NASA developed an advanced robot known as Valkyrie that competed in DARPA’s 2013 Robotics Challenge Trial. DARPA hosted the robot challenge at the Florida’s Homestead Miami Speedway this past December. Eight teams were selected to participate in a series of trials that were focused on displaying whether each team’s robot could react to common disaster response situations. Sadly, NASA’s Valkyrie performed poorly compared to its peers, being blown out of the water by the Japanese designed robot SCHAFT. The end goal of DARPA is to promote the advancement of robotics technology and lead interested companies to produce functional automatons that can serve the public good. While this goal is worthy of praise, is this new frontier of technology not also rifled with potential vulnerabilities? Not to wear out my Terminator references, but its seems like Skynet is a definite possibility…

– by Ben Volcsko, Research Assistant

Wickr’s Nico Sell has disclosed in a PCMag article that she was approached by the FBI at a security conference, and that an agent casually asked if she would be willing to install a backdoor for them in her company’s encrypted communication app. Sell refused, saying that even if the claims of the FBI are legitimate, “It was very clear that a backdoor for the good guys is  always a backdoor for the bad guys.”

Wickr’s laudable stance aside, the question remains as to how many other technology companies have been more forthcoming with granting access to state agencies. If an approach is made to every major app developer, how many of the apps on your phone can you trust? And if one is compromised, and has rights to read all information on the machine, is everything else likewise compromised?

As Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) continue to advance and play an ever growing role in modern warfare, could cyber vulnerabilities pose a potential pitfall? With drone technology rapidly advancing and allowing for the production of truly autonomous UAVs, concerns over these flying terminators being hacked become more legitimate. Here are a couple of articles to give you a little flavor on the topic. 1) Flying Hacker Contraption Hunts Other Drones, Turns Them Into Zombies, an article by Dan Gooding for Ars Technica released in December, discusses how “hacker drones” are being developed and tested to target and gain control of other UAVs. 2) Hacking the Drone War’s Secret History by Wired details how rudimentary programming and hacking skills can allow access to drone’s communication feeds. Having friendly drones falling into the control of opposition forces is a scary thought.

– by Ben Volcsko, Research Assistant

There has been much discussion about 3-D printers lately. Although 3-D printer technology is still in the early stages, many security experts believe that advanced, large-scale 3-D printers will likely revolutionize the battlefield, if not the world. Robert Beckhusen of Wired’s Danger Room offers a perspective on some of the possibilities that 3-D printers might have on the modern-day warfare in his article In Tomorrow’s Wars, Battles Will Be Fought With a 3-D Printer. If you are unfamiliar with the subject of 3-D printers, this is a good place to start.

-by Ben Volcsko, Research Assistant

Bruce Schneier, the Chief Technology Officer of Co3 Systems and well-known security blogger, offers his two-cents on modern day security concerns for today’s interconnected world of computers. His article raises a lot of good questions and identifies some of the key concerns that we should be considering for big-data going into the new year.

– by Ben Volcsko, Research Assistant

Techday IT news published this article on their predictions for cyber trends to look for in 2014. We will see how good their crystal ball skills really are.

– by Ben Volcsko, Research Assistant

If you were curious about how to take on an APT, check out this summary by Gartner, Inc., a private information technology research company. Released in September 2013, this report’s recommendations are short, sweet and informative.

– by Ben Volcsko, Research Assistant