Mediaboss Marketing

Earlier this year, a report from CNET explored the current state of ad blockers. Among the data cited within was a study from the software company Blockthrough, which estimated that 40% of adults in the United States make use of some ad-blocking technology. That might not come as much of a surprise to you but another recent report at Vice offers a fascinating window into some of the people and organizations utilizing ad-blocking technology.

In the Vice article, Joseph Cox covered the way the U.S. intelligence community has begun making use of ad-blocking technology. That includes the CIA and the NSA, among a number of other agencies. Last week, Senator Ron Wyden wrote a letter to the Office of Management and Budget calling for them to protect federal networks from foreign spies and criminals who misuse online advertising for hacking and surveillance.

Wyden cited guidelines from both the NSA and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency recommending that ad-blocking software be used. Wyden goes on to quote the Chief Information Officer from the Intelligence Community, who stated, The IC has implemented network-based ad-blocking technologies and uses information from several layers, including Domain Name System information, to block unwanted and malicious advertising content.

A report from CrowdStrike published earlier this year warned of the dangers of malvertising which has cropped up on legitimate websites, and has been used to give control of computers and mobile devices to a third party. Thats alarming enough in its own right, so its not hard to see why people dealing with classified information would be especially worried. Will Wydens letter find a welcome response? It could be the difference between an ordinary day and a crisis waiting to happen.

Thanks for reading InsideHook. Sign up for our daily newsletter and be in the know.

Continue reading here:
Who's Worried About the State of Online Advertising? The NSA and CIA, For Starters. - InsideHook

Each year North Star Academy (NSA) welcomes students and staff back with a theme carried throughout the school year. This year in particular, a theme of joy and laughter seems quite fitting.

Collectively, the world has seen more challenges in the past 18 months than weve faced in a long time, and with palpable exhaustion and frustration. Building on the courage and resilience theme from the previous two years, North Star Academy principal Kendra Hossfeld kicked off staff development week for the 2021/2022 school year surprising the team with motivational speaker Molly Kennedy and RISE Comedy founder Steve Wilder to jumpstart the joy and laughter theme.

Resiliency is a life-long trait that usually requires challenging experiences and psychological strength. In our household, laughter is the best medicine and sometimes the only medicine. Being able to laugh at yourself and laugh with others relieves stress and creates bonding experiences, Hossfeld said. Research reveals that little moments of joy can help our bodies recover from the physiological effects of stress, and can help us find meaning and purpose in tragic events. Rather than being a distraction, when we allow ourselves a moment of joy, it creates a respite that makes us more resilient, Hossfeld said.

Kennedy, a proponent of the growth mindset, ironman triathlete, author and motivational speaker, shared the importance of gratitude and how it leads to joy. Kennedy has visited NSA in the past, sharing a similar message with students. During her time with the staff, they discussed multiple ways teachers are already practicing gratitude in their own lives, opportunities to expand on that gratitude as well as what it may look like in their classrooms with their students.

Where your focus goes, your energy flows. If we choose to shift our focus to what is good, positive, optimistic, possible, etc, that changes what we see and feel. Operating from this space allows us to feel a bit more invigorated and energized. Thats a good thing, Kennedy said. The North Star teachers were able to easily come up with ways to incorporate gratitude on a regular basis, and some ideas sparked ideas in other teachers. It was wonderful to see!

Following on the heels of Kennedy was guest speaker Steve Wilder, a comedian and founder of RISE Comedy, who took the teachers through several engaging activities that promote joy and laughter. Wilder initiated several games designed to build on the theme.

We focused on simple improv to create fun and laughter in an environment without pressure or expectations, Wilder said. Having fun was the goal versus. trying to be funny. With so many distractions in our world today its important to be present, communicate and take risks in a safe, supportive environment. The improv games we played allowed the NSA teachers to connect in a new way by being silly, goofy and getting out of their heads.

For example, Wilder introduced the clap game, a simple game in which participants get in a circle and take turns clapping simultaneously with a nearby person. While it sounds simple, the result tends to produce an opportunity to pass energy to one another while creating a true presence. The essence of joy is the ability to allow the brain to say, Hey! Im here having fun and theres nothing else clouding my thoughts.

