WyzGuys Tech Talk

I again find myself reviewing Michael Kassner in TechRepublic.  His June 23 article does a great job explaining why were are currently losing more battles than we are winning in the realm of cyber-security.  The problem is that we live in disruptive times.  The Internet has completely changed the balance of power, and the bad guys quite frankly are more willing to learn how to exploit the technology and more nimble and quicker to adapt the good guys ...

Using Military Style Kill Chains on Networks to Combat Advanced Persistent Threats

It is said that if you know your enemies and know yourself, you will not be imperiled in a hundred battles; if you do not know your enemies but do know yourself, you will win one and lose one; if you do not know your enemies nor yourself, you will be imperiled in every single battle. – Sun Tzu in The Art of War

Back on May 1st, Michael ...

Another contribution to the Sunday Funnies archive courtesy of my friend Aaron Miller of Miller Brothers Auto Repair, Somerset, WI. 

Now is your chance to have your ears pierced and get an extra pair to take home, too.

We do not tear your clothing with machinery. We do it carefully by hand.

Great Dames for sale.

Vacation Special: Have your home exterminated.

Wanted. Man to take care of cow that does not smoke or drink.

These were emailed to me by a friend, but sound oh so familiar.  If you work in computer support long enough, you get a nice collection just like these.

• Tech  support:  What kind of computer do you have?
• Customer:    A  white one…
• Tech  support:    Click  on the ‘my computer’ icon on to the left of the screen.
• Customer:    Your left or my left?

****************************

Customer:    Hi, good afternoon, this is Martha, I can’t print. Every time I try, it says ‘Can’t ...

As reported in the CompTIA Smart Brief on May 6th, the Wall Street Journal is reporting that Symantec, the inventor of antivirus software, is declaring that host-based software security solutions can not stop enough malware exploits to be useful.  The problem with most exploits is that they take advantage of computer users’ trusting nature and gullibility to trick them in to permitting something that the software would usually like to block, or the malefactors gain access to systems ...

The latest bit of carnage in the Target Christmas Credit Card breach is the resignation of Target CEO Gregg Steinhafel.  He is being replaced at the helm by interim CEO John Mulligan, Target’s CFO.  The first call he needs to make is to the CIO and his information technology security chief to see where the company is in rectifying the lapses that allowed the security breach to take place.

We see this as a largely symbolic and useless act, a ritual ...

The CryptoLocker ransom-ware exploit remains on of the most difficult security challenges that we face, since once all your personal data is encrypted, the only way back is either from an uninfected backup, or paying the cyber-criminals to receive your decryption key.  The good news (well I guess it’s good news), is that the bad guys are playing fair and actually sending the decryption key and even providing a bit of tech support.  Not all attempts to recover this way ...

Microsoft has announced a serious flaw in all versions of Internet Explorer, and is working on a patch, but for the interim, until the patch is released in Windows Updates, its makes sense to use an alternative browser such as Google’s Chrome, Mozilla’s Firefox, or Apple’s Safari.  Maybe it’s a good day to try the Epic Privacy Browser, a Chrome variant.

Right now, using IE could allow an attacker to gain access to your computer by rerouting you or tricking you ...