Hackers Who Breached White House Network Allegedly Accessed Sensitive Data

Hackers Breached White House Network

According to recent story published by CNN, Russian government hackers have breached the White House’s computer systems late last year and have gained access to sensitive details though the US officials disagree with it. The officials had stated earlier, that in October, the White House breach had only affected an unclassified network, though sources informed CNN that the hackers had gained access to real time non-public details of the president’s schedule.

 The sources also informed CNN that the hackers were the same ones who were behind a damaging cyber-attack on the US Department of State at the same time last year, which forced the department to close down its email system for an extended period of time. The connected cyber-attack on the State Department recently has been characterized as the worst hack on a federal agency. The White House is not unfamiliar to attacks from foreign spies.

 The Chinese have been associated in many high profile attacks of White House unclassified systems together with employee emails. Reports of the breach came in as government official have become more concerned with regards to cyber threats from Russia. James Clapper, FBI director informed Senate committee in February that `the Russian cyber threat is more severe than they had earlier assessed’.

Immediate Measures to Evaluate/Mitigate Activity

Ben Rhodes, White House deputy national security adviser stated that the breached White House system had no sensitive data. He informed CNN that they had an unclassified system and a classified system, a top secret system. And that they do not believe that their classified systems were compromised.

A White House spokesperson who tried to restrain the report informed that it was based on a security breach which was already revealed to the public. Spokesperson, Mark Stroh, informed the media, that this report was not referred to a new incident and any such activity was something which was taken seriously and in this case, they had made it clear at that time and had taken immediate measures to evaluate and mitigate the activity.

He also informed that as officials did last year, the US would not comment on who could have been behind the attacks. Investigating the security breaches are the Secret Service, FBI and US Intelligent agencies which according to CNN sources say were the outcome of one of the most sophisticated cyber-attacks that was ever directed at US government agencies.

Theft of Private Data – Government/Corporation/Individuals 

The recent report comes amid hacker thefts of private data related to governments, corporations as well as individuals, from sensitive emails to medical reports to financial information and possession of these data could tend to be of great importance to either enable criminal acts or assistance in government spying.

As per a senior department official, none of the department’s classified email system in the State Department breach was affected at that time though hackers used that breach to break into the White House’s network as reported by CNN.

The security researchers were under suspicion after the White House security breach was revealed in October, that hackers working for the Russian government were the cause of both the attacks according to the story of Washington Post and inspite of efforts beingmade by the State Department to safeguard its security, hackers were capable of accessing the system with the result that the network was owned for months by Russian hackers.

Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon : Gadget Review

Lenovo brings the latest iteration of its famous ThinkPad Carbon series of laptops which simply aims at providing an alternative between fashionable and business laptops. ThinkPad series has kept up with the successful trend of providing a slim and light weight laptop powered with cutting edge technology.

The Design And Feel Of The Laptop

The Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon weighs just above 1.3 Kg and has a thickness of 18.46 mm which makes its extremely easier to carry around. This is decent laptop which takes much of neither space nor does it is bulky enough to make it gruesome for rough handling.

Lenovo had provided a wide array of ports around its edges, the charger point, HDMI output, Mini-Display Port; two much needed USB 3.0 ports and a standard 3.55 headset socket. For internet connectivity via broadband service it provides for the Ethernet outlet. Unfortunately this laptop doesn’t have any card reader which some of its latest models possess SIM card slot to provide integrated 3G connectivity.

Multiple Choices Available In Terms Of Specifications and Software

Lenovo brings in multiple variants in the new ThinkPad X1 Carbon to fulfill the needs and demands of different consumers like before. The variant reviewed by us had the latest Intel Core i7 processor running at 2.4GHz and possessed an integrated Intel HD Graphics 5500. This was a high end laptop with an 8GB of RAM and a Solid State Drive (SSD) of around 256 GB out of which 216 was available for the users.

The best features feature of the laptop is its 10 point multi-touch support amazing 2560x1440 pixel Full HD screen. Using Windows 8 OS on this laptop gave a complete different feel with its attention to detail and crispness in picture display. On the connectivity front Lenovo has provided the standard Bluetooth v4.0 along with WiFi b/g/n as well as some of the models can work on 3g networks with SIM connectivity. The battery capacity is set at 50Whr which claims to give a run time of around 10.9 hours but within certain usage condition.

