Not being an advertiser for Defcon, but my past experience of Defcon was so much fun that I wish to come back again and again, year after year, to learn about the latest trend in technology and security, while visiting one of the most fun-filled city in America.

I highly recommend this convention.

But it’s not without ways. Karl, a security professional, wrote an article for people who want to get into the security field but don’t know where to start. A great read, I think, and is definitely one that I’ll utilize.

Being someone wanting to get into a security career, this is useful information. After all, I don’t quite have the experience in the security field yet. In this economy, it’s hard enough to just get a job, not to mention a job that is very topic-specific and rare.

Nonetheless, while most people are unaware of this “process”, it is definitely worth knowing. Let’s face it: we are researching something all the time. When we want to find out more, these 7 steps will come in really handy.

But it all turned out well.

While there are some quirks I had to work through, it is nevertheless a valuable learning experience. Some problems were encountered, such as security measures and router slow-down due to torrenting, but in the end these problems were all solved, and now I am able to get Internet access through my desktop machine, which does not have a wireless card, but is hardwired to the router, and have it wirelessly communicate with another one to provide the service.

It’s fun. If one has the need or simply wants to cut the wires, WDS sure seems pretty handy.

I completely agree with this.

See, security has to be usable. You can achieve absolute data security, if you remove the data from everything and everything, ultimately security right there. But what’s the usability of that absolute security? A big zero for you. That’s why it is very important to achieve usable security, that the security employed for an environment is just above the risks it face. Thus, determining the environment and the risk is very crucial.

While I completely agree with that, I do have something to say. First, how do you determine is a risk to the environment or not? My point of view is, for any individual, not a company, not a institute, but an individual, the likelihood of being hit, I would say pretty low. But isn’t the use of seat belt the same thing? The likelihood of you being in an car accident is pretty low, but that doesn’t mean you do not use a seat belt, because it’s better safe than sorry, what you are preventing is that 1 in billions of chance that you are hacked. Then, the risk management move from chance analysis to damage analysis.

So let’s look at how much damage it would cause you when it hits. And the answer? You don’t know. Just like a car accident, you might get bumped a little bit, or you could total your car. Whatever the severity of the damage is, one should prepare for the worst, right? It’s just a best practice for personal. And I think, the best part of the argument is, it doesn’t even cost you anything and only requires minimal effort!

How hard does it take to skim over to see if it’s a HTTPS at a login screen? How hard is it to install an AV and let it run and update? How hard is it to avoid using public computers for personal financial stuff like banking and shopping? And how hard is it to avoid browsing other sites when you are banking and shopping under secure sessions? All these take minimal efforts but some conscience into the action you are doing. To individuals, that’s the best of both world. Note that individuals are not companies or organizations, and you notice the difference, things become much clearer and easy to answer.

My thesis is about individuals, not companies. So when it comes to risk management, I think I am right.

• Windows – Comodo Internet Security (AV & Firewall)
• Mac – ClamXav (AV) & Mac Built-in Application Firewall (Firewall)
• Linux & BSD variants – AVG for Linux or ClamAV (AV) & Firestarter (Firewall)

Now, go get an AV and firewall if you don’t already have them running on your computer. Oh, and if you use a phone or PocketPC, blackberry and those mobile platforms, find similar protection software for them too. Yeah, I am serious.

What could have been the problem?

After examining the error, I found that an error coming from the security scan plugin for WordPress. And guess what? After disabling that plugin, dashboard works again.

So I guess WP Security Scan doesn’t work too well with Chinese. Oh well, at least I made sure the site was set up according to WPSS’s recommendations.

Or is that just me?

How are regular people going to know when to update their flash players since so little of them manually check software updates? Think for pops and moms, please. Add that automatic update as default, and provide an option to disable it.