Webcam Hacking using Google

There are thousands of unprotected webcams available online, Since many Webcams use known protocols to transmit live video streams over the web, it’s often very easy to search for publicly accessible webcams
1.First of all open your Internet browser and visit Google.com
2.Search on Google for the following Keyword “inurl:/view.index.shtml“

3. Next Choose a webcam and Enjoy
Google Dorks
Here is the list of Few Google Dorks used for this purpose:

inurl:/view.shtml
intitle:”Live View / – AXIS” | inurl:view/view.shtml^
inurl:ViewerFrame?Mode=
inurl:ViewerFrame?Mode=Refresh
inurl:axis-cgi/jpg
inurl:axis-cgi/mjpg (motion-JPEG)
inurl:view/indexFrame.shtml
inurl:view/index.shtml
inurl:view/view.shtml
liveapplet
intitle:”live view” intitle:axis
intitle:liveapplet
allintitle:”Network Camera NetworkCamera”
intitle:axis intitle:”video server”
intitle:liveapplet inurl:LvAppl
intitle:”EvoCam” inurl:”webcam.html”
intitle:”Live NetSnap Cam-Server feed”
intitle:”Live View / – AXIS”
intitle:”Live View / – AXIS 206M”
intitle:”Live View / – AXIS 206W”
intitle:”Live View / – AXIS 210″
inurl:indexFrame.shtml Axis
inurl:”MultiCameraFrame?Mode=Motion”
intitle:start inurl:cgistart
intitle:”WJ-NT104 Main Page”
intext:”MOBOTIX M1″ intext:”Open Menu”
intext:”MOBOTIX M10″ intext:”Open Menu”
intext:”MOBOTIX D10″ intext:”Open Menu”
intitle:snc-z20 inurl:home/
intitle:snc-cs3 inurl:home/
intitle:snc-rz30 inurl:home/
intitle:”sony network camera snc-p1″
intitle:”sony network camera snc-m1″
site:.viewnetcam.com -www.viewnetcam.com
intitle:”Toshiba Network Camera” user login
intitle:”netcam live image”
intitle:”i-Catcher Console – Web Monitor”

WCIT - So Far So Good - Recap of Week One

 
The apocalypse that didn't happen
So far the world has survived WCIT-12 and the internet has not been taken over by anybody. So, in the end, what was all the fuss about?
Those who have followed my reporting on these issues from the very beginning more than a year ago — long before the media frenzy on this topic started (see: The Governance of the Internet) — will have seen that we never took the sensational approach. We fully understood the issues that were emerging, but at the same time we could also place them in the right context, to explore how they should be addressed. Even at that early stage we suggested cooperation with ICANN and it was good to see that this indeed eventuated at WCIT-12.
We also indicated from the beginning that we needed to separate the various issues in order to see how they could be best addressed. This is what the first week of WCIT-12 has been all about. However I did not fully appreciate at that time what would be involved in 'herding 193 cats' — the number of countries involved in the ITU — in the same direction. This required some amazing diplomatic skills.
The largest scaremongering came from the USA, particularly through campaigns organised by Google; but when it became clear that the internet apocalypse wasn't going to happen people started to question Google's own agenda in all of this.
The frenzy was also fueled by the hard line taken by the US Administration on issues such as 'the take-over of the internet'. While it was understood that this was part of a posturing strategy it certainly fed the media frenzy in the USA.
What was conveniently left out of these discussions was the fact that proposals made by member states are not the same as policies accepted by the full ITU membership. It was these proposals that were promoted by the attackers as evidence that the end of the world was at hand.
Consensus is building
Now, at the end of the first week of WCIT-12, it is clear that, as expected, a far more conciliatory approach is being taken by all delegates.
The separation of the issues referred to above did, in fact, take place and the discussion was narrowed down to what WCIT is all about — updating the International Telecommunications Regulations (ITRs).
As indicated, there are a few things that I have come to appreciate during week one.
First of all, the language that is used; and the definitions. When you think about it, terms such 'operating agencies', 'security' and 'ICT', cover an extensive variety of concepts and if you want to include them in international treaties you need to be damn sure that everybody uses the same language. Another complication is that in different languages different translations — and often more than one — apply to these concepts. Listening to all the delegates involved in this discussion made me realise how important that is, and that it is not something that can be easily dealt with. Furthermore, some countries have different political agendas — this becomes clear when you listen to the statements made by those countries.
Amazingly, people do eventually come together on most of the issues.
Political posturing and diplomacy
In this context I also appreciated the tough stand that countries such as the USA, Canada, Australia and the European Union took on some of the issues. In the end that worked to clarify matters somewhat, as their strong language made everybody focus on the right issues.
And at the end of the week the US delegation officially declared 'so far so good'. This came as something of a shock to some of the media, who now have to back-peddle on their doom and gloom reporting.
How to move beyond WCIT-12
Are we there yet? No, of course not. There is one more week to go. But I am prepared to stick my neck out and say that there will most likely be a good outcome.
The ITRs, as they exist since we developed them and put them in place in Melbourne in 1988, enabled the world to create the internet. They will stay, albeit fine-tuned a bit; and as proven tools they can, and should, be used by the non-connected or under-connected communities and countries to their own benefit.
As argued in the UN Broadband Commission and in its discussions with various governments around the world, it is now up to these countries to develop policies and strategies that are aimed at obtaining the social and economic benefits of the hard work that has led to the successful telecoms infrastructure from which the whole world is benefiting.
Thanks to organisations like the ITU, who have been working on this since 1865, we can make a telephone call to anybody in the world and access the internet from wherever we are. Compare that with the level of standardisation in the IT world, or in any other sector for that matter. There will be few people who would claim that this is not a great thing, so let us make sure we continue along that road.
Once WCIT-12 is brought to a good conclusion we can start looking at how we can assist the under-connected to become part of the global digital economy, so they can start reaping their own social and economic benefits and thus fund the investments for the infrastructure they need.
Governments should perhaps use some of their often extensive USO funds and lucrative spectrum auctions to channel those incomes to national broadband infrastructure, and work together with their industry to develop their own national broadband plans.
The multi-stakeholders platform established at WCIT-12 should have as a priority assisting countries to build up capacity and human skills to make this happen.
Follow-up ITU meetings and conferences over the next few years can take these issues further and help in developing government and industry policies and strategies, as well as business models that will allow these countries to create their own incomes, rather than depending on handouts coming from the ageing international accounting rate structures. Obviously these old structures cannot be demolished overnight; a transitional period is needed and, again, this is where the rest of the world can assist.
By Paul Budde, Managing Director of Paul Budde Communication. Paul is also a contributor of the Paul Budde Communication blog located here.

Hackers, Crackers & Script Kiddies

Real hackers are few, highly skilled, and probably not interested in you, but the fast growing "script kiddie" hobby assures your systems will be attacked. 



