Tuesday, December 23, 2008
One more post - sever winter weather
Loads of ice very little snow. Yuck! Fortunately family driving to town for the holiday arrived safe and sound. Now family driving home from work just needs to take it slow and safe.
Merry Christmas
This is likely to be my last pre-Christmas blog entry, so Merry Christmas to all of my family and friends out there in internetland.
Monday, December 22, 2008
60,000 Piece Star Wars Diaorama
My dad forwarded this. Mark Borlase has built a 5' x 10' Hoth base diorama consisting of between 55,000 to 60,000 pieces of LEGO and containing 50 real lights and a remote controlled device that can deploy troops from the AT-ATs.
The diorama took 4 years to complete and cost over $3,000.
The diorama took 4 years to complete and cost over $3,000.
Friday, December 19, 2008
Middle Son's Birthday Cake
It's my middle son's birthday today. He's seven years old. His Grandma once again made a pretty amazing cake.
Tuesday, December 09, 2008
Feds take Gov. Blagojevich into custody
UPDATE: Source: Feds take Gov. Blagojevich into custody
A source said today that Gov. Rod Blagojevich was taken into federal custody at his North Side home this morning. The U.S. attorney's office would not confirm the information, and a spokesman for the governor did not immediately return a phone call for comment.
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I'm not a fan of our (Illinois) current governor. This is good news from my perspective.
After reading about this and listening to the press coverage all day I am convinced the Soprano's are running Illinois State government. The Blagojevich family sound more like Tony and Carmella Soprano than Tony and Carmella!
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Here is a link to the legal document related to all of this. Note the 'F-bomb' is dropped with some regularity.
A source said today that Gov. Rod Blagojevich was taken into federal custody at his North Side home this morning. The U.S. attorney's office would not confirm the information, and a spokesman for the governor did not immediately return a phone call for comment.
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I'm not a fan of our (Illinois) current governor. This is good news from my perspective.
After reading about this and listening to the press coverage all day I am convinced the Soprano's are running Illinois State government. The Blagojevich family sound more like Tony and Carmella Soprano than Tony and Carmella!
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Here is a link to the legal document related to all of this. Note the 'F-bomb' is dropped with some regularity.
Monday, December 08, 2008
Can You Guess What This Is?
Can you guess what this is?
.
.
.
.
.
Its a hard disk drive in 1956....
The Volume and Size of 5MB memory storage in 1956.
In September 1956 IBM launched the 305 RAMAC, the first computer with a hard disk drive (HDD). The HDD weighed over a ton and stored 5MB of data.
Makes you appreciate your 4 GB USB thumb drive, doesn't it?
.
.
.
.
.
Its a hard disk drive in 1956....
The Volume and Size of 5MB memory storage in 1956.
In September 1956 IBM launched the 305 RAMAC, the first computer with a hard disk drive (HDD). The HDD weighed over a ton and stored 5MB of data.
Makes you appreciate your 4 GB USB thumb drive, doesn't it?
Wednesday, November 26, 2008
8 years
Eight years ago I married the most wonderful woman in the world.
I know she reads my blog, so this goes out to my beautiful wife.
"Thanks for eight great years sweetheart. I love you."
I know she reads my blog, so this goes out to my beautiful wife.
"Thanks for eight great years sweetheart. I love you."
Quantum of Solace
Quantum of Solace, the new James Bond film is out. It's pretty darn good. Between Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace I think the bond franchise is back on track. The writing is much improved, it's gritty and Daniel Craig is an outstanding James Bond. I hope the next film continues in the same style and tone. I was dubious about Daniel Craig, but all I can say now is WOW. He owns the part of Bond and he's right up there with Sean Connery. 
The new Bond movies defiantly seem to take a page from the Jason Bourne movies in terms of style, but I've got no complaints, and would happily seem more.
My wife is not a huge James Bond movies and she's had nothing but good things to say about the new bond and the two most recent movies. That's high praise indeed.
The new Bond movies defiantly seem to take a page from the Jason Bourne movies in terms of style, but I've got no complaints, and would happily seem more.
My wife is not a huge James Bond movies and she's had nothing but good things to say about the new bond and the two most recent movies. That's high praise indeed.
Friday, November 21, 2008
The Future?
Following is a summary of a report predicting U.S. Dominance and Influence will fade in the next 15-20 years. I found the summary on foxnews.com but the full report is available here.
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The next two decades will see a world living with the daily threat of nuclear war, environmental catastrophe and the decline of America as the dominant global power, according to a frighteningly bleak assessment by the U.S. intelligence community.
"The world of the near future will be subject to an increased likelihood of conflict over resources, including food and water, and will be haunted by the persistence of rogue states and terrorist groups with greater access to nuclear weapons," said the report by the National Intelligence Council.
The analysts said that the report had been prepared in time for Barack Obama's entry into the Oval office on January 20, where he will be faced with some of the greatest challenges of any newly-elected president.
"The likelihood that nuclear weapons will be used will increase with expanded access to technology and a widening range of options for limited strikes," the 121-page assessment said.
Click here to read the report in full
The analysts draw attention to an already escalating nuclear arms race in the Middle East and anticipate that a growing number of rogue states will be prepared to share their destructive technology with terror groups.
