Nel libro “l’arte della Guerra” Sun Tzu scrisse “Se conosci il nemico e te stesso, la tua vittoria è sicura“.

Conoscere il nemico è un aspetto fondamentale di qualunque campo di battaglia, compreso quello della sicurezza informatica. Per questo motivo il lavoro di DarkLab, appena pubblicato per Red Hot Cyber, ha una rilevanza senza pari.

Cosa è accaduto: qualche tempo si è realizzato un data leak che ha visto la pubblicazione di moltissime chat e comunicazioni intercorse tra gli affiliati ad una temutissima gang di criminali informatici, specializzata in ransomware. DarkLab ha analizzato questi documenti e ne ha ricavato un dossier (di facile e veloce lettura, che consiglio vivamente).

Questo report è importantissimo poiché ci consente di vedere cosa e come funziona “dall’altra parte”, traendone informazioni utili che qualunque ente e azienda potrebbero convertire in misure di sicurezza. Qui mi interessa evidenziarne alcune, per il resto (struttura, tattiche di negoziazione dei riscatti, ecc…) vi consiglio vivamente di leggere il rapporto che trovate qui

Le VPN sono bersagli particolarmente attenzionati dai criminali informatici, i quali destinano investimenti mirati per lo sfruttamento delle loro vulnerabilità.

Insegnamento: prestare particolare attenzione e investire particolarmente sulla protezione delle VPN

Tecniche di social Engineering avanzate: la gang ha un operatore dedicato, specializzato nel contatto di personale chiave nelle aziende vittime. Una delle tecniche sviluppate è quella di impersonificare un operatore del dipartimento IT per ottenere accesso ai sistemi delle vittime, anche attraverso call center per rendere tutto più credibile.

Insegnamento: redigere delle politiche ad hoc per i contatti dell’ufficio IT con il personale aziendale, e fare in modo che ne siano tutti informati, in modo tale da non dare seguito a richieste effettuate in maniera non proceduralizzata.

per evitare la detection agiscono con molta calma, fino ad arrivare a lanciare solo un comando al giorno. Inoltre, hanno fatto ricorso ad una mail fingendosi il supporto tecnico interno al fine di mascherare talune operazioni.

Insegnamento: ancora una volta emerge come l’impersonificazione del reparto IT sia un vettore chiave per molti attacchi. Proceduralizzare delle modalità di contatto dei servizi IT, da mantenere riservate, costituisce una importante contromisura.

I criminali informatici cercano di evitare attacchi a realtà che implementano la MFA.

Insegnamento: MFA è uno strumento che può essere un forte disincentivo all’attacco criminale.

Una tecnica molto utilizzata era il phishing mediante Microsoft Teams con un “pretext” standard.

Insegnamento: sviluppare politiche interne per qualunque tipo di comunicazione. Queste politiche sono da mantenere riservate e conosciute solo al personale a cui è fatto divieto di diffonderle. Insegnare a riconoscere i messaggi di phishing all’interno dell’azienda elimina uno strumento di attacco ai criminali.

Tutte queste informazioni sono preziosissime per chi si deve difendere, poiché consente di conoscere le metodologie di attacco e di adottare le contromisure più opportune e adeguate.

Conoscere il proprio nemico è fondamentale, ma altrettanto importante è conoscere se stessi, e forse è da questo punto che molte realtà dovrebbero iniziare poiché troppo spesso c’è poca consapevolezza.

L'articolo Il Dossier Segreto su BlackBasta : Cosa imparare dei retroscena inediti di una Ransomware Gang proviene da il blog della sicurezza informatica.

The Etch A Sketch is a classic children’s toy resembling a picture frame where artwork can be made by turning two knobs attached to a stylus inside the frame. The stylus scrapes off an aluminum powder, creating the image which can then be erased by turning the frame upside down and shaking it, adding the powder back to the display. It’s completely offline and requires no batteries, but in our modern world those two things seem to be more requirements than when the Etch A Sketch was first produced in the 1960s. Enter the Tilt-A-Sketch, a modern version of the classic toy.

Rather than use aluminum powder for the display, the Tilt A Sketch replaces it with an LED matrix and removes the stylus completely. There are no knobs on this device to control the path of the LED either; a inertial measurement unit is able to sense the direction that the toy is tilted while a microcontroller uses that input to light up a series of LEDs corresponding to the direction of tilt. There are a few buttons on the side of the device as well which allow the colors displayed by the LEDs to change, and similar to the original toy the display can be reset by shaking.

