There was a time when each and every printer and typesetter had its own quirky language. If you had a wordprocessor from a particular company, it worked with the printers from that company, and that was it. That was the situation in the 1970s when some engineers at Xerox Parc — a great place for innovation but a spotty track record for commercialization — realized there should be a better answer.

That answer would be Interpress, a language for controlling Xerox laser printers. Keep in mind that in 1980, a laser printer could run anywhere from $10,000 to $100,000 and was a serious investment. John Warnock and his boss, Chuck Geschke, tried for two years to commercialize Interpress. They failed.

So the two formed a company: Adobe. You’ve heard of them? They started out with the idea of making laser printers, but eventually realized it would be a better idea to sell technology into other people’s laser printers and that’s where we get PostScript.

Early PostScript and the Birth of Desktop Publishing

PostScript is very much like Forth, with words made specifically for page layout and laser printing. There were several key selling points that made the system successful.

First, you could easily obtain the specifications if you wanted to write a printer driver. Apple decided to use it on their LaserWriter. Of course, that meant the printer had a more powerful computer in it than most of the Macs it connected to, but for $7,000 maybe that’s expected.

Second, any printer maker could license PostScript for use in their device. Why spend a lot of money making your own when you could just buy PostScript off the shelf?

Finally, PostScript allowed device independence. If you took a PostScript file and sent it to a 300 DPI laser printer, you got nice output. If you sent it to a 2400 DPI typesetter, you got even nicer output. This was a big draw since a rasterized image was either going to look bad on high-resolution devices or have a huge file system in an era where huge files were painful to deal with. Even a page at 300 DPI is fairly large.

If you bought a Mac and a LaserWriter you only needed one other thing: software. But since the PostScript spec was freely available, software was possible. A company named Aldus came out with PageMaker and invented the category of desktop publishing. Adding fuel to the fire, giant Lionotype came out with a typesetting machine that accepted PostScript, so you could go from a computer screen to proofs to a finished print job with one file.

If you weren’t alive — or too young to pay attention — during this time, you may not realize what a big deal this was. Prior to the desktop publishing revolution, computer output was terrible. You might mock something up in a text file and print it on a daisy wheel printer, but eventually, someone had to make something that was “camera-ready” to make real printing plates. The kind of things you can do in a minute in any word processor today took a ton of skilled labor back in those days.

Take Two

Of course, you have to innovate. Adobe did try to prompt Display PostScript in the late 1980s as a way to drive screens. The NeXT used this system. It was smart, but a bit slow for the hardware of the day. Also, Adobe wanted licensing fees, which had worked well for printers, but there were cheaper alternatives available for displays by the time Display PostScript arrived.

In 1991, Adobe released PostScript Level 2 — making the old PostScript into “Level 1” retroactively. It had all the improvements you would expect in a second version. It was faster and crashed less. It had better support for things like color separation and handling compressed images. It also worked better with oddball and custom fonts, and the printer could cache fonts and graphics.

Remember how releasing the spec helped the original PostScript? For Level 2, releasing it early caused a problem. Competitors started releasing features for Level 2 before Adobe. Oops.

They finally released PostScript 3. (And dropped the “Level”.) This allowed for 12-bit colors instead of 8-bit. It also supported PDF files.

PDF?

While PostScript is a language for controlling a printer, PDF is set up as a page description language. It focuses on what the page looks like and not how to create the page. Of course, this is somewhat semantics. You can think of a PostScript file as a program that drives a Raster Image Processor (RIP) to draw a page. You can think of a PDF as somewhat akin to a compiled version of that program that describes what the program would do.

Up to PDF 1.4, released in 2001, everything you could do in a PDF file could be done in PostScript. But with PDF 1.4 there were some new things that PostScript didn’t have. In particular, PDFs support layers and transparency. Today, PDF rules the roost and PostScript is largely static and fading.

What’s Inside?