As "point and click" interfaces have "dumbed down" computer users and administrators, the same has happened in hacker land, to the point the "dumbed down" are not allowed the title, they are called "script kiddies". Script kiddies download automated hacking tools from Internet sites and launch them against random blocks of IP addresses - looking for unprotected computers to play with. Then they use similar low skill tools to do whatever they please with your computer. Problem is, there are many thousands of script kiddies, and more every day.
RULE: Security through Obscurity no longer works - at all. Not against an intense, but totally random attack. If you are vulnerable, someone already knows, perhaps many people, they just haven't had time for you yet.
All this is not to say real hackers aren't still hard at work. Someone creates those easy to use tools, after all.
Hackers vs. Crackers - In the nerdy culture, a "Hacker" is a highly skilled computer geek who does "great hacks" (generally clever computer code). You will be told in no uncertain terms that the people who break into systems are called "crackers", that "hackers" are honest folks who would never, never do such a thing (even though they have no respect whatever for authority, business, government, laws, property, "suits", grooming, personal hygiene, mom or apple pie). OK, some wouldn't. Of course every "cracker" referrs to himself as a "hacker". Common usage lumps the whole lot under the term "hacker".

Dell's Ubuntu XPS 13 should worry Microsoft

TIN BOX FLOGGER Dell's decision to put arguably its best laptop on sale preloaded with Ubuntu Linux shows not only how far desktop Linux has come but how far Microsoft has fallen.
Dell announced its Project Sputnik earlier this year to a warm if not ecstatic reception. The firm had preloaded Linux onto its consumer machines before but they were hard to find and on forgettable machines. However with the XPS 13 the firm is not only loading Linux on its most high profile laptop but showing that Microsoft's operating system isn't the only choice in town for OEMs and consumers alike.
From a Linux community perspective, Dell's XPS 13 comes with Intel's ultrabook branding, which might mean little to those who actually read and understand specifications but means a lot to the customer in the street who is bombarded with Intel's ultrabook marketing message. Dell might be pitching its Ubuntu XPS 13 laptop as a developer's machine rather than one for Facebook and Youtube users, but that isn't a bad idea in the long run either.
Dell's decision to price the Ubuntu XPS 13 $250 more than its Windows counterpart will no doubt generate debate, with some asking where the so-called Microsoft tax has gone.
However some of Dell's price hike can be explained by the 256GB SSD in the Ubuntu XPS 13, double that on the Windows machine. The rest of the laptop's price can be written off thanks to the lack of bloatware that Dell and other OEMs get compensated to clog new machines with.
The perception that Dell simply downloaded a Ubuntu ISO off Canonical's website and loaded it as opposed to paying Microsoft some cash for a DVD simply isn't accurate on several levels. Enterprise Linux vendors such as Red Hat and Suse do not win business because the operating system has a lower sticker price, but rather lower maintenance cost, better reliability and in the case of Linux, perhaps the ability to replicate the functionality of Microsoft's operating system.
From Dell's point of view, it has to support Ubuntu much in the same way that it supports Microsoft's Windows. Not only does the firm have to make sure that all of the features on its XPS 13 work with Ubuntu but it must ensure that its support staff can deal with users, whether they be technology literate developers or not, running Ubuntu after years of spoon-fed Windows support.
The reason why Dell, HP, Acer and others can offer cheap hardware is because it is subsidised by the bloatware peddlers. For those that value their time, Dell's Ubuntu XPS 13 won't require the ritual that follows the purchase of almost every store-bought Windows machine, that is, to wipe the hard drive and reinstall a bloatware-free version of the operating system.
So Dell's decision to price its Ubuntu XPS 13 a bit higher than the Windows version might not be nice but it can be justified and one hopes that in time price parity will be achieved. However the firm's real problem is that the XPS 13 is starting to show its age, especially given that it is still Dell's showcase laptop no matter what operating system it is running.
Dell could do with upgrading the screen on the XPS 13, which it markets as having just HD 720p resolution, or more accurately 1366x768 resolution. Aside from the boost in storage, the firm has done little to evolve what is otherwise a surprisingly premium design.
Specification issues aside, Dell's decision to market the Ubuntu XPS 13 to developers is a very smart move and one that could pay off in the long term. The firm's literature on the machine says it bundles a number of developer tools that should, in theory at least, help developers get the plumbing of their development environments sorted quickly. Some developers will scoff at Dell's bundle but it shows that the firm is focused on what the Ubuntu XPS 13 will be used for and it certainly beats having a load of toolbars and a trialware antivirus constantly thrashing the hard drive.
Although the Linux community has never been short on developers, having more developers build applications and services on Linux will hurt Microsoft and its long standing strategy of pushing its own programming languages and frameworks, such as .Net, C#, ActiveX and Jscript. And as Dell and its rivals look to push Linux into machines that use consumer hardware, not Xeon processors and SAS hard drive controllers, it will force hardware vendors such as Intel to provide equal levels of Linux kernel support on both consumer and enterprise hardware.
What will really hurt Microsoft in the long run is if Dell or its rival OEMs and third party developers work on building applications that make use of their own services, such as Dell Cloud or music stores. Effectively this will mean that not only will Dell avoid the Microsoft tax but it will have a high quality operating system that isn't bogged down with Windows and bloatware that doesn't even promote its own services, which can offset the loss in revenue from not preloading gigabytes of useless software.
Dell's XPS 13 might not be the best laptop on the market right now, especially alongside Lenovo's X1 Carbon or Apple's Macbook Air, but that the firm is willing to preload Linux on its showcase product just weeks after the launch of Windows 8 must be worrying for Microsoft. Dell has said that it is looking at expanding availability of the Ubuntu XPS 13 outside the US, and while it is not expected to be a sales hit thanks to it being pitched at developers, it does put a stake in the ground for both Dell and Microsoft. µ

The Inquirer (http://s.tt/1vH6I)

How to spoof a MAC address

Takeaway: MAC address filtering for wireless networking isn’t real “security”. Anyone who pays any attention to current trends in wireless security at all should know that MAC filtering is less effective than WEP — and that WEP can be cracked almost instantly these days with commonly available tools. This doesn’t mean MAC filtering is useless. [...]

MAC address filtering for wireless networking isn’t real “security”. Anyone who pays any attention to current trends in wireless security at all should know that MAC filtering is less effective than WEP — and that WEP can be cracked almost instantly these days with commonly available tools.
This doesn’t mean MAC filtering is useless. Its resource consumption is almost unmeasurable, and even if it doesn’t keep out any reasonably knowledgeable security crackers willing to spend a few moments gaining access, it does keep out a lot of automated opportunistic attacks that are aiming solely for the absolute lowest-hanging fruit on the security tree. Since that lowest-hanging fruit consists of the majority of wireless access points, MAC filtering can be of value as a way of turning away the majority of opportunistic attackers.
Don’t rely on MAC filtering alone, however. Please, just don’t. It’s a bad idea. People seem to think “Oh, well, sure a determined attacker can get past it, but not anyone else.” It doesn’t take much determination at all to spoof a MAC address. In fact, I’ll tell you how:

1. “Listen” in on network traffic. Pick out the MAC address. This can be done with a plethora of freely available security tools, including Nmap.
2. Change your MAC address.

