Accessing Publicly Available Information on the Internet Is Not a Crime

According to CBC News (April 16, 2018) a 19-year-old is facing a criminal charge for downloading files from Nova Scotia's freedom-of-information portal. The teen has been charged with "unauthorized use of a computer," which carries a possible 10-year prison sentence, for downloading approximately 7,000 freedom-of-information releases.

The vast majority of these files were already publicly available, and had been redacted prior to release to remove any personal information.

But about 250 of the reports were prepared for Nova Scotians requesting their own government files. These un-redacted records contained sensitive personal information, and were never intended for public release.

These documents were hosted on the government web server that also hosted public records containing no personal information. Every request hosted on the server contained very similar URLs, which differed only in a single document ID number at the end of the URL. The teenager took a known ID number, and then, by modifying the URL, retrieved and stored all of the FOIA documents available on the Nova Scotia FOIA website. 

Canadian authorities should drop charges against a 19-year-old Canadian accused of "unauthorized use of a computer service" for downloading thousands of public records hosted and available to all on a government website. The whole episode is an embarrassing overreach that chills the right of access to public records and threatens important security research.

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It is important to be aware that any information that is posted to a publicly accessible web-site may accessed by the public. Some people may download that information, read it, re-post it, etc. Accessing publically accessible information is not a crime. It is not unauthorized use of a computer, cyber-stalking, hacking, or whatever other foolishness the government wants to charge.

If you don't want the public to access information, don't put it on a public web-site, or at a minimum if you must post it on-line, make sure that it is encrypted and password protected.

Password Generators

In January 2018, I wrote about generating random passwords by using a 6x6 matrix, and by using Dice Ware. These are excellent methods when you don't have access to a computer, but in most cases where we need to generate strong passwords it is because we are going to use them in some type of computer application and thus we have computer access.

If you use a password manager (and you should) it probably has a built-in password generator. However, there are also several password generators on-line that you can use to quickly generate random passwords.

Some of these password generators are listed below (may favorites are Random.Org and Gibson Research). 

Random.Org

Gibson Research

Norton Identity Safe

Last Pass

Dashlane

XKPasswd

Privacy Tools

Secure Password Generator

---  Password Strength Checkers ---

Password strength checkers let you estimate the security of various password formats. Never enter you actual password into an on-line password strength checker, rather use them to help understand the strengths and weaknesses of different password schemes.

How Secure is My Password? (Dashlane)

Password Meter

Kaspersky

On-line security tips from Password Generator Net (Secure Password Generator)

To prevent your passwords from being hacked by social engineering, brute force or dictionary attack method, and keep your online accounts safe, you should notice that:

1. Do not use the same password, security question and answer for multiple important accounts.

2. Use a password that has at least 16 characters, use at least one number, one uppercase letter, one lowercase letter and one special symbol.

3. Do not use the names of your families, friends or pets in your passwords.

4. Do not use postcodes, house numbers, phone numbers, birthdates, ID card numbers, social security numbers, and so on in your passwords.

5. Do not use any dictionary word in your passwords. 

6. Do not use two or more similar passwords which most of their characters are same, for example, ilovefreshflowersMac, ilovefreshflowersDropBox, since if one of these passwords is stolen, then it means that all of these passwords are stolen.

7. Do not use something that can be cloned ( but you can't change ) as your passwords, such as your fingerprints.

8. Do not let your Web browsers( FireFox, Chrome, Safari, Opera, IE ) to store your passwords, since all passwords saved in Web browsers can be revealed easily.

9. Do not log in to important accounts on the computers of others, or when connected to a public Wi-Fi hotspot, Tor, free VPN or web proxy.

10. Do not send sensitive information online via unencrypted( e.g. HTTP or FTP ) connections, because messages in these connections can be sniffed with very little effort. You should use encrypted connections such as HTTPS, SFTP, FTPS, SMTPS, IPSec whenever possible.

11. When travelling, you can encrypt your Internet connections before they leave your laptop, tablet, mobile phone or router. For example, you can set up a private VPN( with MS-CHAP v2 or stronger protocols ) on your own server( home computer, dedicated server or VPS ) and connect to it.

