RADIO FLYER CAR: Valley couple's Radio Flyer car turns heads
Couple's Radio Flyer turns heads on streets
by Christine Kim12:00 a.m. AKDT, September 29, 2010
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ANCHORAGE, Alaska —A Valley couple took a childhood memory and turned it into a retirement project. Now, they have a Radio Flyer car to drive around town in.Fred Keller and Judy Foster worked on the car for 11 months, and finished in August of this year, and their ride has been turning heads.
The base of the wagon is a 1976 Mazda pickup truck that Foster inherited from her dad.
The vehicle turns heads everywhere they go.
"I think the words I hear the most often is 'awesome' or 'cool' or people go by and give us a 'hi' sign," Foster said.
The wheels are made from hub caps and detergent bottles, and the steering wheel is the actual wheel from a wagon. The handle rises eight feet high.
Copyright © 2010, KTUU-TV
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Comments (24)
Add / View comments | Discussion FAQhighlands.lad at 6:38 AM October 12, 2010I had a Radio Flyer wagon as a kid, but it wasn't as cool as this one!!!! :~)
RichardB.Reiling at 4:40 PM October 11, 2010Fascinating....a hearty Bravo! How do you get in and out?....over the edge? Don't think most of us who had Radio Flyers could easily hop in and out! Enjoy....
Virginia Graves at 8:49 PM October 09, 2010In Bakersfield, Ca. I saw a red P T Cruser with a wagon handle welded on the front and the license plate said MY LITTLE RED WAGON> It was so cute.
Quickly decrypting cell phone calls - The H Security: News and Features
Karsten Nohl takes a crack at GSM encryption with his tool called Kraken
Source: Uli Ries In his presentation at the Black Hat Conference, German GSM expert Karsten Nohl presented a tool he calls Kraken, which he claims can crack the A5/1 encryption used for cell phone calls within seconds. But first, you have to record the GSM call with a GSM catcher, which you can build yourself based on a Universal Software Programmable Radio (USRP), which costs just under $1500, and the open source GNURadio software.To crack the key, Kraken uses rainbow tables, which Nohl calculated with ATI graphics processors (GPUs). During a live demonstration, the tool cracked the key for a recorded phone call within about 30 seconds. Nohl then decoded the file with Airprobe and converted it into an audio file using Toast.
"Today, recording and cracking GSM is as easy as attacking WiFi was a few years ago", the security expert told The H's associates at heise Security. But Nohl says he refrained from making the process too easy, to avoid lowering the bar too much for newcomers. Nohl added that protection against such attacks has also been around for nearly two years: "In 2008, the GSM Association published an update for the standard. [...] But up to now, no mobile communications provider in Germany has bothered to update its network."
A hacker called "The Grugq" pointed out another problem at the conference. A cheap, low-end Motorola cell phones, a notebook and the OsmocomBB open source software is apparently all you need to block a base station. In what is called a RACHell attack, a cell phone sends thousands of connection requests to the network in an attempt to reserve all available channels for itself; as a result, the station rejects other mobile communications users, including emergency services, such as ambulances and the fire department. The attack does not, however, affect current calls in any way. The hacker was not able to demonstrate the attack at the conference because his dual band cell phone did not work on the frequency used by AT&T at the event.
Network operators are familiar with the issue. An independent expert told heise Security that T-Mobile uses special firewalls in Germany to fend off such attacks. Harald Welte, the GSM expert and author of numerous open source projects pertaining to GSM, such as OpenBSC, told heise Security in an e-mail that T-Mobile's approach would not work; because the attack comes over the air, a firewall or other filter in the GSM backhaul or backbone will not make a difference. Dieter Spaar reportedly already performed at such an attack in autumn 2009.
The Grugq says that other mobile communications users can also be kicked out by reversing the attack. If a detach command is sent to the base station with another user's sender IMEI, the station will not communicate with that cell phone until the phone reports back to the base station, such as when a text message is sent. (Uli Ries)
(djwm)
Shortcut exploit: protect against it with this free tool | Graham Cluley's blog
Sophos engineers have been busy developing and testing a free tool that protects users from malware exploiting the critical zero-day vulnerability known as the "Shortcut exploit".We have begun to see more hackers taking advantage of the exploit, spreading malware which takes advantage of Microsoft's unpatched vulnerability.
