There are many ways to build your own Macintosh clone, and while the very latest models remain a little inaccessible, there are plenty of Intel-based so-called “Hackintoshes” which deliver an almost up-to-date experience. But the Mac has been around for a very long time now, and its earliest incarnation only has 128k of RAM and a 68000 processor. What can emulate one of those? Along comes [Matt Evans], with a working Mac 128k emulated on a Raspberry Pi Pico. Such is the power of a modern microcontroller that an RP2040 can now be a Mac!

The granddaddy of all Macs might have been a computer to lust after four decades ago, but the reality was that even at the time the demands of a GUI quickly made it under-powered. The RP2040 has plenty of processing power compared to the 68000 and over twice the Mac’s memory, so it seemed as though emulating the one with the other might be possible. This proved to be the case, using the Musashi 68000 interpreter and a self-built emulator which has been spun into a project of its own called umac. With monochrome VGA and USB for keyboard and mouse, there’s MacPaint on a small LCD screen looking a lot like the real thing.

If you want a 1980s Mac for anything without the joy of reviving original hardware, this represents an extremely cheap way to achieve it. If it can be compiled for microcontrollers with more available memory we could see it would even make for a more useful Mac, though your Mac mileage may vary.

Of course, this isn’t the only take on an early Mac we’ve brought you.

OK, it’s official: the Quansheng UV-K5 is the king of hackable ham radios — especially now that a second version of the all-band hardware and firmware mod has been released, not to mention a new version of the radio.

If you need to get up to speed, check out our previous coverage of the all-band hack for the UV-K5, in which [Paul (OM0ET)] installs a tiny PCB to upgrade the radio’s receiver chip to an Si4732. Along with a few jumpers and some component replacements on the main board, these hardware mods made it possible for the transceiver, normally restricted to the VHF and UHF amateur radio bands, to receive everything down to the 20-meter band, in both AM and single-sideband modulations.

The new mod featured in the video below does all that and more, all while making the installation process slightly easier. The new PCB is on a flexible substrate and is considerably slimmer, and also sports an audio amplifier chip, to make up for the low audio output on SSB signals of the first version. Installation, which occupies the first third of the video below, is as simple as removing one SMD chip from the radio’s main board and tacking the PCB down in its footprint, followed by making a couple of connections with very fine enameled wire.

You could load the new firmware and call it a day at that point, but [Paul] decided to take things a step further and install a separate jack for a dedicated HF antenna. This means sacrificing the white LED on the top panel, which isn’t much of a sacrifice for most hams, to make room for the jack. Most of us would put a small SMA jack in, but [Paul] went for a BNC, which required some deft Dremel and knife work to fit in. He also used plain hookup wire to connect the jack, which sounds like a terrible idea; we’d probably use RG-316, but his mod didn’t sound that bad at all.

Keen to know more about the Quansheng UV-K5? Dive into the reverse-engineered schematics.

youtube.com/embed/ARlpLA-wjpQ?…

Thanks to [Sam] for the heads up on this one.

Milano, 7 Giugno 2024 – L’ASST Rhodense è stata vittima di un grave attacco informatico da parte del gruppo ransomware Cicada3301, che ha causato il furto di un’enorme quantità di dati sensibili. Questo evento ha avuto un impatto devastante su tutte le strutture dell’ASST, comprese quelle di Garbagnate Milanese, Bollate, Rho e Passirana, nonché sui servizi territoriali nelle aree distrettuali di Garbagnatese, Rhodense e Corsichese.

Secondo le notizie riportate sul sito della Regione Lombardia, l’attacco è avvenuto nella notte di giovedì 6 giugno. Gli hacker sono riusciti a esfiltrare 1 TB di dati, tra cui informazioni di identificazione personale (PII), dati personali, documenti medici, prescrizioni e altri documenti sensibili. Questo furto massiccio di dati è stato successivamente pubblicato integralmente sul sito di leak del gruppo criminale.

Il furto di dati sensibili rappresenta una seria minaccia per la privacy e la sicurezza dei pazienti e del personale dell’ASST Rhodense. Le autorità stanno lavorando incessantemente per valutare l’entità del danno e per mettere in atto le misure necessarie a contenere e risolvere la situazione. Nel frattempo, l’ASST sta collaborando con esperti di sicurezza informatica per rafforzare le proprie difese e prevenire futuri attacchi.

L’ASST Rhodense ha immediatamente informato le autorità competenti e sta collaborando con le forze dell’ordine per identificare i responsabili dell’attacco. Inoltre, è stata attivata una linea di assistenza per i pazienti e il personale colpiti dal furto di dati, al fine di fornire supporto e informazioni utili per proteggere ulteriormente la loro privacy.

La rivendicazione da parte del gruppo Cicada3301

Cicada3301 è un nuovo gruppo Ransomware annunciando sul proprio DLS 4 vittime:

Questo attacco mette in luce ancora una volta l’importanza della sicurezza informatica nelle istituzioni sanitarie, un settore particolarmente vulnerabile a causa della natura sensibile dei dati trattati. È essenziale che tutte le organizzazioni sanitarie rafforzino le proprie misure di sicurezza per proteggere le informazioni dei pazienti da minacce sempre più sofisticate.

La Regione Lombardia ha espresso la propria solidarietà all’ASST Rhodense e ha promesso di fornire tutto il supporto necessario per superare questa crisi. I cittadini sono invitati a rimanere vigili e a segnalare qualsiasi attività sospetta che possa essere collegata a questo grave incidente di sicurezza.

Come nostra consuetudine, lasciamo sempre spazio ad una dichiarazione da parte dell’azienda qualora voglia darci degli aggiornamenti sulla vicenda. Saremo lieti di pubblicare tali informazioni con uno specifico articolo dando risalto alla questione.

