Four short links: 20 September 2013

Insecure Hardware, Doc Database, Kids Programming, and Ad-Blocking AP

  1. Researchers Can Slip an Undetectable Trojan into Intel’s Ivy Bridge CPUs (Ars Technica) — The exploit works by severely reducing the amount of entropy the RNG normally uses, from 128 bits to 32 bits. The hack is similar to stacking a deck of cards during a game of Bridge. Keys generated with an altered chip would be so predictable an adversary could guess them with little time or effort required. The severely weakened RNG isn’t detected by any of the “Built-In Self-Tests” required for the P800-90 and FIPS 140-2 compliance certifications mandated by the National Institute of Standards and Technology.
  2. rethinkdbopen-source distributed JSON document database with a pleasant and powerful query language.
  3. Teach Kids Programming — a collection of resources. I start on Scratch much sooner, and 12+ definitely need the Arduino, but generally I agree with the things I recognise, and have a few to research …
  4. Raspberry Pi as Ad-Blocking Access Point (AdaFruit) — functionality sadly lacking from my off-the-shelf AP.
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