Sophos has been doing a good job of protecting its customers against this problem. But what if you're not a Sophos user and are worried about the attacks?
We can now present, the Sophos Windows Shortcut Exploit Protection Tool. Watch the following video to see it in action:
(Enjoy this video? You can check out more on the SophosLabs YouTube channel and subscribe if you like)
Here are the details in a nutshell:
1. It intercepts LNK shortcut files that contain the exploit, telling you which executable code it was attempting to run. That means it will stop malicious threats which use this vulnerability if they are on non-local disks, such as a USB stick for instance.
2. You can run the tool alongside your existing anti-virus product. No need to throw the baby out with the bathwater. The tool supports Windows XP, Vista and Windows 7. It doesn’t support Windows 2000.
3. Unlike Microsoft's workaround, it doesn't blank out all the shortcuts on your Windows Start Menu - meaning your life (and that of your users) will be easier.
4. It's free to download.
Want to know more? Here's the nerdy explanation:
The vulnerability, known as the shortcut exploit, is in the way that Microsoft Windows handles .LNK shortcut files. If Windows tries to display the icon of an exploited shortcut file it can run the malicious code pointed to by the shortcut, without any user interaction.
One of the ways we have seen this problem exploited is via malware infections on USB sticks - capable of running viral code even if AutoPlay and AutoRun are disabled.
The free Sophos tool installs a new icon handler for Windows shortcuts. Whenever Windows tries to display an icon corresponding to a Windows shortcut, the new icon handler will intercept this request and validate the shortcut. If the shortcut does not contain the exploit, control will be given back to Windows.
But, if the shortcut does contain an exploit, a message is displayed to the user and extraction of the dangerous icon is blocked.
What's really nice is that it doesn't matter what anti-virus software you're using - you can still install this free tool from Sophos, and it will work alongside your existing anti-virus.
And the Sophos Windows Shortcut Exploit Protection Tool (maybe we should have come up with a shorter name?) is a piece of cake to install. The tool can be installed and uninstalled easily and quickly. Administrators can run the installer package on the computer, and network administrators can push the installer package via Group Policies.
Hopefully soon Microsoft will release a proper patch to protect against the shortcut vulnerability, and then you can simply uninstall our tool. But in the meantime, this is neat. Very neat.
Go and get it now.
OMG, Mom! Parents on Facebook
If you’re reading this on a computer, there’s a good chance that you are one of the 500,000,000 or 1 in every 13.4 people on earth who uses Facebook.
A study we did earlier this year found that 73% of Facebook users have not friended their boss, which makes sense when there is more and more evidence that one bad status update can cost you your job.
So it it isn’t that surprising that even kids are selective about whom they associate with on the world’s most popular social network.
New research shows that the younger a child is, the more likely he or she is to hate the idea of being friends with his or her parents on Facebook. However, by the time they get to high school, being friends with mom or dad isn’t so lame. 56% of high school students, in one study, gave their parents full access to their profiles.
Personally, I think parents should become Facebook friends with their kids for two reasons: 1) your presence might give pause to the predators who could be following your kids, and 2) your presence might make your child think twice before posting something he or she shouldn’t.
Sean Sullivan, F-Secure Security Advisor and resident social media security expert, points out that bullying by peers on Facebook is a more common problem than stalking by sexual predators. Further, there aren’t too many teenagers alive who can’t figure out some way of avoiding parents on Facebook or any of the many other social networks teens flock to.
But Sean does see a value in parents joining Facebook. But instead of chasing your kid around the site, ask him or her to show you how to use it, specifically the privacy controls. “Based on that discussion, parents can make judgments about their children’s online behavior,” Sean says.
That’s a savvy idea.
Now, I want to get a little personal—if you don’t mind. I’m wondering how many of you parents are Facebook friends with your kids. Also, how many of you are friends with your parents? Sorry, but the first poll is only for those of you who have kids.
View This Poll
online surveys View This Poll
customer surveys
Thanks for your time,Jason
CC image credit: Victor Bezrukov
Protecting your data is as easy as making a call
For a long time, I had an old, basic mobile phone, good for the occasional call or text message. There was no software available for backing up my phone on my PC, and I would write all my contact numbers in a physical address book in case I ever lost my phone.
Now I have a smartphone and I am still adjusting to it. It is my calendar, my notebook, my dictaphone, my camera and I even use it for making the occasional call. It seems like smartphones have replaced at least 15 different devices.
