Final Semester - Slightly Freaking Out

Whelp, this should be my final semester before I graduate with a Master's in Computer Science.  The course load doesn't seem too bad, and it's interesting and all, but that means I'm beginning to think about the next step - finding a job.

And, of course, I want to find a job before too much longer...but on the other hand I need to finish these classes in order to get the right certifications for the job(s?) I want.

And boy are there a lot of possible certifications!!!

I could spend $700 for a CISSP (we did cover most of the material in one of my classes, so if I study well I ought to pass).  Not sure about some of the other certifications listed here, maybe I would need some of them as well?  And yet that's another $700...

Then, well, this semester should be the final portion of study for the Cisco CCNA, which would be another $300.  I could go for that if I wanted a career in networking, but if I go for the CISSP and focus on cybersecurity than I may not need it. 

Another of my classes is focused on the CEH, but I'm not sure if that means I can take the exam at the end of the class (i.e. if the course is through an accredited partner, the cost may be bundled in with my tuition...but the course site said that the certification is separately purchased, so I'm thinking not.  In which case, I would probably need to go for one of the other options, which would be problematic since they focus more on work experience - and have a $999 certification fee.  If I went for that I'd run into the 'you need experience to get the certification, but you need the certification to get the experience' problem.  Which means maybe I'd just have to pay for the training through an accredited partner, except that seems like a bit of a waste since I'll have covered pretty much all of it in this course anyway.  Plus...how long would it take?  I definitely don't want to waste too much time getting the certifications and finding a job.)

I ran into a tech person while playing Pokemon Go the other day and was talking about my possible interests...I also mentioned my interest in virtualizaton, and he responded by mentioning some MORE certifications.  Because of course there are. 

Which, well, now that I think about it is not too surprising...

So maybe I need to get the VMWare certification?  Something like the VCP6-DCV?  Or some of the other VMWare exams?  Those would only be another $100-$250, right?

And that just made me think that I ought to check on the certifications for my other areas of interest.  Sure enough, it looks like if I want to work more with EnCase and digital forensics I should see about getting a GCFE, GCFA, GNFA, or some other such thing. After all, what's another couple thousand dollars?  Or are these the types of certifications you're expected to get after you're hired?

I think I have a solid foundation for just about any of those, what with the classes I've been taking.  But I don't think I can afford to go for ALL of the certifications...

So I probably need to pick and choose which ones will actually lead to the job I want.  It'd be easier if I already had a job lined up, since I could tailor my focus towards what I'd need for that job, but that's sort of a chicken and egg problem.

What a pain.

How to Keep Perspective

Last month I visited with a few relatives, and my brother reminded me of an incident that happened a long time ago (when we were both quite young).  We were supposed to be doing the dishes after dinner, and our parents basically said we had to stay in the kitchen until they were done.  They said this in part because my brother refused to do the dishes - and I refused to do the work by myself. (I was willing to work, just not without him pitching in.)

From my perspective, doing so would set a baaaad precedent.  It basically would have rewarded my brother for being lazy ('cause why would he ever do the dishes, if he knew I'd take care of them for him), and would have probably meant more future work for me.  So we both sat in the kitchen, refusing to do the dishes.

And sat.

And sat.

I don't really recall how we got out of that impasse...maybe he finally gave in, or our parents yelled at us to get going, or something.  All I really remembered was that I was determined to sit in that fricking kitchen all night long rather than do his work as well as my own.

It wasn't about the work.  Not really.  It was about not letting him get away with doing less than his share.

I brought that up for a different reason, though.  I think it's the mentality behind a lot of what goes on when we complain about 'politics'.  For example, I remember trying to coordinate equipment for some training back in 2004(?).  Except way up the chain of command there was a little turf war over the funding.  Seems TRADOC insisted it was a FORSCOM activity and that FORSCOM should fund it, whereas FORSCOM said it was 'training', and obviously TRADOC (Training and Doctrine Command) should fund it.  The politicking went on long enough that the equipment we needed was rerouted to the front lines, and we were no longer able to get it.  From my perspective, their butting heads interfered with our ability to do the mission right. 

I'm sure, from their perspective, everyone involved believed what they were doing was better in the long run.  Sort of like my refusal to do the dishes that night.  And yet all of our defense funding comes from the same place (i.e. taxes), and from that perspective it doesn't really matter which pot of money it comes out of so long as whatever is necessary gets done.  (From what I understand, defense spending is an unauditable mess...which probably makes things even worse.  After all, it's hard to say that the right things will get funded appropriately when people don't really seem to know what money is going where...and people have a tendency to squirrel away what they can to make sure the 'right' projects get the resources they need.  I'm sure that all had an impact on this, since both commands probably felt that money was tight and they needed everything they could to accomplish all their other missions.)