You can spoof a MAC address when using Nmap with nothing more than a –spoof-mac command line option for Nmap itself to hide the true source of Nmap probes. If you give it a MAC address argument of “0″, it will even generate a random MAC address for you.
For more general MAC address spoofing, your MAC address is trivially reset with tools available in default installs of most operating systems. Here are some examples:

• Linux: ifconfig eth0 hw ether 03:a0:04:d3:00:11
• FreeBSD: ifconfig bge0 link 03:a0:04:d3:00:11
• MS Windows: On Microsoft Windows systems, the MAC address is stored in a registry key. The location of that key varies from one MS Windows version to the next, but find that and you can just edit it yourself. There are, of course, numerous free utilities you can download to make this change for you as well (such as Macshift for MS Windows XP).

All of these techniques can of course be automated by self-propagating malware, and the creation of the malware can even be automated to some extent by existing malware creation “kits”. If that doesn’t convince you that MAC filtering does not provide real security, I don’t know what will.

How the ITU is leading the way to the 20th century

You are likely already aware of the World Conference on International Telecommunications (WCIT) which opened in Dubai on Monday. This two week conference is where a review of the International Telecommunications Rules established by a 1988 treaty is being conducted by representatives of the 178 International Telecommunications Union (ITU) members who are party to it. The ITU, originally formed as an industry association for telegraph operators in the 1800s, has expanded over the years to become a United Nations agency with a membership consisting of nearly 200 countries and more than 700 private organizations. Although only states have votes on the adoption of ITU policy and rules, all members may propose changes.
There have been numerous accusations about secret agendas behind the most significant changes proposed to ITU-T rules which govern wireline communications across the legacy PSTN (Public Switched Telephone Network). Despite the fact nearly all such arguments being charged with political rhetoric and grandstanding, most of them are sadly very accurate. Rather than trying to summarize them all here I'm going to highlight the worst of the worst and provide links to more detailed information on each. We can start with this though. The UN is not trying to take over the Internet. That's not to say that various ITU members are not trying to exert improper regulatory control over it for equally improper reasons. But despite being technically an agency of the UN, the ITU isn't really under their control. In fact the real controlling authority in this case is the 1988 treaty mentioned previously.

The ITU's role in the Internet
ITU Secretary General Hamadoun Toure has claimed that regulation of Internet communication is not an expansion of the agency's authority because their mandate, as mentioned in their own constitution, covers all telecommunication. That's nonsense. The ITU's constitution does, in fact, cover telecommunications but in that context it refers to nothing more than interoperability between international, government regulated PSTN (Publicly Switched Telephone System) networks.

In reality there are basically two goals behind the problematic proposals to expand ITU authority. The first is an attempt by legacy telecom players, including governments with state run telco monopolies, to neutralize market forces to pad their profits. At the same time governments who seek to restrain the flow of information and ideas want to gut the Internet's ability to empower their citizens.

In an opinion piece for Wired last month Toure detailed what their members claim to be aiming for, but even a cursory look at the actual proposals paints a very different picture which mostly boils down to two issues.

Content Filtering
Tourre's first point of emphasis was on cybersecurity:
Many authorities around the world already intervene in communications for various reasons – such as preventing the circulation of pornography or extremist propaganda. So a balance must be found between protecting people's privacy and their right to communicate; and between protecting individuals, institutions, and whole economies from criminal activities.

The problem is while many proposals use the word security in their description it's really just an smokescreen for an obvious agenda of filtering and censorship. They come, not surprisingly, from member states like China and Russia whose attempts to control the free flow of information and communication both through and within their borders are well known. Others originated in regions like the Middle East where social networking has been instrumental in toppling regimes.

Take, for example, Egypt's contribution to the 'security' question (via the Center for Democracy & Technology):
There must be transparency of the routes: on request, Member States must be able to know the routes used, in particular to avoid fraud and to maintain national security. If the [Member State] does [not] have the right to know or select the route in certain circumstances (e.g. for Security reasons), then the only alternative left is to block traffic from such destinations, which is neither logical nor desirable!

That's not security. It's censorship.
Subsidizing telcos
Toure also claimed ITU members were focusing on expanding Internet service to reach more of the world:
The conference will also focus on how ICTs – and particularly broadband – can be highly effective catalysts for sustainable social and economic progress.
Right now, access to this potential is constrained by issues of affordability, with high costs a reality for many users. Related to this is insufficient investment in infrastructure, especially in developing countries.

In reality the big push for revenue is coming from ETNO (the European Telecommunications Network Operators Association), representing the highly profitable European telecom industry. It's nothing more than a demand that others pay for future network upgrades (download full document from WCITLeaks.org):

Operating Agencies shall endeavour to provide sufficient telecommunications facilities to meet requirements of and demand for international telecommunication services. For this purpose, and to ensure an adequate return on investment in high bandwidth infrastructures, operating agencies shall negotiate commercial agreements to achieve a sustainable system of fair compensation for telecommunications services and, where appropriate, respecting the principle of sending party network pays.

In plain English this is nothing more than a rehash of the tired argument ISPs have been making for decades about how companies like Google and Netflix are getting a free ride on their networks. It's just as nonsensical now as it has always been. Without the billions of dollars spent annually developing, deploying, and maintaining search engines, media delivery, cloud storage, and numerous other services ISPs would have no customers for their broadband offerings to begin with. What ETNO is proposing is essentially to shoehorn Internet traffic into a 20th century PSTN model where every hop a packet takes across any network can be metered, measured, and billed to the originating network in order to pad telco profits. If Deutsche Telekom needs to upgrade their infrastructure maybe they should have invested the 480 million euros in profit they declared for the first three months of this year.

And we need the ITU why?
The real question here isn't whether these proposals will be adopted. They won't. In fact it's entirely possible not a single modification to existing rules or recommendations will come out of the WCIT conference because it would require unanimous support from all countries.

What you should be asking is whether it's time to put the ITU out to pasture. They don't necessarily need to disappear entirely. They could simply return to their roots as a standards body for infrastructure providers. Given their almost non-existent role in building the Internet as we know it today, though, it's hard to see any reason to give them control over its future.

Windows vs Linux vs Mac Smackdown : An Objective Comparison

Comparisons between the Microsoft Windows, Apple MAC and Linux computer operating systems have been a long running topic since the beginning of time.Comparisons of these operating systems tend to reflect their origins, historic user bases and distribution models.
We will start with a background comparison of the three operating systems.
Windows
Windows is one of the most well known operating systems developed by Microsoft. About 9 out of 10 homes and businesses currently use at least one Windows computer. Windows was originally based off of MS-DOS. This line of Windows OS became known as the 9x series. Eventually, all subsequent Windows OS’s are based off Windows NT. The most recent WINNT OS would be Windows 7.
Mac OS X
OS X is an operating system developed by Apple and is currently the 2nd most used OS after Windows. It has less than 20% marketshare. OS X unlike Windows, is actually based off of Unix. Therefore, OS X is considered to be part of the Unix OS family like Linux is. In fact, you can almost consider OS X to be a Linux Distribution.
Linux
Linux is not actually a single OS, but rather several distributions all based off of the original Unix system. Linux is very popular for servers but has recently found its way to the desktop. It’s not as popular as OS X or Windows yet, but it’s popularity is rising. Unlike OS X or Windows, Linux is free and open source. There are many distributions of Linux like Ubuntu, OpenSUSE, etc.

