Month: August 2021

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Let’s say you’re a large company that has just shipped an employee a brand-new replacement laptop. And let’s say it comes preconfigured to use all the latest best security practices, including full-disk encryption using a trusted platform module, password-protected BIOS settings, UEFI SecureBoot, and virtually all other recommendations from the National Security Agency and NIST for locking down federal computer systems. And let’s say an attacker manages to intercept the machine. Can the attacker use it to hack your network?

Research published last week shows the answer is a resounding yes. Not only that, but a hacker who has done her homework needs a surprisingly short stretch of time alone with the machine to carry out the attack. With that, the hacker can gain the ability to write not only to the stolen laptop, but to the fortified network it was configured to connect to.

Researchers at the security consultancy Dolos Group, hired to test the security of one client’s network, received a new Lenovo computer preconfigured to use the standard security stack for the organization. They received no test credentials, configuration details, or other information about the machine. An analysis of the BIOS settings, boot operation, and hardware quickly revealed that the security measures in place were going to preclude the usual hacks, including:

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  Boeing, NASA, and ULA are prepared to get the second Orbital Flight Test underway, no earlier than 1:20:18pm ET on August 3, 2021. [credit: Trevor Mahlmann ]

Five days before Christmas, in 2019, Boeing could finally look ahead to the future with a little bit of hope.

It had been a miserable year for the massive aerospace company. After the second crash of a 737 MAX aircraft in March killed all 149 passengers and eight crew members, Boeing's newest and much ballyhooed aircraft was grounded around the world. Orders were canceled. Billions of dollars were lost. Families were understandably aggrieved. Boeing would eventually be charged with fraud and forced to pay more than $2.5 billion to settle the claims.

But by late December the company's space unit had a chance to save the year. Boeing had spent the better part of a decade building its Starliner spacecraft to carry NASA astronauts to the International Space Station. It had not been easy. Long accustomed to cost-plus contracts, Boeing's space division found itself competing with SpaceX and its more nimble approach to space systems development. With a fixed-price contract, Boeing had to closely watch costs and eat any overruns. Yet, Boeing had persevered, with Starliner sitting atop an Atlas V rocket.

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  This is Cadillac's final generation of internal combustion-powered sports sedans, and the company is going out on a high with the 472-hp CT4-V Blackwing. In fact, this might be my new favorite performance sedan. [credit: Jonathan Gitlin ]

ALTON, Va.—The age of the internal combustion engine is drawing to a close. Cadillac is marking the occasion with a pair of V-series performance sedans that will be the last of their kind to run on gasoline. We have to wait another week to tell you about one of them, but as of today, all discussion of the 2022 CT4-V Blackwing is fair game. That means I am now allowed to say that Cadillac's final-ever V6-powered performance car might actually be its best-ever performance car. Like other cars of this kind, the Blackwing is overkill for the street. But when clad in downforce-generating carbon fiber dive planes and splitters, it will engage and reward you on track like few others.

V-Series makes its last gasoline cars

First introduced in 2004, the V-series cars are Cadillac's answer to Audi Sport's RS cars, the machines of BMW's M Division, and the mighty Mercedes-AMGs. But when the American luxury brand first revealed the CT4-V to the world in May 2019, I declared it "more jalapeño than habanero." That was because its 2.7 L V6 offered just 320 hp (240 kW) compared to the 464-hp (346 kW) ATS-V it was replacing.

At the time, GM's vice president of global products told us that "not all customers want track time." That was the explanation Cadillac gave for watering things down (or alternatively broadening its appeal) with less powerful, cheaper V-series cars. But evidently Cadillac realized that some of its customers very much wanted track time—or at least something comparable to a BMW M3 or Alfa Romeo Giulia Quadrifoglio—which is why it developed the $59,990, 472 hp (352 kW), 445 lb-ft (603 Nm), 3.6 L twin-turbo V6 CT4-V Blackwing.