Hi friends,

Here is an update to the hack attack on SurvivalRing yesterday, as mentioned in the email below.

This hack attack seems to have darker overtones than I originally suspected.

While I believe the hack was as I stated yesterday ( a web bot spamming program, which gained access to the site via php script vulnerabilities), I’ve done a bit more research on the destination website that all the spam links were pointing to.

Every one of the nearly fifty hidden links point to a hacked website hosted in the middle east…

hxxp://qasweb.org/library/universe/online/?page=49 (link disabled on purpose)

A quick search found an arabic language based website is the home of

http://qasweb.org/

This is the Qatif Astronomical Society forum website…in Arabic.

You can view a mostly translated into english version here (google cache file)

Following the path of the hacked files, we see this…

Continue Reading »
SurvivalRing hacked by Islamists?

After being offline for a few months, I have finally been able to replace our dead forum board, with a brand new state of the art forum system called the Invision Power Board.

We HAD been using IkonBoard 3.1.1, which suffered massive unfixable security issues, and upon trying to update many different ways to the latest version of 3.1.5, it promptly committed suicide. Hundreds of spams a day were being injected, and the Ikonforum team in the years since I had originally installed the software no longer existed or cared for full path upgrades. This was very disconcerting, and painful to loose so many useful posts.

I was able to save the data in a database, but attempts to salvage them coherently into the new software haven’t been fully successfull…yet.

But… the NEW board is COMPLETELY operational. I’ve already got two new moderators, and more to come.

Jump on over to the SRCC (SurvivalRing Community Center) and register a username and start posting away.

The more the merrier…

Rich
Founder - SurvivalRing

Well, it’s been a while since our last visit to this blog to update the worlds on the adventures of Rich in CollegeLand and MeatWorld. Our last posting was over two weeks ago, as you can see below. In the two weeks, we’ve seen the world change greatly.

Saddam is history, having been hanged in what pretty much amounted to a lynching by his adversaries.

Denver has been socked with major snow storms three weekends in a row.

My little hometown of Riverton, Wyoming made the WORLD news with a piece of a Russian Rocket supposedly landing south of town when it re-entered the atmosphere last Thursday (when I was OUT OF TOWN…dang it!) and was captured on video by an airborn TV news chopper live.

One of the local Riverton cops saw it fly overhead as he got the morning paper, and a Wyoming State Trooper found a 3 by 5 foot burned area near the Louis Lake Turnout on South Pass, which I saw a pic of…but no debris was found, even though NORAD has sent pros out to check the story out.

Many other things going on, and the latest is a report in a British Newspaper has reported that Israel has plans to use tactical nukes on the nuke labs of Iran Real Soon Now, although Israel is DENYING it….hmmm.

For me, this is a new year, full of promise, projects, a few classes, and some BIG changes. Future plans include a degree plan change ( to Journalism ), a new college (University Of Montana at Missoula), new business projects (an eBay store, an internet marketing push, adverts in several REAL magazines to sell my two published CD roms), and more.

Another tussel with Windows XP…this time on my laptop. Major errors, blue screen of death, missing XP files, and the XP Recovery Console failed to fix…so, I just removed the drive ( a 2 month old 120 gig sucker), backed everything up to one of my big external drives on the desktop, wiped the drive after backing up all the files, and just finished a FULL FRESH reinstall of Windows. It’ll take me a few weeks to bring it back to full and regular use, after reinstalling all the dozens of programs I use on it, but it should be fine.

At the same time I’ve been installing XP on the laptop, I’ve also been installing Suse Linux on a server I bought at the CWC used computer sale last year. It’s got two 18gig SCSI removable drives, and dual processors, but it’s an older model HP NetServer LPr. I plan on using this rack mounted server as the household media system, with our music and a few movies on it. I’ll add a monster drive (300 gig or more) later this year, after I figure out the media serving systems available for a linux box.

I’m also rebuilding my 75 Jeep Cherokee, with a new full block, new interior, and lots of upgrades. It’s been a few years since I’ve really had some fun doing vehicle work. My last major project was a 1974 Toyota Landcruiser, which I really wish I still had…drats. Before that, it was a 1978 Dodge Van (the cross over year) that I did a full engine and tranny swap on, and before that my original 1974 Ford Van (see a pic here). I spent many years doing work on many vans, and also did conversions and upgrades to cars, trucks, boats, and even an airplane. This year is going to be one that is HANDS ON in many areas.

