The DMZ

On this episode of adventures into J.Js life - he spent all last night staring into the monitor like a complete moron, went to bed at 1:00, got up, got a Red Bull and went to work :upside_down:

forest

What a cliffhanger.

Journeyman Geek

you went to work upside down?

Anonymous

sighs I literally cannot find the energy to be productive lately, not only not the energy but just the motivation or the will.

Journeyman Geek

also, that's what most of us do every day. Only the beverage changes

Anonymous

I just get home and stare into the screen and do nothing.

Anonymous

8:57 AM

Oh well, I'm only 18, I'm sure I got plenty more years left to learn.

forest

Unless you get hit by a bus tomorrow and die.

Anonymous

Yeah that could happen of course...

Anonymous

Anyways, I'm sure I'll find the motivation soon.

Anonymous

Maybe after these long, long 20~ days pass...

forest

9:23 AM

Bring me Han Solo

Tweeted by FacesPics on January 21, 2019 at 11:31 PM

Anonymous

I'm too young for star wars lol

Journeyman Geek

9:42 AM

You see sir, I have this small field of grass, also known as a lawn. I suggest you vacate it, posthaste... ;p

(also just cause you're too young dosen't mean you can't enjoy it. I kinda only watched a lot of that era's great sci fi years later)

Then there's bladerunner

the show which left me confused cause I ended up watching 3 different cuts in bits over the course of a decade....

(the original cut had a voiceover the studio forced in... there were 3 other cuts after that...)

feersum

10:32 AM

Does anyone have an opinion on what extent CTFs teach industry-relevant skills?

You see I'm afraid by the analogy with algorithm contests.

I enjoy algorithm contests and it helped me get by current job BUT there is nearly zero connection to the day-to-day work.

Anonymous

11:03 AM

@feersum You're right, there isn't a connection between CTF & day-day work but, they help you think outside the box, that is a skill which is very, very useful.

Anonymous

They really allow you to build an ability to think obscurely and sometimes that is required in day-day work.

Anonymous

Sometimes an obscure solution is required, ctf help you build that outside the box thinking style.

feersum

Ah well, I feel obscure enough already.

Tom K.

@feersum there is quite some overlap

but you have to get gud first <:

5aelo (relatively "famous" CTFer) just got hired by GPZ

feersum

I mean skills excluding the ability to get hired :)

What is GPZ?

Anonymous

11:23 AM

@feersum I don't think you can ever be "obscure" enough.

Anonymous

CTF teaches you some really great thinking skills which I don't think should be undervalued at all.

Anonymous

Also, it is just fun!

feersum

Well, I've done a lot of code golf.

Anonymous

I also now have learnt to be a lot more patient from CTFs.

Anonymous

And just various other skills which I enjoy.

Tom K.

12:08 PM

@feersum Google Project Zero

2 hours later…

Tom K.

2:02 PM

So I wanted to encrypt some files. Thought about using 7z+password. Stackexchange folks said "Didn't review it but it should be fine. You can browse the code yourself". So I did. After a few mins I noticed they use 8byte "random" IV. Yes, half of IV is zeroes. But it gets worse.

Tweeted by 3lbios on January 22, 2019 at 11:02 PM

feersum

Yeah a while back I wanted to encrypt some files and ended up rolling my own thing

Tom K.

I'm actually unsure if this is just rambling or if this is indeed bad

Tom K.

2:16 PM

ah okay... yeah.. seems indeed bad :s

if you use 7zip

feersum

I tried to use openssl (the command line utility) but it was not very useful because it only did 1 iteration of an algorithm where it is recommend to do 1 million or wahtever.

Tom K.

2:47 PM

@feersum well, openssl was never really intended for file encryption

wait a second

A: Is openssl aes-256-cbc encryption safe for offsite backup

You should never use OpenSSL's command line utility for general purpose encryption. It is actually designed only as a test of the library's internal encryption routines. Because of this, there are a few problems inherent in using it when real confidentiality and integrity are needed: You will b...