The Tilt-A-Sketch was built by [devitoal] as part of an art display which allows the visitors to create their own art. Housed in a laser-cut wooden enclosure the toy does a faithful job of recreating the original. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the Etch A Sketch is a popular platform for various projects that we’ve seen before including original toys modified with robotics to create the artwork and electronic recreations that use LED displays instead in a way similar to this project.

youtube.com/embed/KoSKXEI5jus?…

hackaday.com/2025/03/20/a-mode…

We’ve all seen the ads. Some offer “free” solar panels. Others promise nearly free energy if you just purchase a solar — well, solar system doesn’t sound right — maybe… solar energy setup. Many of these plans are dubious at best. You pay for someone to mount solar panels on your house and then pay them for the electricity they generate at — presumably — a lower cost than your usual source of electricity. But what about just doing your own set up? Is it worth it? We can’t answer that, but [Brian Potter] can help you answer it for yourself.

In a recent post, he talks about the rise of solar power and how it is becoming a large part of the power generation landscape. Interestingly, he presents graphs of things like the cost per watt of solar panels adjusted for 2023 dollars. In 1975, a watt cost over $100. These days it is about $0.30. So the price isn’t what slows solar adoption.

The biggest problem is the intermittent nature of solar. But how bad is that really? It depends. If you can sell power back to the grid when you have it to spare and then buy it back later, that might make sense. But it is more effective to store what you make for your own use.

That, however, complicates things. If you really want to go off the grid, you need enough capacity to address your peak demand and enough storage to meet demand over several days to account for overcast days, for example.

There’s more to it than just that. Read the post for more details. But even if you don’t want solar, if you enjoy seeing data-driven analysis, there is plenty to like here.

Building an effective solar power system is within reach of nearly anyone these days. Some of the problems with solar go away when you put the cells in orbit. Of course, that always raises new problems.

hackaday.com/2025/03/20/solar-…

A few years ago, [Jeremy Makes Things] built a rope tow in his back yard so his son could ski after school. Since the lifts at the local hill closed shortly after schools let out, this was the only practical way for his son to get a few laps in during the week. It’s cobbled together from things that [Jeremy] had around the house, and since the original build it’s sat outside for a few years without much use. There’s been a lot more snow where he lives this year though, so it’s time for a rebuild.

The power source for the rope tow is an old gas-powered snowblower motor, with a set of rollers and pulleys for the rope made out of the back end of a razor scooter. Some polyurethane was poured around the old wheel hub so that the rope would have something to grip onto. The motor needed some sprucing up as well, from carburetor adjustment, fuel tank repairs, and some other pieces of maintenance before it could run again. With that out of the way it could be hoisted back up a tree at the top of the hill and connected to the long rope.

This isn’t the first time [Jeremy] has had to perform major maintenance on this machine either. Three years ago it needed plenty of work especially around the polyurethane wheel where [Jeremy] also had to machine a new wheel bearing in addition to all the other work that had to go into repairing it that time. From the looks of things though it’s a big hit with his son who zips right back up the hill after each ski run. Getting to the tops of ski runs with minimal effort has been a challenge of skiers and snowboarders alike for as long as the sport has been around, and we’ve seen all kinds of unique solutions to that problem over the years.

hackaday.com/2025/03/20/backya…

Faccio un salto nel passato anche qui, alla Biennale Arte 2024 di Venezia, la rappresentazione queer era forte e presente, ed è stato potente vederla.

Alcune opere mi hanno colpito particolarmente. Louis Fratino esplora la tensione tra famiglia e desiderio con immagini viscerali, raccontando come le persone LGBTQ+ socializzano da ‘outsider’ e affrontano la violenza della tradizione. Xiyadie documenta la vita queer in Cina dagli anni ’80, con opere intime che parlano di repressione, desiderio e liberazione. In Sewn, la metafora del cucirsi con un filo fatto di sperma e sangue rende fisico il dolore dell’identità negata. Omar Mismar sfida la censura in Libano con Two Unidentified Lovers in a Mirror, forse il mio preferito, dove la riorganizzazione dei volti di due amanti mette in discussione la negazione dell’intimità queer.
Lauren Halsey non lavora sul tema queer nello specifico, ma con la sua installazione monumentale celebra la diaspora nera, creando un ponte tra passato e presente.

Ognuna di queste opere è un atto di resistenza, un modo per riscrivere narrazioni e spazi.
Semplicemente è stato bello vedere così tanta arte queer alla Biennale, non solo come tema, ma come presenza forte e consapevole.

