Having 5 classes and multiple computers in use to complete assignments, I have found myself losing flash drives and not having my assignments when I need them. I have tried other services in the  past, but Dropbox is by far the easiest to use and gives me the features I need.

First, what is Dropbox?

“Put your files into your Dropbox on one computer, and they’ll be instantly available on any of your other computers that you’ve installed Dropbox on (Windows, Mac, and Linux too!) Because a copy of your files are stored on Dropbox’s secure servers, you can also access them from any computer or mobile device using the Dropbox website.” (From there site)

Utilizing Dropbox’s sync capabilities I never have to worry about where my assignments reside. They are always available whether I am on my own computer or a computer in the schools labs.

Here are some key features:

• 2 GB of online storage for free.
• 50gb or 100gb packages available for $99 and $199 a year respectively.
• Folder synchronization is by far the best feature of this service. I love the idea of typing a paper on computer A then driving home and finishing my paper on computer B with no effort on my part.
• Works on Mac and PC. Being a “Mac” guy in a Windows world I find myself bouncing back and forth between both operating systems. Dropbox enables me to keep my files safe no matter which operating system I am in.
• Share files easily with others with a click of the mouse

Dropbox will make your life much easier as a student. The nice thing is at the end of the semester you can Zip up the folder that you are using and archive it so you can have a hard copy in case you need it in the future.

Sign up for drop box here

Until next time,

Carpe Noctum

“Sieze the night”

TJ

The Chrome OS seems to be built for the net book community but they are looking to expand the OS into other markets. As of right now the OS is very hardware dependant. Google has a set list of compatible hardware meaning you may not be able to download the OS and just install it. Google is giving all of the code back to the open source community.  Here is a video that will explain more about the chrome OS.

Some of the main points from the webcast:

Chrome will launch in 2010

Under the hood:
-  No hard disks, only solid-state drives
-  Verified boot, meaning if the boot does not pass signature then it will reload.
-  Security: the OS does not trust any app
-  Read-only root file system (Better Security)
-  User data synced to the cloud. If your cloud goes down. O noooz
-  Automatic updates for the entire OS

Trends:
-  Net books have taken off in popularity
-  Web Browser are 90% of what people use PC’s for

Chrome OS:
- Instant boot (Under 7 Seconds)
- Every app is a web app no native apps like android
- All data is in the cloud
- Browser security model. Sandboxes Apps.

Google recently launched a new add-on to Firefox and Internet Explorer called Sidewiki.

Google Sidewiki Logo

This add-on allows users to comment about any given web page that you are on.  However some pages are limited, such as users are not allowed to comment on several Google sites such as Gmail.

If used correctly this tool would be an awesome new way to get the opinions of real life people. If you are interested in a new product you no longer would have to search all around the web to make a decision because all the opinions would be on the site right before your eyes.  Maybe you want to know how the public is reacting to that new iPod nano with the built in video camera?  Well just mosey on over to

But if abused it can really destroy webpages.  As a web developer one drawback is that now you don’t have complete control over what experience users have when they visit your page.

First couple of Sidewiki posts on Microsoft.com

Make sure you check out Google Labs to see what Google is brewing up next.

Happy Hacking,

-Scott

ScottKrieder.Com

SmallTownGeeks.Net

Looks as though BestBuy.com has the Canon 7d Listed on there site.

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=9491944&st=7d&type=product&id=1218115078883

In this episode we go through the parts that we use in our white box. Also we take you through the bios to see what features are available. Our white box is sub $1500. Thanks for watching TJ

It looks as though logmein the fine providers of remote access have decided to upgrade there free product. It looks as though they have a total site re-design in the works with a slicker interface to control your computers.

According to the email they will also be adding WOL (Wake on Lan) Support to compatible  machines. This will make your job as an admin much easier when you get that email in the middle of the night stating that your network is full of fail and everything went to the wayside.

