Evading URL filters the old way

From the linked article:

In their constant quest to find new and interesting ways to abuse the Internet, attackers recently have begun using an old technique to obfuscate URLs and IP addresses to bypass URL filters and direct users to malicious sites.

The technique takes advantage of the fact that modern browsers will allow users to specify IP addresses in formats other than base 10. So a typical IP address that looks something like this-- 192.10.10.1--can also be written in base 8, hexadecimal or a handful of other formats, and the browser will recognize it and take the user to the specified site

So better check a link twice if not trice when receiving that unexpected e-mail or link, if you realy want to click it even though the best rule is : "Received an unexpected mail or link , DON'T OPEN !"

Get rid of vnetd messages in your logs

On our RH machines running Netbackup 6.5.4 I see the secure log flooded with messages related to the vnetd process. The all reloate to conections being opend and closed, from our netbackup master server.

I found this article to get rid of those messages :

Get rid VNETD messages in log files

in Short, you add "log_on_success=" to the vnetd file located in your xinetd.d directory

Fortune's ode to the GC

Reclaimer, spare that tree!
Take not a single bit!
It used to point to me,
Now I'm protecting it.
It was the reader's CONS
That made it, paired by dot;
Now, GC, for the nonce,
Thou shalt reclaim it not.

-----------------------------------

This text was spewn out by the fortune program at logon, don't know who wrote this.

Fortune message of today

This morning I booted my PC, logged on and was greeted by this funny "Fortune message"


For example, in Year 1 that useless letter 'c' would be dropped to be
replased either by 'k' or 's', and likewise 'x' would no longer be part of the
alphabet. The only kase in which 'c' would be retained would be the 'ch'
formation, which will be dealt with later. Year 2 might reform 'w' spelling,
so that 'which' and 'one' would take the same konsonant, wile Year 3 might
well abolish 'y' replasing it with 'i' and Iear 4 might fiks the 'g-j'
anomali wonse and for all.
Jenerally, then, the improvement would kontinue iear bai iear with
Iear 5 doing awai with useless double konsonants, and Iears 6-12 or so
modifaiing vowlz and the rimeining voist and unvoist konsonants. Bai
Iear 15 or sou, it wud fainali bi posibl tu meik ius ov thi ridandant letez
'c', 'y' and 'x' - bai now jast a memori in the maindz ov ould doderez - tu
riplais 'ch', 'sh', and 'th' rispektivli.
Fainali, xen, aafte sam 20 iers ov orxogrefkl riform, wi wud hev a
lojikl, kohirnt speling in ius xrewawt xe Ingliy-spiking werld.

Windows Update Error 0x80024d007

I encountered some machines showing error code 0x8024d007 while trying to update through windows update. Trying to resolve this error I stumbled upon this Microsft document http://support.microsoft.com/kb/956701. But while trying to execute the "regsvr32 wuaueng.dll" the command exited with error code 0x80070005. After some googling and checking stuff I checked the REgistry permisions for the user I found out that the permission settings on the registry key "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\WindowsNT\CurrentVersion\SvcHost" was set on read-only for all local system users and no access was granted to the Domain's system administrator. Adding access to modify the registry key for the domain admin rfesolved the issue.

UPDATE: My photos on Shmaps guides

Update, also a third photo was published on Smapsh guides, this time 8th edition of antwer.

The foto is the one of the Pelican, see the smapsh page here

Want to see all the pictures that have been included in Shmaps guides go to my Flickr Shmaps Set

My photos on Shmaps guides

Shamps Guides has included 2 photos of my Flickr stream into their Guides

The one included in the Rome Guide is a picture of a fountain on "Piazza del popolo"and the other in the Brussels guide is a photo of the famous Atomium in Brussels.

The originals from the Flickr stream:
Atomium
Piazza del popolo

A third photo of a pelican taken at the Antwerp zoo has been selected to be included in the Antwerp guide.