How to Scrub Your Online Presence . . .

It is by now common wisdom that once you put something up on the internet, it is there forever, or at least as long as the internet still exists.  However, it is possible to change your digital footprint enough to hide your tracks.  A small primer on doing so from Make Use Of:

If you’re looking to drop from the Webosphere completely in an attempt to remain anonymous, we can help. The process is arduous and there are several key steps you’ll need to take along the way. But in the end, if you value your online privacy, it’ll be worth it . . .

Glenn Greenwald to Speak at Chaos Communication Conference

From ZDNet:

The world's oldest and largest global hacker organization The Chaos Computer Club (CCC) has announced it will open next week's conference, the 30th Chaos Communication Congress (30c3), with a December 27 opening keynote by Glenn Greenwald.

Glenn Greenwald's keynote tops our list of must-see talks at the legendary event. 30C3's schedule shows that the compelling keynote won't be the only explosive presentation at 30C3.

Mr. Greenwald's keynote will be webcast live on this page. If you miss it, all of 30C3's talks will be archived on the offical CCC media website. CCC's archives go online astonishingly fast.

Researchers Hack RSA with Acoustic Cryptanalysis

From CS.tau.ac:

Many computers emit a high-pitched noise during operation, due to vibration in some of their electronic components. These acoustic emanations are more than a nuisance: they can convey information about the software running on the computer and, in particular, leak sensitive information about security-related computations. In a preliminary presentation, we have shown that different RSA keys induce different sound patterns, but it was not clear how to extract individual key bits. The main problem was the very low bandwidth of the acoustic side channel (under 20 kHz using common microphones, and a few hundred kHz using ultrasound microphones), many orders of magnitude below the GHz-scale clock rates of the attacked computers.

Here, we describe a new acoustic cryptanalysis key extraction attack, applicable to GnuPG's current implementation of RSA. The attack can extract full 4096-bit RSA decryption keys from laptop computers (of various models), within an hour, using the sound generated by the computer during the decryption of some chosen ciphertexts . . .

Tens of Millions of Credit and Debit Cards Compromised in Target Hack

If only there were an alternative global payment processing system, one that did not rely on the shady practices of banks and corporations.  From the Chicago Tribune:

Target Corp said data from about 40 million credit and debit cards might have been stolen from shoppers at its stores during the first three weeks of the holiday shopping season.

The data theft, unprecedented in its ferocity, took place over a 19-day period that began the day before Thanksgiving. Target confirmed on Thursday that it identified and resolved the issue on Dec. 15 . . .

Target said the breach, second-largest hack at a U.S. retailer, might have compromised accounts between Nov. 27 and Dec. 15, a period of nearly three weeks.

China Turns Against Bitcoin: Price Drops

From FT:

China has blocked the country’s Bitcoin exchanges from accepting new inflows of cash, a move that imperils the much-hyped virtual currency in its biggest market.  The head of BTCChina, the world’s largest Bitcoin exchange by trading volume, said he had received word at midday on Wednesday that his platform would no longer be able to accept renminbi from would-be Bitcoin buyers.

The price of Bitcoin has since dropped by 50%.  In related news, the price of Bitcoin is still over 100% higher than it was just a month and a half ago.  

Duolingo: Apple's App of the Year

From the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette:

Apple has named Pittsburgh-based language learning smartphone application Duolingo as the iTunes App Store App of The Year.  Apple announced today that Duolingo, created by Carnegie Mellon University computer science professor Luis Von Ahn, was the editor's choice for 2013 App of the Year. The free iPhone app, described in Apple's App Store as "fantastically well-designed and easy to use," beat out San Francisco-based photo editing app VSCO Cam and San Francisco-based educational game Endless Alphabet.

Judge Finds Dragnet Surveillance "Indiscriminate" and "Arbitrary", Allows It to Continue Anyway

Like the executive and legislative branches of government, the judiciary is an active opponent of basic constitutional rights and liberties in the United States.  Even when judges recognize the dangers posed by government action, they rarely act to stop it.  From Reuters:

From Texaswatch.org

The U.S. government's collection of massive amounts of data about telephone calls, a program revealed in June after leaks by former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden, is likely unlawful, a judge ruled on Monday.

U.S. District Judge Richard Leon stayed his own ruling pending an expected appeal by the government, but in a significant challenge to U.S. spying authority, he wrote that the program likely violated Americans' right to be free of unreasonable searches.

"I cannot imagine a more 'indiscriminate' and 'arbitrary invasion' than this systematic and high-tech collection and retention of personal data on virtually every single citizen," Leon wrote, citing earlier court precedent.