New Features include:

1. Power On Computers using WOL
2. Multiple Computer Views
3. Flash Alternative to Active X
4. Tabbed Access to Multiple Services
5. Faster and Cleaner Interface

Check out the beta: https://beta.logmein.com/US/home.aspx

As a blogger and avid Blackberry user, I have found a need to do screenshots for new product reviews as well as demonstration for How to’s.

The old way of screen capturing involved connecting your BlackBerry to your PC and using a program like JL_Cmder and take a Screenshot.

I will tell you, this was a pain. Since then I have found a few apps that do a much better job at creating screenshots to share with others. The app that works the best, is a free program called “Capture It” from “The Tech Mogul”.

Description from the website:
A simple screen capture utility for Blackberry devices with 4.3 or higher. You simple assign the the application to a Blackberry convenience key, and press the key on the screen of your choice. The device capture will be saved to the first available storage medium (Storage Card or Device Memory)

This has made Screenshotting much easier to do. I definitely recommend using this app if you find yourself needing to showcase an app or a theme on your blackberry.

Developers Website:

http://www.thetechmogul.com/

Over the air Download:

http://www.thetechmogul.com/CaptureIt/CaptureIt.jad

Good Luck

T.J.

This tutorial is about cracking a WEP encryption on an access point using an EeePC 900HD. The EeePC, I am currently using has a rtl8187se wireless card that can be put into monitor mode and will do packet injection. When using this model of the EeePC a few things will have to be done to make every work. Unfortunately using the rtl8178se isn’t as easy as using the other models of the rtl8178 series. The card will have to be tricked into monitor. The operating system, I will use to perform the crack is the most popular Back|track 3. The rtl8187se is not supported natively by the Linux operating system. So, it will only be right on how to show you to obtain that and install it properly.

Kane

Since we are starting from scratch we need to get Back|track 3 ready

Since, I do like having XP on the hard drive of the EeePC. I am going to download the USB version of Back|track 3. {Download here} Choose whether you would like to use a USB drive or a SD card, both will work it is just a matter of what you have available. Do make sure that the USB drive and the SD card are larger than 2GB. Extract the .iso file to the SD card in my case since that is what I am going to use. Now to make the SD card bootable, we must go into the boot folder created by the extraction of the .iso and run the bootinst.bat. It may bring up some errors, but continue through them until command prompt asks if the drive letter that is shown in the description is correct. Once, that is shown down check that the drive letter is correct and hit any key and now the SD card is bootable.

Now that we have Back|track 3 ready to go. We can insert the SD card or the USB drive into the EeePC. When the starting the EeePC when the Asus splash screen appears tap “escape.” (I have noticed it is hard to get the boot select menu to appear at times if the quick boot option is enabled in the BIOS disabling the option will give you more time to react.) This should bring up a boot select menu. Select the flash memory you are using and hit “enter”. This should start Back|track 3. You will have an error message appear that the video setting cannot be detected just hit “space” and it will continue on loading. Next you will just need to choose the compiz option to fully load Back|track 3.

Finding drivers for the rtl8187se wireless card

{Download here}

What I did is download the file and extracted the file onto the SD card I am using to load Back|track 3 so I have it available for each use I run Back|track 3. Once loaded into Back|track 3 drag the folder into the root directory for easy access. Just to make it easier as well I changed the folder’s name to rtl.

Now temporarily installing the driver, because on reboot of the machine all changes will be lost since nothing is saved to the flash memory since only read options are available on default.

Open a shell

Type:

cd rtl

exec makedrv – this closes the shell so re-open a new shell

cd rtl

exec wlan0up

Ok now to check if the install was successful in the KDE panel under Internet choose the wireless assistant option and a few wireless networks shall appear.

Finding the network to attack

We will use airodump-ng to survey the area to see what networks have the WEP encryption, but it is necessary to make the card to work with airodump-ng and this is what makes the rtl8187se tricky compared to most cards.

