 PM, tlvp wrote:
> On Wed, 12 Sep 2012 16:02:07 -0600, Bill Horne wrote:
>
>> The entire phone system is out of service in West Glacier, Montana
>
> Local copper loop, cable, satellite, cellular, Clear, Vonage and the like,
> ... everything ?
Everything I consider to be "phone system". When I say "out", I mean
"not functioning". If I can't get a dialtone, it really doesn't matter
what parts are broken, does it?
> So your post to c.d.t. came in through FidoNet over s/w Ham Radio :-) ?
No, it was posted via my packet radio gateway, w1ac.ampr.org, and passed
onto the Internet at a ham radio station in Columbia Falls, Montana.
I've never used FidoNet, but IIRC, FidoNet depends on modem links for
communication, so it wouldn't have worked anyway.
> Anyway, kudos for getting through, however you did it! Cheers, -- tlvp
Glad I could help.
Bill
--
Bill Horne
(Remove QRM from my address to write to me directly)
Date: Fri, 14 Sep 2012 23:50:48 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Crack in Internet's foundation of trust allows HTTPS session hijacking
Message-ID: <p0624081bcc79aaa17de1@[10.0.1.6]>
Crack in Internet's foundation of trust allows HTTPS session hijacking
Attack dubbed CRIME breaks crypto used to prevent snooping of
sensitive data.
by Dan Goodin
Ars Technica
Sept 13 2012
A screen shot from a video showing CRIME decrypting the contents of
an encrypted cookie used to authenticate a dropbox.com user account.
Researchers have identified a security weakness that allows them to
hijack web browser sessions even when they're protected by the HTTPS
encryption that banks and e-commerce sites use to prevent snooping on
sensitive transactions.
The technique exploits web sessions protected by the Secure Sockets
Layer and Transport Layer Security protocols when they use one of two
data-compression schemes designed to reduce network congestion or the
time it takes for webpages to load. Short for Compression Ratio
Info-leak Made Easy, CRIME works only when both the browser and
server support TLS compression or SPDY, an open networking protocol
used by both Google and Twitter. Microsoft's Internet Explorer,
Google's Chrome and Mozilla's Firefox browsers are all believed to be
immune to the attack, but at time of writing smartphone browsers and
a myriad of other applications that rely on TLS are believed to
remain vulnerable.
CRIME is the latest black eye for the widely used encryption
protocols, which act as the Internet's foundation of trust by
encrypting traffic that flows over open networks and
cryptographically proving websites such as Gmail are really operated
by Google rather than criminal hackers or state-sponsored spies. The
specter of a new attack that could subvert one of the only widely
available protections preventing the interception of sensitive
e-mails and web transactions, follows revelations that both Iran and
China have actively worked to defeat it so they could spy on its
citizens.
...
http://arstechnica.com/security/2012/09/crime-hijacks-https-sessions/
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