Wednesday, August 20, 2014

Free Community For Youth lunch that will feed your soul

Community For Youth changes lives.  I know -- it's changed mine!  

Personal Integrity.  The CFY curriculum and core values have challenged the students in the community as well as mentors like me to be our best selves.  When I started, I didn't challenge myself with clear life goals and share them with others.  I was too afraid of opening myself up to the shame of failure.  However, through CFY, I've come to learn that sharing goals with a powerful community that can support you is exactly what can actually increase your chances of success.  You learn to be more accountable to yourself by being accountable to a supportive community.  And this has bled over into my daily life so much that even for small commitments, I maintain personal integrity.  "Darn, I did say that I was going to bike to work tomorrow.  Guess I have to suck it up and do it."

Authenticity.  I didn't realize how much compartmentalization went on in my head regarding how I presented myself to others.  We learn together how much more pleasant it is to be your own true self and how richer your connections are when you are not holding back or censoring yourself unnecessarily or trying to be someone you are not.  "You let your students see your Facebook posts?"  Sure.  What I post and what I believe are important to me and I only share what interests me.  Who I am or believe should not be something that I have to parcel out in small doses to particular people.  It's much freer to just be myself.  How do people know they have something in common if they don't share of themselves anyway?

Vulnerability.  I felt somewhat comfortable in front of crowds, strangers talking about something abstract or technical.  But CFY challenged everyone, including mentors, to share openly as your true authentic self.  "Get comfortable with being uncomfortable", we say.  That was initially a very difficult thing for me to get used to, "You want me to talk about personal things...in front of everyone?"  But you quickly find that, as social animals, human relationships are strengthened by vulnerability because it cuts through the pretense and superficiality that we often use when interacting with others -- that's not authentic and it shields you from truly connecting with others on a deeper level.  Oh, and one of the biggest ways this has always manifested itself in my live is my reluctance to ask for help and instead go-it-alone.  I've definitely gotten better at realizing when I need help -- not perfect -- but better.

There are many, many other ways that I've changed.  And I have seen my students and other students change as well because of CFY.  It truly does change your life and although you don't always get direct evidence of it, the student's lives are changed as well.

The most moving experience of a transformation I can recall from my 8 years with CFY was when a student who had been paralyzed by fear when speaking in front of crowds was encouraged to perform her spoken word poetry in front of the whole community at one of our weekend retreats.  It took her a while to warm up to the idea and when she started speaking, my jaw dropped.  She gradually transformed into a confident young woman creatively and boldly expressing herself through her words -- compelling us to feel them as she felt them.  She said later that she was incredibly nervous but honestly I had no idea.  You could hear a pin drop in that room.  Everyone was blown away in rapt attention.  That was a turning point for her.  From that point, she was able to challenge herself more and grow into a real leader with things to say and express with less and less fear.  Truly inspiring.

That kind of growth and moving experiences is one of the most rewarding aspects.  But even the challenges are rewarding.  You are faced with situations and kids in situations that you never had to face in your life.  Sometimes you're thinking, "What the f* do I do with that?"  But, you have a supportive community to help find ways of dealing with those solutions.  Then that experience of tackling and possibly overcoming that challenge just makes you more ready for the next challenge in your own life.

Share in the Community Experience

This upcoming year will mark 9 years as a mentor with Community For Youth (CFY).  It is impossible to sum up the impact that CFY has had on the community, the students it serves, and the mentors (especially myself) in a simple blog post.  But there is an opportunity coming up that is far better that I hope you take me up on:  come have a free lunch downtown Seattle on September 30th and learn about CFY, hear from the 2013-2014 mentors of the year, and on top of that, you get to hear from Seahawks wide receiver, Doug Baldwin.

The lunch is an opportunity for those who might know that I'm involved with Community For Youth but may not quite know what it's all about.  I absolutely love CFY and would appreciate any opportunity to share my experiences for others to see how impactful the program is.  You can sign up at www.communitylunch.com and join me at my table.


Get inspired

In a student's own words, on the importance of CFY to their life.
"I appreciate the work that everyone has contributed in one way or another, to keep this program alive. Because there are teenagers like me, who need people, even if it’s just one person, to believe in them." - See more at: http://communityforyouth.org/2013/04/my-introduction-to-cfy/#sthash.Xk9ZikAj.dpuf
Even if you can't join, you should take some time to watch this 12-minute video to learn about who we serve from the students and mentors that are part of this powerful community.  And if you're feeling moved or generous or both, you can head on over and donate to Community For Youth too!
and
Community For Youth from Greg Hay on Vimeo.

Thursday, April 17, 2014

iOS clients not vulnerable to Heartbleed. What does the source say?



Apple's language in their assertion that they are not vulnerable to heartbleed on iOS are troubling as they specifically say (via ReCode), "IOS and OS X never incorporated the vulnerable software..."  However, not incorporating the vulnerable OpenSSL software is merely one way that their customers could have been made vulnerable.  What about the Apple SSL/TLS implementation?  Has anyone checked it?  Did they incorporate RFC 6520 for heartbeat support?  I couldn't find anything Google so figured I would share what I found.