Il tema della Biennale era "Stranieri ovunque" ed era molto presente con opere sulle migrazioni e sui popoli, con tanta rappresentanza di artisti di popolazioni e entie oppresse e marginalizzate. Il rischio di una cornice così internazionale e istituzionale è quello di essere poco incisivi e di essere manipolati, nel mio caso mi ha aiutato a capire di più e ha creato consapevolezza e curiosità su tante altre situazioni anche lontane da noi.
@Arte e Cultura @Cultura
@lgbtqbookstodon group

#arte #biennalevenezia #artequeer

Di Esther Solomon, caporedattrice della versione inglese di Haaretz (quotidiano israeliano)

Esther Solomon, Editor-in-chief, Haaretz English

This week, Israelis woke up to war again, but this time not to the Hamas surprise attack of October 7 but to a conscious decision by their government to restart fighting, against the will of the popular majority, which consistently favors an end to the war and the return of all the hostages. This same week, the Netanyahu government intensified its battles on two other fronts as well: its war on Israeli democracy, and its war on Diaspora Jews.

Prime Minister Netanyahu is baldly exhibiting his 'vision' for the character of his own regime and the principles that govern the Israeli state's behavior at home and abroad. It is a vision that is genuinely revolutionary, in that it rips up and shreds into confetti most of the fundamental values and social contracts that bind the state to its citizens, and the state to the Jewish people outside its borders.

With the Trump administration's backing, but to the consternation of most of the rest of the international community, IDF airstrikes are now raining down on Gaza again. Netanyahu's ministers are using bloodcurdling language, directed at the whole population of Gaza, and not only Hamas.

The declared premise for breaking the cease-fire – that extreme military pressure will force Hamas into capitulation, and will lead to hostages being released alive – is false and illogical. Sixteen months of war has shown that only negotiations bring back significant numbers of hostages alive, that airstrikes kill them, and Hamas, which has repopulated its ranks, has no pangs of conscience to fight to the last Gazan. As Einav Zangauker, warrior mother of hostage Matan, said: "Netanyahu has opened the gates of hell not on Hamas, but on our loved ones."

The real reason for resuming war is to satiate the annexationist warlust of the far right, and win the prime minister more time in power. And both of those reasons factor into the resurgence-on-steroids of the government's judicial coup, now honed to take out the Shin Bet head and the Attorney General, the key remaining gatekeepers of democracy and the rule of law.

There's an urgency to Netanyahu's call to rid himself of these troublesome officials, and it's called Qatargate: the rolling scandal of close aides to Netanyahu allegedly being paid by Doha for positive PR during the war, in which the Shin Bet is a lead investigative agency. In true Trumpist style, and with a nod to his fellow White House populists, Netanyahu took to social media to accuse the "leftist deep state" of conspiring to weaponize the justice system to bring down the right-wing government.

This week there were also dramatic developments in the third front: How the government understands its relationship with Diaspora Jews. Amichai Chikli, the minister in charge of Diaspora relations and Israel's antisemitism czar, is organizing a "combating antisemitism" conference stuffed with representatives of European far-right parties whose antisemitic, neo-Nazi, illiberal record is either a fact of their founding and/or an everyday feature of their activists' rhetoric.

It was an ambush for the high-profile representatives of U.S. and European Jewish communities also invited to attend: To show solidarity with Israel at the cost of their own values and safety. One by one, they have cancelled, from the U.K.'s Chief Rabbi to the head of the ADL: Even Israel's President refused to host the far-right politicians. These are rare, brave moves that may well be a milestone in the breakdown of Israel-Diaspora relations, a sign of how infuriated Diaspora Jews are and how arrogant, cynical and fanatic the Israeli government.

Netanyahu's wars have terrible human costs, but they are also designed to reshape language and the space for dissent. To jumpstart the cease-fire, make war. To save the hostages, bomb them. To save democracy, institute autocracy. To confront antisemitism, welcome antisemites.

Despite their deep fatigue, most Israelis aren't buying it. Forty thousand turned out to protest in Tel Aviv on Tuesday; thousands more in Jerusalem the next day. But Netanyahu has formidable weapons at his disposal, and there is no cease-fire pending for the wars outside and inside Israel's borders.

Dedicato a chi dice che gli scioperi non servono.

[...] prevede l'immediata erogazione di una tantum di 500 euro e un incremento economico medio mensile a regime tra i 220 e i 240 euro

agi.it/economia/news/2025-03-2…

La banca ha scritto in un report che fatica a ricordare altri casi «in cui un marchio abbia perso così tanto valore in così poco tempo»

[...]

Secondo Lekander, Musk «sta dal lato sbagliato dei suoi acquirenti. Non è la gente con gli stivali da cowboy che compra le Tesla»

ilpost.it/2025/03/19/jp-morgan…