The Myths & Facts About These Platforms

• Viruses

It is generally stated that PCs commonly get viruses but Linux and Macs do not. That is untrue because OS X is just as vulnerable to viruses as Windows is. The reason why Windows appear to be more vulnerable is because it literally has more viruses programmed for it. But that doesn’t mean the system itself is more vulnerable. Mac OS X seem to have no viruses targeted at it because hackers don’t think OS X is worth making viruses for. This is because barely anyone owns a Mac compared to the number of Windows users out there. Therefore, there’s not much incentive to program a virus for a Mac. Mac viruses do exist and can affect a mac system just as much as a Windows virus can affect a windows system. There is no hack – proof or virus proof system.
Even Linux systems have a few viruses too.
Truth be told, hardening techniques like the one discussed here makes the Windows platform less susceptible to viruses than it is perceived.

• Stability

Many people say that OS X never crashes and is the most stable OS ever. The same can now be said about Windows 7.
Truth is, Windows 7 is the most stable Windows Operating systems ever. OS X can crash just as frequently as a Windows OS. In fact, OS X crashes even more when you are running non-Apple approved software such as Adobe Flash or Audacity. Even Steve Jobs admitted that Macs can crash a lot, despite what his “I’m a Mac” ads have said.
The famous BSOD (Blue Screen of Death) on Windows is a misconception from older Windows 9x systems. Back during Windows 9x series, stability was actually an issue. However, the switch to Windows NT systems made the OS much more stable and Blue Screens are considered quite rare now. Apple and other Apple fanboys are using the Windows 9x history as an argument against Windows even though those systems have long been discontinued and those problems no longer affect modern Windows systems.
As for Linux, it can crash too although it’s much more rare than WIndows or OS X. When a Linux crashes, it’s called a Kernel Panic.

• Hardware

Normally in a Windows vs Linux comparison, hardware would not be given much mention, but because Mac OS X locks users to Apple hardware, this comparison is necessary.
For Windows and Linux, you can choose what you want to install your OS on. There are tons of options from manufacturers like Dell, HP, Acer, Gateway, Lenovo, Asus, and so on. For Mac OS X, you only have Apple.
Firstly, using the same hardware specifications, a Windows PC usually cost much less than an Apple Mac. Probably the deal breaker for most is that carrying out a hardware upgrade task on a Mac is a near impossible task, except for the real geeks. This is if you do not mind the fact that opening up a Mac will void your warranty and violate Apple’s EULA.

• Software Library

Windows OS has the largest software library than any other OS. This means that the majority of programs, applications, and games out there are meant for Windows. Productivity Suites like Microsoft Office are always available on Windows first. That same version will be released on OS X later on. Many other programs out there are also Windows exclusive. If you’re into gaming, you’ll need good hardware (see above) and to play more games, you’ll need Windows. Many PC games today are meant for PC’s running Windows. There’s a new line of games called Games For Windows, which is obviously meant for Windows. Many Steam games are also meant for Windows. Only a few games will work on Macs or Linux.

• Usage

There’s a common myth that Mac OS X is better and more common for video editing. This is untrue. Almost all video editing programs are multi-platform meaning that they work on both Windows and OS X. Linux may be a less favoured exception.
Programs like Sony Vegas, Adobe Premiere, Autodesk Avid, and so on all work on both OSes. The only notable video editing program that is OS X specific is Final Cut Pro. As for application and software development including game development, Windows is definitely the main platform. Many programs today are written in programming languages such as C++, C#, Java, and Visual Basic. While some of those languages work on OS X and Linux, the newer and more common ones are now for Windows only such as Visual Basic and C#. Game development for consoles and PC’s are done primarily on a Windows platform for the same reason as above.
However, it should be mentioned here that a software called Wine lets you run Windows software on other operating systems like Linux. With Wine, you can install and run these applications just like you would in Windows.
As for server use, Linux accounts for over 60% of server systems. However, Windows is also common for server usage. It depends on preference and the amount of resources someone has.
OS X also has a server edition, however it is not very popular and is rarely used mainly because of cost issues. Apple software and hardware tend to be very expensive and overpriced.
So which is the best OS? Well, that really depends on what you want. Windows is generally recommended for most users who do not have specific needs. I use Linux as my main OS but switch with Windows when there is a need for a software not supported on Linux.

linux vs windows vs mac

linux my new love

guy's, I'm so sorry that i did not post anything in the last few days but i have been crazy busy working with my new Linux OS's. and i think i'm in love. Classically i have always been a windows brat, i have only ever used it since my first win 98 PC way back when. But i just cannot believe how much easier it is to use things like MITM attacks, WEP WPA WPA2-PSK ,cracking and hotspot hacking for free access, Its just insane how easy this is on Linux compared to windows. i simply cannot believe the amount of control Linux gives compared to windows.

so far i have only used Ubuntu 12.10 and backtrack 5 r3 and honestly my favorite for everyday tasks is Ubuntu but my favorite for hacking, and cracking is backtrack for is sheer amount of per-installed tools but please drop a comment and let us know what your favorite OS is and why in the comments below

Voyager discovers 'magnetic highway'

• 
  
  

NASA's Voyager 1 spacecraft has encountered a "magnetic highway" at the edge of the solar system, a surprising discovery 35 years after its launch, the experts behind the pioneering craft said Monday.

