eMarkLee

beer Fifteen

RSA announced this week its uncovering of a universal Man In the Middle kit that can be used by anyone to create more advanced/elaborate spoof sites than the plain old one page spoof site. While phishing kits are not a new thing, this one is a bit more interesting because it is universal and therefore can be used to create simple spoof sites of whatever site they want to attack…ie eBay, PayPal, BofA, etc.

There are a number of ways you can protect yourself from these type of attacks, most of which are common sense but people get phished everyday by these unsophisticated social engineering attacks:

1. Install a security suite on your computer. I have not identified what is the best security suite out there yet but just have something that includes: Firewall, AntiVirus, AntiSpyware, AntiWussy, and AntiGettingFatInTheAss. Remember that the top two AV software suites(Symmantec, Mcafee) are used as the standard testing basis for hackers and therefore may not be the best choices.
2. Do not click on links in emails without analyzing the links first. For n00bs, just don’t click on links in emails.
3. Look for grammatical and spelling errors in emails and on spoof sites. As intelligent as some hackers might be, they will never be smart enough for the intricacies of the cryptic English language.
4. Run scans on your computer regularly to make sure there’s no malware on your system. These include some serious processes that run on your computer from keyloggers, trojans, etc.
5. Don’t use your computer because you will get hacked regardless of what I am telling you to do.

I was cleaning out my magazine rack and chronicled all the magazines I get. I ordered most of these because my airline rewards allows you to get magazines for your expiring miles so the price is right. It does mean you get a lot of magazines, though. (My soft air BB gun is in the picture to fill up that empty space and also in case any of you try to come rob me for my Us Weekly magazine.)

All my magz and my glock, biatch.

Here they all are in order of quality:
1. Us Weekly – BTW, Paris’s BFF Lindsay Lohan (Britney’s ex BFF) was just “disgusted” by a pickup attempt by K-Fed…or as they call him now: “Fed-Ex”. This is it, folks, quality.
2. Business Week – Business news that matters. No stories on menopause and cancer survivor stories.
3. Forbes – Forbunes is good although it’s all sorta the same stuff you get in Businessweek so a bunch of repetition here. What I do get are the world’s richest people list once a year so I can look at my paycheck and say “F Bill”.
4. Fortune – See #3
5. Wired – This magazine has gone downhills over the years but still has some interesting one-pager stories for when you have to choose between reading your moisturizing lotion’s ingredient list, a story about menopause, or a one-pager about nano-tech.
6. Newsweek – I love this magazine because it puts Menopause: Everything you need to know on its cover. I can’t wait for next week’s “Mothers from Inner Cities of 2007″.
7. GQ – Some interesting reads if you’re metro. The hunk on the cover usually throws me off and the fact that it’s 800 pages usually deters me from wanting to pick it up. That said, writing is usually quality and you can tear out the 109 cologne insert pages and put it in your socks and underwear drawers so that your feet and balls will smell GQ the next day.
8. Maxim – Maxim has seen its day. You can only read so many “How to build a ice cave”, “How to survive a 100 foot drop from a cliff”, and “Best sex of your life” articles. It has some entertainment value but mostly it’s trash. There’s not even that many scantily clothed hot chicks in there anymore.
9. Stuff - This is a poor man’s Maxim and is doomed for failure in 2007 like FHM. The girls that are on the cover these days I have never even heard of.
10. Lucky - Uh. I have never opened this magazine. I don’t think it’s about getting lucky, it’s about shopping. A magazine about shopping? WTF?
11. Modern Bride – Some magazine full of MILFs or soon-to-be MILFs, I think.

happy Friday

I get this question sometimes from my n00b friends. It is actually pretty simple, despite the huge number of digital cameras out there and the fact that this blog will be obsolete in 1.4 days. Like anything else, there are different segments of users, from the pro to to your grandma, so I will talk about the different cameras for each of the segments.