People have this amazing ability to justify doing the things they do (like my refusal to do the dishes), and I sort of wanted to discuss how you know when it's gone too far.  At what point should you 'be the bigger person', and accept that you got screwed for the greater good?  (I grew to respect Al Gore more after he conceded the 2000 election, because I thought it was better for the nation as a whole than fighting to the bitter end.  There are obviously many Democrats who resented and regretted that, though, and now push for Democrats to fight harder instead.  And Republicans have similar thought processes on their side...it's so easy to say 'we got screwed and next time we won't take it', which ultimately leads to a lose-lose situation. It means both sides dig in their heels and make things harder for everyone.)

It's hard to decide when an argument for being difficult is legitimate, and when it's just a way of justifying things that appear to be in your own interest.

To make another great jump in this discussion - I actually got to thinking about that for a completely different reason.  I attended a webinar on the FBI's Foreign Influence Task Force.  Infowar and foreign influences are a hot topic right now, and I do agree that we need to do a better job of fighting misinformation.  And yet I am concerned about government efforts to do so, because there's a difference between fighting misinformation with the truth vs. fighting information that is negative to your side with your own spin on things.  (After all, there may be some truth to the idea that certain things would 'destroy' a nation...but from what I've seen it's more often a self-fulfilling prophecy.  That is, the cover up and the lengths a nation goes to in order to prevent anyone from finding out that they screwed up is what ultimately leads to upheaval when the truth finally gets out.  If they'd been up front initially, there'd have been some fuss but it would eventually die down and their political hold wouldn't be so shaken.) So fighting misinformation and addressing foreign influence makes sense when they're spreading lies, so long as it clearly is lies, but is something to be concerned about if it leads to a willingness to label anything that doesn't suit our purposes as a lie.

That sort of goes back to my concern that we're so focused on those 'outsiders' interfering that we fail to realize the only way they can interfere is they touch on subjects that resonate.  That is - their misleading ideas wouldn't go viral and spread if it didn't appeal to people, and why does it appeal in the first place?  What are the cracks in our society, the weaknesses and fractures, that make us vulnerable to these sorts of things?  And how can we fix them, strengthen them?  (Sort of like a discussion I had over a decade ago with a friend about some tensions between the black community and police.  The fact that African-Americans easily believe that the police overreact and are overly harsh with members of their community highlights a friction point between the police and the community they are supposed to be serving.  The sort of thing that could crack wide open into something ugly, the same way that someone stirred up trouble in Iraq by attacking the al-Askari mosque.  Addressing that friction would go a long way to preventing any future such problems...and how do you reduce the tension?  Well, not by rallying around the flag, insisting that the police are always right, and believing that any victims brought it on themselves for one reason or another.  That just exacerbates things and makes it even more likely that the right incident could act like a chisel and hammer.  Too many people seem to want that to happen, which is stupid since all it would lead to is war and violence.  Didn't we learn enough by the bloody mess Europe made of itself during their religious wars?)

Anyways.  Part of the problem, I think, has to do with our ability to think too hard.  We persuade ourselves to do the 'right' thing, whether that means blowing people up in order to 'save' them and bring them to God, or gerrymandering a district in order to make sure the 'right' policies are put in place even if most people don't actually want them. 

It's that arrogant "I know what's best for you, and I don't think I can persuade you that I'm right so I'm just going to force you into doing it anyway".  It's the same underlying attitude.  The same unwillingness to accept that other people are free to disagree, and choose differently.  That same insistence that "I'm right and you're wrong, and since I know better I'll make it happen anyway." 

It's funny that the Quran supposedly says that there should be no compulsion in religion, because all I see from fundamentalist Muslims is compulsion.

And fundamentalist Christians may not be going against their own teachings in quite the same way, but their desire to legislate what's morally right is doing the same thing.  "We're going to make you choose what's right, regardless of what you want, because we know what's best for you and we're doing God's work."

That, to me, is the underlying sin...probably one of the worst ones out there.  The arrogance of believing you know what's best, to such a degree that you will manipulate everyone else. 

Manipulate, not persuade.  I've long thought that the key difference has to do with the willingness to let people make their own choices.  That is, when you try to persuade someone you try to lay out your arguments and convince them you're right...whereas when you manipulate, you try to make it so the 'only' choice is the one you want them to make.  (Like discouraging other candidates from running in the Democratic primary so that the only credible choice was Hillary Clinton.) 

It's the difference between telling someone why you think you should eat at restaurant A, but willing to compromise and go to a different restaurant if they're not persuaded...vs trying to tell them that the other restaurants of interest are bad choices by manufacturing false reports of food poisoning or failed health inspections.  Or even refusing to tell them about an option they'd be interested in, just because you want to limit their choices.