Earlier this year a surge in a key indicator fueled hopes that the craft was nearing the so-called heliopause, which marks the boundary between our solar system and outer space.
But instead of slipping away from the bubble of charged particles the Sun blows around itself, Voyager encountered something completely unexpected.
The craft's daily radio reports sent back evidence that the Sun's magnetic field lines was connected to interstellar magnetic fields. Lower-energy charged particles were zooming out and higher-energy particles from outside were streaming in.
They called it a magnetic highway because charged particles outside this region bounced around in all directions, as if trapped on local roads inside the bubble, or heliosphere.
"Although Voyager 1 still is inside the Sun's environment, we now can taste what it's like on the outside because the particles are zipping in and out on this magnetic highway," said Edward Stone, a Voyager project scientist based at the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena.
"We believe this is the last leg of our journey to interstellar space. Our best guess is it's likely just a few months to a couple years away. The new region isn't what we expected, but we've come to expect the unexpected from Voyager."
Voyager is now 11 billion miles (18 billion kilometers) away from the Sun, which is 122 times the distances from the Earth to the Sun. Yet it takes only 17 hours for its radio signal to reach us.
Scientists began to think it was reaching the edge of our solar system two years ago when the solar winds died down and particles settled in space the way they would in a swamp.
An increase in the number of cosmic rays in May also led them to believe Voyager had approached interstellar space.
In July the reading changed again, and by August 25 Voyager was on the magnetic highway. The number of particles from the outside jumped sharply and the number of particles from the inside fell by a factor of 1,000.
"It is as if someone opened the floodgates and they were all moved down the river, also some boaters powered up stream with close to the speed of light have been able to get in at last," said Stamatios Krimigis, Voyager's principal investigator of low-energy charged particles.
While the magnetic field is exciting, Krimigis sounded somewhat disappointed that Voyager had not yet escaped the solar system.
"Nature is very imaginative and Lucy pulled up the football again," he said, making reference to the classic comic strip Peanuts in a conference call with reporters.
The twin Voyager craft -- Voyager 2 was actually launched first, on August 20, 1977, followed by Voyager 1 on September 5 -- were designed primarily to study the biggest planets in our solar system, Jupiter and Saturn.
Taking advantage of a planetary alignment, they fulfilled that mission before pushing on to Uranus and Neptune, beaming back stunning images of the first two in 1979 and 1980, and the latter pair in 1986 and 1989.
But with those jobs complete and both craft still functioning perfectly, project managers decided to keep mining information as the devices fly further into the void.
NASA has described Voyager 1 and its companion Voyager 2 as "the two most distant active representatives of humanity and its desire to explore."
The scientists controlling Voyager 1 -- whose 1970s technology gives it just a 100,000th of the computer memory of an eight-gigabyte iPod Nano -- decided to turn off its cameras after it passed Neptune in 1989 to preserve power.
Assuming the craft continues to function normally, they will have to start turning off other on-board instruments from 2020, and it is expected to run out of power completely in 2025.

BackTrack 5 R3 Released!

The time has come to refresh our security tool arsenal – BackTrack 5 R3 has been released. R3 focuses on bug-fixes as well as the addition of over 60 new tools – several of which were released in BlackHat and Defcon 2012. A whole new tool category was populated – “Physical Exploitation”, which now includes tools such as the Arduino IDE and libraries, as well as the Kautilya Teensy payload collection.

Building, testing and releasing a new BackTrack revision is never an easy task. Keeping up-to-date with all the latest tools, while balancing their requirements of dependencies, is akin to a magic show juggling act. Thankfully, active members of our redmine community such as backtracklover and JudasIscariot make our task that much easier by actively reporting bugs and suggesting new tools on a regular basis. Hats off to the both of you.

We would like to thank Offensive Security for providing the BackTrack dev team with the funding and resources to make all of this happen. Also, a very special thanks to dookie, our lead developer – for building, testing and packaging most of the new tools in this release.

Together with our usual KDE and GNOME, 32/64 bit ISOs, we have released a single VMware Image (Gnome, 32 bit). For those requiring other VM flavors of BackTrack – building your own VMWare image is easy – instructions can be found in the BackTrack Wiki.

Lastly, if you’re looking for intensive, real world, hands on Penetration Testing Training – make sure to drop by Offensive Security Training, and learn the meaning of “TRY HARDER“.

For the insanely impatient, you can download the BackTrack 5 R3 release via torrent right now. Direct ISO downloads will be available once all our HTTP mirrors have synched, which should take a couple more hours. Once this happens, we will update our BackTrack Download page with all links.

• BT5R3-GNOME-64.torrent (md5: 8cd98b693ce542b671edecaed48ab06d)
• BT5R3-GNOME-32.torrent (md5: aafff8ff5b71fdb6fccdded49a6541a0)
• BT5R3-KDE-64.torrent (md5: 981b897b7fdf34fb1431ba84fe93249f)
• BT5R3-KDE-32.torrent (md5: d324687fb891e695089745d461268576)
• BT5R3-GNOME-32-VM.torrent (md5: bca6d3862c661b615a374d7ef61252c5)

BackTrack Live USB Install

This method of getting a live install to a USB drive is the simplest available using Unetbootin. Note that we will format the USB drive and erase its contents.

1. Plug in your USB Drive (Minimum USB Drive capacity 2 GB)
2. Format the USB drive to FAT32
3. Download Unetbootin from http://unetbootin.sourceforge.net/
4. Start Unetbootin and select diskimage (use the backtrack-final ISO)
5. Select your USB drive and click “OK” for creating a bootable BackTrack USB drive
6. Log into BackTrack with the default username and password root / toor.

The Best Operating System for Hackers

There are a couple of things that are essential to any hacker’s walk of life. To name a few, there’s the ubiquitous flash drive for data transfer. You have the crossover cable for even faster data transfer. There’s the Wi-Fi antenna for high gain and strong amplification. Possibly, you might find a video capture card in the computer. Of course, there’s the ubiquitous laptop and desktop computer. But what software is on these computers? Undoubtedly, you will find at least two operating systems, most often Windows and Linux. But with Linux, there are several different distributions. Is there a specific one? With hackers and crackers, there is only one Linux distro out there. It is called Backtrack.


BackTrack is a Linux-based penetration testing arsenal that aids security professionals in the ability to perform assessments in a purely native environment dedicated to hacking.

Regardless if you’re making BackTrack your primary operating system, booting from a Live DVD, or using your favourite thumb drive, BackTrack has been customized down to every package, kernel configuration, script and patch solely for the purpose of the penetration tester.

BackTrack is intended for all audiences from the most savvy security professionals to early newcomers to the information security field. BackTrack promotes a quick and easy way to find and update the largest database of security tool collection to-date.

Back Track is quite possibly the most comprehensive Linux distribution of security tools. Both hackers and crackers can appreciate the features of this distribution. For black-hatters, it is an easy access to software that facilitates exploitations of secure system. For white-hatters, it is a penetration tester that finds holes in a security scheme. See, everybody wins!

Major Features

BackTrack features the latest in security penetration software. The current Linux kernel is patched so that special driver installation is unnecessary for attacks. For example, an Atheros-based wireless networking adapter will no enter monitor mode or inject packets without the MadWiFi driver patch. With BackTrack, you don’t need to worry about that. It’s just plug-and-play ready-to-go!

What’s great is that this Linux distribution comes Live-on-CD. So, no installation is needed. However, what you experience BackTrack, you will realize that it is a must to download this operating system and install it on your Laptop. At the very least, download the VMWare Virtual Appliance for Backtrack. Make sure you also install the VMWare Tools for Linux as well. Many features will still work in VMWare mode.

• Based on: Debian, Ubuntu
• Origin: Switzerland
• Architecture: i386
• Desktop: Fluxbox, KDE
• Category: Forensics, Rescue, Live Medium
• Cost: Free

Tools:

BackTrack provides users with easy access to a comprehensive and large collection of security-related tools ranging from port scanners to password crackers. Support for Live CD and Live USB functionality allows users to boot BackTrack directly from portable media without requiring installation, though permanent installation to hard disk is also an option.

