Month: May 2018

  • Delerium – The Seven Gates Of Thebes

    Delerium – The Seven Gates Of Thebes

    Apparently the (more famous) Egyptian Thebes is known as “Thebes of the Hundred Gates” whereas the “Thebes of the Seven Gates” is located in Greece^. As far as I’m concerned, Delerium could have picked any ancient city as title for this song.

    Despite the fact that this melody is a contemporary electronica ambient creation, the deep, thoroughly grounded bass, the mysterious choirs and the ghosty piano manage to conjure an aura of ancient knowledge. There are music warlocks at work here. Let yourself be carried away within their spell.

    You can listen to the melody for free, in good quality, on BandCamp, which is one of the best websites when it comes to supporting artists. You can also purchase the song (or album) from this same location. And in case you’re wondering, yes, I did purchase Delerium’s album :).

    https://metropolisrecords.bandcamp.com/track/seven-gates-of-thebes^

    YouTube (decent quality):

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q75eDaPjKSc^

    For Spotify Users (high quality):

    https://open.spotify.com/track/49wb9L9nLxNGWhusSXyeEV^

    For Deezer Users (high quality):

    http://www.deezer.com/track/129781412^

    [ax_meta lnimgurl=’http://mentatul.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/29-DeleriumMythologie-Thumb.jpg’ lnimgw=’250′ lnimgh=’250′ title=’Delerium – The Seven Gates Of Thebes’ desc=’The deep, thoroughly grounded bass, the mysterious choirs and the ghosty piano manage to conjure an aura of ancient knowledge.’]

  • Corporations vs The Public

    Corporations vs The Public

    Back in September of 2017, I met Oliwer, a Norwegian Green Peace activist looking for donations in Stockholm. He told me that they’re trying to stop the Norwegians from drilling for oil in the Arctic. He also told me about how a powerful, profitable company involved in logging is attempting to disrupt the environmental organization by suing it for a massive amount in damages to their business.

    I asked him to tell me more, as it was hard to understand for me how such a thing could even work. My image of Green Peace was that of a world-wide, semi-decentralized network of agents (mostly volunteers). It’s hard to kill such an organization, especially given the volunteering aspect. Unfortunately, most money still leaves a trail (I’d switch to donations via cryptocurrencies if I were Green Peace).

    I promised the man that instead of donating money, I’ll donate time and do what I do best: investigate and write. The case he told me about is only one of the many times corporations and even governments have went after Green Peace^. It is, however, one of the most ridiculous (although admittedly not as ridiculous as when the government of Australia tried to basically pay a corporation to sue Green Peace^).

    The case the activist I met last year was referring to is that of Resolute^, a company in the tree-cutting business (wording intended). The firm went as far as using RICO^, an act conceived and used against the mafia, to go after the environmental organization. That’s almost as preposterous as the mafia using the act to go after the government. Fortunately, both major Resolute cases against Green Peace have been thrown out of courts, including the case the activist was talking about:

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resolute_Forest_Products#Greenpeace

    I don’t want to even imagine what would happen if a lawsuit manages to eventually kill a major organization working for protecting the ecosystem from the rampant expansion of human industry. Setting that sort of precedent is extremely dangerous. Green Peace is not without its faults^, but compare it to the mining industry^ or to some automakers^.

    And since the seed for this article was planted in Stockholm and I brought up the mining industry, I’ll close with one more recent example of criminal negligence on the part of mining companies. This time it’s about a Swedish company called Boliden.

    Last year, the company was sued, here in Sweden^, by Chileans who suffered due to living close to the toxic waste that had been dumped^ by a company that Boliden employed in order to move the poison from Sweden to Chile. The court ruled in favor of Boliden^, which is not surprising given that this was taking place in the city where the company was founded.

    It’s a typical black & white ruling that doesn’t even offer an apology (however symbolic) to the victims; not even acknowledging that Boliden had zero interest about how its toxic waste was being stored; ignoring the fact that a well-off country conveniently dumped poison in another part of the world. By the way, this is the same Swedish company responsible for one of the worst environmental disasters in Spain^.

    To ensure that our children benefit from healthy living conditions, I suggest taking part into and protecting the institutions that are concerned with the future of our ecosystem and making sure that those that disrespect the environment pay a hefty price for their negligence.