RHC monitorerà l’evoluzione della vicenda in modo da pubblicare ulteriori news sul blog, qualora ci fossero novità sostanziali. Qualora ci siano persone informate sui fatti che volessero fornire informazioni in modo anonimo possono utilizzare la mail crittografata del whistleblower.

L'articolo Attacco Informatico all’ASST Rhodense: Cicada3301 pubblica 1 TB di Dati Sensibili liberamente scaricabili proviene da il blog della sicurezza informatica.

I ricercatori di Trend Micro hanno segnalato un nuovo gruppo criminale informatico monitorato sotto il nome di Void Arachne. Questo gruppo di hacker prende di mira principalmente gli utenti cinesi e utilizza file Windows Installer (MSI) dannosi camuffati da VPN per distribuire i sistemi Winos 4.0 C2.

Secondo Trend Micro, gli aggressori distribuiscono anche file MSI dannosi contenenti programmi per creare falsi video pornografici e software basati sull’intelligenza artificiale per cambiare voci e volti.

Per distribuire software dannoso Winos 4.0. vengono utilizzate tattiche di ottimizzazione dei motori di ricerca (SEO) e vengono utilizzati anche social network e messaggistica istantanea. Gli aggressori pubblicizzano software popolari come Google Chrome, LetsVPN, QuickVPN, nonché il pacchetto linguistico di Telegram per il cinese semplificato.

Le catene di attacco alternative identificate dai ricercatori includono anche l‘uso di installer modificati distribuiti attraverso i canali Telegram in lingua cinese.

I collegamenti a file dannosi compaiono grazie ai cosiddetti metodi “black SEO” e portano a un’infrastruttura speciale creata per archiviare i file di installazione sotto forma di archivi ZIP. Per gli attacchi tramite canali Telegram, i programmi di installazione MSI dannosi e gli archivi ZIP vengono posizionati direttamente sulla piattaforma.

I file di installazione sono progettati per modificare le regole del firewall per consentire l’ingresso e l’uscita del traffico correlato al malware durante la connessione alle reti pubbliche. Installano inoltre un loader che decodifica ed esegue la seconda fase del malware, eseguendo uno script Visual Basic per fornire persistenza sull’host ed eseguire uno script batch sconosciuto, distribuendo il malware Winos 4.0.

Winos 4.0, scritto in C++, è in grado di eseguire attacchi DDoS utilizzando TCP/UDP/ICMP/HTTP, eseguire ricerche su dischi locali, gestire file, webcam, acquisire schermate, registrare audio da un microfono, eseguire keylogging e fornire accesso remoto alla shell.

La caratteristica principale di Winos 4.0 è un sistema di plugin che implementa tutte le funzioni attraverso 23 componenti compilati per le versioni di Windows a 32 e 64 bit. Il sistema può essere integrato con plugin esterni integrati dagli stessi aggressori.

Il componente principale di Winos include anche metodi per rilevare la presenza di malware comune in Cina ed è anche responsabile del caricamento di plug-in, della pulizia dei registri di sistema e del download di malware aggiuntivo da un URL fornito.

I ricercatori di Trend Micro sottolineano che un così grande scalpore attorno ai client VPN in Cina è dovuto al lavoro del Great Firewall cinese, e quindi hanno preso di mira proprio questo segmento di utenti Internet.

L'articolo Great Firewall of China Sfruttato dagli Hacker di Void Arachne per Diffondere Malware proviene da il blog della sicurezza informatica.

I distributori di malware utilizzano falsi bug di Google Chrome, Word e OneDrive per indurre gli utenti a eseguire “patch“, che in realtà sono script di PowerShell che installano malware.

Gli esperti di ProofPoint riferiscono che la nuova tattica è già stata adottata da diversi gruppi di hacker. Questi attacchi vengono quindi utilizzati dagli aggressori dietro lo schema ClearFake, il nuovo cluster dannoso ClickFix, nonché il gruppo TA571, che di solito distribuisce spam e invia numerose email che portano all’infezione con malware e ransomware.

In precedenza, gli attacchi ClearFake iniettavano codice dannoso nei siti compromessi, dopo di che le risorse mostravano messaggi falsi sulla necessità di aggiornare il browser.

Nuovi attacchi sfruttano anche JavaScript in HTML sui siti compromessi, ma ora gli overlay mostrano agli utenti errori falsi di Google Chrome, Microsoft Word e OneDrive. Questi messaggi incoraggiano gli utenti a copiare la “correzione” negli appunti, quindi incollarla ed eseguirla manualmente.

“Sebbene un attacco riuscito richieda un’interazione significativa da parte dell’utente, l’ingegneria sociale è abbastanza sofisticata da presentare contemporaneamente all’utente un problema e una soluzione, che può motivarlo ad agire senza valutare i rischi”, avvertono.

I payload osservati da Proofpoint in questa campagna includono: DarkGate, Matanbuchus, NetSupport, Amadey Loader, XMRig, malware che dirotta gli appunti attraverso l’infostealer Lumma.

Gli analisti hanno subito individuato tre catene di attacchi, che si differenziano soprattutto nelle fasi iniziali. Solo uno di essi non è associabile con certezza al gruppo TA571 sopra menzionato.

Quindi, nel primo caso, che è associato agli aggressori dietro gli attacchi ClearFake, gli utenti si recano su un sito compromesso che scarica uno script dannoso ospitato sulla blockchain tramite Binance Smart Chain.

Questo script esegue diversi controlli e visualizza una notifica falsa, presumibilmente proveniente da Google Chrome, che indica un problema con la visualizzazione della pagina web. La finestra di dialogo richiede quindi di installare il “certificato root” copiando lo script PowerShell negli appunti ed eseguendolo in Windows PowerShell.

Una volta eseguito, lo script esegue vari controlli per garantire che il dispositivo sia un bersaglio adatto, quindi scarica un payload aggiuntivo, come mostrato nel diagramma seguente.