"Over the next 15-20 years reactions to the decisions Iran makes about its nuclear program could cause a number of regional states to intensify these efforts and consider actively pursuing nuclear weapons," the report Global Trends 2025 said. "This will add a new and more dangerous dimension to what is likely to be increasing competition for influence within the region," it said.
The spread of nuclear capabilities will raise questions about the ability of weak states to safeguard them, it added. "If the number of nuclear-capable states increases, so will the number of countries potentially willing to provide nuclear assistance to other countries or to terrorists."
The report, a year in the making, said that global warming will aggravate the scarcity of water, food and energy resources. Citing a British study, it said that climate change could force up to 200 million people to migrate to more temperate zones. "Widening gaps in birth rates and wealth-to-poverty ratios, and the impact of climate change, could further exacerbate tensions," it said.
The report says the warming earth will extend Russia and Canada's growing season and ease their access to northern oil fields, strengthening their economies. But Russia's potential emergence as a world power may be clouded by lagging investment in its energy sector, persistent crime and government corruption, the report says.
"The international system will be almost unrecognizable by 2025, owing to the rise of emerging powers, a globalizing economy, a transfer of wealth from West to East, and the growing influence of non-state actors. Although the United States is likely to remain the single most powerful actor, the United States' relative strength -- even in the military realm -- will decline and US leverage will become more strained."
Global power will be multipolar with the rise of India and China, and the Korean peninsula will be unified in some form. Turning to the current financial situation, the analysts say that the financial crisis on Wall Street is the beginning of a global economic rebalancing.
The U.S. dollar's role as the major world currency will weaken to the point where it becomes a "first among equals."
"Strategic rivalries are most likely to revolve around trade, investments and technological innovation, but we cannot rule out a 19th-century-like scenario of arms races, territorial expansion and military rivalries." The report, based on a global survey of experts and trends, was more pessimistic about America's global status than previous outlooks prepared every four years. It said that outcomes will depend in part on the actions of political leaders. "The next 20 years of transition to a new system are fraught with risks," it said.
The analysts also give warning that the kind of organized crime plaguing Russia could eventually take over the government of an Eastern or Central European country, and that countries in Africa and South Asia may find themselves ungoverned, as states wither away under pressure from security threats and diminishing resources..
The intelligence community expects that terrorism would survive until 2025, but in slightly different form, suggesting that Al Qaeda's "terrorist wave" might be breaking up. "Al Qaeda's inability to attract broad-based support might cause it to decay sooner than people think," it said.
On a positive note it added that an alternative to oil might be in place by 2025.
---------------------
The next two decades will see a world living with the daily threat of nuclear war, environmental catastrophe and the decline of America as the dominant global power, according to a frighteningly bleak assessment by the U.S. intelligence community.
"The world of the near future will be subject to an increased likelihood of conflict over resources, including food and water, and will be haunted by the persistence of rogue states and terrorist groups with greater access to nuclear weapons," said the report by the National Intelligence Council.
The analysts said that the report had been prepared in time for Barack Obama's entry into the Oval office on January 20, where he will be faced with some of the greatest challenges of any newly-elected president.
"The likelihood that nuclear weapons will be used will increase with expanded access to technology and a widening range of options for limited strikes," the 121-page assessment said.
Click here to read the report in full
The analysts draw attention to an already escalating nuclear arms race in the Middle East and anticipate that a growing number of rogue states will be prepared to share their destructive technology with terror groups.
"Over the next 15-20 years reactions to the decisions Iran makes about its nuclear program could cause a number of regional states to intensify these efforts and consider actively pursuing nuclear weapons," the report Global Trends 2025 said. "This will add a new and more dangerous dimension to what is likely to be increasing competition for influence within the region," it said.
The spread of nuclear capabilities will raise questions about the ability of weak states to safeguard them, it added. "If the number of nuclear-capable states increases, so will the number of countries potentially willing to provide nuclear assistance to other countries or to terrorists."
The report, a year in the making, said that global warming will aggravate the scarcity of water, food and energy resources. Citing a British study, it said that climate change could force up to 200 million people to migrate to more temperate zones. "Widening gaps in birth rates and wealth-to-poverty ratios, and the impact of climate change, could further exacerbate tensions," it said.
The report says the warming earth will extend Russia and Canada's growing season and ease their access to northern oil fields, strengthening their economies. But Russia's potential emergence as a world power may be clouded by lagging investment in its energy sector, persistent crime and government corruption, the report says.
"The international system will be almost unrecognizable by 2025, owing to the rise of emerging powers, a globalizing economy, a transfer of wealth from West to East, and the growing influence of non-state actors. Although the United States is likely to remain the single most powerful actor, the United States' relative strength -- even in the military realm -- will decline and US leverage will become more strained."
Global power will be multipolar with the rise of India and China, and the Korean peninsula will be unified in some form. Turning to the current financial situation, the analysts say that the financial crisis on Wall Street is the beginning of a global economic rebalancing.
The U.S. dollar's role as the major world currency will weaken to the point where it becomes a "first among equals."
"Strategic rivalries are most likely to revolve around trade, investments and technological innovation, but we cannot rule out a 19th-century-like scenario of arms races, territorial expansion and military rivalries." The report, based on a global survey of experts and trends, was more pessimistic about America's global status than previous outlooks prepared every four years. It said that outcomes will depend in part on the actions of political leaders. "The next 20 years of transition to a new system are fraught with risks," it said.