    [ax_meta lnimgurl=’http://mentatul.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/02873-CorporationsVsPublic-Thumb.jpg’ lnimgw=’250′ lnimgh=’250′ title=’Corporations vs The Public’ desc=’This is only one of the many times corporations and even governments have went after Green Peace.’]

  • Pink Floyd – High Hopes

    Pink Floyd – High Hopes

    Hope is the fuel of dreams. Hope is a key ingredient of life; a ray of light in the darkest of times. Hope is eternal. And so is Pink Floyd’s music.

    A solemn and immortal song that can be a catalyst for hope or a one way ticket to melancholy. There is innocence and wisdom here, shining from within the amazing musical craftsmanship. The melody is both delicate and monolithic, vulnerable and unstoppable. Word for word and echo for echo, a choice waits in perfect balance.

    The song’s message is all the more meaningful as this was to be Pink Floyd’s last song for a long time. It’s the final track of their last album, The Division Bell. Even though in 2014 the band came back with The Endless River, that album is comprised of mostly recycled material so I still think of The Division Bell as their last proper album.

    Like with the other Pink Floyd songs I’ve featured, I am tempted to write more. Unlike other times, I’ll break under the temptation and say that this song has brought me to tears more than once – and for the most part, those were tears of joy.

    “Beyond the horizon of the place we lived when we were young
    In a world of magnets and miracles
    Our thoughts strayed constantly and without boundary
    The ringing of the division bell had begun
    Along the Long Road and on down the Causeway
    Do they still meet there by the Cut
    There was a ragged band that followed in our footsteps
    Running before times took our dreams away
    Leaving the myriad small creatures trying to tie us to the ground
    To a life consumed by slow decay
    The grass was greener
    The light was brighter
    When friends surrounded
    The nights of wonder
    Looking beyond the embers of bridges glowing behind us
    To a glimpse of how green it was on the other side
    Steps taken forwards but sleepwalking back again
    Dragged by the force of some in a tide
    At a higher altitude with flag unfurled
    We reached the dizzying heights of that dreamed of world
    Encumbered forever by desire and ambition
    There’s a hunger still unsatisfied
    Our weary eyes still stray to the horizon
    Though down this road we’ve been so many times
    The grass was greener
    The light was brighter
    The taste was sweeter
    The nights of wonder
    With friends surrounded
    The dawn mist glowing
    The water flowing
    The endless river
    Forever and ever”

    YouTube (decent quality):

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7jMlFXouPk8^

    YouTube (decent quality, live from the Pulse concert):

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HX_du6Gcp1w^

    For Spotify Users (high quality):

    https://open.spotify.com/track/236mI0lz8JdQjlmijARSwY^

    For Deezer Users (high quality):

    http://www.deezer.com/track/117584472^

    This Weekly Song entry has been brought from the FaceBook archive of Weekly Song^. This exploration was originally started through a FaceBook page, about 13 months prior to launching Mentatul. Slowly but surely, the entire FaceBook archive will be brought here.

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  • Amazon Is Interesting These Years

    Amazon Is Interesting These Years

    Every decade or so, we get a couple of very interesting companies to keep an eye on. I’m not referring here to being profitable (even though that’s often the case). It’s about being interesting, as in ground-breaking, mind-bending, evolutionary. This is not a recipe for long-term success, as these companies can either become nearly-unshakable, established names, or end up fading into mediocrity.

    Amazon is most definitely a company to watch out for. It has historically been doing quite well for itself, but as this decade approaches its end, things are getting really interesting. Here’s a very well written and thought-provoking article about the firm:

    https://techcrunch.com/2017/05/14/why-amazon-is-eating-the-world/^

    Even as Amazon draws closer to creating its own delivery service^ (and soon after, taking over the world) the company’s stock has suffered recently from a couple of direct attacks from the Trump Tactical Twitter Terror Torrent^, the White House’s newly found weapon of mass distraction. While it’s true that Amazon has dodged paying^ a lot of taxes, seeing this criticism coming from a master of tax evasion^ is somewhat tragi-comical. Note to self: one day find out who are the investors who profited the most from the dips in Amazon stock caused by the TTTTT^.