Many web projects are coming as well. MAJOR upgrade things to SurvivalRing, Civil Defense Now, and more. A few entire NEW projects too, still under wraps. They’ll be announced as they’re ready.

Thanks for checking in. Look for much more frequent updates from me here on Cosmic Echoes!

Rich

My good friend Shane Connor, of Ki4u.com, was on CNN last week, Oct. 11, 2006. Take a look at what Shane and Glenn were talking about regarding nuclear preparedness.

After much prodding the past year or so, I was able to talk my wife Annie into actually starting her own blog. I’ve had a Wordpress blog set up for her since early last year, but she had never done anything with it, and nary a post was made.

Until this week, that is.

After watching my Google Adsense income take flight this spring, after doing some testing, retesting, and tweaking, I had a thought…and a very good one at that. I thought, wow…what a wonderful time for Annie to share HER wisdom with the world, and with that great Adsense tool, make some income for our family to continue thriving, based on her wonderful and caring perspective on life, from her point of view.

You see, Annie is disabled…and has been in a wheelchair for several years now, due to an injury received in a car accident in Alabama (where we lived before moving to Wyoming), nearly 14 years ago. Her injury came about when we were rear ended on a county highway overpass, at Exit 100 on Interstate 20 in Bucksville, Alabama, waiting to turn into a gas station. Her hip was injured, and diagnosis was not fully made until about five years later, by a very good bone doctor. During this same accident, I earned a broken back (compression fractures in the vertebrae between the shoulder blades), my daughter a broken arm, and both my boys suffered with cuts and contusions.

By the time the damage was actually proven with good xrays, the top of the femur at the hip joint was dying, and the hip socket itself was grossly pocked with extreme calcium buildup, making any movement of the hip very painful.

This was in 1999.

Now, 7 years later, Annie has been in a wheelchair full time for almost 4 years. During this time, she has also earned TWO college degrees, helping our kids move into the adult phases of their life, kept ME fed and clothed, and helped us keep working towards our own home based business, with growing success each month. And, she is now a grandmother of two adorable kids.

Also during this time, we have moved 4 times ( once across the country in 2000 ), been homeless for a few weeks (Spring of 2001), and started over again…twice. And throughout it all, she has been the key to us making it to the next phase of our lives.

She has been through a lot, yet has a LOT to share for others who may be going through the same things we have gone through. With my background of prep and survival skills, learning self reliance the hard way, and my extreme research skills, I’ve brought a lot of new found knowledge into the family.

She’s had to come to a lot of it the hard way, from the point of being disabled, taking care of meds and doctor needs on a very small income, and learning to let go of a lot of things…and grabbing the horns of bigger issues, and wrestling with them on a grand scale…i.e. dealing with the administration of Central Wyoming College, and getting their attention regarding the very disturbing lack of awareness about accessibility issues all over this campus.

She puts a lot of effort into helping others (much like I try to do on a daily basis) and doesn’t notice so much some things that she needs to focus on for herself…others first is her thing sometimes…

I love my wife dearly, and in a few short weeks, we’ll be celebrating our 25th anniversary of marriage.

I hope that you will support her in her blogging career, and that she will be able to reach out to folks the world over, and help them become more self sufficient, personally enriched, and successful individuals….disabled or not.

You can visit her blog here…

Asteroid-watchers worry about cosmic Katrina
Former astronaut presses campaign for global preparedness
By Leonard David
Senior space writer
Space.com
Updated: 8:47 p.m. ET May 6, 2006

LOS ANGELES - Natural events such as hurricanes, tsunamis and earthquakes rock this planet from time to time. But when Earth gets stoned by an asteroid, consider it akin to a Katrina from outer space.

When Hurricane Katrina slammed into the United States in August of last year, it became a deadly, destructive, and costly episode — one that has also become a metaphor for lack of government action, both pre- and post-strike.