The analysts also give warning that the kind of organized crime plaguing Russia could eventually take over the government of an Eastern or Central European country, and that countries in Africa and South Asia may find themselves ungoverned, as states wither away under pressure from security threats and diminishing resources..
The intelligence community expects that terrorism would survive until 2025, but in slightly different form, suggesting that Al Qaeda's "terrorist wave" might be breaking up. "Al Qaeda's inability to attract broad-based support might cause it to decay sooner than people think," it said.
On a positive note it added that an alternative to oil might be in place by 2025.
Monday, November 17, 2008
Friday, November 07, 2008
Fire in Downtown Champaign, IL
There was a fire in a historic building in downtown Champaign, IL today. The law office my wife used to work in, Dobbins, Fraker, Tennant, Joy & Perlstein, was a few doors down from the fire. The law office suffered water and smoke damage. Photos from the local newspaper are online here.
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The following story is from the local newspaper, The News Gazette
DOWNTOWN BLAZE CONSUMES HISTORIC BUILDING
By Meg Thilmony and Mike Monson
Friday, November 7, 2008 9:43 AM CDT
CHAMPAIGN — The 1870s-era Metropolitan Building caught on fire early Friday morning, collapsing under the flames.
No injuries have been reported.
Advertisement
The intersection of Neil and Church streets will be closed all day, officials said. Neil Street southbound is blocked at Washington Street.
Flames were shooting 100 feet in the air when firefighters arrived at about 5:20, said Deputy Fire Chief Tim Wild. About 10 minutes after they arrived, the building collapsed.
The building, on the National Register of Historic Places, is at the southwest corner of Church and Neil streets. It most recently housed The Estate Sale and was under renovation.
The law office building just south of the Metropolitan also has suffered heavy damage, according to Wild.
Flames shoot from the Metropolitan Building at the corner of Main and Neil streets in downtown Champaign early Friday morning.
Renee Monfort, a partner in the law firm of Dobbins Fraker Tennant Joy & Perlstein, said the building at 215 N. Neil St. had smoke, fire and water damage.
"We had fire on the third floor and the roof; there's water damage throughout. There's water on the first floor and ceiling tiles have collapsed," and firefighters are concerned the north wall will collapse, Monfort said.
Larry Happ of the city's building safety division said, "You can see through" the north wall of the law office. He said the city has brought in a structural engineer to evaluate the building and wall.
"We don't want the roof collapsing," he said.
Several streets leading to the heart of Champaign were blocked, and fire hoses snaked down Main Street in front of One Main. Bricks from the collapsed building lay across the street all the way to M2 on Neil development.
Windows at M2 were cracked from the heat.
Power is out to the 200 block of North Neil Street, according to fire department spokeswoman Dena Schumacher. The department will bring in another ladder truck to spray down the building, which she said is full of embers.
Investigators won't be able to seek the cause until all the embers have been extinguished and they can get in the building, Schumacher said.
"It could be days," she said, adding that firefighters may be dealing with hot spots all day.
She planned to work with business owners to get them into their buildings.
Wild said there was no one in the building, and there were no injuries. He said the Metropolitan Building was under construction, so it didn’t have the same fire protection features as a normal building.
Firefighters knew they couldn’t save the building, so they focused their efforts on containing the fire, Wild said. Ladder trucks sprayed a steady stream of water on the building directly south of the Metropolitan Building, as the rising sun illuminated the scene. That building’s roof had been on fire, Wild said, and firefighters were checking the building out for more fire.
Embers flew around the Champaign area and started a small fire on the roof of the Orpheum Children’s Science Museum, a block away. That fire was quickly put out, Wild said, but firefighters were looking inside the building to make sure the fire didn’t spread.
In addition to the Champaign department, firefighters from Urbana, Savoy, Edge Scott, Eastern Prairie and St. Joseph assisted.
Ben Wagner lives in an apartment above Guido’s, 2 E. Main St., across the street from the Metropolitan Building. He said he was still awake from working at SOMA, a downtown bar, when he realized about 5:15 a.m. something was wrong.
“There were flames coming out of the second story. There were windows popping out. I called 911 and they said they had already heard about it." he said. "About two or three minutes later, police got here and about a minute later the first fire engine pulled up and started to pour water on it."
“Pretty quickly, the majority of the facade came down. It was pretty scary.”
Carlos Nieto, owner of Guido’s and several other downtown bars, was watching the fire from Main Street before 6 a.m. He said the heat from the fire had cracked windows at Guido’s, but that he expected to be open today.
“Most of the damage to our building is superficial,” Nieto said. We should be OK.”
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MORE PICTURES
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The following story is from the local newspaper, The News Gazette
DOWNTOWN BLAZE CONSUMES HISTORIC BUILDING
By Meg Thilmony and Mike Monson
Friday, November 7, 2008 9:43 AM CDT
CHAMPAIGN — The 1870s-era Metropolitan Building caught on fire early Friday morning, collapsing under the flames.
No injuries have been reported.
Advertisement
The intersection of Neil and Church streets will be closed all day, officials said. Neil Street southbound is blocked at Washington Street.
Flames were shooting 100 feet in the air when firefighters arrived at about 5:20, said Deputy Fire Chief Tim Wild. About 10 minutes after they arrived, the building collapsed.
