falcontech – Page 3

Imagine that you suddenly woke up and it’s autumn of 1916. What type of world would you witness around you? Can you just close your eyes, take a moment and imagine?

Seems like a 100 years is not such a long time frame, but... in fact it is huge in terms of technical progress — Seems like a 100 years is not such a long time frame, but… in fact it is huge in terms of technical progress

Exactly a century ago, telecommunications were in their infancy and still regarded as something from the world of semi-science fiction. Most wide-spread transport means were via railroad and maritime vessels, accountants and bankers carefully kept their records exclusively on paper and the world as a whole still seemed to be immense in size. There were of course ways of transferring the information through relatively fast avenues like telegraph: a message from Europe could be delivered to North America for only 15 minutes with the means of Trans-Atlantic Cable, but this is something that only the selected few can afford.

The very first Transatlantic cable was laid in 1854-58 and connected Newfoundland, Canada with Valentia Island, Ireland

Who would ever dare to imagine that a hundred years later we will be sending control commands to a robotic rover, that operates on the surface of another planet, taking us same 15 minutes to do it? 15 minutes to get the signal inside the masterpiece of human engineering and artificial intelligence over the distance of 55 million kilometers. It is hard to picture such distance even today in 21st century, but, nonetheless, it is actually happening.

NASA's Curiosity Rover on the surface of Mars — NASA’s Curiosity Rover on the surface of Mars

This small example of technical progress makes us think about the future and how it will look like. During last 100 years’ humanity managed to increase the speed of communication exponentially and it seems like this is directly linked to the overall pace of scientific growth.

Recently we started to hear the term “Internet of Things” more often. Some say that this is a phenomenon that will take humanity to the next level of development. At the same time, some have never even heard about it. And this is typical for the brand new concepts. Coming back to the “100 years ago” example, it would be fair to mention that a telephone wasn’t even taken seriously by many people at the very beginning. Some even were making jokes about “how it would look like if a gentlemen and a lady would keep entertaining themselves with wireless telephone boxes instead of enjoying company of each other while walking in the park”. Sounds hilarious, right?

Early 20th century caricature about "wireless telegraphy" — Early 20th century caricature about “wireless telegraphy”

So what is Internet of things? In 2013 the Global Standards Initiative on Internet of Things (IoT-GSI) defined the IoT as “the infrastructure of the information society.”

As you probably know, there are several distinguished stages of the societal world development: feudal society, which was dominant model in Middle Age, was replaced by the Industrial Society after the Industrial Revolution back in 18th century. Later on, in 20th century the the model got a significant push by overall technical progress, and eventually with the emergence on Informational and Communication Technologies we are now in transition period that is leading us into Post-Industrial Era – a stage of society that is very often called “Information Society”.

The infrastructure of this society will be created by the next generation technologies, that will be connected between each other by the means of Global Network of Internet. And this infrastructure will be there to change the ways of mass-production and global trade forever. Have a look at this short infographic video to understand how it already starts to work:

However, there are some challenges that are coming along this “Informational Revolution”, one of the biggest being data security and safety of communication. Nothing new under the sun, as they say: when the first commercial airlines were launched there was much concern on flight safety (which are still there, even though commercial aviation will soon celebrate 100 years anniversary).

Andrew and Ken Munro of Pen Test Partners (a UK-based IT security company) created a first virus targeted to hit one of the essential parts of any SMART-home technology: internal temperature control system. They later admitted that the malware was specially designed to demonstrate the weak points of the IoT concept. Results of their experiment were demonstrated in August during the Def Con IT conference.

For the experiment, they used one of the most popular models of the thermostat. Tierney and Munro discovered vulnerabilities on the device by means of which they have managed to remotely install malicious software. The hacked thermostat began to change the room temperature from minimum to maximum, and then display the request to transfer money to the account of intruders. Tierney and Munro said that they are planning to transfer all the information about the vulnerabilities they found to the manufacturer of the thermostat.

