In order to profit effectively from a ransomware attack, a threat actor needs to have something to offer in return for payment. This blog post outlines a process to encrypt AWS resources and then revoke access to the secret material until the ransom is paid.
Apparently, this post caused some consternation at AWS, and perhaps this technique is too effective to publish here. So, the original post has been revised to remove the actual scripts, include some mitigations, and provide commentary on how both Public Cloud (AWS Included) and Generative AI are dangerous tools in the hands of the general public and need more regulation.
Striking color photographs of Imperial Russia taken by the Tsar’s official photographer.
http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/empire/
Petabytes on a budget: How to build cheap cloud storage | Backblaze Blog.
Hint: My birthday is coming up. 🙂
How to open CLI to VMware ESXi. How to Clone Virtual Machines. | HowConfig.
In case anyone was wondering, you can run the VI client inside Parallels Desktop on a Mac. As I plan to switch to VMware Fusion if I get Snow Leopard for my birthday I hope it works in that too. I’d really like to virtualize my Windows box.
Ew, assuming I can get the USB pass through to work in ESXi. I need to be able to use the scanner in my VM.
Startups in 13 Sentences
Ramen Profitable
Keep Your Identity Small
The whole list of essays
I found this essay on Paul Graham’s website. Here is the link. I’ve quoted it for posterity.
One reason programmers dislike meetings so much is that they’re on a different type of schedule from other people. Meetings cost them more.
There are two types of schedule, which I’ll call the manager’s schedule and the maker’s schedule. The manager’s schedule is for bosses. It’s embodied in the traditional appointment book, with each day cut into one hour intervals. You can block off several hours for a single task if you need to, but by default you change what you’re doing every hour.
When you use time that way, it’s merely a practical problem to meet with someone. Find an open slot in your schedule, book them, and you’re done.
Most powerful people are on the manager’s schedule. It’s the schedule of command. But there’s another way of using time that’s common among people who make things, like programmers and writers. They generally prefer to use time in units of half a day at least. You can’t write or program well in units of an hour. That’s barely enough time to get started.
So a few months ago I started thinking about virtualization and the future of my profession (System Administration). So much of the hassle we have involves software compatibility issues with libraries and the code that runs on it.
My thoughts were that is would be much easier if, instead of big OSes with lots of services running on it, we had a micro-distribution running just a single application. A DNS or Mail server could be shipped as a virtual appliance with some form of hooks for shared storage via NFS or MySQL for its configuration information.
Not sure if this is documented anywhere, my link for 3.5.x is incorrect in the procedure.
To enable SSHd on ESXi 4.0:
At the console Hit ALT-F1
type “unsupported” it will not be echoed back to you
you’ll see a passwd prompt. Enter the root passwd for that ESXi host.
vi /etc/inetd.conf
Uncomment the line begining with “ssh tcp”
ps ax | grep inetd
VMWare ESXi 4.0 is out. It has most of what I’ve been wanting in ESXi, in particular IDE support. 4.0 supports SATA drives in the host, and IDE drives and some form of USB in the guest OS.
Ever since windows 98, I’ve has a policy of never running anything ending on .0 in a production capacity. I’ve got it running in the lab at work and look forward to putting it through the rounds when I get back from my business trip.
