On Mondays I offer comments on some   of the most interesting information technology stories that I have found on the web that week.  Please feel free to join in the discussion or suggest other stories.

Today’s comments were generated after I read not one, but two stories from The Economist about the threat, fear, and realities of CyberWar.  Great articles, both, that I recommend to you.  Give them a read below.

The Economist – War in the fifth domain: Are the mouse and keyboard the new weapons of conflict?

“After land, sea, air and space, warfare has entered the fifth domain: cyberspace. President Barack Obama has declared America’s digital infrastructure to be a “strategic national asset” and appointed Howard Schmidt, the former head of security at Microsoft, as his cyber-security tsar. In May the Pentagon set up its new Cyber Command (Cybercom) headed by General Keith Alexander, director of the National Security Agency (NSA). His mandate is to conduct “full-spectrum” operations—to defend American military networks and attack other countries’ systems. Precisely how, and by what rules, is secret.”

The Economist – Cyberwar: It is time for countries to start talking about arms control on the internet

“As with nuclear bombs, the existence of cyber-weapons does not in itself mean they are about to be used. Moreover, an attacker cannot be sure what effect an assault will have on another country, making their deployment highly risky. That is a drawback for sophisticated military machines, but not necessarily for terrorists or the armies of rogue states. And it leaves the dangers of online crime and espionage. “

Seriously good writing about seriously complicated topics containing serious information, commentary, and consideration.  What is not to love here.  If you are an Information Professional then you need to read these stories.  Enjoy them.  I suspect that if The Economist is now writing about this weekly, the topic will be showing up everywhere!

OK, that is what I think of this topic. What do you think about this topic?  Do you agree or disagree with me? Do you have a recommended news story for next week? Please share your ideas below.

That is my Information Technology Thought of the Day (ITTOD) for July 5, 2010  by Scott Coughlin.

Image Credit: Help Net Security at net-security.org

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It is available in print and kindle editions from major book sources, including Amazon.com. I appreciated it so much that I also added it to The Information Technology Thought of the Day Webstore, permanently.

I will try to get a full review up in the next couple of weeks, as I finish it.  I can already tell though that it will be a modern day classic for the niche that it is targeted at as well as statisticians and current event geeks.

The opening chapter alone is worth the price of admission and really demonstrates well how much the world of warfare has changed in the past 20 years due to the Internet and Information Technology.  I especially appreciated how the author makes the case that Cyber War is real whether you think that it is or not.    I also valued the parallels that were drawn between the dawn of cyber war and the coming of naval aviation and nuclear weapons.  Considering that the author is a leading expert on Nuclear War policy, I figure that he probably knows what he is talking about.

Image Credit: Tesco Books

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On Mondays I offer comments on some   of the most interesting information technology stories that I have found on the web that week.  Please feel free to join in the discussion or suggest other stories.

Today’s comments were generated after I read a CNN story.  It is about the same message that they issue once per year.  I recommend it to you.  Give it a read below.

CNN.com – Are you ready for the big internet crunch?

“(CNN) — The internet as we know it is reaching its limits.

Within 18 months it is estimated that the number of new devices able to connect to the world wide web will plummet as we run out of "IP addresses" — the unique codes that provide access to the internet for everything from PCs to smart phones.

"The internet as we know it will no longer be able to grow," Daniel Karrenberg, chief scientist at RIPE NCC, the organization that issues IP addresses in Europe, told CNN.”

The basic problem is that when the Internet went mainstream in the mid-nineties, no one envisioned that every person on the planet would have multiple computers, let alone a smart phone, toaster, and Wii that needed an address.  The problem got very acute around the millennial, but was warded off by a new addressing scheme for downstream computers, called NAT, that allowed every computer on a local network to share a single point-of-presence connection to the Internet.  This is why, you are said to be sharing an internet connection on your local street, at the coffee shop, and at work.

The solution is to upgrade the address scheme to a newer version, called IP version 6 or IPv6.  You can read all about it at Wikipedia.  Don’t worry about version 5… it is caput.  IPv6 brings a host of new features in addition to its dramatically increased address space including quality of service, security, and expandability.  The good news is that every piece of networking hardware built in the past five years came out-of-the-box compatible.  The bad news is that people have continued to write online software code that only works on IPv4 even though they new it’s life expectancy was short. And thus lies the problem, the actual impact of shifting will be a crap shoot until we pull the trigger.  That, and no one wants to be the first penguin off the iceberg, and risk mission kill.

The best news is that this story has not changed on lick in the past eight years!  We will all gnash our teeth, complain a bit, and decide to put off the inevitable for another year.  Stay tuned in June 2011 for another CNN news story on this ery same issue….

What do you think about this topic?  Do you agree or disagree with me? Do you have a recommended news story for next week? Please share your ideas below.

That is my Information Technology Thought of the Day (ITTOD) for May 31, 2010  by Scott Coughlin.

Image Credit: VEED.in – Tech News

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The Information Technology (IT) Vocabulary Builder series aims to deliver a very concise summary of a currently relevant topic to Information Professionals.  It is done mostly by collecting a small number of highly relevant web links to save you the time of combing through search results yourself. 

The place where I saw the reference is here:

The UK Register – 3 men charged in $100m scareware scam:

“Federal prosecutors have accused three men of running an operation that used fraudulent ads to dupe internet users around the world into buying more than $100m worth of bogus anti-virus software…

The scheme often tricked users into purchasing multiple sham products, which were sold under names including Malware Alarm, Antivirus 2008 and VirusRemover 2008.”

You can learn more about our new term at Wikipedia. Here is how they define it:

Scareware comprises several classes of scam software with malicious payloads, or of limited or no benefit, that are sold to consumers via certain unethical marketing practices. The selling approach uses social engineering to cause shock, anxiety, or the perception of a threat, generally directed at an unsuspecting user. Some forms of spyware and adware also use scareware tactics.

A tactic frequently used by criminals involves convincing users that a virus has infected their computer, then suggesting that they download (and pay for) fake antivirus software to remove it.

A couple of other web resources are available:

• The ultimate guide to scareware protection | ZDNet
• Security Fix – What To Do When Scareware Strikes

I guess IT Professionals can learn something new every day!

So how do you think that this relates to Information Technology?  How do you think that it could be important to Information Technology Professionals?

Do you know of any other new IT terms that should be discussed?

That is my Information Technology Thought of the Day (ITTOD) for May 28, 2010  by Scott Coughlin.

Image credit: DHS

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I like to take a hard look at:

• Trends in the Information Technology industry
• Gaps in my current knowledge
• Emerging issues that I see coming up at work
• Larger social and culture based effects that I am unprepared for
• Industry media coverage trends

My initial list for this year looks like it includes:

1. The overall aging of the population
2. The rise of mobile, always connected Internet computing devices
3. The growing popularity of Apple computing products
4. The decline of write once, run anywhere software development
5. Enterprise Management Systems
6. Enterprise eLearning Systems
7. Enterprise content management systems
8. Transitioning Legacy Systems to Cloud Based ones.
9. Cloud computing security and information assurance
10. The end of the print era – the all digital content delivery period
11. The rise of cloud computing from a consumer and user perspective.

Obviously, there is more than I can handle for one year on this list.  It is essentially a first draft that will have to be cut down, but it is a starting point.  Now I just need to come up with the training, education, and learning plans to accomplish it.

How do you design, execute, and manage your Information Technology Professional Continuing Learning program? What have you found works best?  Can you share via our comments section?

That is my Information Technology Thought of the Day (ITTOD) for April 28, 2010  by Scott Coughlin.

Image Credit: US Senate Site – Senator Webb

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