The building, on the National Register of Historic Places, is at the southwest corner of Church and Neil streets. It most recently housed The Estate Sale and was under renovation.
The law office building just south of the Metropolitan also has suffered heavy damage, according to Wild.
Flames shoot from the Metropolitan Building at the corner of Main and Neil streets in downtown Champaign early Friday morning.
Renee Monfort, a partner in the law firm of Dobbins Fraker Tennant Joy & Perlstein, said the building at 215 N. Neil St. had smoke, fire and water damage.
"We had fire on the third floor and the roof; there's water damage throughout. There's water on the first floor and ceiling tiles have collapsed," and firefighters are concerned the north wall will collapse, Monfort said.
Larry Happ of the city's building safety division said, "You can see through" the north wall of the law office. He said the city has brought in a structural engineer to evaluate the building and wall.
"We don't want the roof collapsing," he said.
Several streets leading to the heart of Champaign were blocked, and fire hoses snaked down Main Street in front of One Main. Bricks from the collapsed building lay across the street all the way to M2 on Neil development.
Windows at M2 were cracked from the heat.
Power is out to the 200 block of North Neil Street, according to fire department spokeswoman Dena Schumacher. The department will bring in another ladder truck to spray down the building, which she said is full of embers.
Investigators won't be able to seek the cause until all the embers have been extinguished and they can get in the building, Schumacher said.
"It could be days," she said, adding that firefighters may be dealing with hot spots all day.
She planned to work with business owners to get them into their buildings.
Wild said there was no one in the building, and there were no injuries. He said the Metropolitan Building was under construction, so it didn’t have the same fire protection features as a normal building.
Firefighters knew they couldn’t save the building, so they focused their efforts on containing the fire, Wild said. Ladder trucks sprayed a steady stream of water on the building directly south of the Metropolitan Building, as the rising sun illuminated the scene. That building’s roof had been on fire, Wild said, and firefighters were checking the building out for more fire.
Embers flew around the Champaign area and started a small fire on the roof of the Orpheum Children’s Science Museum, a block away. That fire was quickly put out, Wild said, but firefighters were looking inside the building to make sure the fire didn’t spread.
In addition to the Champaign department, firefighters from Urbana, Savoy, Edge Scott, Eastern Prairie and St. Joseph assisted.
Ben Wagner lives in an apartment above Guido’s, 2 E. Main St., across the street from the Metropolitan Building. He said he was still awake from working at SOMA, a downtown bar, when he realized about 5:15 a.m. something was wrong.
“There were flames coming out of the second story. There were windows popping out. I called 911 and they said they had already heard about it." he said. "About two or three minutes later, police got here and about a minute later the first fire engine pulled up and started to pour water on it."
“Pretty quickly, the majority of the facade came down. It was pretty scary.”
Carlos Nieto, owner of Guido’s and several other downtown bars, was watching the fire from Main Street before 6 a.m. He said the heat from the fire had cracked windows at Guido’s, but that he expected to be open today.
“Most of the damage to our building is superficial,” Nieto said. We should be OK.”
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MORE PICTURES
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Wednesday, November 05, 2008
Author Michael Crichton dead at 66
I have read almost all of Chichton's books and have greatly enjoyed his writing.
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NEW YORK (AP) - The family of Michael Crichton, the million-selling author of such historic and prehistoric science fantasies as "Jurassic Park," "Timeline" and "The Andromeda Strain," says the author has died in Los Angeles.
Crichton died Tuesday at age 66. He had been privately battling cancer, his family said.
"Through his books, Michael Crichton served as an inspiration to students of all ages, challenged scientists in many fields, and illuminated the mysteries of the world in a way we could all understand," his family said in a statement.
Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
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NEW YORK (AP) - The family of Michael Crichton, the million-selling author of such historic and prehistoric science fantasies as "Jurassic Park," "Timeline" and "The Andromeda Strain," says the author has died in Los Angeles.
Crichton died Tuesday at age 66. He had been privately battling cancer, his family said.
"Through his books, Michael Crichton served as an inspiration to students of all ages, challenged scientists in many fields, and illuminated the mysteries of the world in a way we could all understand," his family said in a statement.
Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Monday, November 03, 2008
Giant Spider eats bird
Odd news story out of Australia. A very large spider eats a bird. Supposedly there is video out there too but the spider could not finish his meal.
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Cousin's Web Site
My cousin, Kevin Gould, has a web site up with his modeling photos and acting resume/credits. Way to go Kevin! Here's a link to the site: http://www.kevingouldonline.com/
Monday, October 27, 2008
Cookies from ISA Certification Department
Bruce and I received a nice cookie bouquet from the ISA certification team in response for some work we have been doing for them. It was a terrific and appreciated surprise. I've attached a pair of photos.
The card read, 'Ernie + Bruce - Thank you for all your hard work. we appreciate it. You Rock, The Certification Team'.
Very cool!
The card read, 'Ernie + Bruce - Thank you for all your hard work. we appreciate it. You Rock, The Certification Team'.
Very cool!
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Star Trek Episode Song
I found this on YouTube. Some guy wrote a song including the name of every episode of Star Trek the Next Generation. If you know me, you know I am a big Star Trek fan and this video just had to be posted.
Sunday, October 19, 2008
The Snuggie Cult
Anyone seen this commercial. It's too funny. This is going on both of my blogs.