    I’m pretty sure Amazon will continue to grow its business under almost any conditions can be thrown at it. The reason is culture. I believe Amazon managed to implement a culture of innovation that not only outpaces all its competitors, but is also very quick to adapt to changes in its economic and technologic environment.

    I’m not sure if we should cry rivers for bankrupt retailers, but we should definitely cry rivers for the working conditions in some Amazon warehouses^. Keep in mind that this merciless economic ecosystem^ is of our own making^.

    If during the coming years Amazon manages to become an almost transparent bridge between manufacturers and customers, it’s only the other retailers who lose. I emphasized the word “transparent” because sooner or later, Amazon will have to alter its business model in order to adapt to an economy where, other than monthly or seasonal exhibitions, customers will meet manufacturers online, with little to no mediation. It’s already happening through markets such as Etsy^, but will accelerate thanks to cryptocurrencies and other novel, yet to be imagined, means of doing commerce.

    It won’t make me happy if small retailers might have to close shop, but perhaps it would be more pleasant for them to automate their logistics, sell online and spend the rest of their time doing more creative stuff. On the other hand, having a physical shop to go and test a product is quite valuable, albeit this is changing due to an increasingly flexible returns policy. Given the current trends, the job of being a retailer will eventually be completely automated, just like all other non-creative jobs. Or, I should say, the non-creative aspects of being a retailer will be automated, leaving creativity and originality as the valuable differentiator.

    [ax_meta lnimgurl=’http://mentatul.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/02866-AmazonInterestingTheseDays-Thumb.jpg’ lnimgw=’250′ lnimgh=’250′ title=’Amazon Is Interesting These Years’ desc=’I'm pretty sure Amazon will continue to grow its business under almost any conditions can be thrown at it.’]

  • Balligomingo – Lost

    Balligomingo – Lost

    Camille’s passionate, dreamy voice is exactly what such lyrics needed to be carried on. The music contributes to the majestic atmosphere through sweeping arrays of synths and energetic percussion. It’s a different kind of love song – a specialty of Balligomingo (as can be heard here^ and here^).

    “Lost far away in you
    Promise of a lifetime
    Lost
    Miracle of mankind
    Lost

    Childlike love lingers
    Skin is fading, but not your eyes
    Can I hold you?
    But now you’re gone

    Lost far away
    The wind carries me away
    Lost far away
    The wind carries me away

    Memories fall like water
    Shelve too high to reach
    Moments short of a lifetime
    Skin is fading, but not your eyes

    Lost far away
    Can I hold you?
    But now you’re gone

    Life chain reaction
    Willing at any cost
    Living without you
    I’m lost”

    YouTube (decent quality):

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o9t3Mx704lY^

    For Spotify Users (high quality):

    https://open.spotify.com/track/2Kc2WfW4vblbGGRB8c2ki5^

    For Deezer Users (high quality):

    http://www.deezer.com/track/24906251^

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  • Our Warming Atmosphere Makes Plants Less Nutritious

    Our Warming Atmosphere Makes Plants Less Nutritious

    It is said that “you are what you eat”. That stands true not only for humans, but for everything that eats. It’s well known that at optimal temperatures and humidity, plants thrive given light and carbon-dioxide. It was considered that one of the perhaps positive effects of global warming would be that plants would grow faster. This self-balancing property of our ecosystem could even contribute to cleaning up our atmosphere, as more plants would eat more CO2. That may very well hold true, if it wasn’t for desertification^.

    However, even though plants do thrive thanks to having more carbon-dioxide available, they apparently are not as nutritious. This is an extremely important finding, because, like as the article below points out, “increasing carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is reducing the protein in staple crops like rice, wheat, barley and potatoes, raising unknown risks to human health in the future”:

    https://www.politico.com/agenda/story/2017/09/13/food-nutrients-carbon-dioxide-000511^

    “Every leaf and every grass blade on earth makes more and more sugars as CO2 levels keep rising,” Loladze said. “We are witnessing the greatest injection of carbohydrates into the biosphere in human history―[an] injection that dilutes other nutrients in our food supply.”

    Perhaps we humans can compensate for a diet comprised of less nutritious plants through various supplements, but this doesn’t bode well for our ecosystem and therefore for us. The planet is already adapting to the carbon-dioxide we’ve added into the atmosphere, but there will be [unforeseen] consequences, probably more than we can even imagine.