At the current time there is no agency of the U.S. government — or of any other government in the world — that has the explicit responsibility to develop and demonstrate the technology necessary to protect the planet from collisions with near-Earth objects, or NEOs.

The U.S. Congress needs to be encouraged to take a step in demonstrating the ability to deflect a menacing NEO, says former NASA astronaut Russell Schweickart, chairman of the B612 Foundation. On Saturday he presented an update on dealing with troublesome asteroids here at the 25th International Space Development Conference.

Key capabilities
The goal of B612, a confab of scientists, technologists, astronomers, astronauts and other specialists, is to significantly alter the orbit of an asteroid in a controlled manner by 2015.

In detailing today’s NEO situation, Schweickart said there are several givens:

Earth is infrequently hit by asteroids that cross our orbit while circling the sun.
The consequences of such impacts range from the equivalent of a 15-megaton explosion to a civilization-ending gigaton event.
For the first time in the history of humankind, we have the technology to prevent such occurrences from happening in the future — if we are properly prepared.
“Remember, we’re dealing here with a less frequent, but far more devastating Katrina … a Katrina of the cosmos,” Schweickart reported.

“NEOs happen so infrequently that even though they are orders of magnitude more devastating, people don’t naturally make that match,” he told Space.com, “but you don’t want to be caught with your pants down.”

Schweickart said there are key capabilities that will enable humanity to avoid devastating cosmic collisions: early warning; a demonstrated deflection capability; and an established international decision making process.

While some progress is being made, there remains significant work ahead in all these areas, Schweickart emphasized.

Sky-sweeping surveys
If the current pace of sky-sweeping surveys is extrapolated into the future, on the order of 10,000 NEOs with some risk of impact over the next 100 years are likely to be cataloged by 2018, Schweickart forecast. The chances are better than even that none of these 10,000 will actually hit Earth in those 100 years.

“The important fact, however, is that a substantial number of them will appear as though they may be headed for impact,” Schweickart advised. Today, of the 104 currently on impact listings, “two have an elevated risk, and we are watching them closely,” he said.

At present, the two asteroids on that “keep an eye on them” roster are 2004 VD17 and Apophis, formerly listed as 2004 MN4.

“Extrapolating to 2018, we may have as many as 200 in a similarly elevated attention category and of growing concern to the general public,” Schweickart reported Saturday. “Therefore, it is certainly possible, if not likely, that in the time frame of the next 12 years we — the world — may well be in a position where we need to take action to ensure that we will be able to carry out a deflection mission if needed,” he said.

The U.S. Congress amended the Space Act in 2005 to charge NASA with responsibility to “detect, track, catalog and characterize” NEOs wider than 460 feet (140 meters) in diameter. However, thus far Congress has come up short on actually assigning the responsibility to take action, should one of these objects be discovered headed for a collision, Schweickart pointed out.

There is a bit of good news forthcoming, Schweickart explained. Congress did require NASA to provide by the end of 2006 an analysis of possible alternatives that could be employed to divert an object on a likely collision course with Earth. In response to this congressional directive, NASA is about to announce a process for carrying out this mandate.

Global threat … global response
Schweickart told the audience here that a third leg of the triad for protecting Earth from NEO impacts is probably the most challenging, albeit subtle.

“It is complicated by two related facts,” he said. NEO impacts are a global threat, not a national one, and the only decision-making body representing, essentially, the whole planet is the United Nations — a body not known for timely, crisp decision making, he added.

Still, in this area, steps forward are being made.

The Association of Space Explorers — the professional organization of astronauts and cosmonauts — has formed a committee on NEOs that Schweickart chairs. Earlier this year, a technical presentation at a U.N. meeting in Vienna apprised them that this issue was coming at them.

While the United Nations has been brought the problem, Schweickart said, the Association of Space Explorers is committed to bringing them a solution. This solution will take the form of a draft U.N. treaty, or protocol, formulated in a series of workshops over the next two years.

“In these NEO Deflection Policy workshops we will gather together a dozen or so international experts in diplomacy, international law, insurance and risk management, as well as space expertise to identify and wrestle with these difficult international issues,” Schweickart noted. “Our goal is to return to the U.N. in 2009 with a draft NEO Deflection Decision Protocol and present it to them for their consideration and deliberation.”