This is a real product, but it makes these people look like they are in a cult.
This is a real product, but it makes these people look like they are in a cult.
Friday, October 10, 2008
World Bank Under Cyber Siege in 'Unprecedented Crisis'
By Richard Behar - Fox News
The World Bank Group's computer network — one of the largest repositories of sensitive data about the economies of every nation — has been raided repeatedly by outsiders for more than a year, FOX News has learned.
It is still not known how much information was stolen. But sources inside the bank confirm that servers in the institution's highly-restricted treasury unit were deeply penetrated with spy software last April. Invaders also had full access to the rest of the bank's network for nearly a month in June and July.
In total, at least six major intrusions — two of them using the same group of IP addresses originating from China — have been detected at the World Bank since the summer of 2007, with the most recent breach occurring just last month.
In a frantic midnight e-mail to colleagues, the bank's senior technology manager referred to the situation as an "unprecedented crisis." In fact, it may be the worst security breach ever at a global financial institution. And it has left bank officials scrambling to try to understand the nature of the year-long cyber-assault, while also trying to keep the news from leaking to the public.
Click here to see the e-mail.
The crisis comes at an awkward moment for World Bank president Robert Zoellick, who runs the world's largest and most influential anti-poverty agency, which doles out $25 billion a year, and whose board represents 185 member nations. This weekend, the bank holds its annual series of meetings in Washington — and just in advance of those sessions, Zoellick called for a radical revamping of multilateral organizations in light of the global economic meltdown.
Zoellick is positioning himself and the bank as an institution that can help chart a new path toward global financial stability. But that reputation, more than ever, depends on the bank's stable information infrastructure.
The fact that the information vaults of the World Bank have been repeatedly pried open won't help Zoellick's case.
While it remains unclear how much data has been pilfered from the bank, it's a lot. According to internal memos, "a minimum of 18 servers have been compromised," including some of the bank's most sensitive systems — ranging from the bank's security and password server to a Human Resources server "that contains scanned images of staff documents."
Click here to see bank memos about the intrusions.
One World Bank director tells FOX News that as many as 40 servers have been penetrated, including one that held contract-procurement data.
Despite the gravity of the break-ins, the bank is trying hard to pretend to outsiders it didn't happen. "There were attempts to hack the bank's computer systems last summer," says a World Bank spokesman. "However, there was no compromise of confidential information." Requests for on-the-record interviews with Zoellick and other top officials were declined.
Meanwhile, the bank's treasurer, Kenneth G. Lay, has been briefing Zoellick's senior management team regularly on the situation since April.
Other bank officials are also sleuthing. The bank's chief information officer, Guy De Poerck, has engaged Price Waterhouse Coopers to do a confidential million-dollar assessment that is expected to tell him what's going on in his own department. And a 22-page internal report by a computer security company named MANDIANT, dated August 18, fleshes out many details of the June-July breaches. But very few people have ever seen the report, and nobody has been permitted to retain a paper copy.
At the same time, De Poerck has been downplaying the problem to the bank's 10,000 rank-and-file staffers as mere intrusion "attempts" in his e-mails. Yet most of those staffers have been asked to change their password three times in the past three months.
"As previously reported in mid-July," CIO De Poerck and a senior bank treasury official wrote in an August announcement to employees, "we would like to reassure you that there is no evidence that Bank staff personal information is at risk from the recent external attempts."
It's unclear how that statement squares with an internal memo to De Poerck a month earlier revealing that a sensitive Human Resources server "that contains scanned images of staff documents" had been successfully breached. De Poerk declined to comment to FOX News about any of these details.
Click here to see De Poerck's memo.
In reality, the situation is serious enough that federal investigators have been called in. "We're not talking about hackers playing games or messing up our website," insists a senior member of the bank's IT department at its Washington headquarters. "It's about the FBI coming last summer and saying, 'You should take a look at your systems because we think something weird is going on.' It's about the intruders knowing what information they wanted — and getting to it whenever they wanted to. They took our existing data stores and organized them in a way that they could be easily accessed at will."
In plainspeak: "They had access to everything," says the source. "They had the keys to every room at the bank. And we can't say whether they still do or don't until we fully and openly address what's happening here."
The data raids are not a matter of stealing inconsequential bits and bytes. The World Bank's data center is literally a treasure trove of vital financial information from around the globe. As a clearinghouse for financial data from both governments and companies, the bank's computers could provide intruders with both a financial and intelligence gold mine — from inside information on bids and contracts to the minutes of confidential board meetings.
If the bank takes a position in a currency, for example, that currency usually moves in response to the bank's actions. Stocks and bonds can also swing up and down based on World Bank announcements. "If you know beforehand that the bank is going to put an order in for oil pipelines in Chad or healthcare systems in India, you can actually make a good amount of money," says one insider.
Although the bank typically provides only a fraction of the financing for a project, its influence on those projects is immense. Private corporations see the bank's stamp of approval as a guarantee that their own larger investments will be safe — and profitable. Knowing in advance what projects the bank's board will reject could be just as profitable.
Some insiders fear that contractors — perhaps even governments — might be seeking advance knowledge on the status of the bank's anti-corruption probes. "The bank knows the books of countries almost as well as the countries do — including the corruption at times," says one insider.