Alternatively, you can set up an encrypted SSH tunnel between your router and your home computer( or a remote server of your own ) with PuTTY and connect your programs( e.g. FireFox ) to PuTTY.

Then even if somebody captures your data as it is transmitted between your device( e.g. laptop, iPhone, iPad ) and your server with a packet sniffer, they'll won't be able to steal your data and passwords from the encrypted streaming data.

12. How secure is my password? Perhaps you believe that your passwords are very strong, difficult to hack. But if a hacker has stolen your username and the MD5 hash value of your password from a company's server, and the rainbow table of the hacker contains this MD5 hash, then your password will be cracked quickly. To check the strength of your passwords and know whether they're inside the popular rainbow tables, you can convert your passwords to MD5 hashes on a MD5 hash generator, then decrypt your passwords by submitting these hashes to an online MD5 decryption service. For instance, your password is "0123456789A", using the brute-force method, it may take a computer almost one year to crack your password, but if you decrypt it by submitting its MD5 hash( C8E7279CD035B23BB9C0F1F954DFF5B3 ) to a MD5 decryption website, how long will it take to crack it? You can perform the test yourself.

13. It's recommended to change your passwords every 10 weeks.

14. It's recommended that you remember a few master passwords, store other passwords in a plain text file and encrypt this file with 7-Zip, GPG or a disk encryption software such as BitLocker, or manage your passwords with a password management software.

15. Encrypt and backup your passwords to different locations, then if you lost access to your computer or account, you can retrieve your passwords back quickly.

16. Turn on 2-step authentication whenever possible.

17. Do not store your critical passwords in the cloud.

18. Access important websites( e.g. Paypal ) from bookmarks directly, otherwise please check its domain name carefully, it's a good idea to check the popularity of a website with Alexa toolbar to ensure that it's not a phishing site before entering your password.

19. Protect your computer with firewall and antivirus software, block all incoming connections and all unnecessary outgoing connections with the firewall. Download software from reputable sites only, and verify the MD5 / SHA1 / SHA256 checksum or GPG signature of the installation package whenever possible.

20. Keep the operating systems( e.g. Windows 7, Windows 10, Mac OS X, iOS, Linux ) and Web browsers( e.g. FireFox, Chrome, IE, Microsoft Edge ) of your devices( e.g. Windows PC, Mac PC, iPhone, iPad, Android tablet ) up-to-date by installing the latest security update.

21. If there are important files on your computer, and it can be accessed by others, check if there are hardware keyloggers ( e.g. wireless keyboard sniffer ), software keyloggers and hidden cameras when you feel it's necessary.

22. If there are WIFI routers in your home, then it's possible to know the passwords you typed( in your neighbor's house ) by detecting the gestures of your fingers and hands, since the WIFI signal they received will change when you move your fingers and hands. You can use an on-screen keyboard to type your passwords in such cases, it would be more secure if this virtual keyboard( or soft keyboard ) changes layouts every time.

23. Lock your computer and mobile phone when you leave them.

24. Encrypt the entire hard drive with LUKS or similar tools before putting important files on it, and destroy the hard drive of your old devices physically if it's necessary.

25. Access important websites in private or incognito mode, or use one Web browser to access important websites, use another one to access other sites. Or access unimportant websites and install new software inside a virtual machine created with VMware, VirtualBox or Parallels.

26. Use at least 3 different email addresses, use the first one to receive emails from important sites and Apps, such as Paypal and Amazon, use the second one to receive emails from unimportant sites and Apps, use the third one( from a different email provider, such as Outlook and GMail ) to receive your password-reset email when the first one( e.g. Yahoo Mail ) is hacked.

27. Use at least 2 different phone numbers, do NOT tell others the phone number which you use to receive text messages of the verification codes.

28. Do not click the link in an email or SMS message, do not reset your passwords by clicking them, except that you know these messages are not fake.

29. Do not tell your passwords to anybody in the email.

30. It's possible that one of the software or App you downloaded or updated has been modified by hackers, you can avoid this problem by not installing this software or App at the first time, except that it's published to fix security holes. You can use Web based apps instead, which are more secure and portable.

31. Be careful when using online paste tools and screen capture tools, do not let them to upload your passwords to the cloud.

