A lot have already shown up online: Mr. Peanut dies, Rick and Morty get in a pickle with Pringles, and Lil Nas X rides the Old Town Road to Doritos’ Cool Ranch.
Source: CNET
Hoping for Dune, Black Widow or James Bond footage? The big game may not deliver a touchdown for movie fans.
Source: CNET
The 2019-nCoV coronavirus is a global public health emergency of significant concern. It is also, simultaneously, a fount of misinformation, wild conspiracy theories, and both over- and under-reactions. Whose fault is this? So glad you asked. I happen to have a little list.
Purveyors of misinformation. As archly observed by The Atlantic, that misleadingly-self-described Harvard epidemiologist who tweeted “HOLY MOTHER OF GOD” followed by math errors was … well … wrong.
However he pales in comparison to the bioweapon theorists at Zero Hedge (who were banned from Twitter as a result, apparently for doxxing a Chinese scientist) and let’s not forget to shake a finger of blame at the people who posted / linked to the much-debunked, non-peer-reviewed “signs HIV insertions in the coronavirus” paper online.
Science itself. Why would people link to that paper? Well, because non-peer-reviewed preprints are often mistaken by the general public for peer-reviewed science. Why are preprints so increasingly important? Because awful, predatory scientific publishers massively overcharge for access to scentific papers, often even when they’re funded by public money.
Social media. Not to belabor my dead horse here, but what you see on your social media is determined by algorithms optimized for engagement, which frequently means outrage. That viral HOLY MOTHER OF GOD tweet would have been more of a minor blip if Twitter still kept to strict chronological timelines. Note that this would also make “good” tweets far less viral. That would be the price we pay for abandoning the engagement algorithms, but it seems at least plausible that it would still lead to a better world.
General innumeracy: You remember how I mentioned people were underreacting too? I have seen so, so many self-identified galaxy-brain thinkers informing us that it’s silly to be so concerned about the coronavirus when the flu kills more people. I’ve even seen a handy Myths and Facts infographic wandering all over Facebook, ‘informing’ us all that “the common flu kills 60 times more people annually than Corona.”
People, the flu and nCoV-2019 are not comparable. It’s apples to zebras. We know exactly what to expect from the flu: we don’t yet know what to expect from this new virus. That’s why it’s of concern. You especially cannot compare annual death rates, since we don’t know what this new virus’s annual death rate is, since it’s only existed in humans for two months. Sheesh.
Human nature. This is arguably the big one. On some level, everyone loves an apocalypse, in that it’s a narrative they completely understand, one they can envision and have envisioned for themselves. So anything in the real world associated with an apocalypse gets clicks, commentary, and reshares.
I should know: when not writing for TechCrunch I happen to be the director of the GitHub Archive Program, which includes a whole bunch of present-day archiving, as well as very-long-term 1,000-year storage which is primarily intended for historical or recovering-abandoned-technologies usage … and yet everyone’s mind, whenever I talk about it, immediately jumps to “Canticle for Leibowitz”-style postapocalyptic scenarios, and stays there.
Which is fine! I mean, I appreciate that everyone’s interested in the project and has ideas about it, just as I appreciate that the coronavirus is a global public health emergency, and people should be paying close attention to it. But our collective fondness for apocalyptic narratives, combined with the other contributors above, may, if we’re not careful, transmute that attention into belief in wacky conspiracy theories and misinformation. Please stop to think, before you believe, and before you share.
Source: TechCrunch
Wake up, make breakfast, get the kids to school, drive to work, break into the chief financial officer’s inbox and steal the entire company’s employee tax records. Maybe later you’ll grab a bagel from across the street.
For “red teams” — or offensive security researchers — it’s just another day at work.
These offensive security teams are made up of skilled hackers who are authorized to find vulnerabilities in a company’s systems, networks but also their employees. By hacking a company from within, the company can better understand where it needs to shore up its defenses to help prevent a real future hacker. But social engineering, where hackers manipulate their targets, can have serious consequences on the target. Although red team engagements are authorized and are legal, the ethics of certain attacks and efforts can go unconsidered.
Newly released research looks at the ethics involved in offensive security engagements. Is it ethically acceptable to send phishing emails, bribe a receptionist, or plant compromising documents on a person’s computer if it means preventing a breach down the line?
The findings showed that security professionals, like red teamers and incident responders, were more likely to find it ethically acceptable to conduct certain kinds of hacking activities on other people than they are with having those activities run against themselves.
The research — a survey of over 500 people working in both security and non-security positions, presented for the first time at Shmoocon 2020 in Washington DC this week — found that non-security professionals, such as employees working in legal, human resources, or at the reception desk, are nine-times more likely to object to receiving a phishing email as part of a red team engagement than a security professional, such as a red teamer or incident response.
