Electronic sign hacks, and a link to how to do them.

By Jack Brummet,
Persiflage and Pranks Editor

click images to enlarge/zoom

 

Road sign control pads are usually encased in a lock box, but that box is almost always unlocked. And while most road signs have password protection, that password is usually the default "DOTS"—or you can reset the password by holding "shift" and "control" while typing "DIPY" (so it defaults to "DOTS" again).

Jalopnik.com has an article giving step by step instructions on how to hack digital road signs, with the caveat "DO NOT under any circumstances run around hacking into electronic road signs using the information contained in this step-by-step guide of how to transmit hilarious messages to passing motorists."

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Faces drawing No. 189 - the couple

By Jack Brummet

click to enlarge

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One more awesome freeway sign hack

One more great road sign hack. If you look around on the inets, you can find instructions for how to break in & program these babies. But that would be wrong. . .sorta.

click to enlarge

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The Stuxnet Worm-->Noble American-Israeli Mischief?-->Cyber Warfare Begins-->Revenge of the Nerds?

By Jack Brummet
Digital Warfare Editor

The most fascinating news--actually rumor and speculation [ed. note: hey, how much difference is there in 2011?]--to emerge recently concerns the possible genesis of the Stuxnet Worm. The Stuxnet worm (which most people call a virus) was discovered last summer. "It is the first discovered worm that spies on and reprograms industrial systems."

Computer security people think Stuxnet was created to target "high value infrastructures."

News reports state that the infestation by this worm has damaged Iran's nuclear facilities in Natanz and probably delayed the start up of Iran's Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant--by four or five years! I think most of us in the West agree that is a good thing.

Interestingly, the Stuxnet worm--unlike almost all other "malware"--does no harm to most PCs and servers. According to Wikipedia "the attackers took great care to make sure that only their designated targets were hit..." The worm does this because it attacks in layers: first Windows, then the Step 7 industrial software that runs on top of Windows, and finally, it hits a Siemens PLC (a programmable logic controller rootkit).

On those very specific machines, the worm patches into the variable frequency drives, and changes their speeds, which hamstrings or cripples the computer under attack.

Symantec says whoever created the worm was well-funded, with numerous programmers (up to ten) on the project. They also estimate it would have taken six months to complete.

It is little wonder, then, that people are speculating that the worm was created by American or Israeli Intelligence, or even by the US Dept. of Homeland Security.  Sunday's New York Times reports that

"Though American and Israeli officials refuse to talk publicly about what goes on at Dimona, the operations there, as well as related efforts in the United States, are among the newest and strongest clues suggesting that the virus was designed as an American-Israeli project to sabotage the Iranian program."

Israel has acknowledged recently that it has a cyber-warfare with both offensive and defensive branches. What a fascinating story.

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Painting: Map 12 -- The Dawg Islands and surrounding territories

By Jack Brummet

Acrylic and pen and ink on raw (unprimed) canvas.  Approximately 18" x 24".

click to enlarge

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The Rolling Stones' Connection (with lyrics)--one of their best songs ever

By Jack Brummet
20th Century Music Editor

This has always been one of my very favorite Rolling Stones songs.  I had almost forgotten about it, when I heard it again in the movie and soundtrack of "Shine A Light."   Keith Richards usually sings it when it pops up in concert with the Stones, or the X Pensive Winos.



Connection
by Jagger/Richards


Connection, I just can't make no connection.
But all I want to do is to get back to you.


Everything is going in the wrong direction.
The doctor wants to give me more injections.
Giving me shots for a thousand rare infections
And I don't know if he'll let me go


Connection, I just can't make no connection.
But all I want to do is to get back to you.
Connection, I just can't make it, connection
But all I want to do is to get back to you.


My bags they get a very close inspection.
I wonder why it is that they suspect on.
They're dying to add me to their collections
And I don't know if they'll let me go


Connection, I just can't make no connection.
But all I want to do is to get back to you.
Connection, I just can't make no connection.
But all I want to do is to get back to you.
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Patricia Jane Curran, 1933-2011

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Acrylic on raw canvas -- DNA Transit: not Parthenogenesis; just the old in-out in-out

An actual analog, real painting...acrylic and pen and ink on raw canvas -- DNA Transit: not Parthenogenesis; just the old in-out in-out.  Click to enlarge.

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Michele Bachmann for President! (for people who find Palin too cerebral)

By Pablo Fanque,
National Affairs Editor


Hold onto your mukluks Ex-Governor Palin -- your old Mama Grizzly buddy-roo and fellow Tea-Partier Michele Bachmann has set her sights on an Oval Office run in 2012.  Or will you two tea-partiers team up or tag-team until one of you runs out of gas?

I have been trying to find out if Bachmann's announcement has caused any schism between her and Palin, or between their factions within the Tea Party itself.   So far, nothing has turned up.

Bachmann, the three-term congresswoman from Minnesota, is well-known for her doctrinaire conservatism, and her bizarre views like: "homosexuality is a dysfunction," or that President BHO is "turning America into a nation of slaves."  Rep. Bachmann makes liberals perhaps even crazier than her pal, the Ex-Governor.

Which will it be?  Or will they go head-to-head?

Bachmann, the chairwoman of the House Tea Party Caucus, is traveling to Iowa this month "to seek advice from political forces there and party elders close to the caucus process before coming to a final decision" on whether or not to make a run for the big seat.

Conservatives like Shannon Bell of Right Pundits think Bachmann would, at the very least, make for a spirited contest:  "She's unbelievable when it comes to raising money. She has impeccable conservative credentials. Liberals hate her guts. The Tea Party adores her, and she's not afraid to take on the establishment."

The often hilarious Andy Borowitz tweeted when this first came out: "Michele Bachmann would be an awesome presidential candidate for people who find Sarah Palin too brainy."

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Riding high in the water. . .

From "There I fixed it." Yes, this boat was built to ride this way in the water. . .


see more There I Fixed It

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The Stranger puts the Tucson murders/assassination in a larger perspective

Our local (and great) weekly, The Stranger, will be running this cover by Dan Savage and Aaron Huffmanon in their issue appearing January 13th.   
 

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Scratchboard drawings by Jack Brummet on 1-11-11

Art by Jack Brummet

The original image is created using a stylus, scraping away the India Ink layer from a clay ground on an 11" x 14" piece of masonite. The reversed image (the white one) is created digitally, creating--sort of paradoxically--the white, or "negative" image of the scratchboard.  Click the images to zoom/enlarge. . .

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