Since the Apple SSL library code is open sourced, we can actually look at the code.  And based on my read of the code, Apple doesn’t even implement the heartbeat extension. http://opensource.apple.com/source/Security/Security-55471/libsecurity_ssl/lib/sslHandshake.h doesn’t even define the heartbeat helloextension code 15 in the data structure:

/* Hello Extensions per RFC 3546 */
typedef enum
{
 SSL_HE_ServerName = 0,
 SSL_HE_MaxFragmentLength = 1,
 SSL_HE_ClientCertificateURL = 2,
 SSL_HE_TrustedCAKeys = 3,
 SSL_HE_TruncatedHMAC = 4,
 SSL_HE_StatusReguest = 5,

 /* ECDSA, RFC 4492 */
 SSL_HE_EllipticCurves  = 10,
 SSL_HE_EC_PointFormats = 11,

    /* TLS 1.2 */
    SSL_HE_SignatureAlgorithms = 13,

    /* RFC 5746 */
    SSL_HE_SecureRenegotation = 0xff01,

 /*
  * This one is suggested but not formally defined in
  * I.D.salowey-tls-ticket-07
  */
 SSL_HE_SessionTicket = 35
} SSLHelloExtensionType;

Then in the implementation http://opensource.apple.com/source/Security/Security-55471/libsecurity_ssl/lib/sslHandshakeHello.c, they actually only support one extension, SSL_HE_SecureRenegotation. All others return an error code.

     switch (extType) {
            case SSL_HE_SecureRenegotation:
                if(got_secure_renegotiation)
                    return errSSLProtocol;            /* Fail if we already processed one */
                got_secure_renegotiation = true;
                SSLProcessServerHelloExtension_SecureRenegotiation(ctx, extLen, p);
                break;
            default:
                /*
                 Do nothing for other extensions. Per RFC 5246, we should (MUST) error
                 if we received extensions we didnt specify in the Client Hello.
                 Client should also abort handshake if multiple extensions of the same
                 type are found
                 */
                break;
        }
So, it appears from the library code that they would not be vulnerable to this bug at all.

Sunday, April 13, 2014

Using VNC to securely connect to OSX without exposing an unlocked console

I couldn't believe how supremely difficult it is to securely use VNC to access an OSX mac remotely.  Turns out that by default, using a standard VNC client (as opposed to an Apple Remote Desktop client) does not afford you an option to have the physical console lock when someone connects to the VNC server.  Some third-party clients make this an option, but all that I could find were paid VNC clients that support it.  It is somewhat ridiculous that this setting is left to the client rather than enforced on the server, but I digress...

I tried a few things suggested, such as enabling the screen saver or screen blanker, but those did not solve the problem as they did not differentiate between the VNC session and the physical desktop session so applied equally (the only states that were valid were either both unlocked or both locked).  Other options people suggested were to just turn the screen brightness all the way down.  This is security through obscurity though (the display is still unlocked and anyone who can get to your mouse/keyboard could mess with your computer, they just would be blind to what's on the screen).  It also seems problematic for usability (imagine you turn the brightness down and then come into the office the next day; how are you supposed to see the screen when you login if the brightness is still forced to the minimum?)

The solution I found that had the right security and usability properties was to use fast user switching + the Vine VNC Server.  This enables you to have a different set of content on the physical display from what you see remotely on VNC.  Unfortunately, fast user switching with the Apple VNC "Screen sharing" server doesn't work.  It mirrors your display exactly to the VNC display so does not allow you to have separate physical and remote displays.  I presume that's why it has a name like "Screen sharing".  It's also not surprising that this doesn't quite work as well outside of the Apple monoculture.
  1. Download and install Vine VNC Server
  2. Enable Fast User Switching on the mac
  3. Enable fast user switching on OSX Mavericks
  4. Connect to Vine VNC Server on OSX with any VNC client (e.g. on port 5901).  I configure Vine to require SSH so it doesn't listen to any remote port and requires SSH port tunneling to use it.  Less attack surface.
  5. Go to the fast user switching menu and select "Login Window..."  When you do this, the physical display will change to the login screen but the VNC window will remain unlocked and functional, as desired.
Switch to login screen


I get an IRS scam voice-mail

Had to share this hilarious voice-mail I received from an IRS scammer (happened to come in with Unknown caller ID -- I read online that others had been spoofing US phone numbers for caller ID in the past). The transcript does not do it justice.  I laughed out loud when I heard the phrase, "and you get arrested" as that is precisely what one would expect to hear from the IRS.


They actually tried calling me back and I got to talk to one of the people that afternoon, but my crummy cell service in my office resulted in the call dropping before I could chat with them too much. I told them that I didn't believe them that they were from the IRS. Maybe they'll call back again this week?

I plan on reporting it, as suggested.  Head over to the IRS Tax Fraud Alerts page.  Perhaps the best channel will be via their Phishing page.  The IRS warning regarding this scam provides some information but there is of course no direct links to report the issue.  I wonder if the 20,000 that reported it are a small fraction of those victimized since it's so difficult to find a way to report it?  They also suggest lodging a complaint with the FTC as well, but that is also somewhat difficult to determine how to categorize it for reporting.

See also: "IRS monitor: $1 million phone scam 'largest ever' - Mar. 20, 2014 ." Last modified 04/14/2014 05:10:31. http://money.cnn.com/2014/03/20/pf/taxes/irs-phone-scam/ (accessed 4/13/2014).


Transcript

Good morning. This is Willy ["Villy"] Mandersen, calling you from Internal Revenue Service...Crime Investigation Department.  The nature and the purpose of this call is just to let you know that....we have received...a legal petition notice...against your name...under your social security number. So, before this matter goes to the Federal claim court house...and you get arrested, kindly call us back at (866) 978-8320. I repeat (866) 978-8320.  Remember, don't disregard the message...as it is very important for you.  And if you don't return the call, then the situation will be worse. So take care about it, and call us back as soon as possible. Goodbye.