    In closing, here’s a longer quote from the highly recommended article linked above:

    Could carbon dioxide have an effect on human health we haven’t accounted for yet? The answer appears to be yes—and along the way, it has steered Loladze and other scientists, directly into some of the thorniest questions in their profession, including just how hard it is to do research in a field that doesn’t quite exist yet.

    In agricultural research, it’s been understood for some time that many of our most important foods have been getting less nutritious. Measurements of fruits and vegetables show that their minerals, vitamin and protein content has measurably dropped over the past 50 to 70 years. Researchers have generally assumed the reason is fairly straightforward: We’ve been breeding and choosing crops for higher yields, rather than nutrition, and higher-yielding crops—whether broccoli, tomatoes, or wheat—tend to be less nutrient-packed.

    In 2004, a landmark study of fruits and vegetables found that everything from protein to calcium, iron and vitamin C had declined significantly across most garden crops since 1950. The researchers concluded this could mostly be explained by the varieties we were choosing to grow.

    Loladze and a handful of other scientists have come to suspect that’s not the whole story and that the atmosphere itself may be changing the food we eat. Plants need carbon dioxide to live like humans need oxygen. And in the increasingly polarized debate about climate science, one thing that isn’t up for debate is that the level of CO2 in the atmosphere is rising.

    [ax_meta lnimgurl=’http://mentatul.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/02862-WarmingAtmospherePlantsNutrition-Thumb.jpg’ lnimgw=’250′ lnimgh=’250′ title=’Our Warming Atmosphere Makes Plants Less Nutritious’ desc=’Increasing carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is reducing the protein in staple crops like rice, wheat, barley and potatoes, raising unknown risks to human health in the future.’]

  • Ugress – Harakiri Martini

    Ugress – Harakiri Martini

    Careful, this one gets straight to business! And that’s just fine, because Ugress has a lot of work to do in the space of less than three minutes. It’s a funky sound pill that you can easily squeeze into the ear between two interruptions at work. The video Ugress attached to the song is as excellent as it can be for such a playful song. I’m not sure if it makes me want to dance or play. Is there a difference?

    You can listen to the melody for free, in good quality, on BandCamp, which is one of the best websites when it comes to supporting artists. You can also purchase the song (or album) from this same location. And in case you’re wondering, yes, I did purchase Ugress’ album :).

    https://ugress.bandcamp.com/track/harakiri-martini^

    YouTube (decent quality, AWESOME video):

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MeFBGwuMKmM^

    For Spotify Users (high quality):

    https://open.spotify.com/track/2O2w7eIzVx4ZFLV2C84RfH^

    For Deezer Users (high quality):

    http://www.deezer.com/track/24906251^

    [ax_meta lnimgurl=’http://mentatul.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/27-UgressUnicorn-Thumb.jpg’ lnimgw=’250′ lnimgh=’250′ title=’Ugress – Harakiri Martini’ desc=’It's a funky sound pill that you can easily squeeze in the ear between two interruptions at work’]

  • Daring to Imagine Cyberwarfare

    Daring to Imagine Cyberwarfare

    Disclaimer: this article is meant to prevent the hostile use of technology by encouraging transparency and highlighting the major risks that await us during the coming years. I live on a planet where I don’t want to have nuclear weapons and especially not nuclear weapons that can be hacked^.

    Computer viruses and hacking have been around since the dawn of the Internet. But while some time ago the platform was used almost exclusively by academics and the tech-savvy, the Internet is now quickly becoming one of the central technological pillars of our society. Particularly in developed countries, countless vital social systems are now connected to it, ranging from the run-of-the-mill residential heating system to critical infrastructure such as hospitals, public transport and even military.

    In the same time, the skills and tools in the cyber-soldier’s arsenal have greatly increased in potency. Even more importantly, the interest and will to compromise connected systems has increased exponentially in the past decade. Some years ago, the Internet was home to mostly petty crime and the occasional larger security breach. Now-a-days, state actors such as the United States^, North Korea^, and pretty much all major powers and nation-states involved in military conflicts, train and make use of cyber-hacking squads.

    Independent hackers (not aligned with any nation-state or political cause) and hacktivists^ (hackers with a presumably ethical agenda) have also evolved. They’ve become very well organized and armed, sometimes using digital weapons acquired from state agencies. One of the biggest vulnerabilities of cyber-weaponry is that it can be copied and distributed in a matter of seconds.

