Poetry, Security

difficult news

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An excerpt from Asphodel, That Greeny Flower
by William Carlos Williams 

My heart rouses
   thinking to bring you news
      of something
that concerns you
   and concerns many men.  Look at
      what passes for the new.
You will not find it there but in
   despised poems.
      It is difficult
to get the news from poems
   yet men die miserably every day
      for lack
of what is found there.

Found in an interview with Physician Valerie Berry by Len Anderson

LA: Is poetry also a healing art?

VB: I think all arts heal. Sometimes it takes us a while to recognize how, especially when the initial experience of it makes us uncomfortable or leaves us perplexed or angry. I’m reminded of surgery. For me, the sacred moment in surgery is when you hold the scalpel above the unmarked, intact skin. You know that once you cut, it will never be the same, no matter how well it heals–yet the healing can’t begin until the surgery opens the patient, reveals what’s wrong. I think art does that.

Somehow I imagined the sacred moment being when the procedures are finished successfully and all and the tools are accounted for….

Can’t wait to start my next incident response and say “let’s savor this sacred moment — the healing can’t begin until we start cutting”.

History, Security

Do not sit up straight

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When astronauts launch, they never sit up straight. The gravitational forces are apparently better handled in a reclining position. Makes sense, right? So why do people think we should sit up straight? Where does that belief come from?

Oh, what I would do for an office that had a recliner with a monitor suspended above me, like the astronauts…

I always felt like reclining was a more comfortable position and was often scolded in school for my posture. The highlight of abuse came from Mrs. Hebert, a french teacher in high school, who asked me “are you retarded or something” when I slouched in my desk during her class.

Well, research has started to come forward to state the obvious: a reclining position is better for your health.

slouch

They told the Radiological Society of North America that the best position in which to sit at your desk is leaning slightly back, at about 135 degrees.

Experts said sitting was known to contribute to lower back pain.

Data from the British Chiropractic Association says 32% of the population spends more than 10 hours a day seated.

The cost to the economy of the incorrect ergonomics must be significant. How much more rested and ready would staff be if they were allowed to assume a more relaxed position?

Unbelievably, despite all the facts staring us in the face, the most common office furniture today threatens humans with a harmful position.

And what about airplanes? Why not start the flight in a reclining position? Would it really be that hard for people to get out of their chairs in an emergency?

Perhaps the reasons for the upright position are to do with “regal” or “monarchial” habits from western culture — it is more proper to be perpendicular, or even leaning forward, and easier to dethrone a king who sits upright.

One thing is certain, those who are not bound by the past traditions of others and left to establish their own are more inclined to recline.

Poetry, Security

October: National Cyber Security Awareness Month

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Educause has an excellent page with links to video and kits for awareness flyers.

Indiana University, for example, has some funny security slogans that were part of a prepackaged awareness kit:
Password Snatchers

Protect your password – “Invasion of the Password Snatchers”
“Beware of Worms and Viruses”
“Beware of the Phishing Scam”
Be careful when downloading or clicking – “The Thing from the Internet”
Keep your computer free of spyware – “Beware the Eye of the Spy”

Eye of the Spy? Spooky. Nothing like fear and humor to get people thinking.

Security

Industrial Patriotic Hacking

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The title came to me after reading an article in the Guardian about British government officials upset about suspected hacking and relations with China:

“This is happening against a backdrop where, on a whole range of foreign policy issues, the British government is very weak. They seek to appease the Chinese. They should be more robust and indignant.”

The most plausible theories on why the Chinese authorities might choose to foster patriotic hacking were either to test its potential as a weapon or simply to send a signal to other great powers that they have the capability to do so, he said.

In response to a parliamentary question tabled by Mr MacKinlay last year, the then home secretary, Charles Clarke, revealed that the National Infrastructure Coordination Centre had issued a warning in 2005 of “concerted Trojan email attacks from the far east against UK government and business interests”. He said the scale of the attacks as “almost industrial”.

Funny to think that someone would compare the post-industrial efficiency of software and technology in general with industrial output. Is this like using horsepower to describe the output of combustion engines? Should we describe worms in terms of the number of factory workers…?

The article shows how information security has real macro-level issues to deal with, in addition to the usual micro stuff in the news. I have always maintained that international relations was really the study of macro-level security.

The Americans and Germans have also been smarting from Chinese industrial patriot hacking news.