La seconda catena di attacchi è associata alla campagna ClickFix e utilizza iniezioni su siti compromessi che creano iframe per sovrapporre errori falsi. In questo caso, agli utenti viene richiesto di aprire “Windows PowerShell (Admin)” e incollare il codice fornito, che ha lo stesso effetto.

La terza catena di attacchi coinvolge la posta elettronica e l’uso di allegati HTML che assomigliano a documenti di Microsoft Word. Qui agli utenti viene chiesto di installare l’estensione Word Online per visualizzare correttamente il documento.

In questo caso, il falso messaggio di errore contiene le opzioni “Come risolvere” e “Correzione automatica”. Inoltre, selezionando l’opzione “Come risolvere” copia il comando PowerShell codificato base64 negli appunti e indica all’utente di incollarlo in PowerShell.

L’opzione di correzione automatica, a sua volta, utilizza il protocollo search-ms per visualizzare un file fix.msi o fix.vbs ospitato sulla condivisione file remota di un hacker utilizzando WebDAV. Cioè, i comandi PowerShell vengono scaricati ed eseguiti tramite un file MSI o tramite uno script VBS, il che porta all’infezione con i malware Matanbuchus e DarkGate.

L'articolo Nuova Truffa Online: Falsi Bug in Chrome e Word Diffondono Malware proviene da il blog della sicurezza informatica.

I ricercatori Symantec hanno scoperto che gli aggressori associati al ransomware Black Basta stavano sfruttando una vulnerabilità appena scoperta nel servizio Windows Error Reporting (WER) per ottenere privilegi di sistema elevati. Questa vulnerabilità, nota come CVE-2024-26169, è stata risolta da Microsoft a marzo 2024.

Il CVE-2024-26169 è una vulnerabilità di escalation dei privilegi con un punteggio CVSS di 7,8. Consente agli aggressori di ottenere i diritti di amministratore di sistema. L’analisi dello strumento di exploit utilizzato negli attacchi recenti ha mostrato che la compilazione potrebbe essere stata completata prima che la vulnerabilità fosse stata corretta, indicando che era utilizzata come vulnerabilità zeroday.

Symantec sta monitorando questo gruppo motivato finanziariamente chiamato Cardinal, noto anche come Storm-1811 e UNC4393. Questi aggressori utilizzano Black Basta per monetizzare l’accesso ai sistemi, spesso ottenendo l’accesso iniziale tramite QakBot e DarkGate.

Negli ultimi mesi, il gruppo ha utilizzato prodotti Microsoft legittimi come Quick Assist e Teams per attaccare gli utenti. Secondo Microsoft, gli aggressori inviano messaggi e chiamate tramite Teams fingendo di essere personale IT, portando all’uso improprio di Quick Assist, al furto di credenziali tramite EvilProxy e all’utilizzo di SystemBC per fornire accesso persistente e controllo dei comandi.

Symantec ha inoltre affermato di aver osservato lo strumento utilizzato in un tentativi di attacco ransomware. Gli aggressori utilizzano il file “werkernel.sys“, che crea chiavi di registro con un descrittore di sicurezza nullo. Ciò consente di creare una chiave di registro che avvia una shell di comandi con diritti amministrativi.

Un portavoce di Microsoft ha confermato che il problema è stato risolto a marzo e che i clienti che hanno installato la correzione sono protetti. Il software di sicurezza proprietario include strumenti per rilevare e proteggersi da questo malware.

Fortunatamente, la tempestiva patch di Microsoft ha impedito gravi attacchi, ma l’incidente serve a ricordare la crescente importanza della protezione dalle minacce informatiche.

L'articolo Black Basta ha utilizzato una Vulnerabilità Zero-Day in Windows per distribuire il ransomware proviene da il blog della sicurezza informatica.

The last time we used a scanning electron microscope (a SEM), it looked like something from a bad 1950s science fiction movie. These days SEMs, like the one at the IBM research center, look like computers with a big tank poised nearby. Interestingly, the SEM is so sensitive that it has to be in a quiet room to prevent sound from interfering with images.

As a demo of the machine’s impressive capability, [John Ott] loads two US pennies, one facing up and one face down. [John] notes that Lincoln appears on both sides of the penny and then proves the assertion correct using moderate magnification under the electron beam.

Some electron microscopes pass electrons through thin samples much as light passes through a sample on a microscope slide. However, SEMs and REMs (reflection electron microscopes) use either secondary electron emission or reflected electrons from the surface of items like the penny.

You often see SEMs also fitted with EDS — energy dispersive X-ray spectrometers, sometimes called EDX — that can reveal the composition of a sample’s surface. There are other ways to examine surfaces, like auger spectrometers (pronounced like OJ), which can isolate thin films on surfaces. There’s also SIMS (secondary ion mass spectrometry) which mills bits of material away using an ion beam. and Rutherford backscattering spectrometry, which also uses an ion beam.

We keep waiting for someone to share plans to make a cheap, repeatable SEM. There are a few attempts out there, but we don’t see many in the wild. While the device is conceptually simple, you do need precise high voltages and high vacuums,. Also, you frequently need ancillary devices to do things like sputter gold in argon gas to coat nonconductive samples, so the barrier to entry is high.

youtube.com/embed/tAhovMMRcEM?…

I ricercatori hanno scoperto sei vulnerabilità nel router economico Netgear WNR614 N300, popolare sia tra gli utenti privati e delle piccole imprese. Purtroppo il supporto per questi dispositivi è già stato interrotto e non sono previste patch.

I ricercatori di RedFox Security riferiscono che i bug riscontrati vanno dal bypass dell’autenticazione e politiche di password deboli all’archiviazione di password in chiaro e alla divulgazione del PIN Wi-Fi Protected Setup (WPS).