There was a willingness by the North Star staff to go for it and by the end of my time with them, they were having a blast and willing to look silly in front of their peers. It was so refreshing and you could feel the positivity and excitement in the room with a palpable level of support and acceptance, Wilder said.

Our joy and laughter theme seems perfect this year after what we have endured the past year and a half. The trainings were a fun way to start the school year. We certainly had a lot of laughter as we saw our colleagues step out of their comfort zone during the improv session especially, said NSA middle school social studies teacher Kerrie Derosia. The NSA staff is already having fun focusing on the theme when we want to step away from the curriculum in our classes for a minute. We can chalk any fun idea with the students up to incorporating joy and laughter. Things as small as a minute of silly dancing or as big as an additional field trip.

Morgan Schneider, NSA middle school science teacher added, It feels really good to focus on the excitement and to have some space for laughter and fun in life, work and the classroom. It was a lot of fun seeing my coworkers let loose and be silly doing improv with Steve.

Read more:
North Star Kicks off School Year with Joy and Laughter | YourHub - The Know

THE National Sheep Association (NSA) is welcoming the United States lifting its ban on imports of British lamb, saying it will help maximise trade opportunities for UK sheep farmers.

With a ban on both British lamb and beef imports to the US in place since 1989, due to concerns around BSE, NSA believes the announcement will increase demand for British sheepmeat within the US.

NSA Chief Executive Phil Stocker comments: The sheep industry in the UK has clear potential to grow further but any expansion must be market and demand led. The announcement helps the supply and demand dynamics to support a strong market and potential further growth. The UK is the third largest exporter of sheepmeat globally, telling us that we are good at producing sheepmeat and that our supply chains are efficient and able to deliver.

This creates another opportunity for our industry to maximise trade opportunities and we have always seen the US as being a potentially important market. After the domestic market, which takes 60 65% of UK production, the EU is still our largest export market and is on our doorstep. However, access is more difficult than it was when we were part of the EU. Its essential to maintain EU access but is also important to work on any market that gives us future potential.

Mr Stocker notes the wider opportunities presented by the lifting of the ban: We shouldnt expect to see any sudden surge in volumes going to the US, but we do know there is strong demand for UK sheep genetics semen and embryos. Many British sheep breeds are in the US but are numerically too small to have a strong gene pool so the demand for our genetics is strong.

See the original post here:
NSA welcomes the lifting of a ban on British lamb imports by USA | News and Star - News & Star

A new noodle bar has opened in North Brooklyn.

No Strings Attached Noodle Bar (135B North 5th St.), also called NSA, is a fusion restaurant byrestaurateurs Chiwa Yeung and Spencer Cartledge, and Executive Chef Brooke Apfelbaum.

Yeung and Cartledge, both architectural designers, met while studying at the Pratt Institute, and the two college friends eventually became business partners, buying La Margarita Pizza on the Lower East Side in March 2020. Obviously, not the best time to take on a new restaurant, the two, along with newly hired chef, Apfelbaum, pivoted to selling pasta kits to earn revenue.

The kits popularity led to the creation of NSA, and the team wanted a brick and mortar space for the concept, which fuses Japanese and Italian-American fare.

NSAs opening menu includes seasonal gyoza with peanut butter sauce, stuffed macaroni bites with Japanese sausage, scallop crudo with yuzu and caviar and more inventive appetizers. Main courses, both family-style and individually portioned, include house-made pasta, like garganelli with Wagyu ragu and parmesan fettuccine with seared Japanese scallops and garlic chips. An elegant uni creme angel hair with nori panko rounds out the pasta menu.

On the ramen side, guests can choose from truffle tonkatsu ramen, smoky tempeh miso ramen, chilled yuzu shrimp ramen and more.

NSA is truly a collaborative affair, with the chefs older brother, Samuel Apfelbaum, running the beverage program. While the restaurant waits for a liquor license, mocktails will be served.

NSA Noodle Bar is built a sleek, minimalist space with bar seating and a small dining room with tables and counter seating. Adorned with homemade pottery and art that is all contributed by the staff and close friends, the restaurant embodies creativity at every level.

Link:
No Strings Attached Noodle Bar Merges Italian and Japanese Fare in Williamsburg - greenpointers.com

America's National Security Agency has published an FAQ about quantum cryptography, saying it does not know "when or even if" a quantum computer will ever exist to "exploit" public-key cryptography.