32. If you're a webmaster, do not store the users passwords, security questions and answers as plain text in the database, you should store the salted ( SHA1, SHA256 or SHA512 )hash values of of these strings instead. It's recommended to generate a unique random salt string for each user. In addition, it's a good idea to log the user's device information( e.g. OS version, screen resolution, etc. ) and save the salted hash values of them, then when he/she try to login with the correct password but his/her device information does NOT match the previous saved one, let this user to verify his/her identity by entering another verification code sent via SMS or email.

33. If you are a software developer, you should publish the update package signed with a private key using GnuPG, and verify the signature of it with the public key published previously.

34. To keep your online business safe, you should register a domain name of your own, and set up an email account with this domain name, then you'll not lose your email account and all your contacts, since your can host your mail server anywhere, your email account can't be disabled by the email provider.

35. If an online shopping site only allows to make payment with credit cards, then you should use a virtual credit card instead.

36. Close your web browser when you leave your computer, otherwise the cookies can be intercepted with a small USB device easily, making it possible to bypass two-step verification and log into your account with stolen cookies on other computers.

37. Distrust and remove bad SSL certificates from your Web browser, otherwise you will NOT be able to ensure the confidentiality and integrity of the HTTPS connections which use these certificates.

38. Encrypt the entire system partition, otherwise please disable the pagefile and hibernation functions, since it's possible to find your important documents in the pagefile.sys and hiberfil.sys files.

39. To prevent brute force login attacks to your dedicated servers, VPS servers or cloud servers, you can install an intrusion detection and prevention software such as LFD( Login Failure Daemon ) or Fail2Ban.

Wickr "On Password Protection"

A white paper "On Password Protection" by Joël Alwen, Wickr Cryptography.

This white paper is an excellent overview of password use on the Wickr Me platform. It also provides information on password protection in general. I like Wickr Me as a secure communications platform, and recommend reading this white paper if you also use Wickr.

Counter Extremism Project

The Counter Extremism Project (CEP) is a not-for-profit, non-partisan, international policy organization formed to combat the growing threat from extremist ideologies. Led by a renowned group of former world leaders and diplomats it combats extremism by pressuring financial and material support networks; countering the narrative of extremists and their online recruitment; and advocating for smart laws, policies, and regulations.

The Failure Drill Revisited

During the Mozambique war of independence, a mercenary named Mike Rousseau had occasion to be jumped by a terrorist at very close range. Rousseau applied two shots from his pistol, I believe it was a Hi Power, to the vital zone of his attacker. The results were not satisfying, as the attacker stayed on his feet and remained a threat. Rousseau then tried for a head shot, instead hitting the bad guy high in the throat and severing the spinal column which ended the encounter.

Sometime afterward, Col. Jeff Cooper heard about the incident and incorporated it into a Gunsite training exercise that he called the Mozambique Drill. For whatever reason, over the years, the exercise has come to be called "The Failure Drill."

So what do you do when an attacker is hopped up on drugs, or wearing body armor and your shots to center of mass are not having the desired effect? This article in the American Rifleman revisits that question.

This YouTube video from Richard Mann demonstrates the Failure Drill.

Active Shooter - Should You Be Armed?

An active shooter is an individual actively engaged in killing or attempting to kill people in a confined and populated area, with no distinctive time period between the shootings.  In most cases there is no pattern or method to the active shooter’s selection of victims.  Active shooter situations are unpredictable and evolve very quickly.

Studies conducted by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) found that the average active shooter incident lasts just 12 minutes, with 37% of active shooter incidents lasting less than five minutes.  The average time for law enforcement to respond to an active shooter incident was 18 minutes.  Forty-three percent of the time an active shooter incident was over before the arrival of law enforcement.  When law enforcement arrived while the shooter was still active, he often stopped his attack – turning his attention toward the responding law enforcement officers.  

What the available research clearly showed was that during an active shooter incident, the people with the ability to react to and stop an active shooter are the shooter’s potential victims, the people on scene when the active shooter incident begins.  Once an active shooter is confronted with an armed response the active shooting incident usually ends.  The active shooter may be shot by the armed responder, take his own life (commit suicide), or focus his attack on the armed responder, but in each case that active shooter is no longer randomly murdering the people around him. 

