Before reading the introduction, I decided to have a look into the preface, to my surprise, it started off with a sentence that I would have never expected to read before starting a book.

"I have written this book partly to correct a mistake."

From there, it goes into how his first book "Applied Cryptology" didn't direct people in the direction he wanted. Instead, it lead to "lesser" security systems around the world. More importantly however, he immediately states three points about the novel I am going to read about:

"This book is about those security problems, the limitations of technology and the solutions"

"Read this book, from beginning to end"

"Many technical books are meant to skim, bounce around in,  and use as a reference. This book isn't. It has a plot."

In several senses, I was taken back, but lets just get straight to the point, shall we?

The introduction to the book first logs a number of security events during March 2000, whether they were defacing websites, security breaches, bugs or errors with software. This continues on for a bit before it his point becomes abundantly clear, that there are a multitude of problems and vulnerabilities in the software that is supposedly meant to be "secure". He discusses in detail why and what can be done about the problem at hand, being the primary subject of his book.

Thus far, its been a fascinating book to read, and it really adds perception to the security in our world. It looks into detail about the underlying systems that go into creating the 'security' in our world, and how it seemingly may seem less secure then before.

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We have looked over Web2.0, a big step in Internet functionality, but Web3.0 may be the next significant advance in the reasonably near future.

The 20-year anniversary of the World Wide Web was celebrated at a gathering in Geneva recently on the 14th of March. Tim Berners-Lee, acclaimed inventor of the Internet, attended this celebration and delivered his next proposition for a further advance in Internet functionality.

His idea is not farfetched; he is moreso publicizing the concept rather than inventing it. The concept is to advance the Internet into a web of data. The combination and correlation of raw data would aid scientific research and development.

A widespread effort to materialize this concept has been taken on by a group of European computer scientists through DBPedia. This system obtains key information from the popular site, Wikipedia, and retains the information in a database. e.g. Historical figures' dates of birth/death, hometowns, heights, etc. An obvious Social & Ethical Issue arises from this idea. How can one authenticate the data derived from a publicly edited domain like Wikipedia? Automatic testing methods to validate and verify derived information have been looked into to ensure the authenticity of these databases, but problems can be expected to follow alike Web3.0's predecessors.

Source: http://www.nzz.ch/nachrichten/medien/das_grosse_aufraeumen_im_hypertext-haufen_1.2216427.html

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Yes Grade 11's along with Slifeing and finishing your book review here is a third assignment that will keep you busy. Using the skills that you will garner during the next week or so with creating tutorial/example based Excel Spreadsheets (yes for once we will use a normal application rather than some Web 2.0 based shenanigins), you must then choose a realistic project from one of your other subjects to design and create a spreadsheet for. Subjects that would probably be very sensible to choose might be Mathematics, Economics, Sciences, Design Technology, Drama etc... What productive function the spreadsheet does is up to you? It might create a test, it might plot a specific experiment and show results, it might be a booking sheet for a theatre or it might be a break even chart analysis? YOU decide.

You must however use a minimum of ten of  the following skills (that you will practice this next week or so) within your spreadsheet to make the design and so its workings as efficient and automatic as possible:-

1. Vlookup
2. If Statement
3. Countif Statement
4. Charts
5. Advanced Filters
6. Basic Mathematical Formulas - Aveage, Sum, Max, Min,
7. Macros (you will need to use Office 2004 on the Mac - Why?)
8. Conditional Formatting
9. Spinners
10. Date/Time Functions
11. Formatting, Titles and Buttons
12. Validation/Verification
13. Password Protection

Along with this, the spreadsheet should be well designed and user friendly with suitable instructions for a new user to be able to follow and understand what they are doing when it comes to inputing data and processing an output. The spreadsheet should have multiple sheets, and include a title page. Dr Tech will show you some examples of existing spreadsheets that fulfill the above purpose.

Make sure you test your spreadsheet models, as the assessment will be based on an unknown user/client attempting to use your spreadsheet without instruction from yourself.

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The article that I found most appropriate for my father's biggest fear in technology describes the various concepts of Biometric Face Recognition. As a general overview, Biometric Face Recognition is a technique used in modern tracking technology currently under government control. The United Kingdom, as an example, uses this software with the CCTV cameras in airports, train stations and streets of London. Computers are able to rapidly analyse images produced by these cameras and identify people in view. This process is used to locate criminals and protect citizens, residents and tourists...

The following clip advertising the latest 3VR Intelligent Video Management Solution (IVMS) clearly describes the process and purpose of this technology:

This advertisement describes the benefits and advantages of Biometric Face Recognition in CCTV Cameras.

Included is the ability for the system to locate a person and notify a supervisor within 20 seconds. This would enable these cameras to locate criminals or missing children in even large crowds far more efficiently than with the naked eye of an observer. There are, however, many problems with the system.

In relation to Reliability, these face recognition systems are accurate a decent but not perfect 95% of the time. If all the cameras in a city identify 1 million passers by in a day, this would involve 50,000 misidentified people daily. Since these occurrences typically announce the misidentified person as a criminal suspect the output of the system could produce catastrophe.

Privacy is also a major concern with this technology. Innocent passers by would be identified and 'tracked' by these cameras which to many seems intimidating. The ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union) disagrees with such security methods since they infringe on personal privacy rights. Since these rights are constantly being compromised, however, the technology seems to be prevailing.

Another ethical issue in this article is People and Machines. With the collaboration of police forces and mechanical camera systems, crime should be minimized.

Article at Biometric Face Recognition & Biometric Identification Technologies (2005)

Clip from YouTube: 3VR Intelligent Video Management Solution as seen on KBS

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The government is planning on making a database that will contain every phone call that you have made, every email that you have sent to your friends and relatives and also every web page that you have visited during the last 12 months. The government thinks that this is necessary in order to stop terrorism.

In my opinion I think that this is an invasion of privacy. This issue is an invasion of privacy because they meaning the government is looking at the people private emails that they sent to their friends and also family member and the also the fact that they are also looking at the phone calls that we make. This is a invasion of Privacy because the government just can’t look at our email and phone calls that we make since they are really private to us. I have will have to agree with that by doing this whole thing that they, meaning the government will be able to find terrorist.

The Link to the article:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/guest_contributors/article3979928.ece

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Hi ITGS group, I will unfortunately be absent for the Tuesday single period. So here is what you will need to do/complete by Wednesday:-

• Download the following countries Filemaker Pro Database - Information Age Database.
• If you need to transfer it to the Cedar 20 laptops there is my USB Flash memory in the draw of the teachers desk.
• Grab one of the Filemaker Pro Worksheets from my desk - and start manipulating the database and answering the questions.

We will go over these answers next lesson. Remember also that your mini virus database assignment is due on Thursday, when I am expecting your JING movie and also your database emailed to me.

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