An Oldie

Back in the mid 90s I had an unusual experience, in which I was caught in the blast-corona of Operation Sundevil – the Secret Service’s attempt to gain relevance in cybersecurity [wik]. My role was small but it made me realize that the government, at that time, was ignorant enough that they could easily be stampeded into doing stupid things, a form of “terrorism by stupid cop” which I later re-framed as “a denial of clue attack.”

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So Many Of The Weird Things

When I encounter a weird story that might be an interesting core for some bloggy ruminations, I usually email it to myself. Email is my “post it note” and it’s been a great technique since I keep a complete archive of my emails going back to the 80s. The problem is that I have an in-box that consists mostly of weird messages from myself (2000+ at present).

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More Security Neeping

Tomorrow I’m going to be on a webinar about security, “injecting security into systems engineering.” As Ghandi allegedly said when asked about “western civilization”, “… it would be nice.” I’m going to have to say more than that, and (as you have probably noticed) “saying more” is not something I have a problem with. [eventbrite]

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Strategic Security Neepery

Now that I’m retired, I try hard not to be the guy who stands in the back of the room and shouts “You kids get offa my lawn!” but I have to admit that I often feel that computer security (as a field, in general) has gone horribly out of control and is thumping through the rough terrain and weeds while the driver, who lacks vision, keeps grasping for simple solutions to what is really a complex problem involving strategy, economics, and skepticism.

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