Month: July 2017

Enlarge (credit: Today is a good day)

Quantum key distribution is supposed to provide a high degree of certainty in the security of secret keys. That certainty is based on the laws of physics, and all attacks against quantum keys have exploited implementation weaknesses, rather than the underlying physics. Unlike mathematical methods of encryption, quantum key distribution does not provide a key that is difficult to figure out. Instead, the nature of the key generation process allows any interloper to be detected—you know if your key is secret or not.

At present, quantum key distribution is limited to about 70km to 100km between the two nodes, because fiber optical cables tend to absorb the photons used to carry the key. To provide end-to-end distribution between, say, Paris and Berlin, you either need to trust the third parties in between (so each node has its own pair of keys that it has generated with neighboring nodes) or have a quantum memory at each node. A quantum memory allows you to store each qubit and then teleport its state to the next node. At the end of the key-generation process, teleporting ensures that a single shared key is generated between the end-points, and the intermediate nodes have no knowledge of the key.

Therein lies a weakness: maybe the memories at the intermediate can be exploited, allowing a secret key to be intercepted without detection. To close that particular exploit, a group of researchers has proposed a clever way to scramble a quantum memory.

Enlarge / John Oliver takes on FCC Chairman Ajit Pai in net neutrality segment. (credit: HBO Last Week Tonight)

The US Federal Communications Commission says it has no written analysis of DDoS attacks that hit the commission's net neutrality comment system in May.

In its response to a Freedom of Information Act (FoIA) request filed by Gizmodo, the FCC said its analysis of DDoS attacks "stemmed from real time observation and feedback by Commission IT staff and did not result in written documentation." Gizmodo had asked for a copy of any records related to the FCC analysis that concluded DDoS attacks had taken place. Because there was no "written documentation," the FCC provided no documents in response to this portion of the Gizmodo FoIA request.

The FCC also declined to release 209 pages of records, citing several exemptions to the FoIA law. For example, publication of documents related to "staffing decisions made by Commission supervisors, draft talking points, staff summaries of congressional letters, and policy suggestions from staff" could "harm the Commission’s deliberative processes," the FCC said. "Release of this information would chill deliberations within the Commission and impede the candid exchange of ideas."

Enlarge / Appropriately enough, I don't see the Blizzard Launcher on this familiar Windows XP desktop image...

If you're using an operating system that's over a decade old to play Blizzard games, we have some bad news for you. Starting in October, Blizzard says it will "begin the process of ending support for Windows XP and Windows Vista in World of Warcraft, StarCraft II, Diablo III, Hearthstone, and Heroes of the Storm."

The fact that Blizzard was still supporting these long-in-the-tooth Microsoft OSes (XP launched in 2001, Vista launched in early 2007) says something about the long tail of low-end hardware that the company targets alongside top-of-the-line modern systems. Though Microsoft dropped mainstream support for Windows XP and Windows Vista years ago—and ceased issuing security fixes for the operating systems in 2014 (with another issued earlier this year)—Blizzard says that a "decent portion of our audience was still using" the platforms long after Microsoft left them for dead. Three major Windows releases later, though, the "vast majority of our audience has upgraded" to a more recent OS, Blizzard says.

Windows XP's longevity was something of an outlier in the world of PC operating systems, still seeing significant adoption a decade after its launch. When Microsoft finally pulled the plug on mainstream support for the OS in 2014, it was still running on 29 percent of web users' PCs. Even today, XP commands a surprising 6.4 percent of all desktop web users, according to NetMarketShare, far ahead of Vista's 0.53 percent.