    In 2017, the NSA was humiliatingly robbed^ by hackers. Immediately after, the agency’s arsenal was distributed and sold^ to organizations across the globe. Some major^ security incidents^ followed. I’m sure that what was made public so far only scratches the surface^ of the damage done. The increasing popularity of ransomware^ will lead to many more such attacks in the future^. After all, it appears like North Korea got itself quite a bit of money using WannaCry^.

    Judging by the trend of the past decade, it sure looks like things will get worse before they get better. As more and more devices come online, the risks will only increase. The cyber-arsenal of the 2020s is beginning to look very scary, especially when considering the exponentially increasing number of targets. Combined with the way technology permeates our lives (and how much of our personal information is in the hands of companies that profit from selling data^), a country could find itself brought to its knees before a single shot was fired.

    Throughout the past few years I’ve been compiling a list of cyber-attack methods ranging from the mundane to the most interesting and devious. Later in the article I’m going to present you with a few scenarios showing how these methods could be used against a nation-state. I do this in the hope that governments will take the necessary steps to protect their citizens (and, in fact, the entire world) from what I consider to be the blitzkrieg of the 21st century.

    Means of Cyberattack

    This list is by no means exhaustive and I aim to regularly maintain it. It’s important to also keep in mind that none of the items on this list is particularly devastating by itself. The power of today’s cyber-attacker lies in mastering the art of combining several attacks to reach the desired result, something that will be covered in the second part of the article.

    • Worms^ and viruses are the oldest means of cyberattack. Despite the popularity of antivirus programs, these old acquaintances of ours can still wreak havoc long before antivirus makers can issue the required countermeasures. The omnipresence of the Internet has allowed viruses and worms to maintain their feasibility.
    • Spyware^ is commonly perceived as a tool employed by shady organizations in order to acquire user data (with the purpose of monetizing it). It’s much more dangerous than that. I’m unsure if espionage saved more lives than it destroyed, but through the use of spyware, people with little foresight (for example script kiddies^) can gain access to information that can destabilize a fragile geo-political and economic balance. What’s even more dangerous is that influential leaders can be blackmailed using data grabbed by spyware. And this sort of attack has been evolving as of late. Check this one about ultrasound tracking^.
    • Exploits^ are another very old acquaintance in security circles. All software has bugs. Vulnerability scanners^ are a means of automatically and easily discovering ways to deliver attack payloads such as trojan horses^. It became much worse in the past few years because various technology companies started giving remote access “features” to their devices^ – in fact, these “features” have quickly turned into messy back-doors. I suspect governments have played quite a role in motivating device manufacturers to install these back-doors. Perhaps I can entrust a government to spy only for fighting crime, but unfortunately these same tools quickly get into the hands of the same category of people the government is presumably trying to reduce. However, I think that the privacy compromises made in the name of “fighting crime” are causing more damage than they prevent.
    • Social engineering^ and phishing^ are newer additions to the cyber-arsenal. These means of obtaining private information and gaining access to restricted systems have become popular thanks to the Internet, and particularly when millions of less tech-savvy people started using it.
    • And now onto more inventive means of attack. In 2017, students demonstrated that sonic attacks^ can be used to disrupt vehicle steering systems. This is just the tip of the iceberg though.
    • As far back as 2016 (which is ages ago in technology), researchers have proven that a Skype call’s sound^ can be scraped to detect up to 41.89% of the keystrokes somebody presses during the call. The ratio goes up to 91.7% if there is knowledge about the keyboard model being used and the user’s typing behavior. With the advent of machine learning^, I’m quite sure that these numbers can be greatly improved. Given enough data, a program can recognize the model of the keyboard being used after analyzing the sound of a couple of sentences being typed, and then be able to map every sound to the appropriate key. When in doubt, the same program can employ a dictionary of common words and phrases to figure out the gaps.
    • Hacking robots is quickly becoming a serious threat. One of the most famous cyberweapons ever employed was the Stuxnet^ worm, which was responsible back in 2009^ for damaging Iran’s nuclear program. Legal experts have actually concluded that, despite the worm’s “good intentions”, its use was illegal^. Despite my opposition to nuclear weapons, I find it hypocritical when one country forbids another to build them through dehumanizing excuses such as “you are irresponsible warmongers”.
    • Continuing with robot hacking, we’re living in an age when more and more of the technology we use becomes “smart” (read: exploitable). Enter “smart” cars (read: hackable cars^). And this Internet of Things^ thing is gaining momentum despite all the warnings out there^. As internet pioneer Bruce Schneier recently pointed^ out, “it might be that the internet era of fun and games is over, because the internet is now dangerous.”
    • Last but not least, here’s my absolute favorite cyber-attack. Hardware backdoors^! As the Wiki article points out, “China is the world’s largest manufacturer of hardware which gives it unequaled capabilities for hardware backdoors”. A well-hidden back-door^ may never be discovered until too late. This is one of the most effective and most expensive weapons in the cyber-arsenal; only nation-states or large corporations can afford deploying it. And I’m quite sure that almost all of our devices are ridden with such crafty points of entry.

