Gone Phishin' in China

Today's Network World article on phishing tactics (see it here) caused me to reminisce about the Joe Pesci and Danny Glover movie Gone Fishin'. Some "phishing" datapoints:

• Basically, the best phishing holes are in China, at least if you count up the registrars who issue phishing licenses worldwide.
• Phishing tactics give "catch and release" a whole new meaning, what with the proliferation of the 89,748 unique compromised hosting domains used.
• Phishing with dynamite is the new trend; mass break-in techniques were used in 58,100 attacks. Toss in that stick of dynamite and get out your nets as all the stunned phishees float to the top.
• Shared hosting environments have become the "Phishing boats"of choice, particularly WordPress, cPanel and Joomia installations.

Unlike the movie, though, there's not a whole lot of laughing going on, at least as long as we're constrained to play defense-only/hands-tied-behind-our-back security management. We're just dumb fish on a pond, waiting for that next stick of dynamite to knock us senseless and into the nets of phishers who, by the way, are having a lot of fun.

Infecting an Alien Architecture Now on both Nook AND Kindle devices

DESTROYING ANGEL just went live on the Nook (see here) as well as on the Kindle (see here).

I believe the hyperlinks to the 22 Principles of the Perfect Virus—as well as to music videos and movie clips—will significantly change the print publishing industry.

Infecting an Alien Architecture: DESTROYING ANGEL now available on Kindle

Order the Kindle edition for $2.99 here.

Over a decade ago, before I'd formalized the 22 Principles for the Perfect Virus, I wrote a hardcover novel about suppressed genius. I have completely rewritten Destroying Angel to apply not only that new technology, but to include ebook hyperlinks to the 22 Principles plus multi-media links to music videos and movies relevant to chapter themes (since I kept all the publishing rights, I can do that).

The main technical focus of Destroying Angel is Principle #7: Black Box Portability—what I call The Holy Grail of all virus technology—whereby The Perfect Virus can deduce a totally alien environment and adapt itself iteratively to become native to that environment, all without human intervention.

Let me know if you'd like to see Destroying Angel in other ebook formats.

Legal Justification for Killing Hackers?

A Huffington Post article (read it here) cites a report written for NATO (read original report here) opining that hackers lives may be targeted as cyberwar escalates. Called The Tallinn Manual, it contains the following disclaimer:

The Tallinn Manual on the International Law Applicable to Cyber Warfare is not an official document, but instead an expression of opinions of a group of independent experts acting solely in their personal capacity. It does not represent the views of the NATO CCD COE, its Sponsoring Nations, or NATO. It is also not meant to reflect NATO doctrine. Nor does it reflect the position of any organization or State represented by observers.

In my own humble opinion, The Morgan Doctrine stands a much better chance of deterrent success. A disproportionate and overwhelming financial response will do more to "put a check in the swing" of any cyber sportsmen than a nebulous and ill-defined bag-em-and-tag-em mentality.