The effect of an armed response was seen in December 2013, during an active shooter incident at Arapahoe High School in Centennial, CO.  As the shooting began, James Englert, a sheriff’s deputy assigned as the school resource officer, ran toward the sound of the gun fire and confronted the shooter.  Once confronted by Deputy Englert the shooter stopped targeting the students around him in the school and took his own life.  The time from beginning to end of this active shooter incident was just 80 seconds, because a good guy with a gun was present to stop the bad guy with a gun.

In December 2012, Nick Meli confronted an active shooter in the Clackamas Town Center, near Portland, OR.  Meli drew his concealed handgun and aimed it at the active shooter but was unable to get a clear shot off for fear of hitting innocent people running behind the shooter.  Meli reported that after the active shooter saw him with his pistol ready to shoot, there was only one more shot fired when the active shooter committed suicide, ending his own life.  As with the active shooter incident in Centennial, CO once the active shooter was met with an armed response the incident ended with the criminal killing himself.    

In January 2014, an active shooter entered a club in Portland, OR and began shooting customers. The active shooter first shot the club’s security guard, and then shot two other people in the club.  Before the active shooter could shoot anyone else an armed private citizen in the club drew his concealed handgun and shot the attacker, ending the incident.  This active shooter incident ended without further death or injury because again a good guy with a gun was present to stop the bad guy with a gun.
    
Colorado State Rep. Carole Murray stated: “Most of the mass killings that we talk about have been affected in gun free zones.  So when you have a gun free zone, it’s like saying, come and get me.”  John Wills (2013) writing for Officer.Com stated: “the venues selected by the bad guys are often ‘soft targets… gun-free zones,’ where it’s likely the shooter will encounter minimal or no resistance.” Nick Dial (2013) commenting in Law Enforcement Today stated: “The largest disconnect from reality currently responsible for more school shooting victims than any other is the so-called ‘gun free zone.’ The ‘gun free zone’ continues to be pushed as a mainstay for schools.  In reality, it does nothing to protect the individual.  Instead, such zones bar law-abiding citizens from their fundamental right of defense.”  A 2009 Washington Times editorial pointed out that even our military installations are gun free zones, putting our Service Members at risk from active shooters.

Time after time, public murder sprees occur in “gun-free zones” - public places where citizens are not legally able to carry guns. The list is long, including massacres at Virginia Tech and Columbine High School along with many less deadly attacks. Last week’s [November 5, 2009] slaughter at Fort Hood Army base in Texas was no different... terrorists would face more return fire if they attacked a Texas Wal-Mart than the gunman faced at Fort Hood, home of the heavily armed and feared 1st Cavalry Division... [Military personnel are prohibited from carrying a personal firearm on base, even if they possess a state concealed weapons permit.] 

Most people understand that guns deter criminals. Research also shows that the presence of more guns limits the damage mass murderers can unleash. A major factor in determining how many people are harmed by these killers is the time that elapses between the launch of an attack and when someone - soldier, civilian or law enforcement - arrives on the scene with a gun to end the attack. All the public shootings in the United States in which more than three people have been killed have occurred in places where concealed handguns have been banned.

Thirteen dead bodies in a Texas morgue are the ultimate fruit of gun-control illogic - in which guns are so feared that government regulation even tries to keep them out of the hands of trained soldiers. (Washington Times 2009)

While available data did not indicate that a gun free zone was a primary factor for active shooters selecting their targets, the fact remains that most active shooter events have occurred in facilities where possession of firearms was prohibited.  Gun free zones do nothing whatsoever to prevent violent criminals from attacking you, nor do they in anyway protect you against an active shooter.  A criminal bent on murder is not going to be deterred because his target is in a gun free zone.  Gun free zones do however ensure that law-abiding individuals will be unarmed and thus defenseless when confronted by an armed violent criminal.
      
Law enforcement response to an active shooter incident will always be delayed to some extent.  No matter how quickly the police arrive, there will be some delay from the time they receive the call until they arrive on scene.  During this time the active shooter is free to continue his shooting spree, unless stopped by an armed person at the incident scene.  The Sonora, CA Police Department (2013) stated: “Because active shooter incidents are often over within 5-15 minutes, before Law Enforcement arrives on scene, individuals must be prepared both mentally and physically to deal with an active shooter situation.” 