BackTrack includes many well known security tools including:

• Metasploit integration
• RFMON Injection capable wireless drivers
• Kismet
• Nmap
• Ettercap
• Wireshark (formerly known as Ethereal)
• BeEF (Browser Exploitation Framework)

A large collection of exploits as well as more common place software such as browsers. BackTrack arranges tools into 11 categories:

• Information Gathering
• Network Mapping
• Vulnerability Identification
• Web Application Analysis
• Radio Network Analysis (802.11, Bluetooth, Rfid)
• Penetration (Exploit & Social Engineering Toolkit)
• Privilege Escalation
• Maintaining Access
• Digital Forensics
• Reverse Engineering
• Voice Over IP

Download and Documents:

Home Page
User Forums
Documentation
Download Mirrors

5 Alternatives to The Pirate Bay

With all this activity surrounding the DDOS attacks and the blocking of Swedish BitTorrent website The Pirate Bay in some countries, we decided to look the 5 best alternatives to the The Pirate Bay.

News surrounding The Pirate Bay is certainly a reminder that it’s great to have a back-up plan. Late last month, the UK High Court ordered all ISPs in the UK to block the site. Getting around such blocks is pretty trivial. Still, what happens when the site is DDOS attacked like what happened recently when an Anonymous defector allegedly attacked the site? Such a thing could theoretically disrupt your day-to-day downloading.
For something totally different, download LimeWire Pirate Edition
Here are the 5 best Pirate Bay alternatives
1. ISOHunt
A Canadian open BitTorrent website that has really withstood the test of time. Still around and still serving up torrents for everyone. This probably is one of the best true alternatives to ThePirateBay.
2. 1337x
Another open site, though younger by comparison. Has lots of different torrents to choose from and is one of the higher ranking sites as voted by our very own ZeroPaid readers.
3. KickAss Torrents
An open site with lots of torrents. Another site that has received high ratings by our readers.
4. BitWiki
A popular BitTorrent index and search engine.
5. Torrent Project
A Torrent search engine able to crawl through numerous sites and get both torrents and files inside each torrent.
Notable

• Demonoid.me
• Torrentdownloads.net
• Torrentz.eu
• Zamunda.net

Dell ships lightweight XPS 13 laptop with Ubuntu Linux

After months of experimenting, Dell took the wraps off a thin-and-light XPS 13 laptop with the Ubuntu Linux 12.04 LTS, an OS that is code-named Precise Pangolin.
The XPS 13 with Ubuntu was developed as part of an internal Dell project called "Project Sputnik." Over six months, Dell worked with the open-source community to develop tools, drivers and software for the OS to work on XPS 13, which has the frame of an ultrabook.
The laptop has an Intel Core i7 CPU, 8GB RAM and 256GB of storage. Priced at US$1549, it comes with one year of on-site support as part of the package. The laptop is now available in the U.S. and Canada, and will become available in other countries next year.
The XPS 13 laptop has a 13-inch screen. The company did not immediately provide the weight or battery life of the laptop.
Dell is already selling the XPS 13 ultrabook with Windows 8 starting at $999, making the Linux-based cousin much pricier. Dell mostly sells laptops with Windows, and ultrabooks with Linux are not yet available from PC makers.
The company has described the new XPS 13 with Ubuntu as a developer edition, but will sell the product to enterprises and consumers as well.
The XPS 13 with Ubuntu gives developers the "essentials they want while staying true to our core values of openness and affordability," said Nnamdi Orakwue, vice president of Dell Cloud, in an emailed statement.
Development of the laptop was led by Barton George, web vertical director at Dell. Working with Canonical and other open-source developers, Dell created the drivers and tools for the Linux OS to work on XPS 13.
The joint development effort has also led to some new features unique to the laptop. One is called the "profile tool," which enables developers to easily set up software development environments via quick access to tools for Ruby, JavaScript and Android in the github repositories.
Another feature on XPS 13 is the "Cloud Launcher" which Dell said allows for simulation of cloud environments on the laptop. The simulated environment can then be deployed directly to the cloud.
Dell has sold laptops and netbooks with Ubuntu Linux in the past, but the company has larger plans with XPS 13 and Ubuntu. Typically Dell provided install images of the Ubuntu OS, but has not collaborated with the open-source community on a wide scale.
The company is committed to open source, and development around Linux and the laptop will continue, Orakwue and George said in separate statements.
Agam Shah covers PCs, tablets, servers, chips and semiconductors for IDG News Service. Follow Agam on Twitter at @agamsh. Agam's e-mail address is agam_shah@idg.com

No ‘Incredible Hulk 2′ Until After ‘The Avengers 2′

Robert Downey Jr. and Chris Hemsworth return to theaters next year in Iron Man 3 and Thor: The Dark World, respectively. The following spring, Chris Evans suits up for Captain America: The Winter Soldier and after that, we boldly go where no moviegoer has gone before with Guardians of the Galaxy. All of this leads to the summer of 2015 where the heroes team-up once again in The Avengers 2, leaving Mark Ruffalo and his take on The Hulk with no headlining appearance of his own.
While Bruce Banner is the only character from The Avengers with a live-action TV show in development, he’s also the only super-powered member of the team not getting another solo movie. At least not anytime soon, according to Marvel President of Production, Kevin Feige.

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Since the first Iron Man launched Marvel Studios into what it is today, all of the talent signing up to join the franchise must do so with lengthy, multi-picture deals. Mark Ruffalo, taking over the role of Banner from Edward Norton, has a six-picture contract with the studio and will be back in a big way over and over again. When and in what stories then, can Hulk be implemented if The Incredible Hulk 2 isn’t in the cards, at least for Phase Two of the Marvel cinematic universe?

In chatting with MTV, Feige pondered the possibilities of seeing Hulk return with his own movie, even in an adaptation some of his more recent and outlandish story arcs from the books.

“I don’t think there’s a lot that we couldn’t do someday, as the cinematic universe continues to grow and expand and get as big as the comic book universe. ’Planet Hulk’ is a cool story. ‘World War Hulk’ is a cool story… I think there are pitfalls of continuity-overload, and mythology getting so dense that it almost collapses in on itself. It happens every few decades or so in the comics. Apart from that, I’d say everything is on the table.”
“Do I think Hulk can carry a movie and be as entertaining as he was in ‘Avengers’? I do believe that. I do believe he absolutely could. We certainly are not even going to attempt that until ‘Avengers 2. So there’s a lot of time to think about it.”

The Phase Two lineup for the next three years has already been set and the only film without a release date is Edgar Wright’s Ant-Man which has been teased as a possible third release for 2014, should Wright have time to shoot it after finishing The World’s End. That possibility is becoming less and less likely as Marvel Studios continues to demonstrate a hesitation towards the Ant-Man property. In chatting with Louis D’Esposito, Co-President of Marvel Studios, he made it it clear to me that the studio doesn’t want to put too much on their plate and stretch their resources thin. Translation: it’s possible that Ant-Man could be a second release alongside The Avengers 2 in 2015, the same year Marvel’s President of Consumer Products, Paul Glitter, previously said The Incredible Hulk 2 was planned for.