The first breach of the bank's secrets was discovered in September, 2007, after the FBI —while at work on a different cybercrime case — notified the bank that something was wrong. The feds pointed to a part of the bank's network that led out of the Johannesburg hub of the International Finance Corp. (IFC), a bank arm that lends to the private sector.
Within a week of the tip, teams of bank investigators sent to Johannesburg discovered that intruders had gained full and total access to all of IFC's worldwide information — including all incoming and outgoing e-mail — for at least six months. "They were downloading everything and anything," says one insider, who says that IFC's monitoring systems were extremely weak. "They [intruders] had full access."
Investigators discovered that the intruders were using a so-called "cluster" of IP addresses from Macao, China. But since those addresses can be spoofed (i.e., disguised) the discovery doesn't prove that the breaches actually originated in China. Nonetheless, bank officials and its executive director for China clashed behind closed doors over whether or not China's government is involved in the break-ins.
Bank sources tell FOX News that Johannesburg is one of several secret "hubs" containing a "common data store" (or CDS) that the World Bank Group has established around the globe. In layman's terms, a CDS is the cyber-world's version of a bomb shelter where every piece of an organization's data is replicated and backed up in case of a data-wipeout at headquarters in Washington. While it's known that IFC data was accessible at the hub, it remains unclear if all World Bank Group data was compromised there.
The second major breach — of the bank's treasury network in Washington — was discovered in April 2008. The World Bank's Treasury manages $70 billion in assets for 25 clients — including the central banks of some countries. It carries out substantial collaborations with the world's finance ministers on public wealth and debt management, runs an active bond-trading desk in Washington, and does everything from currency trading to capital markets financings.
After a forensic analysis of the treasury breach, bank investigators discovered that spy software was covertly installed on workstations inside the bank's Washington headquarters — allegedly by one or more contractors from Satyam Computer Services, one of India's largest IT companies.
The software — which operates through a method known as keystroke logging — enabled every character typed on a keyboard to be transmitted to a still-unknown location via the Internet.
Upon its discovery, insiders report, bank officials shut off the data link between Washington and Chennai, India, where Satyam has long operated the bank's sole offshore computer center responsible for all of the bank's financial and human resources information.
Satyam was also banned from any future work with the bank. "I want them off the premises now," Zoellick reportedly told his deputies. But at the urging of CIO De Poerck, Satyam employees remained at the bank as recently as Oct. 1 while it engaged in "knowledge transfer" with two new India-based contractors.
Satyam — one of the largest and most prestigious IT companies in India — is publicly listed on the NYSE and boasts having $2 billion in sales and more than 150 Fortune 500 companies as clients. In 2003, Satyam — it means "truth" in Sanskrit — won a much-heralded and lucrative five-year "sole source" contract to design, write and maintain all of the World Bank's information systems.
The contract — which began at $10 million and grew to more than $100 million by 2007 — was suddenly not renewed this year. Satyam so far declines to comment.
Then came the June-July breaches in Washington. They were similar to the Johannesburg attack, as the same group of IP addresses from Macao were used.
This time, however, the cyber-burglars used a different spyware. They broke into an external server run by the bank's private sector development unit. They were able to acquire passwords — including the password for the systems administrator.
That enabled them to jump into the servers at MIGA, the bank's giant insurance arm. It was there that they captured the security administrator's password as he was logging on to his computer.
It took ten days for bank officials to detect that they'd been invaded. Once they did, they shut down all external servers, except for e-mail — which it turns out the invaders were already using as their entrance point. By the end of July the invaders "had completely mapped out the topography of the bank's information systems," says one expert — "where everything was, the types of servers, and the types of files on the servers."
What the intruders did with all that information is the World Bank's most sensitive and painful mystery. It has clearly left the institution in a highly vulnerable position.
And the same may go for bank president Zoellick. Bank insiders say that he needs desperately to get the security of his own house in order. Despite the vast sums that the Bank spends on data and data storage, its information systems are deeply in disarray.
Today the total cost to maintain the bank's information infrastructure is at least $280 million per year. But according to one disgruntled bank staffer, "We don't even have an internal search engine that works."
The truly alarming fact, however, is that someone — or many people — seem to know their way around the bank's most valuable resource very well, even though they aren't supposed to be there at all.
The World Bank Group's computer network — one of the largest repositories of sensitive data about the economies of every nation — has been raided repeatedly by outsiders for more than a year, FOX News has learned.
It is still not known how much information was stolen. But sources inside the bank confirm that servers in the institution's highly-restricted treasury unit were deeply penetrated with spy software last April. Invaders also had full access to the rest of the bank's network for nearly a month in June and July.
In total, at least six major intrusions — two of them using the same group of IP addresses originating from China — have been detected at the World Bank since the summer of 2007, with the most recent breach occurring just last month.
In a frantic midnight e-mail to colleagues, the bank's senior technology manager referred to the situation as an "unprecedented crisis." In fact, it may be the worst security breach ever at a global financial institution. And it has left bank officials scrambling to try to understand the nature of the year-long cyber-assault, while also trying to keep the news from leaking to the public.
Click here to see the e-mail.
The crisis comes at an awkward moment for World Bank president Robert Zoellick, who runs the world's largest and most influential anti-poverty agency, which doles out $25 billion a year, and whose board represents 185 member nations. This weekend, the bank holds its annual series of meetings in Washington — and just in advance of those sessions, Zoellick called for a radical revamping of multilateral organizations in light of the global economic meltdown.