Lenovo has somewhat ruined the software appeal with presence unwanted pre installed software such as the PC App Store, Lenovo PC Experience and others. Even the preinstalled Norton Internet Security suite is quite bleak in nature and often bombards the user with register requests.

A Sublime and Robust Performance

Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon is a flagship business laptop which as its predecessors provides a robust performance. The boot up process is quick and doesn’t have lags or slowdowns while performing day to day tasks. Heavy apps and software are most likely to run sublimely on this laptop and it will provide a memorable experience as well.

Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon range of laptops is designed with a different purpose by the Lenovo where it is looking forward to address the needs of the users by giving a consumer friendly product. There are far superior looking business laptops available in the market but Carbon series stand out for its implantation of such features which makes it extremely easier to get things done quickly. This laptop offers splendid display, massive battery and better features at a price of Rs. 1, 75,000.

GoPro Hero4 Black Review: The Best Action Cam Gets Upgraded

The main difference between a normal camera and an action camera lies in its form factor. The action camera can be placed on a surfboard out on huge waves, strapped onto dogs, ceiling fans and flying drones without the risk of damage. In fact, they are made for such purposes, where the use of a normal camera will be bizarre and impractical.

The GoPro is a tiny box like action camera with an amazing picture quality and other features added by GoPro and other third party companies. There are two models: the GoPro Hero4 Black and the GoPro Hero4 Silver. There are subtle differences between the two. The Silver costs a 100 dollars less than the Black, as the Black one has additional features and a faster processor. It has the best video quality and more shooting options, as it supports a wide range of mounting options.

The History

This series of action camera has been in existence since the year 2004. The GoPro Hero range of action camera has been the capture of adventure sports since that time. Initially the photographs used to be captured on still shots on 35mm film. GoPro can be called a pioneer of sorts of the action camera. The years hence has only resulted in advancement of the original idea.

The Exterior

The main aspect of the exterior of action camera is that it should be inconspicuous. Therefore the core design and the ergonomics haven’t seen much change throughout the years. Its dimensions can be measured as 41X59X30mm. The camera weighs 88g with the exclusion of its waterproof cover. After the cover is added on, it weighs around 152g.

A small LCD is located at its left side and the lens protrude from the front. Next to the LCD, there are two LED indicators- the top one blinks blue to indicate the WiFi signal and lower one shows the camera status and also works as the battery indicator. The power up button is located beneath the LCD and it also can change the modes.

There is another camera status indicator located on the rear of the action camera and a port, for the purpose of accessorizing the camera with an external LCD monitor and LCD Touch BacPac.

The right side plays host to the Micro-HDMI port, Micro-USB Port as well as the MicroSD card slot and a speaker. The battery door is at the bottom, a tiny slip of paper which is attached to the battery to pull it out.

The Interior

This action camera is equipped with a 12 megapixel 1/2.3 inch CMOS sensor as well as an F2.8 aperture ultra wide angle lens. It can capture 4K (3840X2160) footage at 30fps and also shoot 1080p video at up to 120fps and 720p footage at 240fps. It has a mono microphone for the purpose of recording audios, plus there is a provision of an optional 3.5mm input accessory for a better external mike if required. For recording better audios, there is an added integrated analog-to-digital converter present.

Producing Valuable Content: How to Get Stared

Every SEO expert will tell you that the key to a successful SEO campaign is valuable content. What they often forget to mention is the very definition of valuable content and how we can make them. Producing valuable content doesn’t have to be difficult as long as you know the basic guidelines to follow. To help you get started, we are going to discuss some useful tips on how to produce valuable content in this article.
Useful and Informative

The two aspects to consider when writing contents for your site are usefulness and the information you are adding to the contents. First of all, the article needs to offer some use to the visitors. A good way of making sure your site’s contents are useful is by placing yourself as a visitor and asking these questions:

• Did I get tips and tricks from the article?
• Is the article amusing?
• Can I do something new with the information I get from the article?

Aside from being useful, an article should also be informative. News, updates and other contents that fall in the same category may not always be useful, but they can always be informative.