I have it backed up. However, I don’t explore its features the way I would if I were placed in front of a personal computer. I’ve been holding back.
I hate to say it, but I even held back with exploring my F-Secure security settings. I’ve been an exploratory computer user for years, poking around just to ‘see what happens’ and trusting that no serious or irreversible side-effects will occur. Yet with my phone I held back until a few weeks ago when, in anticipation of our new and improved Mobile Security offering, which is now available for Android, I finally took the time to explore the settings.
I’d known my firewall and anti-virus updates were up and running, which is another reason why exploring had not been so urgent for me. What I had not activated were the anti-theft settings. The best bit! Phones get lost, damaged and stolen far more often than they suffer virus attacks right now. In the future this is bound to change, but for now I think it’s a good idea to ensure you have your anti-theft settings in place.
I opened the anti-theft settings in my own phone and looked at the screen telling me about the locking and wiping functions. The idea was simple, great even. All I had to do was read a few lines of explanation to find that my phone would only lock if I sent a special text message, and I could even wipe the SIM card if I knew for sure that it had been stolen. There was no default pass code to look up in a manual, I could set it myself first time and give it a pass code that no-one could guess but me.
I enabled the Anti-Theft on my mobile phone in no time at all and it was easy.
F-Secure Anti-Theft also has a “Locate” feature. If I ever lose my phone I know exactly what to do to find it: I just text #locate#<and my pass code here> to my own number.
I’m so keen to try it that I might have to hide my phone somewhere and test it out.
Don’t post and regret
In my last post I raised the issue of cyberstalking. Even if the situation is somewhat difficult from the legal perspective, the Finnish police, for instance, is doing a magnificent job in making its presence know in social media.
On Facebook they are being active on their own page, talking about their regular activities, participating and getting a discussion started. They are also present on a Finnish web service, IRC-galleria, a web service where especially youngsters upload pictures and comment on them. Three brave police officers have created profiles to help out those who might have been bullied and and in general to be available for those in need of advice. I think this is a great approach and example on how authorities can provide help and reach out to us in the places where we actually go.
However, there are things you can do to make sure you don’t even need to contact the police. Here are my tips for dos and don’ts for Facebook.
1. Never ever insult anybody in your status update, on your wall or any other posts. This is what could happen to you. In the worst case, you might end up in a lawsuit for offending someone.
2. When posting photos, always, ALWAYS, check it is ok for the persons in the picture. You wouldn’t want your friend, or even worse, you yourself ending up on a after a hilarious bar night out with friends.
3. Everything you publish on Facebook, every status update, every wall post, every like, every group you join, will be logged and remembered in the future. So think twice – what do you want people to know about you in 20 years. And think twice about which people you want to have as your friends.
4. Be sure to protect your privacy. Read more on how in Jason’s blogpost.
Cheers,
GiaImage by César Astudillo
A New Site to Help You Navigate Health Insurance - Kiplinger
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What kind of information does the new HealthCare.gov Web site provide?
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ HealthCare.gov makes it easy to learn about all of your personal health-insurance options. The site, created in just the 100 days after the health-care-reform law was passed, launched on July 1. After you enter answers to a few questions (such as your state, age range and health status), the site immediately lists all of the private insurance plans in your area, as well as public programs you may qualify for -- such as the new Pre-Existing Condition Insurance Plan (the high-risk pool created by the health-care-reform law), any existing high-risk pool in your state, the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) and Medicaid -- with detailed information about coverage and eligibility criteria for each program in your state.
Related Links
- SPECIAL REPORT: Health-Care Reform and You
- The Quest for Health Insurance
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- Make the Most of Health Reform
- Beware of Health Reform Scams
The site also explains the new rules for covering young adults under age 26 and laws governing job-based health coverage (and protections if you lose your job or exhaust your COBRA coverage). And it provides links to hospitals and health-care facilities that offer free or below-cost health care to low-income people.
This is the first time that all of the public and private options have been listed in one place and personalized, which was a major undertaking because some health-care programs are national, some state-based and some local.
