Security

The late, great, John Lewis is well known for a quote about getting into trouble. Never, ever be afraid to make some noise and get in good trouble, necessary trouble. It’s time to start some good trouble. Anyone who knows me, reads this blog, or follows me on Twitter, is well aware I have been a proponent of CVE Identifiers for a very long time. I once assigned CVE IDs to most open source security vulnerabilities. I’ve helped more than one company and project adopt CVE IDs for their advisories. I encourage anyone who will listen to adopt CVE IDs. I’ve even talked about it on the podcast many times. ...

I listen to a lot of podcasts. A lot of podcasts. I was listening to the Dave and Gunnar Show podcast episode 212 with guest David A. Wheeler. The Titanic was used as an example of changing process after a security incident. This opened up a flood of thoughts to me, but not for the reasons intended in the conversation. The point of the suggestion was the Titanic sinking created changes to international requirements to help avoid a similar disaster next time, and we should be viewing SolarWinds in a similar way. The idea being we should use the SolarWinds event to drive meaningful change to make security better. Why no change will come of this is a different conversation: TL;DR it’s because nobody important died from SolarWinds, the Titanic killed a lot of important people. But I think this is an interesting way to talk about how we tend to deal with problems in software and how we deal with them in real life. ...

Josh and Kurt talk about the new right to repair rules in the EU. There’s a strange line between loving the idea of right to repair, but also being horrified as security people at the idea of a device being on the Internet for 30 years. https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/opensourcesecuritypodcast/Episode_254_Right_to_Repair_Security.mp3 Show Notes EU right to repair repair.eu

Josh and Kurt talk about this idea that seems to exist in security of “attackers only need to be right once” which is silly. The reality is attackers have to get everything right, defenders really only need to get it right once. But “defenders only need to be right once” isn’t going to sell any products. https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/opensourcesecuritypodcast/Episode_253_Defenders_only_need_to_be_right_once.mp3 Show Notes Richard Feynman and manhole covers Richard Feynman on Why He Can’t Tell You How Magnets Work Israeli airport security FAA stolen sweater XKCD Is it worth the time CGP Grey The trouble with transporters

Josh and Kurt talk about change. Specifically we discuss how the past was a terrible place. Never believe anyone who tells you it was better. Part of a career now is learning how to learn. The things you learn today won’t be useful skills in a few years. The future is is always better than the past. Even in 2020. https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/opensourcesecuritypodcast/Episode_218_The_past_was_a_terrible_place.mp3 Show Notes I no longer build software Temple OS Top Gear electric car 1959 Bel Air crash test

Josh and Kurt talk to Travis Murdock about how to tell your story. Travis explains how to talk to the press and how to tell our story in a way that helps get our message across and lets the reporter do their job better. https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/opensourcesecuritypodcast/Episode_217_How_to_tell_your_story_with_Travis_Murdock.mp3 Show Notes Ruder Finn CVE-2009-3555 Heartbleed

Josh and Kurt talk about how we talk about what we do in the context of life on Venus. We didn’t really discover life on Venus, we discovered a gas that could be created by life on Venus. The world didn’t hear that though. We have a similar communication problem in security. How often are your words misunderstood? https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/opensourcesecuritypodcast/Episode_216_Security_didnt_find_life_on_Venus.mp3 Show Notes Phosphine on Venus GPS and relativity

Josh and Kurt talk about attacking open source. How serious is the threat of developers being targeted or a git repo being watched for secret security fixes? The reality of it all is there are many layers in a security journey, the most important things you can do are also the least exciting. https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/opensourcesecuritypodcast/Episode_215_Real_security_is_boring.mp3 Show Notes Targeting developers XKCD Infrastructure comic Hiding security flaws in git Mossad vs Not-Mossad (PDF warning)

Josh and Kurt talk about how your actions can tell the world if you actually take security seriously. We frame the discussion in the context of Slack paying a very low bug bounty and discover some ways we can look at Slack and decide if they do indeed take our security very seriously. https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/opensourcesecuritypodcast/Episode_213_Security_Signals_What_are_you_telling_the_world.mp3 Show Notes Reddit carbon monoxide Part 1 Part 2 GCP Grey minus infinity Josh’s blog post

Josh and Kurt talk about Secure Boot. The conversation uses the recent “Boot Hole” vulnerability to frame a conversation about what Secure Boot is and isn’t. Why the Boot Hole flaw doesn’t really matter, and why Secure Boot was very scary for Linux users back when it came out. https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/opensourcesecuritypodcast/Episode_209_Secure_Boot_isnt_Secure.mp3 Show Notes Boot Hole