Like we said, a PostScript file is a lot like a Forth program. There’s a comment at the front (%!PS-Adobe-3.0) that tells you it is a PostScript file and the level. Then there’s a prolog that defines functions and fonts. The body section uses words like moveto, lineto, and so on to build up a path that can be stroked, filled, or clipped. You can also do loops and conditionals — PostScript is Turing-complete. A trailer appears at the end of each page and usually has a command to render the page (showpage), which may start a new page.
A simple PostScript file running in GhostScript
A PDF file has a similar structure with a %PDF-1.7 comment. The body contains objects that can refer to pages, dictionaries, references, and image or font streams. There is also a cross-reference table to help find the objects and a trailer that points to the root object. That object brings in other objects to form the entire document. There’s no real code execution in a basic PDF file.

If you want to play with PostScript, there’s a good chance your printer might support it. If not, your printer drivers might. However, you can also grab a copy of GhostScript and write PostScript programs all day. Use GSView to render them on the screen or print them to any printer you can connect to. You can even create PDF files using the tools.

For example, try this:

%!PS
% Draw square
100 100 moveto
100 0 rlineto
0 100 rlineto
-100 0 rlineto
closepath
stroke

% Draw circle
150 150 50 0 360 arc
stroke

% Draw text "Hackaday" centered in the circle
/Times-Roman findfont 12 scalefont setfont % Choose font and size
(Hackaday) dup stringwidth pop 2 div % Calculate half text width
150 exch sub % X = center - half width
150 % Y = vertical center
moveto
(Hackaday) show

showpage

If you want to hack on the code or write your own, here’s the documentation. Think it isn’t really a programming language? [Nicolas] would disagree.

hackaday.com/2025/04/24/from-p…

There’s just something about a satisfying “click” that our world of touchscreens misses out on; the only thing that might be better than a good solid “click” when you hit a button is if device could “click” back in confirmation. [Craig Shultz] and his crew of fine researchers at the Interactive Display Lab at the University of Illinois seem to agree, because they have come up with an ingenious hack to provide haptic feedback using readily-available parts.
An array of shapes showing some of the different possibilities for hapticoil soft buttons.
The “hapticoil”, as they call it, has a simple microspeaker at its heart. We didn’t expect a tiny tweeter to have the oomph to produce haptic feedback, and on its own it doesn’t, as finger pressure stops the vibrations easily. The secret behind the hapticoil is to couple the speaker hydraulically to a silicone membrane. In other words, stick the thing in some water, and let that handle the pressure from a smaller soft button on the silicone membrane. That button can be virtually any shape, as seen here.

Aside from the somewhat sophisticated electronics that allow the speaker coil to be both button and actuator (by measuring inductance changes when pressure is applied, while simultaneously driven as a speaker), there’s nothing here a hacker couldn’t very easily replicate: a microspeaker, a 3D printed enclosure, and a silicone membrane that serves as the face of the haptic “soft button”. That’s not to say we aren’t given enough info replicate the electronics; the researchers are kind enough to provide a circuit diagram in figure eight of their paper.

In the video below, you can see a finger-mounted version used to let a user feel pressing a button in virtual reality, which raises some intriguing possibilities. The technology is also demonstrated on a pen stylus and a remote control.

This isn’t the first time we’ve featured hydraulic haptics — [Craig] was also involved with an electroosmotic screen we covered previously, as well as a glove that used the same trick. This new microspeaker technique does seem much more accessible to the hacker set, however.

youtube.com/embed/-F2PaWVy2_I?…

hackaday.com/2025/04/24/haptic…

[Agatha] sent us this stunning multimeter she built as a gift for her mom. Dubbed the Mohmmeter — a playful nod to its ohmmeter function and her mom — this project combines technical ingenuity with heartfelt craftsmanship.

At its core, a Raspberry Pi Pico microcontroller reads the selector knob, controls relays, and lights up LEDs on the front panel to show the meter’s active range. The Mohmmeter offers two main measurement modes, each with two sub-ranges for greater precision across a wide spectrum.