• CVE-2024-36787 : consente a un utente malintenzionato di ignorare l’autenticazione e ottenere l’accesso all’interfaccia amministrativa. In effetti, questo problema consente l’accesso non autorizzato alle impostazioni del router.
• CVE-2024-36788 : il flag HTTPOnly per i cookie non è impostato correttamente sui dispositivi. Un utente malintenzionato può utilizzare questo bug per intercettare e ottenere l’accesso ai messaggi riservati scambiati tra il router e i dispositivi ad esso collegati.
• CVE-2024-36789 : consente agli aggressori di creare password che non soddisfano gli standard di sicurezza e persino di utilizzare un solo carattere come password per l’account amministratore.
• CVE-2024-36790 : il router memorizza le credenziali in testo non crittografato, che consente l’accesso non autorizzato, il controllo del dispositivo ed espone anche dati sensibili.
• CVE-2024-36792 : L’implementazione WPS consente l’accesso al codice PIN del router. Ciò rende i dispositivi potenzialmente vulnerabili agli accessi non autorizzati.
• CVE-2024-36795 : i privilegi non sicuri consentiranno agli aggressori di accedere a URL e directory codificati nel firmware del router, aumentando il rischio di accesso alla rete non autorizzato.

Dati dell’amministratore in testo non crittografato
Poiché il supporto per i router Netgear WNR614 N300 è già terminato, è improbabile che Netgear rilasci patch per questi problemi.

I ricercatori consigliano vivamente ai proprietari dei dispositivi interessati di sostituirli con nuovi modelli supportati il ​​prima possibile. Se per qualche motivo ciò non è possibile, si consiglia di adottare le seguenti misure protettive:

• disabilitare le funzionalità di gestione remota per ridurre il rischio di accesso non autorizzato;
• utilizzare password complesse e lunghe e cambiarle regolarmente;
• Separare il router dai sistemi critici della rete per limitare l’impatto di un potenziale attacco;
• Assicurati che il tuo router utilizzi HTTPS e utilizza le impostazioni del browser che forzano tutte le connessioni a utilizzare HTTPS.
• disabilitare il WPS in modo che gli aggressori non possano utilizzare questa funzione e ottenere un accesso non autorizzato al router;
• passare a WPA3, che migliora la sicurezza rispetto ai protocolli precedenti;
• limitare l’accesso all’interfaccia amministrativa del router.

L'articolo Scoperte 6 Vulnerabilità Critiche nei Router Netgear WNR614 N300: Cosa Fare Subito proviene da il blog della sicurezza informatica.

Aerial drone image of a litter windrow in Bay of Biscay, Spain. Windrow width: 1-2 meters. (Credit: ESA)
Recently ESA published the results of a proof-of-concept study into monitoring marine litter using existing satellites, with promising results for the Mediterranean study area. For the study, six years of historical data from the Sentinel-2 satellite multispectral imaging cameras were used, involving 300,000 images with a resolution of 10 meters. The focus was on litter windrows as common collections of litter like plastic, wood and other types of marine debris that float on the surface, forming clearly visible lines that can be meters wide and many times as long.

These were processed as explained in the open access paper in Nature Communications by [Andrés Cózar] and colleagues. As marine litter (ML) tends to be overwhelmingly composed of plastic, this eases the detection, as any ML that’s visible from space can generally be assumed to be primarily plastic litter. This was combined with the spectral profile of common plastics, so that other types of floating materials (algae, driftwood, seafoam, etc.) could be filtered out, leaving just the litter.

This revealed many of these short-lived litter windrows, with spot confirmation from ships in the area. Some of the windrows were many kilometers in length, with an average of around 1 km.

Although just a PoC, it nevertheless shows that monitoring such plastic debris from space is quite doable, even without dedicated satellites. As every day tons more plastics make their way into the oceans, this provides us with the means to at least keep track of the scope of the problem. Even if resolving it and the associated microplastics problem is still a far-off dream.

This week Jonathan Bennett and Simon Phipps chat with Matthew Hodgson and Josh Simmons about Matrix, the open source decentralized communications platform. How is Matrix a Git for Communications? Are the new EU and UK laws going to be a problem? And how is the Matrix project connected with the Element company?

youtube.com/embed/BpIIgTP-7tA?…

– matrix.org/blog
– element.io/

Did you know you can watch the live recording of the show right in the Hackaday Discord? Have someone you’d like use to interview? Let us know, or contact the guest and have them contact us! Take a look at the schedule here.

play.libsyn.com/embed/episode/…

Direct Download in DRM-free MP3.

If you’d rather read along, here’s the transcript for this week’s episode.

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Uno scritto davvero interessante, prepotente e sincero senza freni e rivelatore, per uno scrittore fra i più interessanti dello spaghetti weird. @L’angolo del lettore

iyezine.com/michele-borgogni-t…

Michele Borgogni - Terror Supermarket

Michele Borgogni - Terror Supermarket - Terror Supermarket: Michele Borgogni iper realista e descrive cosa potrebbe succedere in un supermercato se cadessero le flebili barriere ipocrite - Terror Supermarket

^{Massimo Argo (In Your Eyes ezine)}

Craig Lindley is a technical author and a prolific maker of things. This simple project was his first attempt to create a laser harp MIDI device. While on vacation, Craig saw a laser harp with only three strings and decided to improve upon it by expanding it to ten strings. The principle of operation is straightforward: ten cheap diode laser modules aim a beam towards an LDR, which changes resistance if the light level changes when the beam is interrupted.

The controller is a simple piece of perf board, with a Wemos D1 mini ESP32 module flanked by some passives, a barrel socket for power, and the usual DIN connector for connecting the MIDI instrument. Using the ESP32 is a smart choice, removing all the need for configuration and user indication from the physical domain and pushing it onto a rarely-needed webpage. After a false start, attempting to use a triangular frame arrangement, [Craig] settled upon a simple linear arrangement of beams held within a laser-cut wooden box frame. Since these laser modules are quite small, some aluminium rod was machined to make some simple housings to push them into, making them easier to mount in the frame and keeping them nicely aligned with their corresponding LDR.

