Changes between Version 1 and Version 2 of lowdown-drafts-053008

Timestamp:

May 31, 2008, 10:00:20 PM (17 years ago)

Author:

Daniel Kahn Gillmor

Comment:

--

lowdown-drafts-053008

@@ -7 +7 @@
 We have ways of fending off those attacks so this wasn't going to succeed but the amount of attempts every second zapped the server's resources and we were experiencing what is called a DOS or "denial of service" attack. That means the person is using all the resources and nobody else can log in or do much with the sites on the server.
 
-Jamie and Daniel Kahn Gilmor conferred and decided to reconfigure the servers to detect apparent dictionary attacks and block their IP for a period of time as soon as they start. This pre-emptive step closed those attacks down and saved the performance on all servers. Impact was hardly felt! :-)
+Jamie and Daniel Kahn Gillmor conferred and decided to reconfigure the servers to detect apparent dictionary attacks and block their IP for a period of time as soon as they start. This pre-emptive step closed those attacks down and saved the performance on all servers. Impact was hardly felt! :-)
 
 But they led to another discovery.
@@ -13 +13 @@
 While we were researching what to do, the Debian developers sent out an advisory about a horrible exploit. A couple of definitions are in order.
 
-GNU/Debian is a free operating system that uses linux; it's the operating
-system we use on our servers.
+Debian is a free operating system that uses the GNU tools and the Linux kernel; it's the operating system we use on our servers.
 
 An exploit is a piece of code that can be used by a clever attacker to get
 access to a server and do damage, steal data or illicitly use resources.
 
-One other definition: a Secure Sockets Layer key. An SSL key is a long string
+One other definition: an RSA key. An RSA key is a long string
 of characters that is unique to every server that provides the basis for the
 server to establish a secure, encrypted connection with computers that connect
 to it.
 
-These software packages are developed by large numbers of people all over the world who merely contribute to them; that's what Free and Open Source Software is. They work through collaborative work systems and they communicate on-line. Most have never met.
+These software packages are developed by large numbers of people all over the world who merely contribute to them; that's what Free and Open Source Software is. Free software developers work through collaborative work systems and they communicate on-line. Most have never met each other in person.
 
 In this case, one person filed a report and the community's leaders  checked
-and approved it. It seems that, with the Debian installed  throughout the
+and approved it. It seems that, with the most widely-distributed version of Debian installed throughout the
 world, you can guess certain parts of the key that are supposed to be
-generated radomly.  These means that, eventually, you may be able to guess the
+generated randomly.  These means that, eventually, you may be able to guess the
 key itself.
 
@@ -39 +38 @@
 the members.
 
-We put together an approach to making the necessary changes on all three platforms: Mac, Window and Linux. And then we did how-tos on all three, published those and sent out advisories explaining the situation. We did all that in about a day! I've never seen anything like this in all my years on the Internet.
+We put together an approach to making the necessary changes on all three major platforms: Mac, Windows and GNU/Linux. And then we wrote how-tos on all three, published those and sent out advisories explaining the situation. We did all that in about a day! I've never seen anything like this in all my years on the Internet.
 
 https://support.mayfirst.org/wiki/ssl_host_key_changed
@@ -57 +56 @@
 So we rerouted email to another empty server ready to handle the load. The campaign's email service continued to be affected during the four day attack but all other members' functionality was returned to normal. After four days of failure, this hacker stopped the attack and the domain was routed by to its normal server.
 
-This kind of creactive thinking and flexibility under fire is reminiscent of what oru people did in saving the on-line registration at the U.S. Social Forum.
+This kind of creative thinking and flexibility under fire is reminiscent of what our people did in saving the on-line registration at the U.S. Social Forum.
 
 These two weeks were hardly routine but they were perhaps a hint of the kinds of challenges we are going to be facing in the future. Every challenge is a challenge, of course but, based on these two weeks, I think we're ready.