This is, I think, our major failing in today's society.  Our political so-called leaders are so focused on the politicking that they will justify manipulating society in order to do what they think is 'right'.  They've, in many ways, given up on the free market place of ideas and persuasion (okay, yes...sometimes the general public does seem uneducated and willfully makes horrible decisions.  That's a call for you to educate and persuade, not ignore their wishes and manipulate politics to get around them.  Doing the latter undermines the very fabric of our society in a way that's more insidious than allowing horrible ideas to  make it into political discourse.  After all, there is something to be said about the power of sunlight, and at least when it's out in public we can shine light on it and expose how horrible the idea is.)

If we truly had a free market place of ideas, the horrible ideas will ultimately lose.  That's the classic liberal mindset.  One based on confidence, and belief in our fellow humans.  I know sometimes it's hard to hold on to, there's so much evidence of people buying into bad ideas.  And yet I think the best way of addressing them is not to push them into hiding, but to bring them out into the light of day. 

All right, that was rather long and scatter-brained.  I felt compelled to write it to clarify the thoughts in my head, though, and it seems to have done the trick.

CS Cracks Me Up

"I'm doing homework and came across something called a *-property.  Pronounced star property.

Why?  Because nobody could come up with a name.  It was written that way in a report so it'd be easy to find and update once they came up with a name, but they never did.

This field is sometimes so...goofy.  They make jokes all the time, like naming the programming language C++ because it meant "add one to C" in computer programming, or rather its a way of saying "one better than C"

I've always kind of enjoyed how humanity seeps out in unexpected ways (like how telegraphers develop a distinct style and personality even when transmitting something as straightforward as Morse code), but I somehow still don't expect it to essentially permeate my textbooks like this.

Marketing, Influence Operations, Etc.

I almost forgot.  A few weeks ago I had a discussion with one of my brothers (Kawphy) that spurred some thoughts I wanted to capture here.

What I kind of liked about philosophy classes is that we all can read the famous philosophers (Plato, Aristotle, Kierkegaard, Sartre) and draw on our own experiences to debate their thoughts and ideas.  That is, there's no 'right answer' handed down from on high.  When you debate topics - like justice, or virtue - we all have our own personal experiences that we can draw on.  The best philosophers make sound arguments, make us look at things in a new light, make us think things through more deeply than we otherwise would have...but ultimately we're still the ones who have to decide for ourselves whether what they're saying matches our own experiences. 

I don't like how focused they get on technical details (like spending an entire chapter defining a specific word), though I get why they do that.  Still, there's something sort of fun about coming up with your own answers to the questions posed.

Why did I bring that up?  Because comparing what you are taught to your own personal experience is a pretty useful skill.  It's part of why I think you should have a healthy sense of skepticism towards economics, for example.  I'm not criticizing the field as a whole, but when I consider my own personal experiences as a consumer, I don't think it quite fits the model of rationality and utility they describe (or you have to expand the notions of 'utility' to include things like 'how pretty is the package').  I brought that up in a previous post where I discussed how I'd select a bottle of wine. 

The same process holds true when you consider the impact of marketing, information operations, and possible Russian influence on our democracy.  Or, conversely, our influence on Latin American countries during the Cold War.

Consider commercials for cars.  The thing is, if I'm not in the market for a car then those commercials are pretty much wasted on me.  I'm not buying a car, they're too expensive to do casually, there's not much point to it unless I'm at the point where its time for a new one anyway.  (And when it does come time, I generally look up cars by the traits I want first...and consider deals such as family or company discounts.  My last two cars were Fords, and that's mostly because I have an aunt who worked in a Ford factory and can get me a discount...and my company had a deal with Ford so I could get a discount through them.  I could go with whichever deal was better at the time.) 

This is not to say that all car commercials are useless.  For those looking to buy, they can be very useful.  You'd have to get into the statistics on how many people they want to draw in with their commercials to get some sense of why/whether the cost of advertising pays off.  Plus, even if I'm not in the market for a car, the brand or image presented might have a role in my decision when I am ready to make that purchase.  1-10 years down the road, that is. 

But do I see a commercial for a new car and immediately rush out to buy one?  Not at all.  Or only if I already know I want a new car. 

Things are slightly different with food commercials.  See, most people don't buy a new car every year...but everybody has to eat.  And we all have to eat multiple times a day.  Which means that food commercials are more likely to work, as I might see an ad and think to myself "I haven't had that in a while, okay."  Next meal I'm ordering pizza, or getting tacos, or whatever.  (Though it's not necessarily from the company doing the advertising.  Taco Bell might remind me of tacos, but then I'll go to a local Mexican restaurant instead of Taco Bell.)

The point I want to make here is that attempts to influence people are...well, complicated.  They work best when someone is already open to being influenced (i.e. if I'm not in the market for a new car the car commercials are mostly wasted on me.) 

Though it's not quite as black and white as that, either, as good salespeople can persuade us even when we don't think we're in the market for something.  (I think we've all had the experience of purchasing something we had no intentions of buying originally.)

