Blog On

20 years in the IT Industry numerous posts on news and chat sessions on IRC but this is the first time I have put figure to keyboard as part of a blog site. I'm not even sure what I'm going to use this medium for perhaps nothing the whole thing may disappear in a week or so if I loose interest in writing about nothing.

Over the last ten years I’ve worked in a number of fields advising cooperates on how to secure information or helping track down those who have stolen it. Since day one I’ve known the Internet is not an anonymous place with a few tools and a few tricks in what has trendily become called social engineering you can track somebody down fairly quickly. Its all dreadfully simple the problem is most people see “cyber space” as a complex environment were you can do and say what you want. As a student of those who engage in the murkier side of the Internet I’m aware of a number of other tools/techniques that can be used to track down authors without resorting to legal means.

When I get time between my ex. wife, girlfriend, work and the numerous other things that leach my time I will run through a number of topics that may be of interest to those who want to understand the nature of the Internet.

One of the main reasons I chose this site was because it had a nicely written privacy policy. I suggest you all read this in conjunction with the site rules as these provide a wealth of information that can be used to your advantage. The statement:

This page summarizes the privacy policy and practices on the Blogdrive Web site. We will not willfully disclose your private individual data without your express permission, unless required for law enforcement or by statute

It does not say court order/subpoena just law enforcement if you were to post a something that may have evidence to a criminal case then this website would provide the requesting police force with:

· Your computer's Internet Protocol (IP) address. (An IP address is a number that is automatically assigned to your computer whenever you go on the Web.)
· The domain from which you access the Internet (for example, aol.com, if you are connecting from an America Online account).
· The Internet address of the Website, if any, from which you came to our site (for example, www.yahoo.com).
· The date and time you arrived at our site and how long you spent on the site.
· The name and version of your computer's operating system and browser: for example, Windows XP/Netscape Navigator 6.x. (This information is supplied automatically by your computer.)
· Which pages you visited.

Say you posted in Ireland to a website in the USA the criminal activities you were talking about would no doubt be in Ireland. The Gardi would contact the blog host providing credentials and a reason to see the log extract if necessary completing the correct legal paperwork. This information would be passed back. If you connected from your home telephone, cable provider, wireless network this would have been in Ireland. It would then be fairly simple for the Gardi to then follow the same process on their home turf. What happens next your door goes in at 2am you, your loved ones and your PC are all having to explain the prank you were trying to play.

I guess the reason this does not happen more often is there is so much out on the internet that you would really have to do something really stupid to get anybody’s attention believe me people do it.