FreeBSD X Configuration

I installed FreeBSD 5.1 REL on my IBM Thinkpad a20p this afternoon. I finally have X working on a FreeBSD system "out of the box" -- more or less. X couldn't auto-configure my card, but I was able to do it manually. Once I was done installing XFree86 4.3 I installed KDE 3.1. I copied the .xinitrc (just a text file with 'exec startkde' from root's home directory to my user directory.) Here's my X config file:

-bash-2.05b$ cat /etc/X11/XF86Config
Section "ServerLayout"
Identifier "Layout0"
Screen 0 "Screen0" 0 0
InputDevice "Keyboard0" "CoreKeyboard"
InputDevice "Mouse0" "CorePointer"
EndSection

Section "Files"
EndSection

Section "Module"
# Load "freetype"
# Load "xtt"
Load "extmod"
Load "glx"
Load "dri"
Load "dbe"
Load "record"
Load "xtrap"
Load "type1"
Load "speedo"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Mouse0"
Driver "mouse"
Option "Protocol" "SysMouse"
Option "Device" "/dev/sysmouse"
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
Identifier "Keyboard0"
Driver "keyboard"
Option "XkbModel" "pc101"
Option "XkbLayout" "us"
EndSection

Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Monitor0"
HorizSync 30.0 - 100.0
VertRefresh 50.0 - 100.0
EndSection

Section "Device"
Identifier "Card0"
Driver "ati"
EndSection

Section "Screen"
Identifier "Screen0"
Device "Card0"
Monitor "Monitor0"
DefaultDepth 24
SubSection "Display"
Depth 24
Modes "1400x1050"
EndSubSection
EndSection

Also -- Happy 10th birdthday FreeBSD!

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Don't Hack Air Force Systems

It does not pay to live in the US and compromise Air Force systems! From this article:

An 18-year-old hacker who breached computers at Sandia National Laboratories and posted an anti-Israeli message on the Eglin Air Force Base Web site was sentenced Thursday to a year and a day in federal prison.

Adil Yahya Zakaria Shakour also was ordered to pay $88,253 in restitution, and his computer use was restricted during the three years he will spend under supervised release after his prison term.

Shakour, a Pakistani national who lives in Los Angeles, pleaded guilty in March to computer and credit card fraud charges.

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Combining NIC interfaces on FreeBSD

I wrote this post yesterday in response to a question on how to mirror interfaces for combining tap outputs.

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Microsoft Patterns and Practices

A colleague informed me of the Microsoft Patterns and Practices site, which offers book-length treatises on many subjects. The latest is Improving Web Application Security: Threats and Countermeasures.

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Cisco IOS Licenses

While reading comp.dcom.sys.cisco, I found a thread discussing licenses for Cisco IOS. This abbreviation of Cisco's software transfer and licensing policy states "owners of Cisco products are only allowed to transfer, re-sell or re-lease used Cisco hardware and not the embedded software that runs on the hardware." One option for licensed use of Cisco gear at reduced prices is buying refurbished equipment, sold by authorized resellers, and getting a SMARTnet support contract to access parts of Cisco's software center. There seems to be no shortage of Asian sites offering IOS, although I suspect Trojaned versions might appear in those listings. This thread includes a lengthy post by Ted Mittelstaedt explaining how Cisco discourages eBay purchases of Cisco gear.

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You go Marty!

Read Marty Roesch's response to the uninformed claims of Gartner, Inc.. From the Gartner press release:

According to the Gartner, Inc. (NYSE: IT and ITB) Information Security Hype Cycle, IDSs have failed to provide value relative to its costs and will be obsolete by 2005.

From Marty's response:

Let me get this straight… better access control will completely remove the need for auditing? Auditing functions are a fundamental part of providing defense in depth in any security environment. Do they not understand this or, perhaps, have the economic challenges for industry analysts led them to the point where citing the outrageous is a competitive necessity?

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Stealing Network Address Space

Kevin Poulsen published an article on stealing network address space. From the article:

Los Angeles County had been hit by a growing type of hi-tech fraud, in which large, and usually dormant, segments of the Internet's address space are taken away from their registered users through an elaborate shell game of forged letters, ephemeral domain names and anonymous corporate fronts. The patsies in the scheme are the four non-profit registries that parcel out address space around the world and keep track of who's using it. The prizes are the coveted "Class B" or "/16" (read "slash-sixteen") address blocks that Internet authorities passed out like candy in the days when address space was bountiful, but are harder to get legitimately now.

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