It comes down to risk vs. reward and The Incredible Hulk was the lowest grossing film of all of the Marvel Studios self-financed productions to date. It made nearly the same money at the box office as Ang Lee’s Hulk did years before and for Marvel execs, it makes better business sense to continue expanding the franchise, using the characters that do sell to help launch others. It’s the same reason Black Widow and Hawkeye will never get solo spinoffs of their own.
Ruffalo absolutely nailed his performance in The Avengers, becoming a easy fan-favorite. That had a lot to do with the character’s supporting role, working off of the other heroes. Feige shares this same sentiment:

“Part of what’s fun about the way we played him in ‘Avengers’ is the ensemble quality of it. I think the pathos and humor, most importantly, that Mark and Joss brought to it showcased a different element of Hulk that’s there in the comics, and was always inherent in his character. But when he was so brooding in his other two films, he didn’t get to have that wry sense of humor that Mark did such an amazing job performing.”

So the question is, where will The Hulk show up next? Fans will be quick to point out that The Avengers ended with the heroes parting ways and Banner taking a spin in Tony Stark’s Acura, leading to the belief that they could show up together in Iron Man 3. Feige says a Hulk cameo in IM3 is not happening however, so take that for what you will.
Is Banner off seeking isolation from the world during the events of Phase Two or could be be enlisted as a member or consultant of S.H.I.E.L.D. who could show up in Captain America 2? He has to make an appearance somehere in the next two years before The Avengers 2, right?
Iron Man 3 releases May 3, 2013, Thor: The Dark World on November 8, 2013, Captain America: The Winter Soldier on April 4, 2014, Guardians of the Galaxy on August 1, 2014 and The Avengers 2 on May 1, 2015.

Syria’s Internet shutdown leaves information void, may signal escalating war

View Photo Gallery — Syrian conflict persists as rebels make advances: As rebels and forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad continue to clash, refugees seek shelter across Turkish border.

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By Craig Timberg and Babak Dehghanpisheh, Friday, November 30, 3:34 AM

Syria’s civil war went off­line Thursday as millions of people tracking the conflict over YouTube, Facebook and other high-tech services found themselves struggling against an unnerving national shutdown of the Internet.
The communications shutdown immediately evoked memories of similar action by Libya’s Moammar Gaddafi and Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak, and it sparked fears that President Bashar al-Assad could be preparing to take even harsher action against Syrian opposition forces, which have recently made significant advances in the battle against the government.

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WorldViews

Map: How Europe voted on Palestine at the U.N., in 2011 and now

Max Fisher 12:57 AM ET

Since last year, nine European countries appear to have shifted toward greater support for Palestinian efforts at the UN. None shifted away.

The three big questions on Syria's Internet blackout

Max Fisher NOV 29

Did web service go completely dark in the country because the military is planning something or as a reaction against rebel gains?

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A Syrian official blamed the outages on technical problems. Analysts said it was far more likely that Assad had ordered the Internet and some cellphone connections switched off, although it was possible that a rebel attack had severed crucial cables.
Whatever the cause of the blackout, it was clear that the remarkable window into the war offered by technology had dramatically narrowed for Syrians on both sides of the conflict and the many outsiders following the story. Observers said it signaled the beginning of a dangerous new phase after 20 months of escalating conflict.
“In some ways, it’s a Cyclops stabbing itself in the eye,” said Joshua M. Landis, a Syria expert at the University of Oklahoma. “They’re turning the light out on themselves here, which is not good.”
The shutdown came amid scattered rebel gains Thursday and intensified fighting that shut down the Damascus airport. In Washington, meanwhile, officials indicated that the Obama administration was moving toward recognizing a newly formed opposition coalition as the legitimate representative of the Syrian people.
‘There will be panic’
The rising popularity of smartphones and the Syrian government’s sharp limits on the movements of independent journalists have made social media an especially vital source of information about the conflict. The abrupt loss of the technology has caused widespread fear, said Ammar Abdulhamid, a fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.
“Not everyone will have access” to news about the conflict, said Abdulhamid, who has close ties to Syria’s opposition. “There will be panic. There will be fear.”
Syrian rebel forces have many satellite phones. But the devices expose users to risk of detection by government forces, and there are not enough of the phones to keep millions of Syrians informed.
“Most of the activists, especially in Damascus, are relying totally on the local Internet services, which are delivered by the Syrian communication companies,” said Ahmed Radoun, an activist in Hama who works for an opposition news service. “They want to pressure the activists who rely on the Internet services from the local companies and to limit the news delivery to the TV channels and the news agencies we deal with.”
The government has shut down Internet services previously, as well, often in specific regions right before launching attacks. On at least two other occasions, the outages were national in scope.
Omar Abu Laila, a spokesman for the rebel fighters in the eastern city of Deir al-Zour, said communications have been down for so long there that the new disruptions will have no impact. “The communication outage did not affect us,” he said. “You should report that we’re happy the rest of Syria joined us.”

Yet, Thursday’s blackout — at 12:26 p.m. Damascus time, according to the Internet monitoring company Renesys — set off alarms worldwide. Among the worries: The only Syrian networks still routing traffic into the nation have a history of delivering malware to opposition activists, meaning that they almost certainly are controlled by the government.
Window into the conflict

Personal Post

WorldViews

Map: How Europe voted on Palestine at the U.N., in 2011 and now

Max Fisher 12:57 AM ET

Since last year, nine European countries appear to have shifted toward greater support for Palestinian efforts at the UN. None shifted away.

The three big questions on Syria's Internet blackout

Max Fisher NOV 29

Did web service go completely dark in the country because the military is planning something or as a reaction against rebel gains?

6 scathing highlights from the Leveson report

Olga Khazan NOV 29

The British judge implicated the police, politicians and regulators in the 2,000 word report

Petraeus says he messed up ‘royally'

Olga Khazan NOV 29

The former CIA director admitted his mistake and said he'd try to save his marriage

The Syrian civil war has played out with unnerving intimacy for viewers of YouTube. Shaky videos delivered images of dead children, the bloodied walls after a massacre and, just this week, the fiery streak of an opposition missile destroying a government helicopter.
Analysts said the image of that attack, which highlighted the opposition’s rising military capabilities, may have prompted Assad to cut off communications after months of allowing information to flow with relative freedom.
The government had reason to do so. Its forces used the Internet for some routine communications. Easy access to the Web also helped the government spy on opposition forces, which relied on such technology to communicate. Social media sites, meanwhile, were popular with civilians, and continued access to the sites lent a veneer of normalcy in Damascus, the capital.
Yet most blamed Assad for the Internet shutdown. The main telecommunications cables are controlled by the government-owned Syrian Telecommunications Establishment, and all of the country’s Internet providers and cellphone companies rely on the data it provides. Shutting down the flow of information, analysts say, is easy.
“It’s a sign that the regime is going to take its gloves off,” said Andrew J. Tabler, a senior fellow and Syria expert at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. “They’re going to make sure they’re the only ones who can communicate, or at least they are going to try.”
Opposition forces, however, have grown savvy at distributing images from the fighting to keep their cause visible to the world. Rebels operating near international borders, such as with Jordan, Turkey or Lebanon, have access to cellphone signals emanating from those countries. Governments backing the Syrian opposition have sent thousands of satellite phones to the rebels; the U.S. State Department says it has sent 2,000 pieces of communications equipment, which could assist in distributing videos even if the Internet remains shut down.
“Syria is going to be an excellent test” of such initiatives, said Andrew McLaughlin, a former top policy official at Google who also worked as a White House technology adviser. “People have been preparing for this day. . . . I’ll be glued to my screen for the next 24 to 48 hours to see if that did any good.”