Anyways, the same things hold true when you're trying to conduct information operations, influence operations, etc.  Russian accusations of Western meddling, for example, deny the fact that Western 'meddling' wouldn't have any sort of impact at all if there weren't disgruntled Russians with unaddressed grievances.

And vice versa - Russian meddling in the recent 2016 election would not have been possible if they weren't tapping into our own domestic fault lines.  It's like a car commercial targeting someone who's realized they kind of want a new car.

You can focus on those outside influences, I suppose.  It's not completely wrong.  Yet I think we'd all be better off focusing more on why our people are susceptible in the first place.  What problems are being unaddressed, that people would rather believe x or y or whatever?

Also - don't overestimate the threat.  Thinking you can somehow make another nation do the things you want is about as likely to lead to disaster as success.  Just consider our attempt to reinstate the Shah of Iran.  The 2016 election might make Russia think they've got a good thing going, but if they misunderstand the source of success they're just as likely to make their own mistakes - like ours in Iran - as they are to have future success.

This 'N That

I haven't posted much because, well...

I'm focusing on what I can do, I guess.  That is, I'm pretty disturbed by what I see in the news...but for the most part all I can do is vote (and contact my Congress person...which given his response last time I did, isn't going to do much good.) So I'll just show my displeasure with my vote.  And if enough other people feel the same way, then come mid-terms things may change.


I sort of feel as though things are so far past f'd up that there's no point yelling and screaming about it any more.  The people I'd want to persuade are clearly not interested in listening, or they wouldn't be doing the things they're doing in the first place.  You sort of have to be willfully ignorant (or in a pretty serious bubble) to be doing the things these guys are doing.

So whatever.  The drumbeat of war is beating, even though nobody sane wants that. 

Or rather, as Sun Tzu says -

 "If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles.  If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat.  If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle."

If you truly have that level of knowledge, going to war is not necessarily a gamble.  Or it's a calculated gamble that may get the result you want.  Yet who can say that they really know the enemy and know themselves?  Historically, we're pretty lousy at that...and there's nothing worse than getting all aggressive, thinking it will be a "short, victorious war" and winding up in the deadly slog of WWI.  Maybe if you have the talent of Otto von Bismarck you can accurately assess the situation and make it happen, but if you don't you wind up losing far more than you gain.

Given our track record for the past half a century or so (Vietnam, OEF, OIF) I do not think there's any grounds for feeling confident in how well we "know the enemy and know yourself".

Honestly?  Eh...it could be Trump is an able negotiator and that acting like a crazy person will somehow end the decades long tension with North Korea.  Maybe. And even though those game theory studies show that trying to be a harda$$ tends to backfire and make things worse, maybe in the real world things will be different and what he does will work.  (I'm saying that in order to acknowledge my preconceptions on such things, and to be open to the possibility that I could be wrong). 

In some ways, I do hope I'm wrong.  I hate feeling all doom and gloom.  On the other hand, I feel there are some potential parallels between Trump and Wilhelm Kaiser II, who alienated most of Germany's allies, came across as a threat to England, and contributed greatly to the disastrous political environment leading up to WWI.

I'm not in a position to do anything about that, though...so I guess I'm just going to work on some more homework and watch more Naruto or something.

Rising Inequality Hurts Everyone

The Psychology of Inequality https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/01/15/the-psychology-of-inequality?mbid=synd_digg

New Year's Update

Well, Christmas went well.  Other than it being friggin cold, of course!  I also have my new computer set up to play with...

The idea was to work on malware analysis and cybersecurity type issues.  Get my hands dirty. 

I have Kali Linux installed on the computer, and mostly I've been messing around making sure drivers were installed correctly and everything.  One of the sites discussing what you can do with Kali directed me to OverTheWire, which seems like a cool site for trying out some things.

I haven't yet built my virtual machines, though that's on my agenda for things to do during winter break.  I'm not sure yet if I want to focus on OverTheWire, go through each of the different tools on Kali as organized by purpose, or dive right into virtual machines.  The tools look cool, especially since I've started to learn about some of them (i.e. wireshark, metasploit, and nmap in particular). 

Since this is all stuff I'm doing for fun, I don't think I'll put a formal order to it.  Just see what I feel in the mood for that day. 

In other news -

In other news, Iran is looking interesting.  I'm not going to say too much about it, mostly because (given our history of meddling) I think it's better to step back and see what they do on their own.  Easy to say, of course, when I don't have any responsibility for intel analysis or trying to figure out what actions we can take to sway things in a direction we favor. 

Other than that - I've ordered and received all my textbooks for the next semester.  I think I have all the various access codes required, too.  I've also finished with Bleach and am now watching Naruto.  I guess I do tend to favor the shonen type of anime, though one of my brother's gave me a list of other shows to watch.

I hope everyone had a Happy New Year, and is staying warm.