Facing the challenge
In wrapping up his ISDC talk, Schweickart said the NEO challenge, in a sense, “is an entry test for humankind to join the cosmic community.” He reasons that, if there is intelligent life elsewhere in the universe “it is virtually certain that it has already faced this challenge to survival … and passed it.”

“Our choice is to face this infrequent but substantial cosmic test … or pass into history, not as an incapable species like the dinosaurs, but as a fractious and self-serving creature with inadequate vision and commitment to continue its evolutionary development,” Schweickart concluded.

Leonard David is senior space writer for Space.com and the former editor of Ad Astra, the official magazine of the National Space Society. The views of this article are the author’s and do not reflect the policies of the National Space Society.

URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12665493/

Well, I must say THIS is good news…I was just about to order some titanium Wile E. Coyote umbrellas…

Rich

NASA says comet fragments won’t hit Earth
Space agency tries to quash rumors of killer tsunamis, mass extinctions
By Tariq Malik
Space.com
Updated: 7:36 p.m. ET April 27, 2006

Chunks of a comet currently splitting into pieces in the night sky will not strike the Earth next month, nor will it spawn killer tsunamis and mass extinctions, NASA officials said Thursday.

The announcement, NASA hopes, will squash rumors that a fragment of the crumbling Comet 73P/Schwassmann-Wachmann 3 (SW 3) will slam into Earth just before Memorial Day.

“There are some Internet stories going around that there’s going to be an impact on May 25,” NASA spokesperson Grey Hautaluoma, told SPACE.com. “We just want to get the facts out.”

Astronomers have been observing 73P/Schwassmann-Wachmann 3, a comet that circles the Sun every 5.4 years, for more than 75 years and are confident that any of the icy object’s fragments will remain at least a distant 5.5 million miles (8.8 million kilometers) from Earth — more than 20 times the distance to the moon —at closest approach between May 12 and May 28.

“We are very well acquainted with the trajectory of Comet 73P Schwassmann-Wachmann 3,” said Donald Yeomans, manager of NASA’s Near-Earth Object Program Office, in a written statement. “There is absolutely no danger to people on the ground or the inhabitants of the International Space Station, as the main body of the object and any pieces from the breakup will pass many millions of miles beyond the Earth.”

The main SW 3 fragment, dubbed Fragment C, will make its closest pass by Earth on May 12 at a safe distance of 7.3 million miles (11.7 million kilometers), NASA said, adding that skywatchers will be able to use small telescopes to spot the comet chunks by scanning the constellation Vulpelca during the early-morning hours.

NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope and other instruments have been watching SW 3’s disintegration. The comet’s numerous fragments stretch across several degrees of the night sky. For comparison, the moon’s diameter covers about one-half a degree in the sky.

“Catastrophic breakups may be the ultimate fate of most comets,” explained Hal Weaver, a planetary astronomer of the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, in a statement.

Weaver led a team of researchers during the Hubble observations of SW 3, and used the space telescope to study the break up of comets Shoemaker-Levy 9 — which was ripped apart by Jupiter’s gravity and hit the giant planet between 1993 and 1994 — Hyakutake in 1996, and 1999 S4 (LINEAR) in 2000, NASA said.

Hubble’s new SW 3 observations suggest that chunks of the comet are pushed behind its tail by the outgassing of Sun-facing pieces. Smaller pieces appear to be ejected from their nucleus faster than their larger brethren, while other fragments seem to simply fade away.

When set alongside studies by other observatories, Hubble’s images may help astronomers determine what is causing the comet’s disintegration as it nears the Earth and Sun, the space agency added.

German astronomers Arnold Schwassmann and Arno Arthur Wachmann first discovered the SW 3 comet in 1930 while hunting for asteroids. Despite its relatively short orbital period, the icy object was not seen again until 1979, and then was missed during a 1985 pass.

Since then, however, astronomers have kept a close eye on SW 3 and in 1995 observed its initial break up.

Aside from a great sky show, the comet poses no danger to Earth and its inhabitants, NASA officials said.

URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12521174/