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Security Stories and Help with Network Documentation

Once upon a time this used to be my blog. For current updates head over to Networklore.

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Document Your Servers in Norwegian

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If you’re living close to the fjords, or just pine for them this post is for you. Since SYDI-Server 2.0 it’s been possible to convert the xml files produced by SYDI-Server to a Word document. This is done by the script ss-xml2word.vbs.

The script takes a language file as argument and thanks to Stian Johansen we now have a language file for Norwegian. At the moment the language file is released as a patch and is located here. It will be included in the next version of SYDI-Server. Support for Italian was released a month ago.

To download SYDI go to the website.

If you want to support your native language, please contact me. Creating a language file is quite easy, just open the ones in the language directory and take a look, if you have any questions just ask me.

[tags]network documentation, norwegian, sydi, translation, inventory[/tags]

The Tale of the Disgruntled Employee – Part 5

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When n3m0 came to work on Thursday he thought for a moment that he was there before Thomas. That’s a first. Then he found out that Thomas had in fact been there for quite some time and was having a meeting with Jennifer.

The last few days had been very slow, and n3m0 had managed to put together a résumé. The result didn’t sound very impressive, but n3m0 couldn’t tell what was wrong with it.

Thomas was walking toward him. “You’re up.”
“I’m what?” n3m0 asked annoyingly.
“It’s your turn, a little ‘one on one’ with Jennifer.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Jennifer is informing us about her company and wants to talk to each one of us.” Thomas informed.
“What’s the verdict?” n3m0 asked.
“Actually there won’t be much change, though Beateval seems to have a much stricter dress code than we do.” Thomas smiled, looking at n3m0’s t-shirt which had a picture from the 8-bit version of Donkey Kong on it.

“Dress code!?” n3m0 exploded, “we answer the freaking phone!”
“Well we’ve had some bosses here to show our facilities to customers.”
“Bosses? The only time we get executives down here are when their secretaries are on vacation and they get lost on their way to the bathroom.”
Thomas seemed shocked, “Mark was here the other day.”
Are you for real? “Oh, silly me, we got a top shot to visit us when he was shutting down the department.”
“Actually merge our dep…” Thomas tried.
“But can you imagine I forgot to bask in his executive aura. I’m told it’s quite majestic!” n3m0 wondered if Thomas understood sarcasm.

“Excuse me, are you ready,” someone asked.
“WHAT?” n3m0 turned to see Jennifer with a disapproving look on her face.
“Your interview.”
“Yeah, I’m coming,” n3m0 said to her breasts. She turned and walked towards the meeting room.
As n3m0 followed her Thomas called to him. “Hey it’s not that bad really.” Then he made a thumbs up sign and mouthed. “Good luck”. n3m0 considered giving him the birdie just to see his reaction, but he contained himself. Instead he raised his thumb.

Jennifer had been talking for some time, n3m0 wasn’t listening as much as watching her. She leaned over the table and pointed to a chart. After a while she fell silent. n3m0 looked up from her cleavage and met her eyes, they were hard and cold.
“Are you listening?,” she asked with a sharp tone, changing position so she was sitting up more straight.

“Yes, of course, you were saying I was the top performer in this department,” n3m0 tried a smile, it wasn’t returned.
“I said nothing of the sort,” Jennifer continued in a cold voice.
“But,” n3m0 said pointing at the chart while stealing a glance at her breasts. Jennifer stood up.
“What I said was that you work fast, unfortunately we value customer satisfaction higher than speed.”

Ain’t this going swell, n3m0 was focusing hard to look at her face. He didn’t know if he should stand up too or remain seated. n3m0 tried to remain quite for the remainder of the interview, only opening his mouth to answer her direct questions. At the end her voice wasn’t as cold as it had been, which n3m0 guessed was a good thing. When he was leaving the room she called after him. “Good luck with your application then.”
“Application?” n3m0 was confused.
“For the job, do you have a résumé?”
“For what job?”
“A job at Beateval, wasn’t that obvious?” n3m0 could have sworn Jennifer was amused.
“Wait, you mean I have to apply for my own job?”
“No, your current job won’t exist anymore. As the help desk resource is transferred to us from Exibice your employment with them will end.” Jennifer smiled for the first time since n3m0 had entered the room. “You are of course free to submit your résumé to see what Beateval has to offer. If you have a résumé that is?”
“Yes,” n3m0 said, the word didn’t come out much louder than a whisper.
“Excellent, good luck then. Will you please send in Simon.”

Shit, shit, shit, n3m0 cursed his bad luck.

[tags]security, stories, fiction, insider threat, disgruntled employee[/tags]

The Tale of the Disgruntled Employee – Part 4

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n3m0 was furious after the meeting, he headed straight for his computer. I’m leaving this ship, he thought, time to write a resumé. He whipped up notepad.

After twenty minutes he was still staring at a completely blank screen. He wrote “bush hid the facts” saved and closed the file. When opening it again he laughed at the results. I’m going nowhere with this.

n3m0’s financial situation was a disaster at best, in reality he needed any kind of job he could get. I refuse to spend my days in the land of always helpdesk. He had even taken a few mcp exams to please his evil overlords and now this!

According to his calculations he would last just over eight weeks without a steady income. A few things would have to be sold on eBay in order to buy food during that time.

After surfing job sites for an hour, n3m0’s hope was quickly fading. I might have to work at Beateval while I’m looking for another job. n3m0 felt like screaming out loud.

The thought of working from home had crossed his mind many times but he just wasn’t landing enough jobs to afford it. n3m0 always got the feeling that he was lowest down on the food chain both at work and among his online friends.

It was just minutes before five and n3m0 had “worked” enough for the day He was out of the building before the computer had finished shutting down.