The government used its muscle to gather comprehensive information about the private health-insurance programs, which had been difficult to navigate in the past. The site includes more than 1,000 insurance companies with more than 5,500 plan offerings. Type in your zip code, and you’ll see a list of each company offering health insurance in your area. Click on “View Plans” next to an insurer’s name to get a list of plans you can buy from it. You’ll also see links to the insurer’s list of services covered, provider network (with the insurer’s tool to check for your doctors), drug coverage and more information.
If any of the links that an insurer provided did not include useful information, the site’s creators put “Correct Link Not Provided” in that topic’s allotted space. “When we made our first request [to insurers], we got some good information and some sketchy information,” says Kathleen Sebelius, Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. “We told them they’d be side by side with their competitors, and they stepped up their game a bit. I’m a believer that competition starts with transparency, and it’s hard to get a competitive market if people don’t know what it looks like.”
The site doesn’t include pricing information for private plans yet -- that’s slated to be added in October. And even then, the prices won’t be precise because insurers can base premiums for individual and small-group coverage on people’s medical conditions until 2014. But you’ll still be able to get an idea of how their standard rates stack up against each other. And you’ll eventually see each insurer’s “medical loss ratio,” which will show the percentage of the insurer’s premiums spent on medical expenses versus administrative costs.
HealthCare.gov is a great first stop for anyone who is searching for health-care options. But you’ll still need to explore further to do a comprehensive search for health insurance. To get price quotes based on your specific health condition and to buy a policy, you can go to eHealthInsurance.com, contact a local health-insurance broker (you can find some at www.nahu.org) or contact the insurer directly. But by going to HealthCare.gov first, you’ll know whether there are other insurers in the area that don’t appear at eHealthInsurance.com or aren’t sold by your local broker.
Your state insurance department may include pricing information for insurers doing business in the area on its Web site (you can find links to state insurance departments at www.naic.org). The state site may also have market-conduct reports and complaint ratios for insurance companies, which can help you avoid companies that have a history of hassling people at claim time. You can also check complaint ratios (the insurer’s U.S. market share of closed complaints compared with the company’s U.S. market share of premiums) at the National Association of Insurance Commissioners Consumer Information Source. And you can find some additional information about public programs available in your area at www.coverageforall.org.
If you visit HealthCare.gov, please share your experience in the comment box below.
Beware of Phony Online Car Dealers - Kiplinger
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Scammers are creating Web sites with the names of real auto dealers and offering too-good-to-be-true deals on repossessed cars, according to the Better Business Bureau. People across the country already have lost thousands of dollars by buying nonexistent cars, according to BBB.
For example, Memphis dealership America Auto Sales (www.memphisautoworld.com) received more than 1,000 calls from car shoppers who shopped on a phony site (www.americaautosales.com) thinking it was Memphis dealership's site, according to BBB. Buyers were told to wire a deposit to an individual -- rather than the company -- and pay the balance when the car was delivered. The phony site claimed that this payment method would help the company avoid taxes legally. After paying, several victims called America Auto Sales to arrange delivery of their cars -- and some even showed up at the dealership.
Related Links
The BBB says similar Web sites have posed as dealerships in Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Michigan, New Mexico and Texas. To protect yourself when shopping online for cars, follow these tips:
Be suspicious of ridiculously low offers. Before buying a car, check Kelley Blue Book to find out what its market value is.
Verify that the vehicle exists. Start by getting a phone number from the seller and calling him or her (don't rely solely on e-mail communication). Ask the seller to send you a copy of the vehicle registration and the VIN, which you can use to get a vehicle history report from CARFAX.
Mind your money and personal information. When paying, don't send a personal check or wire money (a request to do so can be a scam). Do not give out your Social Security number.
N.Y. police: Dog dies in hot car while owner swims
N.Y. police: Dog dies in hot car while owner swims
July 07, 2010YORKTOWN HEIGHTS, N.Y. (AP) — A New York City man has been charged with letting his dog die in a 140-degree car while he went out for a swim.
Ken Ross, chief investigator for the SPCA in Westchester County, said Wednesday that Heriberto Palacio had gone for a swim at Franklin D. Roosevelt State Park in Yorktown Heights on Monday.
Temperatures were in the 90s outside. Ross says that 41-year-old Palacio left two windows open about 2 inches and left his 6-pound Maltese dog in the parked van.
Another park patron noticed the dog convulsing and notified park police. Ross said the police broke in and tried to revive the dog but it died.
Ross says Palacio was arrested and charged with animal cruelty. There was no phone listing for Palacio.
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