In the document, titled Quantum Computing and Post-Quantum Cryptography, the NSA said it "has to produce requirements today for systems that will be used for many decades in the future." With that in mind, the agency came up with some predictions [PDF] for the near future of quantum computing and their impact on encryption.

Is the NSA worried about the threat posed by a "cryptographically relevant quantum computer" (CRQC)? Apparently not too much.

"NSA does not know when or even if a quantum computer of sufficient size and power to exploit public key cryptography (a CRQC) will exist," it stated, which sounds fairly conclusive though in 2014 the agency splurged $80m looking for a quantum computer that could smash current encryption in a program titled Owning the Net, so the candor of the paper's statements is perhaps open to debate.

What the super-surveillance agency seems to be saying is that it's not a given that a CRQC capable of breaking today's public-key algorithms will ever emerge, though it wouldn't be a bad idea to consider coming up with and using new techniques that could defeat a future CRQC, should one be built.

It's almost like the NSA is dropping a not-so-subtle hint, though why it would is debatable. If it has a CRQC, or is on the path to one, it might want to warn allies, vendors, and citizens to think about using quantum-resistant technologies in case bad people develop a CRQC too. But why would the spies tip their hand so? It's all very curious.

Progress on quantum computers has been steadily made over the past few years, and while they may not ever replace our standard, classical computing, they are very effective at solving certain problems

Eric Trexler, VP of global governments at security shop Forcepoint, told The Register: "Progress on quantum computers has been steadily made over the past few years, and while they may not ever replace our standard, classical computing, they are very effective at solving certain problems. This includes public-key asymmetric cryptography, one of the two different types of cryptosystems in use today."

Public-key cryptography is what the world relies on for strong encryption, such as TLS and SSL that underpin the HTTPS standard used to help protect your browser data from third-party snooping.

In the NSA's summary, a CRQC should one ever exist "would be capable of undermining the widely deployed public key algorithms used for asymmetric key exchanges and digital signatures" and what a relief it is that no one has one of these machines yet. The post-quantum encryption industry has long sought to portray itself as an immediate threat to today's encryption, as El Reg detailed in 2019.

"The current widely used cryptography and hashing algorithms are based on certain mathematical calculations taking an impractical amount of time to solve," explained Martin Lee, a technical lead at Cisco's Talos infosec arm. "With the advent of quantum computers, we risk that these calculations will become easy to perform, and that our cryptographic software will no longer protect systems."

Given that nations and labs are working toward building crypto-busting quantum computers, the NSA said it was working on "quantum-resistant public key" algorithms for private suppliers to the US government to use, having had its Post-Quantum Standardization Effort running since 2016. However, the agency said there are no such algos that commercial vendors should adopt right now, "with the exception of stateful hash signatures for firmware."

Smart cookies will be glad to hear that the NSA considers AES-256 and SHA-384 "safe against attack by a large quantum computer."

Jason Soroko, CTO of Sectigo, a vendor that advertises "quantum safe cryptography" said the NSA report wasn't conclusive proof that current encryption algos were safe from innovation.

"Quantum computers alone do not crack public key cryptography," he said, adding that such a beast would need to execute an implementation of Shors algorithm. That algo was first described in 1994 by an MIT maths professor and allows for the calculation of prime factors of very large numbers; a vital step towards speeding up the decryption of the product of current encryption algorithms.

"Work on quantum resistant cryptographic algorithms is pushing forward based on the risk that Universal quantum computers will eventually have enough stable qubits to eventually implement Shors algorithm," continued Soroko. "I think its important to assume that innovation in both math and engineering will potentially surprise us."

While advances in cryptography are of more than merely academic interest to the infosec world, there is always the point that security (and data) breaches occur because of primarily human factors. Ransomware, currently the largest threat to enterprises, typically spreads because someone's forgotten to patch or decommission a machine on a corporate network or because somebody opens an attachment from a malicious email.

Or there's the old joke about rubber hose cryptanalysis, referring to beating the passwords out of a captured sysadmin.

Talos' Lee concluded: In a world where users will divulge their passwords in return for chocolate or in response to an enticing phishing email, the risk of quantum computers might not be our biggest threat.

See the original post:
NSA: We 'don't know when or even if' a quantum computer will ever be able to break today's public-key encryption - The Register