Zoellick is positioning himself and the bank as an institution that can help chart a new path toward global financial stability. But that reputation, more than ever, depends on the bank's stable information infrastructure.
The fact that the information vaults of the World Bank have been repeatedly pried open won't help Zoellick's case.
While it remains unclear how much data has been pilfered from the bank, it's a lot. According to internal memos, "a minimum of 18 servers have been compromised," including some of the bank's most sensitive systems — ranging from the bank's security and password server to a Human Resources server "that contains scanned images of staff documents."
Click here to see bank memos about the intrusions.
One World Bank director tells FOX News that as many as 40 servers have been penetrated, including one that held contract-procurement data.
Despite the gravity of the break-ins, the bank is trying hard to pretend to outsiders it didn't happen. "There were attempts to hack the bank's computer systems last summer," says a World Bank spokesman. "However, there was no compromise of confidential information." Requests for on-the-record interviews with Zoellick and other top officials were declined.
Meanwhile, the bank's treasurer, Kenneth G. Lay, has been briefing Zoellick's senior management team regularly on the situation since April.
Other bank officials are also sleuthing. The bank's chief information officer, Guy De Poerck, has engaged Price Waterhouse Coopers to do a confidential million-dollar assessment that is expected to tell him what's going on in his own department. And a 22-page internal report by a computer security company named MANDIANT, dated August 18, fleshes out many details of the June-July breaches. But very few people have ever seen the report, and nobody has been permitted to retain a paper copy.
At the same time, De Poerck has been downplaying the problem to the bank's 10,000 rank-and-file staffers as mere intrusion "attempts" in his e-mails. Yet most of those staffers have been asked to change their password three times in the past three months.
"As previously reported in mid-July," CIO De Poerck and a senior bank treasury official wrote in an August announcement to employees, "we would like to reassure you that there is no evidence that Bank staff personal information is at risk from the recent external attempts."
It's unclear how that statement squares with an internal memo to De Poerck a month earlier revealing that a sensitive Human Resources server "that contains scanned images of staff documents" had been successfully breached. De Poerk declined to comment to FOX News about any of these details.
Click here to see De Poerck's memo.
In reality, the situation is serious enough that federal investigators have been called in. "We're not talking about hackers playing games or messing up our website," insists a senior member of the bank's IT department at its Washington headquarters. "It's about the FBI coming last summer and saying, 'You should take a look at your systems because we think something weird is going on.' It's about the intruders knowing what information they wanted — and getting to it whenever they wanted to. They took our existing data stores and organized them in a way that they could be easily accessed at will."
In plainspeak: "They had access to everything," says the source. "They had the keys to every room at the bank. And we can't say whether they still do or don't until we fully and openly address what's happening here."
The data raids are not a matter of stealing inconsequential bits and bytes. The World Bank's data center is literally a treasure trove of vital financial information from around the globe. As a clearinghouse for financial data from both governments and companies, the bank's computers could provide intruders with both a financial and intelligence gold mine — from inside information on bids and contracts to the minutes of confidential board meetings.
If the bank takes a position in a currency, for example, that currency usually moves in response to the bank's actions. Stocks and bonds can also swing up and down based on World Bank announcements. "If you know beforehand that the bank is going to put an order in for oil pipelines in Chad or healthcare systems in India, you can actually make a good amount of money," says one insider.
Although the bank typically provides only a fraction of the financing for a project, its influence on those projects is immense. Private corporations see the bank's stamp of approval as a guarantee that their own larger investments will be safe — and profitable. Knowing in advance what projects the bank's board will reject could be just as profitable.
Some insiders fear that contractors — perhaps even governments — might be seeking advance knowledge on the status of the bank's anti-corruption probes. "The bank knows the books of countries almost as well as the countries do — including the corruption at times," says one insider.
The first breach of the bank's secrets was discovered in September, 2007, after the FBI —while at work on a different cybercrime case — notified the bank that something was wrong. The feds pointed to a part of the bank's network that led out of the Johannesburg hub of the International Finance Corp. (IFC), a bank arm that lends to the private sector.
Within a week of the tip, teams of bank investigators sent to Johannesburg discovered that intruders had gained full and total access to all of IFC's worldwide information — including all incoming and outgoing e-mail — for at least six months. "They were downloading everything and anything," says one insider, who says that IFC's monitoring systems were extremely weak. "They [intruders] had full access."
Investigators discovered that the intruders were using a so-called "cluster" of IP addresses from Macao, China. But since those addresses can be spoofed (i.e., disguised) the discovery doesn't prove that the breaches actually originated in China. Nonetheless, bank officials and its executive director for China clashed behind closed doors over whether or not China's government is involved in the break-ins.
Bank sources tell FOX News that Johannesburg is one of several secret "hubs" containing a "common data store" (or CDS) that the World Bank Group has established around the globe. In layman's terms, a CDS is the cyber-world's version of a bomb shelter where every piece of an organization's data is replicated and backed up in case of a data-wipeout at headquarters in Washington. While it's known that IFC data was accessible at the hub, it remains unclear if all World Bank Group data was compromised there.
