Open Source Security

Josh and Kurt talk about the Krebs blog post titled "When in Doubt: Hang Up, Look Up, & Call Back". In the world of security there isn't a lot of actionable advice, it's worth discussing if something like this will work, or ever if it's the right way to handle these situations. Show notes When in Doubt: Hang Up, Look Up, & Call Back Tech Support Scam podcast: Part 1 , Part 2 STIR/SHAKEN Drill the...

Josh  and Kurt  talk about what beer and reproducible builds have in common. It's a lot more than you think, and it mostly comes down to quality control. If you can't reproduce what you do, you're not a mature organization and you need maturity to have quality. Show Notes Reinheitsgebot Josh's Blog Post Ken Thompson's reflections on trusting trust Tor Browser Deterministic Builds One line package...

Josh  and Kurt  talk about automatic updates. Specifically we discuss a recent decision by Ubuntu to enable forced automatic updates. There are lessons here for the security community. We have a history of jumping to solutions rather than defining and understanding problems. Sometimes our solutions aren't the best. Also murder bees. Show Notes The Oatmeal giant bee comic Honeybees cook giant horne...

Josh  and Kurt  talk about the uproar around Cloudflare's "Is BGP safe yet" site. It's always interesting watching how much people will push back on new things, even if the new things is probably a step in the right direction. The clever thing Cloudflare is doing in this instance is they are making the BGP problem something anyone can understand. Also send us your funny dog stories. Show Notes Is...

Josh  and  Kurt  talk about the new normal that's working away from an office. It's not exactly working from home as there are some unforeseen challenges that we just took for granted in the past. There are a lot of new and strange security problems we have to adapt to, everyone is doing amazing work with very little right now. Show Notes Microsoft buys corp.com Hijack computer network traffic wit...

Josh  and  Kurt  talk about space. We intended to focus on Apollo 13 but as usual we have no ability to stay on topic. There is a lot of fun space discussions in this one though. Do you think you can hack Voyager 1? Only if you have a big enough satellite dish. Show Notes Eavesdropping on Apollo 11 Apollo 11 classified weather satellite The pen that saved Apollo 11

Josh  and  Kurt  talk about Kurt's recent treadmill purchase and the lessons we can lean in security from the consumer market. The consumer market has learned a lot about how to interact with their customers in the last few decades, the security industry is certainly behind in this space today. Once again we display our ability to tie even the seemingly mundane things back to a discussion about se...

Josh  and Kurt  talk about security scanners. They're all pretty bad today, but there are some things we can do to make them better. Step one is to understand the problem. Do you know why you're running the scanner and what the reports mean? Show Notes Edmonton freeze thaw cycles Josh's security scanner blog series

Josh  and Kurt  talk about building a talent ecosystem. What starts out as an attempt by Kurt to talk about Canada evolves into a discussion about how talent can evolve, or be purposely grown. Canada's entertainment industry and Unit 8200 are good examples of this. Show Notes SCTV Red Team Project Moon Shot book   AvE channel   Turning a tree root into a bowl   Mailing the Hope Diamond The Ecosyst...

Josh  and Kurt  talk about video games and hacking. Specifically how speed runners are really just video game hackers. Show Notes Developer speedrun commentary Super Mario World end credits glitch explained Mario 3 RCE Breath of the Wild speedrun Super Metroid reverse boss order TMR beats every NES game

Josh  and Kurt  talk about video games. Yeah, video games. Specifically about cheating in video games. There's a lot of other security themes in the discussion. With the news being horrible these days, we needed to talk about something fun. Show Notes Penny Arcade Banned from Fortnite Apollo Robbins, world's best pickpocket

Josh  and  Kurt  talk about Wireguard. There have been a lot of recent conversations about it and if it's better or worse than other VPN solutions. It's safe to say in our modern age, less is usually more, especially when it comes to security. Wireguard has a lot going for it, it can't be ignored. Show Notes Replacing a Nintendo Switch fan WireGuard Hacker News discussion