First of all, brand. Get Nikon or Canon. All the pros get Nikon or Canon. All the good lenses out there are Nikon/Canon. Don’t get Kodak, HP, Lumix, or Coccyx. Stick to these two brands, especially if you are buying an SLR. Personally I think Canon rules the compact cameras and nikon rules the SLR because of its lenses and build. I’ve had great success with Canon compact cameras and so far so good with the Nikon SLR.

Here’s are my recommendations for what you should buy:

n00b (your Grandma or Workmonkey) to the casual picture taker: Canon SD700IS($325). SD800($380) if you take more scenery shots or lots of pictures of lots of people. You can save the money from the difference between the SD700 and the SD800 and PayPal it to me. I won’t object. Don’t get smart and think you can get the SD900($365), just because it has more megapixels. You get better resolution but don’t get Image Stabilization, so don’t go there. Clear as mud?

Wanna-be(cheap) photographer: Get the Canon S3($400). This camera has a 36 mm – 432 mm (12x) zoom lens!!! That zoom is incredible. It also takes great pictures, video, and fights common colds and flu like symptoms. This camera also offers Image Stabilization, which is great for super zoom pictures. If you got no money but want to try to capture Lindsay Lohan closeups to sell to Us Weekly, this is a way to achieve that zoom level.

Hobbyist: Nikon D50($560) or the Canon Rebel XTi ($720). I don’t like how the Canon feels in my hand, but you may be fine with it. The D50 is the SLR I own and it’s been great both in terms of image quality as well as value. I think it’s a great way to get into the SLR world if that’s what you want. SLRs have little lag and you have full control of your pictures. You can also changes lenses and use it to battle insurgents, Fadayeen, and the Desctructicons. The SLR world means you will go back to taking pictures through the viewfinder again, which may mess up your eye makeup or cause problems after I beat you up for your lunch money.

Prosumer: Nikon D80($1150). This is the best camera for amateurs on the market currently. It will set you back a pretty penny, but its viewfinder and image quality are the best in class.

Professional: Nikon D200($1600). It is very close to the D80, but it’s meant for pros. The cameras mentioned above probably blow away any pro cameras from 5 years ago, so unless you make your living snapping weddings, you don’t need anything in the professional range. Professionals put their money in lenses more than camera bodies.

Ultimately, it’s about the pictures you take not the camera. If you look at the pictures taken by Phil Askey on dpreview.com, he will take amazing pictures with a crappy Coccyx camera. It’s all about composition, which you don’t have. So just pick up that SD700 and continue snapping drunken, blurry shots of your dinner party and your half empty Strawberry Daiquiri. Maybe half of them will come out without your fingers in the picture.

Happy shooting.

The first question that is asked when you show someone a digital camera is
“Yo, mah brutha, what da megapixel on dat sheeznit?”

I usually answer that question with:
“Paaaa-leeeezzzzz. You betta recognyyyyyyyzzzzzzzzeeeee befo you get victimizzzzzzzzzeeddd”

What I am trying to convey is that we are beyond the megapixel count at this point. Unless you are printing BIG(not 8 x 10) prints, you WILL NOT notice the difference between a 3MP and a 6MP camera. When you look at the higher resolutions, 6MP, 8MP, 10MP, the difference is even smaller. Even if you are blowing up to a 30×20 poster, you are ok at 6MP because people view larger pictures from farther away anyway.

Next time you are shopping for a camera, do NOT look just at the megapixel. Look at the image quality, look at the build, consider how comfortable the camera is, then look at the man behind the megapixels and say:
“Muh bad, muh brutha.”

ok its 100016 cuz I forgot but these Jap cars run 4ever

Here’s a quote from the Everest: Beyond the Limit show on Discovery, which I blogged about.

“The main problem with climbing Everest nowadays is pissing through a six-inch suit with a three-inch penis.” – Russel

All I have to say to that is “Amen”.

Descent. Just watch it.
Kill Bill Vol 1 & 2 (ok…this may not be 2006, but they’re the best movies of the decade)
Butterfly Effect because I heart Ashton
Hostel. I think this was 2005, but oh well, what’s not to like with the eyeball scene?
1st half of Dawn of the Dead….my reasons here.