If you find yourself in an active shooter situation, your best chance for survival is to flee the area if you can do so without being observed by the shooter.  If you are unable to make it to an exit without coming into the shooter’s field of fire, you may be able to temporarily hide from the shooter and thereby avoid being shot, but you must be prepared to move and escape the area as soon as the shooter’s attention is focused elsewhere.  However, when you come face-to-face with an armed violent criminal intent on killing you, your only real option for survival is to be armed yourself and trained to use your firearm to defend yourself and those around you.

References

Dial, Nick. (2013). “Gun-free zones: A threat to every child.” Law Enforcement Today. August 4, 2013. http://lawenforcementtoday.com/2013/08/04/gun-free-zones-a-threat-to-every-child/
Follman, Mark. (2013). “Opinion flashback: NRA’s gun-free zone myth.” USA Today. September 18, 2013. http://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2013/03/24/nras-gun-free-zone-myth--column/2015657/
Harwood, Matthew. (2012). “Researchers offer new solution to active shooter mitigation.” Security Management. August 10, 2012. http://www.securitymanagement.com/news/researchers-offer-new-solution-active-shooter-mitigation-0010209
Murgado, Amaury. (2013). “Quicker response to active shooters.” Police: The Law Enforcement Magazine. October 16, 2013. http://www.policemag.com/channel/patrol/articles/2013/10/quicker-response-to-active-shooters.aspx
Richardson, Valerie. (2013). “Colo. governor says active-shooter protocol saved lives at school.” The Washington Times. December 15, 2013. http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/dec/15/colo-governor-says-active-shooter-protocol-saved-l/?page=all
Schweit, Katherine W. (2013). “Addressing the problem of the active shooter.” FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin. May 7, 2013. http://www.fbi.gov/stats-services/publications/law-enforcement-bulletin/2013/May/active-shooter
Sernoffsky, Evan. (2014). “Gunman hits 3 before being shot by bystander at Portland club.” KGW News. January 12, 2014 on Northwest Cable News. http://www.nwcn.com/news/oregon/Gunman-hits-3-before-being-shot-by-bystander-at-Portland-strip-club-239845821.html
Sonora, CA Police Department. (2013). “Information on active shooter incidents.” January 4, 2013. http://www.sonorapd.com/information-on-active-shooter-incidents/
Terry, Lynne. (2012). “Clackamas Town Center shooting: Man says he had shooter in his sights, but chose safety over firing.” The Oregonian. December 17, 2012. http://www.oregonlive.com/clackamascounty/index.ssf/2012/12/security_guard_said_he_had_rob.html
Washington Times Editorial. (2009). “End Clinton-era military base gun ban.” The Washington Times. November 11, 2009. http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/nov/11/end-clinton-era-military-base-gun-ban/   
Wills, John. (2013). “What we know about active shooters”. Officer.Com March 4, 2013. http://www.officer.com/article/10887915/what-we-know-about-active-shooters   

CryptoCat

Cryptocat is free software with a simple mission: everyone should be able to chat with their friends in privacy.

In an interconnected world where everyone is watching - not just malicious hackers but even the government - privacy and security of your communication is more important than ever.

With Cryptocat, you can rest easy with the knowledge that your messages are secure and encrypted, from sending to receiving.

With Cryptocat, all messages are encrypted by default, and are "Forward Secure," meaning they can't be decrypted even if your keys are stolen. One Cryptocat account across multiple devices will be able to receive your "Forward Secure" messages even when you're offline.

Cryptocat provides users with the ability to share documents, video recordings, photos and other such media.

Cryptocat is cross-platform, available on Windows, Linux, and Mac. Its code is completely open-source and transparent, allowing anyone to review and verify the quality of its security.

• Open source. All Cryptocat software is published transparently.
• Encrypted by default. Every message is encrypted, always.
• Forward secure. Chats are safe even if your keys are stolen.
• Multiple devices. Devices receive messages even when offline.
• File sharing. Securely share files with friends.

To create a Cryptocat account you simply choose a user name (that is not already in use) and a strong password. There is no need to associate your Cryptocat account with an e-mail address or a telephone number.

The Cryptocat's chat server is located in the Bahnhof Bunker, in Sweden.