It is hoped the findings will help start a discussion about the effects of a red team’s engagement on a company’s morale during an internal penetration test, and help companies to help understand the limits of a red team’s rules of engagement.
“When red teamers are forced to confront the fact that their targets are just like themselves, their attitude about what it’s OK to do to another person about testing security on other people changes dramatically after they confront the fact that it could happen to them,” said Tarah Wheeler, a cybersecurity policy fellow at New America and co-author of the research.
The survey asked about a range of potential tactics in offensive security testing, such as phishing, bribery, threats, and impersonation. The respondents were randomly assigned one of two surveys containing all the same questions, except one asked if it was acceptable to conduct the activity and the other asked if it was acceptable if it happened to them.
The findings showed security professionals would object as much as four-times if certain tactics were used against them, such as phishing emails and planting compromising documents.
“Humans are bad at being objective,” said Wheeler.
The findings come at a time where red teams are increasingly making headlines for their activities as part of engagements. Just this week, two offensive security researchers at Coalfire had charges dropped against them for breaking into an Iowa courthouse as part of a red team engagement. The researchers were tasked and authorized by Iowa’s judicial arm to find vulnerabilities in its buildings and computer networks in an effort to improve its security. But the local sheriff caught the pair and objected to their activities, despite presenting a “get out of jail free” letter detailing the authorized engagement. The case gave a rare glimpse into the world of security penetration testing and red teaming, even if the arrests were universally panned by the security community.
The survey also found that security professionals in different parts of the world were more averse to certain activities than others. Security professionals in Central and South America, for example, object more to planting compromising documents whereas those in the Middle East and Africa object more to bribes and threats.
The authors of the research said that the takeaways are not that red teams should avoid certain offensive security practices but to be aware of the impact they can have on the targets, often which include their corporate colleagues.
“When you’re setting up a red team and scoping your targets, consider the impact on your co-workers and clients,” said Roy Iversen, director of security engineering and operations at Fortalice Solutions, who also co-authored the research. Iversen said the findings may also help companies decide if they want an outside red team to carry out an engagement to minimize any internal conflict between a company’s internal red team and the wider staff.
The researchers plan to expand their work over the next year to improve their overall survey count and to better understand the demographics of their respondents to help refine the findings.
“It’s an ongoing project,” said Wheeler.
Source: TechCrunch
Alexa just can’t wait to get off the road again.
Source: CNET
You can livestream Super Bowl LIV between the Chiefs and 49ers for free, even in 4K, no cable subscription required.
Source: CNET
Hackers have been taking advantage of the fear over the coronavirus outbreak to spread malware through emails.
Source: Digital trends
When Uber and Lyft went public, it wasn’t the drivers who got rich — it was the executives, investors and some early employees. In an era when it has become clear that tech executives and investors are frequently the only ones who’ll reap rewards for a company’s success, cooperative startups are getting more attention.
Depending on how it’s set up, a cooperative model offers workers and users true ownership and control in a company; any profits that are generated are returned to the members or reinvested in the company.
Co-ops aren’t new: The nation’s longest-running example is The Philadelphia Contributionship, a mutually owned insurance company founded by Benjamin Franklin in 1752. In 1895, the International Co-operative Alliance formed to serve as a way to unite cooperatives across the world. Some colleges have student-run housing co-ops where cleaning, food preparation and other responsibilities are shared. Today, there are many well-known large-scale co-ops, including outdoor recreation store REI, Arizmendi Bakery in San Francisco and Blue Diamond Growers, one of the world’s largest tree-nut processors.
What’s novel, however, is applying the co-op model to technology startups. Start.coop, an accelerator for cooperative startups, is just one group trying to facilitate that practice.
Source: TechCrunch
Following our look at why so many startups are building OKR-focused software and why venture capitalists are pouring capital into their efforts, today we’re asking a similar question about insurance marketplace startups.
This month, Insurify raised a $23 million Series A that TechCrunch covered here. And even more recently, Gabi, a competitor, raised $27 million. The two rounds added up to $50 million for the insurance marketplace startup space in less than two weeks.
But there was more to come. Late in the wek, Policygenius, another participant in the space, added $100 million to its accounts. With that round, the total venture tally for insurance marketplace startups rose to $150 million for the month of January.
What the hell is going on, and why has so much been invested in the space recently? Let’s try to answer those questions by looking at who competes in the space, how much they have raised individually, and then unpack what has attracted all the fresh capital. Hint: As always, it’s about market size and economics.
Source: TechCrunch
British Columbia finally welcomes ride hail, while San Francisco’s main drag goes car-free.
Source: Wired