    Cyberwarfare

    So now that the little list of doom is more or less complete, let’s see what attack vectors combinations are likely to be used in a major confrontation where the target is a technologically-developed country. Here, the imagination’s the limit, so I’ll just give a few scary examples to make a point and leave the rest of the inventing to those that have more time (and money) for it.

    • A country can be very easily thrown into chaos by a well-orchestrated cyberattack. Just suppress the invasion alert system^, shut down the power grid^, overload the communication networks^, mess with the self-driving traffic and other robots, disrupt stock markets and, of course, invade with conventional troops that have a better knowledge of the invaded country than the defending army does. Sounds difficult? Not for a nation-state that does its homework. There is so much personal data and so many vulnerabilities out there! A secret agency can work its way into the system by blackmailing the right people and ask them to do seemingly harmless favors at just the right time. Slowly but surely, foreign software is everywhere and plenty of vulnerabilities have been created and exploited.
    • How about taking over an armed outpost with no casualties on the attacking side? It can be done by taking out all the guards, silently and quickly. It’s easy when the attacker knows their patrol routes^ by heart. The article I linked shows how a seemingly harmless app reveals such information because some soldiers use it to track their fitness. Hilarious and dangerous in the same time. Because of the hardware backdoors most likely present in our devices, it’s fairly safe to assume that at least some countries on Earth can probably activate GPS tracking on seemingly harmless mobile devices in case of war. Even if measures are taken to counteract this, we’re talking 21st century technology here: conventional weapons have evolved and, used in conjunction with various surprise elements, can win a war faster than nukes. This is because nukes simply destroy everything, whereas a well-orchestrated attack can result in hostages, hijacked equipment and most importantly, access to secure data systems.
    • One of the most awful attacks I’ve ever read about was when an epileptic journalist was sent into a seizure^ after somebody sent him a strobing image using social media. This led to an arrest. It shows not just what our technology allows, but also how deviously inventive people can be. The attacks combined here are knowing something about somebody and then employing a means of delivery (social media) for sending a dangerous payload (an image causing an epileptic seizure).
    • And we can’t forget meddling into politics. It’s already well-known that Russia interfered^ in the 2016 election over in the USA. And guess what: they still interfere in daily life there^. It’s already turning into a fashion, and probably other countries are taking notes and getting ready to follow suit. Now-a-days not a single shot needs to be fired to push a country over the brink. A clever use of cyber-weapons can give a nation-state a solid advantage in a trade or cultural war. Divide et impera.
    • Some time ago, somebody deactivated Trump’s Twitter account^. Even though hopefully nobody would believe a nuclear war declaration from a Twitter account, such a security breach could be coupled with fake radar signals or other misleading information. A paranoid adversary might be quick to pull the trigger and in the aftermath, there won’t be many winners.
    • As our technology evolves, so will our use of various robots. Self-driving cars, fully automated factories and countless jobs that will soon be given to robots. It’s not hard to imagine the amount of damage that can be done to a country’s infrastructure and population by a well-orchestrated cyberattack.
    • Last but not least, let’s talk machine learning. As I pointed out before, AI is not really intelligent yet^. Many developed countries make use of machine learning for all sorts of things, such as super-fast trading on the stock market. As the years pass, we will see more systems being automated, but not able to discern right from wrong. And what will happen when such systems are hijacked? What would a terrorist do with an AI? This is a door that my imagination doesn’t want to open.

