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October 2015

This is the cyber warfare Jim Webb was talking about

[Commentary] Jim Webb said during Oct 13's Democratic debate that the greatest "day to day" national security threat is cyberwarfare. Whether cyberwarfare is the single largest threat to the United States, or merely among the biggest, is besides the point. What matters is that Webb was the only presidential candidate to even mention cybersecurity, a subject that deserves more attention. America's top intelligence officials testified before Congress in September that cyberattacks are growing more severe, and the country doesn't have sufficient protections in place to prevent a serious cyber catastrophe. That doomsday scenario involves a foreign country attacking the electrical grid, shutting off power across the country. Or perhaps it's an attack on the computer systems controlling stock trading. An attack on command and control centers for nuclear facilities might even be possible. Luckily, catastrophic cyberattacks remain unlikely, according to US national intelligence director James Clapper. But he has warned that serious cyberattacks aren't some remote threat -- they're happening today.

Cybersecurity fears are making US sailors learn to navigate by the stars again

Steering a ship by the stars fell out of favor with the rise of radio wave and GPS navigation. In fact, the US Naval Academy stopped teaching the skill nearly 20 years ago. But now this ancient navigation is making a comeback at the Annapolis (MD) school, thanks to cybersecurity fears.

"We went away from celestial navigation because computers are great,” said Lt. Cmdr. Ryan Rogers, the deputy chairman of the academy's Department of Seamanship and Navigation. “The problem is, there’s no backup." For now, the training is limited: Just a three-hour course covering the basics. But it's part of a larger trend. As governments grapple with the rise of threats in cyberspace -- and increasingly realize that they may not be able to stop all of them -- old-fashioned techniques are being dusted off as a fail-safe. A security force that guards high-ranking Russian officials, for instance, reverted to using typewriters after revelations about US digital spying capabilities, local news outlets reported. German officials have considered a similar move.

AT&T's new NumberSync service aims to let multiple devices share one phone number

If you listen to technology analysts, futurists, and network executives, you'll hear a common refrain: it won't be very long until every device in your life is connected to the Internet. And not just connected with a Bluetooth tether to your already-connected phone or on a Wi-Fi network, but independently connected to the cellular networks that are all around us. But there's an inherent problem when you connect something to a cellular network: it's given its own phone number and identity, making it hard to use as an independent device from your phone. Nobody wants to give everyone they know a new phone number just to send messages from their watch. AT&T thinks it has a solution to this problem with its NumberSync service, which is being announced Oct 14 and will roll out to devices later in 2015.

NumberSync lets connected devices on your account, such as a tablet or watch, use the same phone number as your main line for making and receiving calls and sending and receiving text messages. It's essentially spoofing your number at the network level, so when you send a text to your partner from your LTE-connected smartwatch, it doesn't come from a completely strange number, but from the same 10 digits you've always used.

Buying a copy of The New York Times now gets you digital access for that day

The New York Times is launching a new experiment; buy a physical copy of the paper from any newsstand, and you'll be gifted full, unbridled access to its website and the company's mobile apps for that same day. This marks the first time the Times is offering "day passes," as they're being called, and is meant to "provide newsstand customers with a similar benefit to that of home delivery subscribers."

It's also intended to showcase the worth of the Times' vast digital presence to people who've made reading the paper part of their daily routine. That said, it's not like the company is having trouble hooking online readers; earlier this year, the Times passed a significant milestone: 1 million digital-only subscribers. The process of redeeming a day pass is slightly convoluted, though. Within the Times you'll find a keyword. Text that keyword to a mobile shortcode, and a reply containing a link for digital access gets sent back.

Rand Paul called out his own campaign for a ‘dumbass’ Internet move

Sen Rand Paul's (R-KY) campaign decided to livestream a presidential candidate's typical day of Iowa campaigning Oct 13, in all its glorious monotony. Sen Paul was not the most natural candidate for the Truman Show treatment; earlier in 2015, he said that the briefly popular livestream app Meerkat might ruin the last vestiges of reality. "If we know that every interaction with every voter is going to be filmed, it’ll mean that you have plastic candidates saying nothing," he said then. "No response, no nodding of the head, because you know everything will be filmed."

On Oct 13, his take appeared to have shifted. “I wish I knew" why the livestream was happening, Sen Paul said. “I’ve been saying, I don’t want to do this, I don’t want to do this and now we’re doing this.” In response to one of Google's most-asked questions -- are you still running for president? -- he had this reply: "I wouldn’t be doing this dumbass livestreaming if I weren’t," he said. "So yes, I still am running for president, so get over it."

Radio host: Trump campaign said no policy questions

An Atlanta (GA) radio host who interviewed Donald Trump on his show was told by Trump's campaign that he was not allowed to ask questions about policy. “So he wouldn’t let you ask him anything about his platforms running for president,” co-host Cheryl White asked host Steve McCoy, who interviewed Trump. “No, cause he said those policies -- well he didn’t say it, his handlers said -- the policies aren’t set in stone yet and I guess we can kind of understand that, they got a year to go,” McCoy said after the interview.

As BuzzFeed first reported, Trump's campaign called McCoy prior to the interview and said they had the right to nix questions they didn't agree with. “It came with some restrictions: I couldn’t ask anything about his current policies,” McCoy said. “And they had the right to x out any questions that I did ask and we got through about three minutes of it.”

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