Sadly, the magnetic attachment method [Craig] used to keep the LDRs in place and aligned with the laser didn’t work as expected, so it was necessary to reach for the hot glue. We’ve all done that!

An interesting addition was using an M5 stack Unit-Synth module for those times when a proper MIDI synthesiser was unavailable. Making this luggable was smart, as people are always fascinated with laser harps. That simple internal synth makes travelling to shows and events a little easier.

Laser harps are nothing new here; we have covered plenty over the years. Like this nice build, which is more a piece of art than an instrument, one which looks just like a real harp and sounds like one, too, due to the use of the Karplus-Strong algorithm to mimic string vibrations.

PCB business cards for electronics engineers might be very much old news in our circles, but they are still cool, not seen too much in the wild, and frankly inaccessible to those in other industries. For their entry into the 2024 Business Card Challenge, [Dima Shlenkevitch] is helping a little to alleviate this by providing a set of design examples and worked costs with suppliers.
Original green is still the cheapest option.
[Dima] lists key features every PCB business card should include, such as the expected thickness, restrictions for placing NFC components, and some aesthetics tips. Make sure to choose a supplier that allows you to remove their order number from the manufactured PCB, or it will look out of place.

Ordering PCBs with these specifications to keep costs reasonable requires effort, so [Dima] offers some example designs along with the results. If you want to have pretty gold lettering and graphics, you will need ENiG plating, increasing the price. Non-standard solder mask colors can also raise the price.

Will this help with the practical aspects of driving the PCB design software and actually placing the order? Obviously not, but the information provided gives you a leg up on some of the decisions so you don’t go down an expensive rabbit hole.

By the time you read this the Iowa-class battleship USS New Jersey (BB-62) should be making its way along the Delaware River, heading back to its permanent mooring on the Camden waterfront after undergoing a twelve week maintenance and repair period at the nearby Philadelphia Navy Yard.

The 888 foot (270 meter) long ship won’t be running under its own power, but even under tow, it’s not often that you get to see one of the world’s last remaining battleships on the move. The New Jersey’s return home will be a day of celebration, with onlookers lining the banks of the Delaware, news helicopters in the air, and dignitaries and veterans waiting eagerly to greet her as she slides up to the pier.

But when I got the opportunity to tour the New Jersey a couple weeks ago and get a first-hand look at the incredible preservation work being done on this historic ship, it was a very different scene. There was plenty of activity within the cavernous Dry Dock #3 at the Navy Yard, the very same slip where the ship’s construction was completed back in 1942, but little fanfare. Staff from North Atlantic Ship Repair, the company that now operates the facility, were laboring feverishly over the weekend to get the ship ready.

While by no means an exhaustive account of the work that was done on the ship during its time in Dry Dock #3, this article will highlight some of the more interesting projects that were undertaken while it was out of the water. After seeing the thought and effort put into every aspect of the ship’s preservation by curator Ryan Szimanski and his team, there’s no doubt that not only is the USS New Jersey in exceptionally capable hands, but that it will continue to proudly serve as a museum and memorial for decades to come.

A Fresh Coat of Paint

The primary goal of putting New Jersey into dry dock was to repaint the hull below the water line, something which had not been done since the ship was deactivated by the US Navy in 1990. Under normal circumstances this is the sort of routine maintenance that would be done every few years, but for a static museum ship, the recommended dry docking interval is 30 years. There was no indication that the hull was in particularly bad shape or in need of emergency repair — most of the work done during this yard period was preventative in nature.

The first step in this process was to remove the old paint, along with any biological growth and rust. Unfortunately, there’s no “easy” way to do this. The entire surface area of the underwater hull, totaling roughly 125,000 square feet (11,600 square meters), was painstakingly cleaned using ultra-high pressure washers operating at approximately 30,000 psi. In some areas, getting close enough to the surface of the hull meant putting workers up on a lift, but for the ship’s relatively flat bottom, personnel had to squat down and spray the surface over their heads.

As the ship is resting on around 300 “keel blocks”, this process had to be done in two separate phases. First, the approximately 90% of the hull that was not covered by the blocks was stripped, painted, and left to dry. Then the dry dock was flooded just enough to get the ship floating , so it could be pulled forward a few feet and dropped back down to uncover the areas of the hull that were previously covered.

Checking for Leaks

Even though the steel of the hull itself might be intact, a large ship will have many openings under the water line that can leak if not properly maintained. According to Ryan the New Jersey has about 165 such openings, ranging from tiny drain lines to massive seawater intakes. While the ship was in operation each one of them would have served an important purpose, but as a floating museum with essentially no operating hardware onboard, they’re a liability.

The easiest solution would have been to simply weld plates over all of them. But part of the arrangement that allows the New Jersey to operate as a museum is that the Navy has the right to take the ship back and reactivate it at any time. Admittedly it’s an unlikely prospect, but those are the rules.

Permanently blocking up all those critical openings would make the ship’s reactivation that much more difficult, so instead, each one was “boxed over” with a custom-made steel enclosure. The idea is that, should the ship ever need to return to operation, these boxes could easily be cut off without damaging the hull.

Only one of these boxes was known to be leaking before pulling New Jersey out of the water, but out of an abundance of caution, the integrity of each one was manually checked by pressurizing them with air. If the box held pressure, it was good to go. If it lost air, then it was sprayed with soapy water and closely inspected for bubbles. If there were no bubbles on the outside that meant the air was leaking into the ship through whatever the enclosed fitting was — a problem the Navy might need to address in World War Three, but not something the museum needed to concern themselves with.

Swapping Out Anodes

To help fight off corrosion ships use a technique known as cathodic protection, which essentially turns the steel of the hull into the cathode of a electrochemical cell. The surrounding water serves as the electrolyte, and blocks made of a metal with a high ionization tendency are mounted to the ship to act as the anode. As electrons flow through this circuit, the sacrificial anode dissolves, sparing the hull and other underwater gear such as the propellers.

