Author: infossl

AI as Sensemaking for Public Comments

Posted on By infossl
artificial intelligence, laws, LLM, public interest, Security technology, Uncategorized

It’s become fashionable to think of artificial intelligence as an inherently dehumanizing technology, a ruthless force of automation that has unleashed legions of virtual skilled laborers in faceless form. But what if AI turns out to be the one tool able to identify what makes your ideas special, recognizing your unique perspective and potential on … Read More “AI as Sensemaking for Public Comments” »

Ethical Problems in Computer Security

Posted on By infossl
academic papers, computer security, ethics, Security technology, Uncategorized

Tadayoshi Kohno, Yasemin Acar, and Wulf Loh wrote excellent paper on ethical thinking within the computer security community: “Ethical Frameworks and Computer Security Trolley Problems: Foundations for Conversation“: Abstract: The computer security research community regularly tackles ethical questions. The field of ethics / moral philosophy has for centuries considered what it means to be “morally … Read More “Ethical Problems in Computer Security” »

Power LED Side-Channel Attack

Posted on By infossl
Security technology, Uncategorized

This is a clever new side-channel attack: The first attack uses an Internet-connected surveillance camera to take a high-speed video of the power LED on a smart card reader­or of an attached peripheral device­during cryptographic operations. This technique allowed the researchers to pull a 256-bit ECDSA key off the same government-approved smart card used in … Read More “Power LED Side-Channel Attack” »

Friday Squid Blogging: Squid Can Edit Their RNA

Posted on By infossl
Security technology, squid, Uncategorized

This is just crazy: Scientists don’t yet know for sure why octopuses, and other shell-less cephalopods including squid and cuttlefish, are such prolific editors. Researchers are debating whether this form of genetic editing gave cephalopods an evolutionary leg (or tentacle) up or whether the editing is just a sometimes useful accident. Scientists are also probing … Read More “Friday Squid Blogging: Squid Can Edit Their RNA” »

Security and Human Behavior (SHB) 2023

Posted on By infossl
conferences, cybersecurity, security conferences, Security technology, Uncategorized

I’m just back from the sixteenth Workshop on Security and Human Behavior, hosted by Alessandro Acquisti at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh. SHB is a small, annual, invitational workshop of people studying various aspects of the human side of security, organized each year by Alessandro Acquisti, Ross Anderson, and myself. The fifty or so attendees … Read More “Security and Human Behavior (SHB) 2023” »

On the Need for an AI Public Option

Posted on By infossl
artificial intelligence, essays, LLM, Security technology, Uncategorized

Artificial intelligence will bring great benefits to all of humanity. But do we really want to entrust this revolutionary technology solely to a small group of US tech companies? Silicon Valley has produced no small number of moral disappointments. Google retired its “don’t be evil” pledge before firing its star ethicist. Self-proclaimed “free speech absolutist” … Read More “On the Need for an AI Public Option” »

AI-Generated Steganography

Posted on By infossl
academic papers, artificial intelligence, cryptography, encryption, Security technology, steganography, Uncategorized

New research suggests that AIs can produce perfectly secure steganographic images: Abstract: Steganography is the practice of encoding secret information into innocuous content in such a manner that an adversarial third party would not realize that there is hidden meaning. While this problem has classically been studied in security literature, recent advances in generative models … Read More “AI-Generated Steganography” »

Friday Squid Blogging: Light-Emitting Squid

Posted on By infossl
Security technology, squid, Uncategorized

It’s a Taningia danae: Their arms are lined with two rows of sharp retractable hooks. And, like most deep-sea squid, they are adorned with light organs called photophores. They have some on the underside of their mantle. There are more facing upward, near one of their eyes. But it’s the photophores at the tip of … Read More “Friday Squid Blogging: Light-Emitting Squid” »

Operation Triangulation: Zero-Click iPhone Malware

Posted on By infossl
exploits, forensics, ios, iphone, malware, Security technology, Uncategorized

Kaspersky is reporting a zero-click iOS exploit in the wild: Mobile device backups contain a partial copy of the filesystem, including some of the user data and service databases. The timestamps of the files, folders and the database records allow to roughly reconstruct the events happening to the device. The mvt-ios utility produces a sorted … Read More “Operation Triangulation: Zero-Click iPhone Malware” »