Start with putting the card into monitor mode

airmon-ng start wlan0

airodump-ng wlan0 – (This is going to start surveying the networks that are available and what type of encryption are on these networks. As you probably notice, there are no networks that are showing even though a couple were shown in the wireless assistant. Well we need to trick the card)

In a different shell type:

iwconfig wlan0 mode managed

iwconfig wlan0 essid (any of the networks names the you remember from wireless assistant manager, case sensitive)

crt + c after a list of networks have shown

This may freeze airodump-ng and lock it on one channel try it several times if this is the case, but in airodump-ng the CH (channel) should be searching every channel.

OK, at this time you should have list of available networks with the type of encryptions they have on them. Now pick a network that has WEP encryption this can be found under the ENC column list as WEP.

Things to be remember of the network you have chosen is

BSSID

The channel the network is on

ESSID

Write the down if you have too.

Capturing packets

With the network you have chosen we will use airodump-ng with filters to capture the packets later used in the cracking section. Start by typing:

airodump-ng –c (insert channel here) –w wep –bssid (insert BSSID here) wlan0

Of course we need to trick the card again so in a separate shell:

iwconfig wlan0 mode managed

iwconfig wlan0 essid (Insert ESSID here)

iwconfig wlan0 channel (insert channel here)

So we have set-up airodump-ng to create a file called “wep” that will store our packets used to crack the WEP. The main thing in airodump-ng that we are worried about is the number located in the #data column. When all said and done we want roughly 50,000 to 100,000 collected.

Packet injection

So we need to create lots of activity on the network to make this process go faster, because if no one is on the network using it this could take a very long time. So we can use a method of packet injection that that will create activity on network.

First method will be fake authentication with pack re-injection

We will first need to fake that we are associated with the AP using aireplay-ng we have this option to do so by typing:

aireplay-ng -1 0 –a (insert BSSID here) wlan0

So now in airodump-ng there should be a BSSID “BSSID of AP” associated with the Station “our mac address”.

Now is it is time for the packet re-injection.

airplay-ng -3 –b (insert BSSID here) wlan0

Now basically you are waiting around for an ARP packet to be sent to you. Sometimes this never happens, but it is also monitoring if someone else connects to the network and you will be able to use that authentication packet to for the reinjection. You may have better luck waiting for someone to connect to the network and find better luck.

Second method de-authentication with packet re-injection

Do use this method you must have a client already associated with the AP.

aireplay-ng -0 0 –a (insert BSSID here) –c (mac address of client) wlan0

This is going to de-authenticate the client creating ARP packets for the client to rejoin. Next I like to use re-injection of packets since its fast and more reliable. Open a new shell turn run:

airplay-ng -3 –b (insert BSSID here) wlan0

crt + c the de-authentication shell so re-injection can have full bandwidth and processor.

Cracking the WEP

We will use the file created by airodump-ng.

Aircrack-ng wep-01.cap

Always add -01.cap to the file name or if you use the same name twice use -02.cap and etc.

The key should show if you collected enough packets and the more packets you collect the faster the process will be. Once the line KEY FOUND appears, use the list sequence of letters and numbers without any colons as your password for the network.

Conclusion

This tutorial is not bullet proof. It is mainly to give you an idea or the theory of cracking WEPs. It is also here to help using the rtl8187se cards which can be used very effectively if that is all you have available. See what you can grab from the tutorial and good luck in the field. Also I love my EeePC.

As you may have heard blackberry messenger was leaked a couple of weeks ago. Since then there have been quite a few links and mirrors posted on various websites. So far it has been a really good experience and the new features are an improvement to the usability of the software.

Some of the new features include:

• Improved GUI to manage your conversations
• Barcode Scanning to add friends and Co-Workers
• Added Emoticons
• Better Response time for Chat
• Added ability to backup and restore your contact list

I think the coolest feature of the update is the ability to add contacts via a barcode that is generated. This will make it much easier when trying to find your pin when someone asks to add you to there contact list.

I will caution that this is a “Leaked Version” and there is no support for this beta program. It is a use at your own risk. There have been a few reports of memory leaks on some models. If you find that you are having issues you can install version 4.7 from Blackberry’s Site.

Over The Air Download Can Be Found Here: http://bit.ly/Jx2CM

Enjoy!

TJ