The second major breach — of the bank's treasury network in Washington — was discovered in April 2008. The World Bank's Treasury manages $70 billion in assets for 25 clients — including the central banks of some countries. It carries out substantial collaborations with the world's finance ministers on public wealth and debt management, runs an active bond-trading desk in Washington, and does everything from currency trading to capital markets financings.
After a forensic analysis of the treasury breach, bank investigators discovered that spy software was covertly installed on workstations inside the bank's Washington headquarters — allegedly by one or more contractors from Satyam Computer Services, one of India's largest IT companies.
The software — which operates through a method known as keystroke logging — enabled every character typed on a keyboard to be transmitted to a still-unknown location via the Internet.
Upon its discovery, insiders report, bank officials shut off the data link between Washington and Chennai, India, where Satyam has long operated the bank's sole offshore computer center responsible for all of the bank's financial and human resources information.
Satyam was also banned from any future work with the bank. "I want them off the premises now," Zoellick reportedly told his deputies. But at the urging of CIO De Poerck, Satyam employees remained at the bank as recently as Oct. 1 while it engaged in "knowledge transfer" with two new India-based contractors.
Satyam — one of the largest and most prestigious IT companies in India — is publicly listed on the NYSE and boasts having $2 billion in sales and more than 150 Fortune 500 companies as clients. In 2003, Satyam — it means "truth" in Sanskrit — won a much-heralded and lucrative five-year "sole source" contract to design, write and maintain all of the World Bank's information systems.
The contract — which began at $10 million and grew to more than $100 million by 2007 — was suddenly not renewed this year. Satyam so far declines to comment.
Then came the June-July breaches in Washington. They were similar to the Johannesburg attack, as the same group of IP addresses from Macao were used.
This time, however, the cyber-burglars used a different spyware. They broke into an external server run by the bank's private sector development unit. They were able to acquire passwords — including the password for the systems administrator.
That enabled them to jump into the servers at MIGA, the bank's giant insurance arm. It was there that they captured the security administrator's password as he was logging on to his computer.
It took ten days for bank officials to detect that they'd been invaded. Once they did, they shut down all external servers, except for e-mail — which it turns out the invaders were already using as their entrance point. By the end of July the invaders "had completely mapped out the topography of the bank's information systems," says one expert — "where everything was, the types of servers, and the types of files on the servers."
What the intruders did with all that information is the World Bank's most sensitive and painful mystery. It has clearly left the institution in a highly vulnerable position.
And the same may go for bank president Zoellick. Bank insiders say that he needs desperately to get the security of his own house in order. Despite the vast sums that the Bank spends on data and data storage, its information systems are deeply in disarray.
Today the total cost to maintain the bank's information infrastructure is at least $280 million per year. But according to one disgruntled bank staffer, "We don't even have an internal search engine that works."
The truly alarming fact, however, is that someone — or many people — seem to know their way around the bank's most valuable resource very well, even though they aren't supposed to be there at all.
Monday, October 06, 2008
Darth Balloon
My friend Jessica Lum shared these photos with me. She recently moved from Campaign to Albuquerque, NW with her finance. These in particular were too cool not to post.
"That's no moon..."
"That's no moon..."
Saturday, October 04, 2008
Timpano
For the first time in almost 7 years I'm making Timpano. I have made it 5 or 6 times.
What is Timpano? It's easier to show you
It's a pastry shaped like a drum stuffed with pasta, tomato sauce, chicken, meatballs, sausage, vegetables, cheese and more...
There is a great blog entry with a longer explanation and some photos on Terry's Table.
My kids are old enough now that I can try it and this is a big thank you to my family for helping me recover from foot surgery. Lots of people went out of their way to help me recover and I wanted them to know I appreciate their efforts.
I first became aware of Timpano like many others through the movie, "Big Night" starring Tony Shaloub, Stanley Tucci, Minnie Driver and Isabella Rossellini. The movie is about a failing Italian restaurant run by two brothers who gamble on one big night to try to save the business. The big night features a feast of epic proportions and is amazing to watch.
Here is the feast scene. (Forgive the music during the intro, I didn't post this clip.):
Finally if you are curious about "Big Night, here is the original trailer.
Many thanks to an old dear friend, Jonathon Breen, that I've lost contact with for steering me towards this movie many years ago. Jonathon if you are out there drop me a line sometime.
What is Timpano? It's easier to show you
It's a pastry shaped like a drum stuffed with pasta, tomato sauce, chicken, meatballs, sausage, vegetables, cheese and more...There is a great blog entry with a longer explanation and some photos on Terry's Table.
My kids are old enough now that I can try it and this is a big thank you to my family for helping me recover from foot surgery. Lots of people went out of their way to help me recover and I wanted them to know I appreciate their efforts.
I first became aware of Timpano like many others through the movie, "Big Night" starring Tony Shaloub, Stanley Tucci, Minnie Driver and Isabella Rossellini. The movie is about a failing Italian restaurant run by two brothers who gamble on one big night to try to save the business. The big night features a feast of epic proportions and is amazing to watch.
Here is the feast scene. (Forgive the music during the intro, I didn't post this clip.):
Finally if you are curious about "Big Night, here is the original trailer.
Many thanks to an old dear friend, Jonathon Breen, that I've lost contact with for steering me towards this movie many years ago. Jonathon if you are out there drop me a line sometime.
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