She also included circuitry protections against reverse polarity and over-voltage, ensuring durability. There was also a great deal of effort put into ensuring it was accurate, as the device was put though its paces using a calibrated meter as reference to ensure the final product was as useful as it was beautiful.

The enclosure is a work of art, crafted from colorful wooden panels meticulously jointed together. Stamped brass plates label the meter’s ranges and functions, adding a steampunk flair. This thoughtful design reflects her dedication to creating something truly special.

Want to build a meter for mom, but she’s more of the goth type? The blacked-out Hydameter might be more here style.

hackaday.com/2025/04/24/the-mo…

I criminali informatici sono a caccia. Sona a caccia di VPN Ivanti e la prossima potrebbe essere quella installata nella tua organizzazione!

I cybercriminali infatti sono alla ricerca di VPN Ivanti da sfruttare e lo stanno facendo attivando scansioni mirate. Un aumento delle attività di scansione rivolte ai sistemi VPN Ivanti Connect Secure (ICS) e Ivanti Pulse Secure (IPS), sono state rilevate recentemente e questo segnala un potenziale sforzo di ricognizione coordinato da parte degli autori della minaccia.

Questo aumento delle scansioni avvengono dopo la pubblicazione della vulnerabilità critica di buffer overflow basata sullo stack in Ivanti Connect Secure (versioni 22.7R2.5 e precedenti), Pulse Connect Secure 9.x (ora fuori supporto), Ivanti Policy Secure e Neurons per i gateway ZTA. Il bug di sicurezza è monitorato dal National Vulnerability Database con il codice CVE-2025-22457.

Anche l’Agenzia per la Cybersicurezza Nazionale italiana (ACN) aveva pubblicato un bollettino riportato la fase di sfruttamento attivo del bug di sicurezza all’inizio del mese di aprile. Inizialmente sottovalutata, si è poi scoperto che questa falla permetteva invece l’esecuzione di codice remoto (RCE) non autenticato, consentendo agli aggressori di eseguire codice arbitrario su dispositivi vulnerabili.

L’11 febbraio 2025 è stata rilasciata una patch per CVE-2025-22457 (versione ICS 22.7R2.6), ma molti dispositivi legacy rimangono senza patch e sono esposti.

I sistemi di monitoraggio di GreyNoise hanno segnalato scansioni massive attraverso i loro tag scanner ICS dedicati, che tracciano gli IP che tentano di identificare sistemi ICS/IPS accessibili tramite Internet .

Il picco, che ha registrato oltre 230 indirizzi IP univoci che hanno sondato gli endpoint ICS/IPS in un solo giorno, rappresenta un aumento di nove volte rispetto alla tipica base di riferimento giornaliera di meno di 30 IP univoci.

I tre principali Paesi di origine delle attività di scansione sono Stati Uniti, Germania e Paesi Bassi, mentre i principali obiettivi sono le organizzazioni in questi Paesi. Negli ultimi 90 giorni sono stati osservati 1.004 IP univoci che hanno eseguito scansioni simili, con le seguenti classificazioni: 634 Sospetto, 244 Malizioso, 126 Benigno.

È importante notare che nessuno di questi IP era falsificabile, il che indica che gli aggressori hanno sfruttato infrastrutture reali e tracciabili. Gli IP dannosi precedentemente osservati in altre attività nefaste provengono principalmente dai nodi di uscita Tor e da noti provider cloud o VPS.

Lo sfruttamento in natura è già stato confermato, con gruppi APT (Advanced Persistent Threat) come UNC5221 che hanno sottoposto la patch a reverse engineering per sviluppare exploit funzionanti. Per mitigare i rischi, le organizzazioni dovrebbero:

• Installare immediatamente le patch più recenti su tutti i sistemi ICS/IPS (ICS 22.7R2.6 o successive).
• Esaminare i registri per rilevare sospette ricerche e tentativi di accesso da IP nuovi o non attendibili.
• Bloccare gli IP sospetti o dannosi identificati da GreyNoise e altri feed di threat intelligence.
• Monitorare attività di autenticazione insolite, in particolare da Tor o da IP ospitati sul cloud.
• Utilizza lo strumento Integrity Checker (ICT) di Ivanti per identificare i segnali di compromissione.