New Jersey was fitted with 1,200 anodes when the Navy deactivated her, but unfortunately, they ended up being the wrong type. At the time it was assumed that the ship would be stored in a saltwater port as part of what’s known as the “Mothball Fleet”, so zinc anodes were used. There was no way to know that, a decade later, the ship would be transferred to the fresh waters of the Delaware River to live out the rest of its life as a museum.

Because of this, the zinc anodes didn’t corrode away as was intended. In fact when the dry dock was drained, it was revealed that the anodes were in nearly perfect condition. You could even still read the manufacturing info stamped into many of them. On the plus side, they’ll make for excellent souvenirs in the museum’s gift shop. But in terms of corrosion protection, they didn’t do a thing.

Luckily, fresh water is relatively forgiving, so the battleship didn’t suffer too badly for this lack of functioning cathodic protection. Even so, it was decided to install 600 aluminum anodes in place of the originals, which are more suitable for the conditions the ship is stored in.

Closing Off the Shafts

Before New Jersey went in for this yard period, there was some debate about removing its propellers and drive shafts. The idea being that the huge openings in the hull which the shafts pass through were a long-term liability. But not only would this have deviated from the museum’s overall goal of keeping the ship as intact as possible, it would have been a considerable undertaking.

Instead it was decided to seal off where the shafts pass through the hull with custom-made steel enclosures, much like the other openings on the bottom of the ship. In addition, the shafts were wrapped with fiberglass where they pass through the support brackets on the rear of the ship. The fiberglass isn’t expected to be a permanent solution like the steel boxes around the shafts, but should provide at least some measure of protection.

Lots and Lots of Caulk

One of the surprising things discovered upon inspecting the hull of New Jersey was that caulking had been applied to all the seams along the riveted hull plates. At least in theory, this shouldn’t be necessary, as the overlapping plates are designed to be watertight. But if the Navy thought it was worth the time and expense to do it, there must have been a reason.

Sure enough, a dive into the ship’s onboard reference library revealed a document from October of 1990 that described a persistent water intrusion issue on the ship. Basically, water kept getting inside the hull, but they couldn’t figure out where it was coming from. Although the Navy couldn’t actually find any leaks between the hull plates, the document went on to explain that the decision was made to caulk them all anyway in hopes that it would solve the issue.

Since the ship hadn’t been taking on any mysterious water while docked in Camden, it would appear the fix worked. As such, it was decided to re-caulk the roughly 18,000 linear feet (5,500 meters) of plate seams just like the Navy did in 1990. Since the manufacturer of the product was mentioned in the document, the museum was even able to get the exact same caulking used by the Navy 34 years ago.

Views From Dry Dock

Documentation for the Future

Walking along the ship’s massive hull, the projects I’ve listed here were the most obvious to even the untrained eye. But as I said at the start, this isn’t a complete list of the work done to the USS New Jersey during its dry docking. It’s hard to overstate the scale of the restoration work that was accomplished in such a short amount of time. It took years of planning by a team of very dedicated individuals to pull this off.

But you don’t have to take my word for it. Ryan Szimanski and his team have done an incredible job of documenting the entire dry docking process on the ship’s official YouTube channel. Putting all of this information out for the public to view and learn from will undoubtedly inform the restoration efforts on other museum ships going forward, but even if you don’t have a battleship in your backyard, it makes for fascinating viewing.

youtube.com/embed/jcScaxaF2PQ?…

Air ride suspensions have several advantages over typical arrangements, but retrofitting a system to a vehicle that didn’t come with it can get pricey fast, especially if you want to go beyond the basics. The Open Source Air Suspension Management Controller aims to give people a fully customizable system without the expense or limitations of commercial units.

The project started as an upgrade to a basic commercial system, so it assumes that you’re bringing your own “bags, tank, compressor, tubing and fittings, gauges and manual paddle switches.” The current board uses an Arduino Nano, but the next revision based on the ESP32 will allow for a wider feature set.

With a Bluetooth connection and Android app, you can control your ride height from a phone or integrated Android head unit. Currently, the app shows the pressure readings from all four corners and has controls for increasing or decreasing the pressure or airing all the way up or down to a given set point.

Want to know how air suspensions work? How about this LEGO model? If you want a suspension with active tuning for your bike, how about this Arduino-powered mod?

Tomorrow (Thursday) EU governments are to vote on a bill (officially called “child sexual abuse regulation” but known as “chat control”) that would require automated searches in and disclosure of private chats, including end-to-end encrypted chats, that might contain illegal photos or videos.[1] If a user refuses this “upload moderation” of their chats, they would be blocked from receiving or sending images, videos and URLs. 48 politicians from Germany, Austria, Luxembourg, the Czech Republic and the Netherlands have published a letter to their governments calling for rejection of the latest version of the chatcontrol proposal, arguing that mass surveillance violates fundamental rights and would fail in court.[2] Signal and Threema have announced they would end their services in the EU if forced to implement the proposed automated monitoring (so-called “client-side scanning”). Whatsapp head Will Cathcart warned “scanning peoples messages like the EU is proposing breaks encryption”.[3] Last night NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden was the latest to weigh in on X, calling the proposal “a terrifying mass surveillance measure”.

[4]It is not yet clear whether the proponents among EU governments will be able to convince enough EU governments to make a qualified majority, which is why tomorrow’s agenda item is marked as “possible”.[1] Against this backdrop Pirate Party Member of the European Parliament Patrick Breyer, who co-negotiated the European Parliament’s position on the proposal[5], has published a call on citizens to reach out to EU governments, listing several governments that may yet be undecided.