Internet of Things is shaping today and this process is irreversible. But it brings to the top of the list the data and connectivity security issues. Manufacturers should never underestimate these issues and pay maximum attention to the possible weak points of their products. It may be reached through careful and comprehensive QC/QA procedures.

Falcon Technologies International have never underestimated data security, and this is one of the basic values we put at the core of every single product we develop. Once the data is recorded on Century Archival disc, it is safe for centuries, and we give a 100% guarantee for that.

Smart cloud-based storage technologies such as Apple’s iCloud, Google’s Drive, Dropbox and many others available out there have become part of our daily activities, both in our personal and professional lives. It is certainly very convenient to have all your files stored somewhere “in the cloud” and accessible from al the devices connected to the Internet (well, literally any device – everything is hooked up to the web nowadays – right?) It is certainly a great technology that makes our life so easier, but in the euphoria of excitement we maybe forgot about one of the major issues with “clouds” – their security. The area where most of the consumer-oriented cloud-based storages is still very vulnerable.

Cloud-based storage is usually an array of hard discs connected to a high-speed Internet channel

On August 31, 2014, a collection of almost 500 private pictures of various celebrities, mostly women, were posted on the 4chan image board, and later disseminated by other users on websites and social networks. The images were believed to have been obtained via a breach of Apple’s cloud services suite iCloud, but it later turned out that the hackers could have taken advantage of a security issue in the iCloud API which allowed them to make unlimited attempts at guessing victims’ passwords. On September 20, 2014, a second batch of similar private photos of additional celebrities was leaked by hackers. Less than a week later, on September 26, a third batch was also leaked.

The leak prompted increased concern from analysts surrounding the privacy and security of cloud-based services such as iCloud—with a particular emphasis on their suitability to store sensitive, private information.

Due to a targeted attack, tens of celebrities became victims of hackers.

Apple reported that the leaked images were the result of compromised accounts, using “a very targeted attack on user names, passwords and security questions, a practice that has become all too common on the Internet”.

In October 2014, the FBI searched a house in Chicago and seized several computers, cell phones and storage drives after tracking the source of a hacking attack to an IP address linked to an individual named Emilio Herrera. A related search warrant application mentioned eight victims with initials A.S., C.H., H.S., J.M., O.W., A.K., E.B., and A.H., which supposedly points to stolen photos of Abigail Spencer, Christina Hendricks, Hope Solo, Janette McCurdy, Olivia Wilde, Anna Kendrick, Emily Browning and Amber Heard. According to law enforcement officials, Herrera is just one of several people under investigation and the FBI has carried out various searches across the US.

A more recent incident happened in the UK, where one of the major tabloids reported that it was offered private images featuring the Duchess of Cambridge’s sister Pippa Middleton. It was said that the images also feature Duchess’s children, Prince George (the future King of England) and Princess Charlotte.

The Police are investigating the case, their main lead being iCloud account hack. It is also said that the leak includes approximately 3000 private photographs that were stored on Pippa Middleton’s iCloud account.

Keeping your sensitive data safe - the only way to prevent being hacked. — Keeping your sensitive data safe – the only way to prevent being hacked.

As you can see from the facts and the events described above, cloud-based storage solutions are certainly not the most reliable data storage solutions. They are very flexible and accessible from any device, but it is important to keep in mind that sometimes they may be accessed by unauthorised parties, that may use sensitive and private information against its holders.

One of the reasons why offline data storage is still used today is that some information sources are containing data that should be stored offline due to security reasons. Private images, spreadsheets with secret data, classified investigation files and many other kinds of sensitive information will never be accessed by any hacker in the world if it is stored on optical disc that is locked down in the safe. There is no way it could be accessed, unless the disc is in physical possession of the person that wants to access the data. And physical access to the information is easier to control.

Tag: falcontech

Internet of Things: The Next Stage of Social Development