Josh  and Kurt  talk to Tony Meehan from Elastic (formerly Endgame) about endpoint detection, response, protection, and even SIEM. Tony has a great history coming from the NSA and has a number of great stories to help understand the topics. Show Notes Tony Meehan   Rob Joyce on Disrupting Nation State Hackers Bobby Filar living off the land blog Dwell time graph   Snowboarder vs Tree

Josh  and Kurt  talk about the Linux Foundation Census 2. There is a lot of talk around how to fix open source security, but the reality is we can't fix it. We need to stop trying to fix what isn't broken and engineering around the system we have, not the system we want. Show Notes Linux Foundation Census 2 Core Infrastructure Initiative

Josh  and Kurt  talk about the sale of the corp.com domain. Is it going to be the end of the world, or a non event? We disagree on what should happen with it. Josh hopes an evildoer buys it, Kurt hopes for Microsoft. We also briefly discuss the CIA owning Crypto AG. Show Notes corp.com is for sale CIA owned Crypto AG

Josh  and Kurt  talk about a huge working from home experiment because of the the Coronavirus. We also discuss some of the advice going on around the outbreak, as well as how humans are incredibly good at ignoring good advice, often to their own peril. Also an airplane wheel falls off. Show Notes Work from home Hacker News discussion CDC advice How to wash your hands Air Canada flight without runn...

Josh  and Kurt  talk about open source maintainers and building communities. While an open source maintainer doesn't owe anyone anything, there are some difficult conversations around holding back a community rather than letting it flourish. Show Notes Actix-web story Lodash Possible Lodash security issue   Javascript libraries are almost never updated Ularn

Josh  and Kurt  talk about SIM swapping. What is it, how does it work. Why should you care? There's not a ton you can do to protect yourself, but we go over some of the basic concepts and what to watch out for. It's unfortunate this is still a problem. Show Notes Five Major US Wireless Carriers Are Vulnerable to SIM Swapping Edmonton Police SIM swap website

Josh  and Kurt  talk about two recent vulnerabilities that have had very different outcomes. One was the Citrix remote code execution flaw. While the flaw is bad, the handling of the flaw was possibly worse than the flaw itself. The other was the Microsoft ECC encryption flaw. It was well handled even though it was hard to understand and it is a pretty big deal. As all these things go, fixing and...

Josh  and  Kurt  talk about the updated Google Project Zero disclosure policy. What's the new policy, what does it mean, and will it really matter? We suspect it will improve some things, but won't drastically change much. Show Notes Google and 90 day patch disclosure Upgrading all Windows versions

Josh  and Kurt  talk about a discussion on Twitter about if discovering CVE IDs is important for a resume? We don't think it is. We also discuss the idea of ransomware putting a company out of business. Did it really? Possibly but it probably won't create any substantial change in the industry. Show Notes Games Done Quick   Ransomware puts company out of business 1 in 5 companies shut down due to...

Josh  and Kurt  talk about marketplace safety and security. Will we ever see an end to the constant flow of counterfeit goods? The security industry has the same problem the marketplace industry has, without substantial injury we don't see movement towards meaningful change. Show Notes BrickLink Cars in Canada lighting on fire   President Roosevelt used Al Capone's Limo Dangerous car seats Fake ex...

Josh  and Kurt  talk about security predictions for 2020. None of the predictions are even a bit controversial or unexpected. We're in a state of slow change, without disruptive technology next year will look a lot like this year. Show Notes The Rising Speed of Technological Adoption Slack Certified GDPR Fines and Notices

Josh  and Kurt  talk about the opportunistic nature of crime. Defenders have to defend, which means the adversaries are by definition always a step ahead. We use the context of automobile crimes to frame the discussion. Show Notes Stealing cars with radio relays RTL Software Defined Radio Canada most stolen car

Josh  and Kurt  talk to Rob Schultheis from GitHub about some of the amazing projects GitHub is working on. We discuss GitHub security advisories, getting a CVE from GitHub, and what the new GitHub Security Lab is doing. It's a great conversation about how GitHub is working to make security better for all of us. Show Notes GitHub Security Advisories GitHub CVE requests GitHub Security Lab GitHub S...