Dehghanpisheh reported from Beirut.

Syria's internet cut off amid increased fighting

Rebels and forces loyal to Syria's president Bashar al-Assad are locked in a fierce battle just outside the capital Damascus. At the same time, internet and telecommunications links in the country have been cut. Both the Assad regime and rebel forces are blaming each other for the outage.

TRANSCRIPT:

ASHLEY HALL: Rebels and forces loyal to Syria's president Bashar al-Assad are locked in a fierce battle just outside the capital Damascus.
The fighting has cut access to the international airport, and two airlines have stopped flights to the Syrian capital.
At the same time, internet and telecommunications links in the country have been cut.
Both the Assad regime and rebel forces are blaming each other for the worst communications blackout in 20 months of conflict.
It's making it much more difficult to get accurate information about the situation in Syria.
Nonetheless, Timothy McDonald reports.
(Sound from rockets firing)
TIMOTHY MCDONALD: Amateur video uploaded by activists, shows what appears to be MiG warplanes firing rockets on the city of Homs.
Like many others that have emerged since the start of the Syrian conflict, it can't be independently verified.
For the opposition, the internet has played a vital role in documenting the war and pressing the case for international support.
For the time being, that appears to have stopped.
Jim Cowie from the US internet monitoring company Renesys told the BBC that internet traffic has stopped entirely.
JIM COWIE: It's as if the Syrian internet fell off a table and stopped working. It's very unambiguous, it is a complete withdrawal of all the internet connected resources in the country.
TIMOTHY MCDONALD: The apparent shutdown follows fighting in Damascus, which has forced the closure of the international airport. Emirates and EgyptAir stopped flights to the Syrian capital.
US officials say the rebels are making gains, but the war hasn't yet shifted decisively in their favour. US State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland blames the Syrian government for the shutdown, and says it's quite a revealing move.
VICTORIA NULAND: And it just again speaks to the kind of desperation of the regime as it tries to cling to power.
TIMOTHY MCDONALD: One IT expert says the government may have calculated that it was worth shutting down the internet, even though it makes its own communications more difficult too.
Professor Matt Warren is the chair of information systems at Deakin University.
MATT WARREN: It may be that they've made a decision that they're actually losing the perception war, and it's more advantageous for them to control the flow of information rather than resistance organisations being able to disseminate information, you know, widely to the world.
So it could be that form of assessment as well that the Syrian government feels is actually in their best interests to have a greater control, you know, over internet communications.
TIMOTHY MCDONALD: Shutting down the internet has been a government tactic in other places too. During protests in Egypt last year, the government there tried similar tactics.
In response, engineers at Google and Twitter organised a voice-to-tweet service to help protesters work around the shutdown.
Syria's opposition too, has other ways of getting the word out. The US has provided around 2,000 communications kits to the opposition.
Victoria Nuland says they're not affected.
VICTORIA NULAND: They are all designed to be independent from and able to circumvent the Syrian domestic network precisely for the reason of keeping them safe, keeping them secure.
TIMOTHY MCDONALD: Also, satellite communications aren't affected, and the opposition can always get footage out the old fashioned way - by taking it over the border.
Still, Professor Warren says the government probably will gain a tactical advantage, because military communications are likely to be unaffected.
MATT WARREN: They would have their own independent communication systems not linked to the internet, so a lot of their equipment and technology historically has been supplied to them by Russia. So it means that they would have their own independent communication network, independent of the internet.
But what may be an issue actually for the resistance is mobile communications because, as we've seen with ad-hoc movements that have developed, mobile communications are actually a very effective way for people to sort of keep in touch.
So again, it may be that some of these strategies are going to impact the resistance organisations more than the government forces.
TIMOTHY MCDONALD: Syria's minister of information denies that the government is responsible, and instead blames terrorists for the countrywide outage.
He says engineers are working to repair what he said was a fault in the main communications and internet cable.
ASHLEY HALL: Timothy McDonald.

Syria: Internet and mobile communication 'cut off'

The internet has been cut off and mobile phones have been disrupted in Syria, monitoring firms have said.

Networking firm Renesys said the country's connection protocols were unreachable, "effectively removing the country from the internet".

Local reports suggested that the internet had been down since early afternoon, and that telephone lines were only working intermittently.

The Syrian government has blamed "terrorists" for the disconnection.
"The terrorists targeted the internet lines, resulting in some regions being cut off," Syria's minister of information told a pro-government television station.
According to activists, it has been known for similar communication cuts to occur in isolated areas before military operations.

Amnesty International has described the reports as "very disturbing".
Renesys, a US-based company which tracks internet connectivity worldwide, said on its blog: "In the global routing table, all 84 of Syria's IP address blocks have become unreachable."
According to its systems, access was disconnected at 12:26pm local time (10:26 GMT).
'Started to dive'
 

Another US firm, Akamai, also confirmed it was unable to connect with Syria's internet.
Activists were using satellite phones to make contact with the outside world, Reuters reported.
Search giant Google noted that Syrians were unable to access any of its services including YouTube. The video sharing website is a popular place for activists to upload footage from the country.
Psiphon, a Canadian company that produces advanced computer systems for circumventing censorship systems, told the BBC that its monitoring showed the number of people connecting from within Syria had "started to dive" from around midday local time.

Psiphon's system - which requires specialised software - has throughout November been seeing 13-15,000 log-ins per day.

Monitoring firm Akamai posted this graph showing level of net activity in Syria

However, at the time of the reported outage, none of its users were able to get online.
Syria has previously seen large outages in July and August this year, each lasting less than an hour and only affecting targeted areas.

During the uprising in Egypt, four major internet service providers were cut off in the country during mass protests against the then-President Hosni Mubarak.
Breaking connections
 
Egyptians quickly found ways around the blocks, and Google introduced a "speak-to-tweet" service which allowed people to connect to Twitter via the telephone.

In Libya, internet blackouts were common in areas that were at the time still controlled by Colonel Gaddafi.

The exact method being used to cut off the internet in Syria is unknown, one security expert said, but there are clues.

"It looks like they are using the same approach as Libya did," explained Rik Ferguson, vice president of security research at Trend Micro.

"Requests for Syrian addresses are simply timing out - so it's likely to be 'blackholing' or even breaking connections physically by cutting cables or switching things off."

Black-holing is a tactic which involves sending internet traffic into a dead end - rather than its intended destination.

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