[6]“Europeans need to understand that they will be cut off from using commonplace secure messengers if chat control is adopted – that means losing touch with your friends and colleagues around the world”, warns Breyer. “Do you really want Europe to become the world leader in bugging our smartphones and requiring blanket surveillance of the chats of millions of law-abiding Europeans? The European Parliament is convinced that this Orwellian approach will betray children and victims by inevitably failing in court. We call for truly effective child protection by mandating security by design, proactive crawling to clean the web and removal of illegal content – none of which is contained in the Belgium proposal governments will vote on tomorrow. We have one day left to make our governments take a different approach of effective and rights-respecting protection while saving our privacy and security online!”

[1] Agenda for tomorrow’s meeting: data.consilium.europa.eu/doc/d…
[2] Open letter by EU lawmakers: patrick-breyer.de/en/lawmakers…
[3] Statement by head of Whatsapp: x.com/wcathcart/status/1803178…
[4] Statement by Edward Snowden: x.com/Snowden/status/180312759…
[5] Summary of the European Parliament’s position: patrick-breyer.de/en/posts/cha…
[6] Breyer’s call for action: patrick-breyer.de/en/council-t…

Breyer’s website on the chat control proposal: chatcontrol.eu/en/feed

patrick-breyer.de/en/chat-cont…

Questo Memories Have Faces esce a quasi dieci anni di distanza da Inside Out Your Mind, ultimo vagito su trentatré della band, dimostrandosi, a mio modesto avviso, ancora superiore al suo già di per sé brillantissimo predecessore;  a riprova, se mai ce ne fosse bisogno, di come passione, competenza e sacro fuoco non abbandonino chi di certe sonorità si è reso uno dei più credibili e quotati alfieri.

@Musica Agorà

iyezine.com/the-loons-memories…

The Loons - Memories Have Faces

The Loons - Memories Have Faces - The Loons - Dream In Jade Green - The Loons

^{Il Santo (In Your Eyes ezine)}

Ad ulteriore dimostrazione di quanto ho scritto in occasione delle sue precedenti uscite, i nove pezzi di questo nuovo album si aprono con suggestioni tra il deserto e lo spazio infinito di Dirty Ground passando poi all'andamento doloroso di Light the Incense.
@Musica Agorà

iyezine.com/black-snake-moan-l…

Black Snake Moan - Lost In Time 

Black Snake Moan - Lost In Time  - Black Snake Moan - Lost In Time: - Black Snake Moan

^{Il Santo (In Your Eyes ezine)}

“The healer” su Thrill Jockey Records è il quinto disco sulla lunga distanza per i Sumac, gruppo di punta del rumorismo e della totale libertà musicale. Il gruppo formato da Nick Yacyshyn, Brian Cook e Aaron Turner torna a disegnare ardite parabole nei consumati cieli della musica moderna. @Musica Agorà

iyezine.com/sumac-the-healer

Sumac - The healer

Sumac - The healer - Sumac: una delle più particolari e meravigliose esperienze sonore che possiate compiere in questi tempi aridi. - Sumac

^{Massimo Argo (In Your Eyes ezine)}

I did something recently I haven’t done in a long time: I recompiled the Linux kernel. There was a time when this was a common occurrence. You might want a feature that the default kernel didn’t support, or you might have an odd piece of hardware. But these days, in almost all the cases where you need something like this, you’ll use loadable kernel modules (LKM) instead. These are modules that the kernel can load and unload at run time, which means you can add that new device or strange file system without having to rebuild or even restart the kernel.

Normally, when you write programs for Linux, they don’t have any special permissions. You typically can’t do direct port I/O, for example, or arbitrarily access memory. The kernel, however, including modules, has no such restriction. That can make debugging modules tricky because you can easily bring the system to its knees. If possible, you might think about developing on a virtual machine until you have what you want. That way, an errant module just brings down your virtual machine.

History

Some form of module support has been around since Linux 1.2. However, modern kernels can be built to include support for things or support them as modules. For example, you probably don’t want to put drivers for every single known video card in your kernel. But it is perfectly fine to build dozens or hundreds of modules you might need and then load the one you need at run time.

LKMs are at the heart of device drivers, file system drivers, and network drivers. In addition, modules can add new system calls, override existing system calls, add TTY line disciplines, and handle how executables run.

In Use

If you want to know what modules you have loaded, that’s the lsmod command. You’ll see that some modules depend on other modules and some don’t. There are two ways to load modules: insmod and modprobe. The insmod command simply tries to load a module. The modprobe command tries to determine if the module it is loading needs other modules and picks them up from a known location.

You can also remove modules with rmmod assuming they aren’t in use. Of course, adding and removing modules requires root access. You can usually run lsmod as a normal user if you like. You might also be interested in depmod to determine dependencies, and modinfo which shows information about modules.

Writing a Module

It is actually quite easy to write your own module. In fact, it is so simple that the first example I want to look at is a little more complex than necessary.

This simple module can load and unload. It leaves a message in the system messages (use dmesg, for example) to tell you it is there. In addition, it allows you to specify a key (just an arbitrary integer) when you load it. That number will show up in the output data. Here’s the code:
#include <linux/module.h>
#include <linux/moduleparam.h>
#include <linux/printk.h>

MODULE_AUTHOR("Al Williams");
MODULE_DESCRIPTION("Hackaday LKM");
MODULE_LICENSE("GPLv2"); // many options, GPL, GPLv2, Proprietary, etc.

static int somedata __initdata=0xbeef; // this is just some static variable available only at init
static int key=0xAA; // you can override this using insmod
// Note 0644 means that the sysfs entry will be rw-r--r--
module_param(key,int,0644); // use module_param_named if you want different names internal vs external
MODULE_PARM_DESC(key,"An integer ID unique to this module");

static int __init had_init(void)
{
// This is the usual way to do this (don't forget \n and note no comma after KERN_INFO), but...
printk(KERN_INFO "Hackaday is in control (%x %x)\n",key,somedata);
return 0;
}

static void __exit had_exit(void)
{
// ... you can also use the pr_info macro which does the same thing
pr_info("Returning control of your system to you (%x)!\n",key);
}

module_init(had_init);
module_exit(had_exit);</pre>

This isn’t hard to puzzle out. Most of it is include files and macros that give modinfo something to print out. There are some variables: somedata is just a set variable that is readable during initialization. The key variable has a default but can be set using insmod. What’s more, is because module_param specifies 0644 — an octal Linux permission — there will be an entry in the /sys/modules directory that will let the root set or read the value of the key.