At home he logged in to his online bank. I wonder how hard it would be to set up a phishing site, n3m0 thought as he saw his balance.

Seeing that orion was online he shot of a ping.

n3m0: sup?

It took a few minutes for orion to answer.

orion: busy
n3m0: with a job?
orion: yep
n3m0: anything for me?
orion: no
n3m0: come on man, anything?
orion: no, listen I’m busy
n3m0: You hardly never have anything for me anymore
orion: bull, I gave you a job just a few weeks ago
n3m0: But that was just a joke, you said so yourself
orion: so?
n3m0: what do you mean so!? It was a joke
orion: you took the money
n3m0: it was $800!!!
orion: not my problem, by the way when was the last time you shared a gig?
n3m0: screw you!

orion disconnected.

[tags]security, stories, fiction, insider threat[/tags]

The Tale of the Disgruntled Employee – Part 3

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“As I said earlier this is Jennifer from Beateval.” Mark said to his helpdesk staff. n3m0 checked his watch. 2:55 PM, I think I’ll have an executive lunch hour tomorrow. Looking around at the other drones in helpdesk, they all seemed to be smiling at Jennifer. n3m0 couldn’t really blame the other guys; she looked fabulous. But when they were feeling anticipation, n3m0 was closer to hostility.

When she started to speak her words never registered in n3m0’s mind, instead he found himself traveling to Middle Earth.

There was a long silence. At last Frodo spoke with hesitation. “I believed that you were a friend before the letter came,” he said, “or at least I wished to. You have frightened me several times tonight, but never in the way that servants of the Enemy would, or so I imagine. I think one of his spies would – well, seem fairer and feel fouler, if you understand.”
Jennifer is fair but feels foul, n3m0 found himself agreeing with Frodo’s wisdom.
“I see,” laughed Strider. “I look foul and feel fair. Is that it? All that is gold does not glitter, not all those that wander are lost.”
“Did the verses apply to you then?” asked Frodo. “I could not make out what they were about. But how did you know that they were in Gandalf’s letter, if you have never seen it?”
“I did not know,” he answered. “But I am Aragorn, and the verses most definitely were not about Jennifer.” Sam said nothing.

As Jennifer stopped talking, n3m0’s consciousness returned to the office. Seeing her with new eyes he thought dreamingly, my precious.

“Let’s save the questions for later,” Mark interrupted the explosion in the room. “As Ms. Hartpence was saying her company is one that specializes in call center services just like this helpdesk department.”
“We are going to outsource helpdesk to Beateval, for most of you that will mean you’ll have closer to work.”

n3m0 almost laughed. Remembering the visiting address from Beateval’s website he knew he would be adding at least half an hours travel in each direction.

Well isn’t this ironic, I start working in this dump in order to climb a ladder which is knocked down by those above and now sold by the man in charge. n3m0’s eyes found Jennifer’s cleavage, I wonder if this was a financial decision.

n3m0 was having trouble staying focused on the discussion and he missed Simon’s question.
“To be frank, it’s my fault,” Mark answered, “lately I haven’t had time to involve myself in helpdesk.”
I think what you’re trying to say is that you haven’t cared enough.
“And I know that Jennifer will out perform me any day, besides I’ve heard they have just as good dental care as we do.”
The group chuckled.
“No Mark, that’s actually wrong. Ours is much better!” Jennifer showed off her perfect white teeth.
The group laughed.

The meeting went on for an hour; Jennifer seemed to be charming the lot of them. n3m0 on the other hand was feeling weak. At the end of the meeting he could see an imagined BSD demon jumping up and down on his shoulders. Over and over it was screaming “Division by zero, division by zero!”

[tags]security, stories, fiction, insider threat[/tags]

The Tale of the Disgruntled Employee – Part 2

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“Simon isn’t here,” Thomas informed them, “he’s at the dentist this morning.”
“The dentist” Mark was clearly disappointed, “so when will he be back?”
Thomas checked the Outlook calendar. “He’s coming after lunch.”
“Can you stay until then?” Mark asked Jennifer.
“Sure, that’s no problem.”
“Okay, great,” he turned to his staff. “We’ll be back after lunch. Make sure everyone, including Simon, are here.”

Whey they left, the cubicle farm came alive with chatter. n3m0 never spoke much during these types of events, instead he tried to listen and make sense of the information.

It turned out that no one had a clue that Mark and Jennifer had been sitting in meetings. n3m0 sighed, well isn’t that bloody strange, we never know what that guy is up to.

“She kind of remind me of someone famous.” n3m0 didn’t hear who said it but knew it was Thomas.
“Yeah, doesn’t she?” Jack agreed.
Is this really relevant? n3m0 shook his head.
“I think she might have appeared in a movie,” Thomas continued “but I’m not positive.”
“You know what, someone should Google her ass.” Jack laughed.
n3m0 had had enough, trying his best to sound like a fairy princess he said, “yes why don’t we Google her fine ass, lets just hope no one else is called Jennifer. Hell with such a pretty face she might have a page rank of nine.”
“We never got her last name, did we?” Thomas sounded disappointed.

However stupid n3m0 thought it was at first, it gave him an idea. He opened up Firefox and typed, [Ctrl]+K, Beateval Services, [Enter]. The Google results presented him with Beateval’s home page.

He found a picture of Jennifer among the executives. Her full name was Jennifer Hartpence. The thought of sharing the information with the others never crossed n3m0’s mind, he didn’t see how he could profit by telling his coworkers. n3m0 liked the term “need to know basis”, as long as it didn’t apply to him.

He clicked on the about link which described the company. When he was done he continued to read about their services, their customers, their news archive. He went back to the search page and checked the other results for Beateval.

All in all he did not like his findings.

[tags]security, stories, fiction, insider threat[/tags]