    Countermeasures

    Security needs to be taken much more seriously. In 2017, a bunch of big names got together with the purpose of securing the Internet of Things^. At least once in a while, it’s good that corporations seem capable of actually cooperating. Or can they?

    The website of the famed alliance looks deserted^; there are very few resources there and it seems like it hasn’t been updated since its launch in early 2017. Unfortunately, in the age of hyper-consumerism^, such a publicity stunt is probably enough to keep people thinking that these companies actually care about security (they don’t seem to). So, the majority keeps buying insecure devices that can eventually be used against them (and their countries).

    Shortly after writing this article (12 days, to be precise), a new, fancier alliance between tech behemoths launched the Cybersecurity Tech Accord^ with great fanfare. Let’s wait and see if their website^ will still be around in about a year from now…

    I believe the only way for society to protect itself from online threats is to:

    • Use open source software exclusively and thoroughly verify it, line by line.
    • Rely on open source hardware designs or come up with them itself (it’s not so difficult now-a-days – several countries already do this).
    • Build all critical hardware in-house (local factories, local employees).
    • Secure communication endpoints with encrypted routers using multiple layers and fallback endpoints, similar to TOR^ but with additional layers of redundancy (similar to two people having to turn the same key at the same time in order to launch a missile).

    And last but certainly not least, we have… quantum cryptography^. This could be a savior but it remains to be seen if nation-states and corporations will ever allow its use by the general public. China has been making great strides^ when it comes to this technology. Yes, the same China that manufactures most of our electronics. I wonder why they’re so interested in secure communication…

    Version history:

    2018-04-06 – 1.0 – Written.

    [ax_meta fbimgurl=’http://mentatul.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/002835-Cyberwarfare-Share.jpg’ lnimgurl=’http://mentatul.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/002835-Cyberwarfare-Thumb.jpg’ fbimgw=’1170′ fbimgh=’350′ lnimgw=’250′ lnimgh=’250′ title=’Daring to Imagine Cyberwarfare’ desc=’The skills and tools in the cyber-soldier's arsenal have greatly increased in potency. Even more importantly, the interest and will to compromise connected systems has increased exponentially in the past decade.’]

  • Earth’s Humming a Little Tune

    Earth’s Humming a Little Tune

    Well, it’s only “little” when considering the ultralow frequencies involved. In fact, it’s a massive tune. It’s a world-wide phenomenon and probably as old (thus long) as the Earth itself. The article below summarizes years of research into a perpetual hum that has been detected in places such as Antarctica, Algeria and on the floor of the Indian Ocean:

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/speaking-of-science/wp/2017/12/08/scientists-are-slowly-unlocking-the-secrets-of-the-earths-mysterious-hum/?utm_term=.dd2b27f1f139^

    I always had a gut feeling that there’s more to what our bodies need from Earth, other than oxygen, water and nutrition. This primordial vibration that permeates all life on this planet should probably be considered if we think about relocating to another planet. Unless this can be replicated somehow, there could be unforeseen consequences to us departing our world long-term.

    The coming decades will clarify the relation between our body and certain facts about the environment on this planet, particularly previously-hidden “features” such as this humming. I’m going to keep my ears on the ground for more news about the Earth’s song. See what I did there?

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  • Ganga Giri – Don’t Follow The Guru

    Ganga Giri – Don’t Follow The Guru

    Behind this playful melody lies a wise message. I can think of a few other Ganga Giri songs that have more impressive instrumentals, but this one is perfect just as it is. Perhaps laughing at wisdom is the wisest thing one can do in the face of wisdom.

    “Don’t follow that guru – you are the guru!”

    You can listen to the melody for free, in good quality, on BandCamp, which is one of the best websites when it comes to supporting artists. You can also purchase the song (or album) from this same location. And in case you’re wondering, yes, I did purchase Ganga Giri’s album :).

    https://gangagiri.bandcamp.com/track/dont-follow-the-guru^

    YouTube (decent quality):

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ReliokYsGwg^

    For Spotify Users (high quality):

    https://open.spotify.com/track/5MkH7GWj1q3StGt0MkeZUl^

    For Deezer Users (high quality):

    http://www.deezer.com/track/11368489^

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