Concise and Readable

Here’s another set of aspects to keep in mind when developing valuable contents. Long articles are not always good, especially if most of the actual contents are not useful or informative enough to your users. Keep it short and concise to maximize the value of the content itself.

I’m not saying you can’t write long articles; as a matter of fact, you can. However, long articles need to be kept readable for them to be as valuable to users as shorter, more compact articles with a lot of information. To help make long articles more readable:

• Divide the article into paragraphs and state what the paragraph is all about in the first sentence. Most of your users will scan through paragraphs quickly, so mentioning your point at the beginning of the paragraphs really helps.
• Furthermore, divide the long article into parts with subtitles and pointers. An article that has subtitles are much easier to scan and are often more readable than those that only include long paragraphs.
• Use images and visual elements to keep users engaged. Reading long articles online can be quite boring, so visual cues are needed to keep users glued to the screen. It will also make your site more appealing.

Credibility Matters! 

Writing an article for the web is not like writing an article for magazines or papers. Site owners tend to ‘forget’ about citing their sources and providing valid data. This will greatly damage the article’s credibility; of course, it will also damage the site’s credibility.

When you do present data from other sources, site the sources properly. Your users will automatically associate citations with better credibility, causing them to trust the contents you are displaying even more. According to SEO experts from Blue Hat Marketing, using inner-linking to cite other pages on your site is also a great for getting your site’s SEO performance up.

Build A Mars Base with A Box of Engineered Bugs

Travel to Alien Planet – Bug Boxes – Engineered Microbes

The next time humans intend to set foot on an alien planet, they may not have to travel alone but travel along with small lightweight `bug boxes’ that could be full of engineered microbes that would make life on these planets much more liveable.

The pioneering settlers would be needing food, fuel as well as shelter in order to survive on a distant world and tugging along bulky supplies from the Earth could be costly. Another option has been offered by Synthetic biology.

It is said that microbes weigh less and the space taken is next to nothing on a spacecraft though once the mission lands on Mars it is said that they could multiply by feeding on the materials that may be available there. The outcome of their labour could provide the essentials for human settlement.

A research has begun by NASA to realise this vision, according to Lynn Rothschild at the Ames Research Centre in Moffett Field, California. Rothschild who is the leader of NASA’s new Synthetic Biology Initiative, aims to build designer microbes for future crewed space missions and shared her vision at the BioDesign Forum, last week in Cambridge, UK.

Synthetic Biology – At Crossroads of Biology/Engineering 

Synthetics biology lying at the crossroads of biology and engineering has its practitioners building a biological toolkit comprising of chunks of genes, known as biobricks, each performing a certain function of making a bacterium generate natural antifreeze molecule, for instance: Biobricks could be inserted into other microbes to provide that function.

With this approach, a microbe having the capabilities of surviving on an alien planet could become one that can endure human life there. With regards to energy, several earthly microbes would have died in extra-terrestrial environment that are rich in carbon dioxide and nitrogen, the two main elements of Martian air. Anabaena, an ancient cyanobacterium tends to thrive in these conditions though metabolising both gases in order to make sugar.

Rothschild states that `as long as it has warmth and some shielding from ultraviolet light radiation, it could do well on gases in the mars atmosphere’. Anabaena utilises most of the energy produced, from carbon dioxide and nitrogen but synthetic biologist could encourage the cyanobacteria to share its supplies.

Waste – Feed the Microbes

At a synthetic biology competition last year – International Genetically Engineered Machines – iGEM, a team from Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island and Stanford University in California portrayed how inserting genetic machinery from E.coli made Anabaena excrete more of its energy as sugar.

 Moreover they also showed that they tend to support colonies of other bacteria as well on sugar. Such microbial colonies, in theory tend to make oil, plastic or fuel for the astronauts. The team which was led by Andre Burnier, a recent Brown graduate who had been advised by Rothschild had also come with options of supplying human settlers on Mars with mortar and bricks and had started with a bacterium known as Sporosarcina pasteurii that unusually tends to break down urea which is the main waste product in urine, excreting ammonium, making the local atmosphere alkaline enough for calcium carbonate cement to form. The waste created by the astronauts could feed the microbes and they in turn could help strengthen fine rocky material on the planet’s surface to create bricks.