GreyNoise continua a monitorare questa minaccia in evoluzione e consiglia ai team di sicurezza di restare vigili.

L'articolo Stanno cercando proprio la tua VPN Ivanti! oltre 230 IP stanno a caccia di endpoint vulnerabili proviene da il blog della sicurezza informatica.

AI, AI e ancora AI. E sembra che l’intelligenza artificiale giorno dopo giorno ci porti innovazioni sia come difesa ma soprattutto, come attacco.

L’intelligenza artificiale è già in grado di creare exploit funzionanti per vulnerabilità critiche, anche prima che vengano pubblicate le versioni PoC. Ciò è stato dimostrato dal ricercatore di sicurezza Matt Keeley, che ha scritto un exploit con GPT-4 utilizzando vulnerabilità CVE-2025-32433 nel server SSH Erlang/OTP. La vulnerabilità ha ricevuto il punteggio CVSS massimo di 10,0 e consente l’esecuzione di codice remoto senza autenticazione.

La descrizione CVE stessa si è rivelata sufficiente: l’IA non solo ha capito qual era il problema, ma ha anche trovato in modo indipendente il commit con la correzione, lo ha confrontato con il vecchio codice, ha identificato le differenze, ha trovato vulnerabilità, ha scritto il PoC, lo ha testato, ne ha eseguito il debug e lo ha migliorato.

Da quanto riportato da Keely, tutto questo è avvenuto in una sera. Qualche anno fa, questo tipo di lavoro avrebbe richiesto una conoscenza approfondita di Erlang e molte ore di analisi manuale.

La vulnerabilità, divulgata il 16 aprile 2025, è dovuta a un bug nella gestione dei messaggi del protocollo SSH nella fase iniziale della connessione.

Ciò consente a un aggressore di eseguire codice arbitrario con privilegi elevati sul server. Keeley ha iniziato a interessarsi al bug dopo aver letto un tweet di Horizon3.ai, in cui si affermava di aver creato un exploit ma di non averlo reso pubblico. Il ricercatore ha quindi deciso di testare le capacità di GPT-4 e ha ottenuto un risultato funzionante, guidando l’IA passo dopo passo.

Questa scoperta sta suscitando entusiasmo tra gli esperti, ma sta anche suscitando preoccupazione. L’automazione del processo di individuazione delle vulnerabilità e di creazione di exploit riduce drasticamente la barriera d’ingresso per gli aggressori.

Entro 24 ore dalla divulgazione della vulnerabilità, diversi team avevano presentato le loro versioni degli exploit e il team Platform Security aveva addirittura reso disponibile al pubblico su GitHub il loro PoC generato dall’intelligenza artificiale.

Le versioni vulnerabili di Erlang/OTP (OTP-27.3.2 e precedenti, OTP-26.2.5.10 e precedenti, OTP-25.3.2.19 e precedenti) sono state aggiornate urgentemente. Si consiglia di effettuare l’aggiornamento a OTP-27.3.3, OTP-26.2.5.11 o OTP-25.3.2.20 il prima possibile.

Questa storia mostra chiaramente come l’intelligenza artificiale stia cambiando le regole del gioco nella sicurezza informatica. Quanto più potenti diventano gli strumenti, tanto minore è il tempo che intercorre tra la scoperta di una vulnerabilità e il suo sfruttamento. Ciò significa solo una cosa: la strategia dell’applicazione istantanea delle patch è ora più importante che mai.

L'articolo GPT-4 scrive un exploit prima del PoC pubblico. La corsa alla Patch non è mai stata così essenziale proviene da il blog della sicurezza informatica.