At the end, there are two calls that register what happens when the module loads and unloads. The rest of the code is just something to print some info when those events happen.

I printed data in two ways: the traditional printk and using the pr_info macro which uses printk underneath, anyway. You should probably pick one and stick with it. I’d normally just use pr_info.

Building the modules is simple assuming you have the entire build environment and the headers for the kernel. Here’s a simple makefile (don’t forget to use tabs in your makefile):
<pre>obj-m += hadmod1.o

PWD := $(CURDIR) # not needed in most cases, but useful if using sudo

all:
make -C /lib/modules/$(shell uname -r)/build M=$(PWD) modules

clean:
make -C /lib/modules/$(shell uname -r)/build M=$(PWD) clean</pre>

Once you build things, you should have a .ko file (like hadmod.ko). That’s the module. Try a few things:

1. sudo insmod hadmod.ko # load the module
2. sudo dmesg # see the module output
3. cat /sys/modules/hadmodule/key # see the key (you can set it, too, if you are root)
4. sudo rmmod hadmod.ko # unload the module
5. sudo insmod hadmod.ko key=128 # set key this time and repeat the other steps

That’s It?

That is it. Of course, the real details lie in how you interact with the kernel or hardware devices, but that’s up to you. Just to give a slightly meatier example, I made a second version of the module that adds /proc/jollywrencher to the /proc filesystem. Here’s the code:
#include <linux/init.h>
#include <linux/module.h>
#include <linux/moduleparam.h>
#include <linux/printk.h>
#include <linux/uaccess.h>
#include <linux/fs.h>
#include <linux/proc_fs.h> // Module metadata
#include <linux/version.h>

MODULE_AUTHOR("Al Williams");
MODULE_DESCRIPTION("Hackaday LKM1");
MODULE_LICENSE("GPLv2"); // many options, GPL, GPLv2, Proprietary, etc.

static char logo[]=
" \n"\
" \n"\
" \n"\
" #@@@@@@ ,@@@@@@ \n"\
" &@@@@@* &@@@@@, \n"\
" @@@@@@% @@@@@@# \n"\
" @@ .@@@@@@@@@ .@@@@@@@@@ .@# \n"\
" &@@@& /@@@@@@@@@@@@ @@@@@@@@@@@@ @@@@* \n"\
" @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@# @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@, \n"\
" &@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@* ,@@@@@@@@@@@@% &@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@* \n"\
" ,*. @@@@@@@@@@@/ .@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@& &@@@@@@@@@@# ** \n"\
" @@@@@@, &@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@, %@@@@@& \n"\
" ,@& /@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ @@ \n"\
" &@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@* \n"\
" %@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@. \n"\
" @@@@@@ #@@@@@@@. /@@@@@@ \n"\
" /@@@@& @@@@@@. @@@@@ \n"\
" ,@@@@% (@@@@@@@@@@&* @@@@@ \n"\
" @@@@@# @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@% @@@@@& \n"\
" /@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@, #@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ \n"\
" @@ *@@@@@@@@@@@@@& ( @@@@@@@@@@@@@@ .@( \n"\
" %@@@@@. @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@% #@@@@@* \n"\
" (%&%((@@@@@@@@@@ @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@% ,@@@@@@@@@@*#&/ \n"\
" @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@( @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@& \n"\
" @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ @@@@@@*@@@@@@/%@@@@@& *@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@# \n"\
" @@@@. @@@@@@@@@@@. .. . . (@@@@@@@@@@# /@@@* \n"\
" @, %@@@@@@@@ .@@@@@@@@. \n"\
" ,@@@@@( @@@@@@ \n"\
" *@@@@@@ (@@@@@@ \n"\
" @@@@@@, %@@@@@@ \n"\
" \n"\
" ";

static struct proc_dir_entry *proc_entry;
static ssize_t had_read(struct file *f, char __user * user_buffer, size_t count, loff_t * offset)
{
size_t len;
if (*offset>0) return 0; // no seeking, please!
copy_to_user(user_buffer,logo,len=strlen(logo)); // skipped error check
*offset=len;
return len;
}

#if LINUX_VERSION_CODE >= KERNEL_VERSION(5,6,0)
static struct proc_ops procop = // prior to Linux 5.6 you needed file_operations
{
.proc_read=had_read
};
#else
static struct file_operations procop =
{
.owner=THIS_MODULE,
.read=had_read
#endif

static int __init had_init(void)
{
// This is the usual way to do this (don't forget \n and note no comma after KERN_INFO), but...
printk(KERN_INFO "Hackaday<1>; is in control\n");
proc_entry=proc_create("jollywrencher",0644,NULL,&procop);
return 0;
}

static void __exit had_exit(void)
{
// ... you can also use the pr_info macro which does the same thing
pr_info("Returning control of your system to you...\n");
proc_remove(proc_entry);
}

module_init(had_init);
module_exit(had_exit);

The only thing here is you have an extra function that you have to register and deregister with the kernel. However, that interface changed in Kernel 5.6, so the code tries to do the right thing. Until, of course, it gets changed again.

Once you load this module using insmod, you can cat /proc/jollywrencher to see your favorite web site’s logo.

Of course, this is a dead simple example, but it is enough to get you started. You can grab all the source code online. One great way to learn more is to find something similar to what you want to build and take it apart.

We don’t suggest it, but you can write an LKM in Scratch. If you really want to learn the kernel, maybe start at the beginning.